EricK

The big negative to this is that partner may have to make a decision based upon zero information. I would always bid 2♥ in this situation giving full clarity at the earliest opportunity, so partner can make any decision informed. The trouble is that standard methods don't differentiate between offensive hands and defensive hands. If you are going to support in exactly the same way on ♠xxx ♥QJx ♦Kx ♣QJxxx and ♠KJx ♥xxx ♦xx ♣AJxxx partner is hardly in a great position to make a correct decision if LHO bids Whereas passing on the first, intending to support later, and supporting immediately on the second, allows us to differentiate; which in turn allow us to make the correct final decision more often.

This is nice, but does this compensate for the cases, where they found their fit on a lower level and especially for the cases where we need to enter the auction after 1♠ (X) pass (2♦) pass (3♦)? It does when we are strong because: 1. Normally the opps are too weak to raise to the 3 level. It's all very well saying they will bid there pre-emptively because of their fit and "the law", but it doesn't seem to happen in practice. Probably because LHO can't trust RHO's double to contain 4 of every suit, and RHO can't trust LHO's forced bid to be genuine. 2. Even in the rare cases where we have to enter at the 3 level, we are probably only worse off if: a. We go down and b. The opps would have let us play at the 2 level had we bid an immediate 2♠ and c. We would have freely chosen to play at the 2 level had we bid immediately

This is a very non-standard view, but when you have a decent hand with spade support, I'm not sure it is always right to bid immediately over a double. Opponents are in a forcing situation with probably fewer, and possibly much fewer, than half the points. LHO might be sitting there dreading having to dredge up a bid on his hand (eg a 4333 yarborough!) and by bidding we just let him off the hook. It is almost certain that we are going to play this hand in some number of spades whatever we do now. If we play that pass followed by showing spade support when the bidding comes back to us shows this sort of hand (reasonable hand, spade support, some desire to defend if opponents bid on) we gain a few advantages over standard methods: 1. We will have more distributional information when we play the hand because of LHO's enforced bid 2. We sometimes get to double them when RHO overcompetes by supporting LHO's enforced bid 3. We sometimes get to defend 1NTx by LHO 4. We sometimes even get to declare 1♠x

Yes. I'd act bored.

The way I answer ATB problems like this is to look at the hands, read through the auction and see at which point I involuntarily say "huh?!" Using this highly scientific method (patent pending), I determine the blame lies with North.

I have never heard of this agreement, and it certainly doesn't feel like a good one. The agreement that with a minimum hand you shouldn't make a higher bid than 2M after 1M 2x is a more sensible one, though. With that agreement after 1♠ 2♣, you would rebid 2♠ rather than raise to 3♣ with a minimum 5224 hand

1♣ 2♥ 2♠ 2NT 6NT is a simple auction; but it risks missing the grand. 1♣ 2♥ 2♠ 2NT 3♥ 3♠ 4NT etc is only slightly more complicated (opener agrees ♥ even though he is not planning to play in ♥), but has a good chance of reaching the grand if it is there.

4♠ is silly IMO. If partner wants to insist on ♠ he can take you out of 3NT, so surely supporting partner shows more than a small singleton.

In Judaism, saving a life trumps pretty much all other religious laws. So if you were to threaten to kill his partner unless he writes an explanation down, then he is allowed to write his explanation. Or perhaps that should be the job of the director.

SJS at the 2 level are good bids. They make slam bidding so much easier. Just witness the number of hands posted on the forums which caused problems at the table, but are trivial if responder is allowed to jump to show strength. Although there is an argument that SJS waste bidding space, I think this only applies to SJS at the 3 level. When the SJS is made at the 2 level, it often saves space in the long term because every bid thereafter is more meaningful. If these hands start with a response at the one level, not only is respnder often forced to make meaningless bids just to keep the bidding open, but opener also makes irrelevant bids because he doesn't yet know what repsonder's intentions are. An example of the latter comes in a sequence like 1♣ 1♥ 1♠. Opener could have a hand like ♠Jxxx ♥Kx ♦Qx ♣ AQJxx or one like ♠KQJx ♥xx ♦xx ♣AQJxx because opener doesn't know if responder might be interested in the spade suit. But if the bidding starts 1♣ 2♥, then opener knows that responder doesn't care about Jxxx so will bid something else (2NT), but might very well want to know about KQJx, so his spade rebid on the latter hand becomes meaningful.

You are approaching this from the wrong point of view. The most important principle is full disclosure. You may not have more knowledge about the meaning of your partner's bid than the opponents. We can argue about psychs all night long. Full disclosure is 100 times as important, and the rules dealing with psychs (and your handling of them) may not violate full disclosure. If you think there is something wrong with the rules, then you should lobby for more permissive regulation of agreements. You shouldn't try to weaken full disclosure. I think I have posted "full disclosure" often enough for now, but I am happy to explain the importance of the concept further if you think it may be necessary. But I thought this was the point of view I was approaching it from! I have never suggested people shouldn't disclose their partner's psyching tendencies. On the contrary I am claiming that as long as they disclose it, and as long as they continue not to allow for their partner having psyched, then partner should be able to psyche as much as he wants. Anything else seems unworkable.

But there are two frequencies at play - the relative frequency of the two hand types (e.g. how often does one hold a weak hand with short spades and hearts support, compared to how often one holds a responding hand with a spade suit), and the frequency with which one psyches when holding a suitable hand. Depending on these frequencies, it can easily be the case that one can psyche very frequently on a particular hand type and yet psyche very rarely in that auction

This just seems ridiculous to me. Since most psyches would be systemically illegal, it seems one is never be able to disclose partner's psyching tendencies, since the very fact that you know enough to disclose them, means he his no longer able to bid those psyches.

But my point is that if you do disclose your partnership tendenices, and don't actually cater for your partner having psyched even if it is a tendency to psyche in that situation, then that should be sufficient. Anything else is practically unworkable.

So you can have a situation where two pairs in the same compeition who play the same system bid a pair of hands in exactly the same fashion (including a psyche, and a follow up which does not cater for that psyche), and one is acting illegally and the other legally?

Is a psyche a deviation in this sense? I would take a deviation to mean, say, bidding 1NT on a lot of 14 point hand. In which case the partnership is playing 14+ - 17 rather than 15-17, and so on. How can a psyche can ever be considered part of your methods when most system regualtions do not allow the sort of two way bids which that would entail?

You say you play strong jump shifts in competition. If so, then this must be a 3♥ bid. If it isn't, why do you play strong jump shifts in competition?

If you tell the opponents then it's not a psyche, it's part of your agreements. In which case you can also cater for it. I don't think this is true though. if you point out that partner has been known to psyche a certain bid in a certain position, it is still a psyche! But it's still not an agreement as to what the bid means.

But I'm getting mixed messages here. Is it always OK to make a psyche, as long as you tell the opps , and still don't cater for it; or does it cease to be OK, despite taking all these precautions if you do it often enough?

Most of the blame must lie with South who underbid his hand on three or four occasions. This is a 1♦ opening. But failing that, it is a 2♦ response. But failing that, he probably should do more than just bid 3♣. But if he doesn't do that, then he oughtn't to pass 3NT. That's not to say North is blameless. 3NT suggests the ♠ are stronger than they are. He should bid 3♥ to show the main undisclosed feature of his hand.

With regards to my question 5, why does it matter whether partner expects the psyche? Surely all that is important is that partner doesn't cater for the psyche? If a bid is a good bid on a particular hand for whatever reasons (and those could include the level of the opponents, the state of the match, or whatever), then it is a good bid whenever those circumstances repeat. Why have rules which means that you can only make the bid which in your opinion is good, on some of those poccasions but not others?

I open 4♥

Can you and your partner not take an afternoon to just practice your NT structure? There are programs available which can easily generate a large number of hands fitting the auction 1NT (P), keep bidding them (half with her as the 1NT bidder, half with her as the responder) until your partner remembers the structure.

Imagine a regular partnership, player A and player B, who play a natural system. In particular the response in the uninterrupted sequence 1♥ 1♠ shows 5+ points and 4+ ♠. When playing together, neither player has ever psyched this response on a weak hand with short ♠ and a ♥ fit, although both are experienced enough to be aware of this possibility and aware that their partner is aware of it. 1. Because they are aware of this possibility, if the sequence crops up, do they need to alert the opposition to the possibility? I assume not. Let's say that one day player A opens 1♥ and player B psyches a 1♠ response 2a. In future, does A need to alert the opposition to this possibility whenever he opens 1♥ and B responds 1♠? 2b. In future, does B need to alert the opposition to this possibility whenever he opens 1♥ and A responds 1♠? 3. If not, how often does the psyche have to occur before the opposition should always be warned? Both players wish to be ethical, and always bid as if their partner hasn't psyched. 4. Are they allowed to use the sequence 1♥ 1♠ 3NT to show a GF raise of ♠, and the further response of 4♥ to be an absolute sign off (but not necessarily showing a psyching hand)? 5. Are they allowed to always respond 1♠ on weak hands with short ♠ and ♥ support as long as they continue to always bid as if the ♠ are a genuine suit? 6. If not, what are the (approximate) limits to how often a particular psyche can be used as a percentage of all hands on which it could be used?

After eg 1♠ 2♦ 2♥ 4NT (assume it's Keycard Blackwood with ♥ agreed) 5♠ (2 plus ♥Q) how does responder know about the ♠K? And (this is in response to Ken, really) if responder supports ♥ first, does a 3♠ cue-bid really promise two top honours? How does does opener bypass to spades to cue something else with either zero or one top honour? This is a good idea on this hand, but not so good on many others I would think. And in response to Codo, in your sequence, how does opener know about the solid spades?