GrahamJson

I wish I shared your confidence in BBO taking action. In the past I have made several reports of players cheating with little evidence that there has been any action taken. Perhaps this is because the cheating took place in casual play, not tournaments. Incidentally one person whom I have reported several times previously I see is still up to his tricks. He always plays with the same partner, who is almost certainly the same player logged in twice. And there can be no question of him/them cheating. Over the last month they have played 900 imp hands with an average score of 6.36 imps per board. Of the 900 boards only 24 have a negative score greater then one imp. One example of their cheating is one board where one overcalls 4S on 1073 AKJ6 J10972 7 then finds partner (who had passed throughout) with AJ9642 Q5 K63 98. 4SX then rolls home when both spade honours and QD are all onside.

I like to have the best of all worlds so with my regular partner we play multi 2 ♦ together with a form of Tartan Twos for the majors. So:- 2♣ is the traditional strong bid, usually balanced or semi balanced. 2♦ is a weak major, strong minor or balanced 20-22 2♥/♠are either weak 5-5 Mm hands or Acol Two with the bid major 2NT is a weak minor two suitor It would be good to use the 2NT opener as it is in the Little Major system; a minor suit pre-empt or a strong minor two suitor. Unfortunately this method isn't licensed here.

It seems to me that pass followed by a 2 suited overcall on the second round (assuming that is a possibility) describes this hand perfectly (5-5 or better, little defense). That being so why make an opening bid that will almost inevitably lead to you having to miss-describe your hand on the next round? Also, even if your opening of 1H or 1C finds a fit with partner it won't necessarily work out well. Suppose, for example, opponents save over your 4H contract and partner doubles. How confident would you be in letting it stand? Yet pulling to 5H could turn a big plus into a minus. If you had passed originally then you can let the double stand with a clear conscious.

If you need to ask this question then the answer is 2C. The style in which you always respond in the major is fine, but only if you have detailed agreements. Suppose the bidding goes 1H-1S-2H-3C. Planning traditional methods opener can be sure of at least five spades opposite, making the rest of the bidding easier. With Mafia style how does opener know the relative suit lengths and hence where best to play? Experienced partnerships will have this sorted, but it perhaps requires a lot of effort that might be better expended in other areas.

What’s wrong with 2C-2H-3S-7S?

3 of a minor I meant.

3 of a minor I meant.

I prefer a flexible style of response where 2D is negative but could have fair values if a positive response looks like it would take you too high too quickly. This tends to mean that a 2H response can be made on very limited values whilst 2 of a minor requires a good hand.(unless you have an easy rebid over openers rebid).

Taking the finesse gains when S holds Kx in hearts, playing ace and another gains when north has Kx. In all other cases it doesn’t make any difference. My inclination would be to take the finesse as north is more likely to lead a singleton when holding three small trumps than Kx. Also a successful finesse gives you an overtrick, which may be worth something, especially at MP.

Curiously nobody has suggested opening one of the major. That seems to be the modern Acol style.

To my way of thinking the situation is as follows: it’s an individual event so, unless the opponents happen by coincidence to be regular partners, there is no partnership agreement so nothing to disclose. Actually, even if they were a regular partnership I’d be very surprised if they had an agreement that covered this situation, other than general principles (e.g. “over a strong 1C we bid immediately on weak hands but pass and come in later on strong hands”). As to what the bid does mean, my guess would be a strong two suiter. With a weak two suiter you would bid immediately over 2C (probably), with a three suiter you would double 2S and with a single suiter you’d just bid the suit.

I prefer a1NT rebid, although I agree 2NT is also reasonable. So how about 1C-1D-1S-1NT-2D-4D-5D or 1C-1D-1S-2NT-3D-4D-5D?

I think west may have a legitimate gripe. At our club it is normal to state your methods briefly at the start of each round. In this case the summary should include “transfer responses to 1C”. This gives oppo a chance to agree a simple defense (e.g “double is takeout of the suit shown” or whatever). It’s all very well alerting bids such as this, but unless oppo have an agreed defense this doesn’t necessarily help a lot. Of course you can’t go through your entire system, but should certainly highlight artificial bids that come up frequently. For example, our summary is “12-14, four card majors, multi 2D and two way two bids which show the suit bid”.

Regarding point 2, your interpretation of the bidding, the EBU White book states “A player who is not sure whether or not a call made is alertable should alert it. If there is no partnership understanding about the meaning of the call, the player should say so rather than say how is going to treat it.” That seems clear enough.

It seems to me that the main reason for dredging up a 1H response is in case partner has a big hand. It therefore seems illogical to pass when partner confirms that he really does have a huge hand.