Siegmund

I thought I wanted to go to 4H anyway, expecting to make it opposite most hands where partner had two aces. Ran a quick sim (partner has exactly 4 hearts, 10-12 HCP), and got confirmation that it is only making 4H double-dummy about 30% of the time, which surprised me. I was prepared to be wrong about 4H, but not prepared to see the success rate below 40%. That is low enough that even with the 'opening lead bonus' from the defense you probably aren't making quite often enough. Guess I learned something new today.

#1 is substandard, but people often do it and get away with it. #2 is deeply flawed with two outside cards; I would never preempt with that honour distribution. #3 seems obvious. (We aren't ALL crazy enough to open 1 just because we have a sound 2.)

After 1C-1S-3H, surely North can do something other than leap to 4S, which sounds more like a flat 6-count. What is the difference between 3S, 3NT, and an immediate 4D cue? Without a serious/nonserious agreement, I would guess 3S was marking time and 4D was a hand that was happy about hearing the 3H bid. But no way am I leaping to 4S and trying to end the auction with a 7-loser hand.

Yet another hand where life is so much easier if 1D-1H-2C-3D is natural and GF setting trumps, rather than sticking these through FSF. Ah well... I wouldn't be confident 5C was exclusion unless we had definitely agreed trumps. I wish I knew whether ANY bids by me, besides 4D, agreed trumps in this auction.

If people put everything on their convention cards that they should, and kept the convention cards where they were visible, you wouldn't need to ask what their 1C was, because you'd be able to read it. It is going to be eye-opening for Stefanie to see how little the average ACBL player puts on the card and how few cards are in sight. I just came back from playing 4 days at a regional, 2 sessions a day, and in that time, I had one person study my card before the beginning of a match and three people glance at it during a hand. Everyone else just ignored it as it sat on the table, and then asked about our carding when our side was about to make an opening lead.

I used 4-5 overcalls for a long time with a few regular partners... a variation we called 'Michelangelo', part Michaels and part Roman Jumps: 1C-2C = 4S 5+Red 1C-2D = 4H 5+D 1D-2D = 4M 5+C 1D-2H = 4S 5+H 1H-2H = 4S 5+m We required 5-5 for 1S-2S and for 2NT showing minors since we were forced to the 3-level. I am a big believer in having the 5-5s bid naturally, but allowing the artificial jumps to be 4-6 or 4-7. Part of their 'goodness' comes from partner knowing what to do at his turn, and he's going to assume 4-5. Our simple overcalls DID still contain some 4-5 hands; 1C-2D was NF so had to be limited strength, with a strong 4-5 we started with 1D intending to reverse. With the cuebids you have room to fit in more than one strength range especially over the minors. I was always a bit surprised, however, that Overcall Structure needed these: I used them in the context of simple overcalls promising 5 cards, such that 4-5s were easily lost after simple overcalls. If you allow a 1D overcall on 4-5 shape, and allow a 1M advance on 4, there is a bit less need for a 4-5 convention. One reason I put two hand-shapes into the cuebid was so lost fewer of the weak jump shifts. I would certainly be willing to consider giving up a natural 1NT overcall to handle more of the 4-5s (if you didn't have to specify both suits for it to be GCC) before I would be willing to give up three or more weak jumps.

That partner and I actually did play 4-level CABs -- but we modified them to ask for queens, too, so with that partner I'd have heard 4S, not 4H, if partner had xx in diamonds. (Yes, playing all of the methods in A&Z, the slam is biddable; and with that partner, the 5-level is probably safe almost all the time But playing with all of my current Ogust partners, the agreement is just Ogust and new suits forcing, and I'd be up a creek. I suppose responding 3C and seeing if partner volunteers 3D is the best I can do.)

I think Yunling was proposing that 2D-2H,2S-2NT (among other possibilities) is available to handle the hand that wants to drop in 2H but invite in spades, if you want to use 2D-2H,2S-3S as preemptive. That said, the handful of times I ever played Multi (being from the US, the only time I ever play Multi is when I am playing on BBO with a foreign partner who likes Multi but doesn't know Wilkosz), I would have taken this 3S as invitational.

With many partners I've played Ogust, and with one, we played 2NT Ogust and 3C shortness ask, as recommended by A&Z. The shortness ask came up rarely and I don't remember it ever influencing our result, good or bad, when it did. But this past weekend, I was playing at the Great Falls Regional, and a hand came up where I was really glad my partner had asked to play features: ♠Ax ♥KQ ♦Qx ♣AKQJTxx Partner opens a weak 2H. If you are playing features, you ask, and if partner shows a diamond feature, you can confidently move on to a slam. At IMPs 6C is probably safest; at MPs you'd be pretty confident 6H or 6NT will work, and conceivably ask for aces and bid 7 if partner has both red aces (though you do need 3-2 hearts or the HJ, plus no first-round ruff, for that to work.) If you are Playing Ogust, you still won't know what to do when partner shows a good hand. It darn near made me a believer in features on the spot. (Now, if only my partner trusted me not to open 2H in first seat on a ten-high suit like her husband did for years. She called bidding slam a "Hail Mary gamble", not believing she was guaranteed six an honor in hearts.)

More a matter of lots of people who can't afford to use brain cells to remember a meaning for 2NT-4S, I would think.

David Weiss is a (the?) big proponent of the method. His defense problem books feature it in action. Hard but thought-provokiing books, whether you like the method or not. I think it's an interesting idea to use it vs NT when declarer is known to be short. I wonder whether it actually comes up much. May have to keep an eye out this weekend and see if there are any hands where it would apply.

Still lead the 7. There are only a handful of times where a raise changes what you would lead in partner's suit -- the most common one is you have three small in partner's suit; if you have not raised, you lead bottom to show three, but if you have raised, you can lead top to deny an honour, with no risk of partner thinking you have a doubleton.

I like to play that 3D unambiguously sets diamonds too. But if I were playing a method where we still didn't know what trump was after the 3H bid... I would consider a 3S or 4C bid to agree hearts, and a 4D bid to agree diamonds. Much the same as after 1NT-2D-2H-3D, where the immediate cuebids agree the most recent suit and a return to the other suit sets it.

I actually played this with one partner, some years ago -- rebids after 1NT-4S were 4NT with a minimum, otherwise 4-card suits up the line. It was supposed to help us get to 6 of a minor more often. It never quite seemed like a satisfactory solution -- the hands where we could make 6 of a minor but not 6NT were the hands we were stopping in 4NT anyway! -- and we never invested any effort in something better.

I have kicked around the idea of smaller, 4- 6- or 8-point "IMP" scales... things like 10-40=1, 50-240=2, 250-490=3, 500+=4... but never really been captivated by any of the ideas I have tried. I am a big believer that the 10-point difference should count. It's one of my many annoyances with IMPs as used today. But a big question is, who will such a system make happy? I like matchpoints. I would probably like matchpoints better than a hybrid system. Other people like IMPs. They would probably like IMPs better than a hybrid system. To gain any traction, there would have to be some specific goal, for which the new approach is nearly optimal. I can't think of one, off the top of my head.

To make an intelligent decision between 3NT and 5D, opener would need to know about the singleton spade, I think, even at IMPs. Put me down for Stayman then 3NT (and I feel like it may be a slight overbid.)

Laws changes - I like the suggestions so far, and am sorely tempted to nominate an automatic revoke penalty rather than the equity-based one now which requires so much extra director work -- but I will go for a new Law 40, similar in spirit to the 1997 one but going a bit farther to protect one's right to psych and to play any natural system, and would entertain the idea of using the Laws to push much harder for allowing anything reasonably easy to disclose. GCC changes - barring a sweeping rewrite or wholesale replacement, how about allowing all transfer bids? I'd understand if you only want them from responder's first call onward rather than allowing transfer openings. From a wordsmithing standpoint, moving the Midchart item about any call promising length in a known suit would work for me.

Surprised to see people excited about a slam. Yes, partner is short in diamonds... but we may have promised him one working card already with the pass-not-double on the previous round, and I don't see any reason to be expecting better than the usual 3- or 4-loser hand from partner. It would not have even crossed my mind to take a call here. I do agree that 5H now must be a cuebid.

This is an unusually challenging sim to automate because of the interesting superaccept criteria. Note that cyberyeti specified returning to hearts with 4333 after 2NT-3D-3H, and superaccepting with 3433 after 2NT-3D, neither of which is everyone's cup of tea, but the sim is as requested. (And the sim was run before yeti's post below with further details.) I can mostly confirm BillPatch's findings with a larger sample size. Given three strategies 1. Pass 2NT 2. Transfer then pass (ends in 3H or 4H) 3. Transfer then rebid 3NT (ends in 3NT or 4H), and a sample of 1,000 hands, Strategy 1 scored 32.9±3% of the matchpoints vs. strategy 2; Strategy 1 scored 45.3±3% of the matchpoints vs. strategy 3; Strategy 2 scored 51.7±3% of the matchpoints vs. strategy 3. The difference between 2 and 3 was too small to be shown conclusively with only 1,000 hands. Edited to add: with 10,000 hands, Strategy 2 is the winner, 51.9±1% against strategy 3. I would not be surprised to see the winner between 2 and 3 depend on how opener chooses to bid his 4333s. *** For those of you curious about the Andrews Deal 3.1 program, here is the script I used to do the sim: source lib/score2.tcl source format/none north is {A73 98652 93 T62} shapecond balanced5S {$s==5&&($h*$d*$c==18)} shapecond balanced5H {$h==5&&($s*$d*$c==18)} shapecond balanced5D {$d==5&&($s*$h*$c==18)} shapecond balanced5C {$c==5&&($s*$h*$d==18)} shapecond ntopener { [balanced eval $s $h $d $c] || [balanced5S eval $s $h $d $c] || [balanced5H eval $s $h $d $c] } holdingProc hons {A K Q} {return $A + $K + $Q} sdev 1v2 sdev 1v3 sdev 2v3 main { set h [hcp south] reject if {$h<20} {$h>21} reject unless [ntopener south] # final contracts: 2NT=1, 3H=2, 3NT=3, 4H=4 # South always continues after xfer-then-3NT with 3 hearts set hs [hearts south] if {$hs>=3} {set final3 4} {set final3 3} # South superaccepts with 4 hearts, or Hxx hearts + HHxxx another if {$hs>=4} {set final2 4} { if {$hs==3 && [hons south hearts]>=1 && ( [balanced5S south] && [hons south spades]>=2 || [balanced5D south] && [hons south diamonds]>=2 || [balanced5C south] && [hons south clubs]>=2 ) } {set final2 4} {set final2 2} } set th [deal::tricks south hearts] set tn [deal::tricks south notrump] set sc1 [score {2 notrump} nonvul $tn] if {$final2 == 2} {set sc2 [score {3 hearts} nonvul $th]} {set sc2 [score {4 hearts} nonvul $th]} if {$final3 == 3} {set sc3 [score {3 notrump} nonvul $tn]} {set sc3 [score {4 hearts} nonvul $th]} if {$sc1 < $sc2} {1v2 add 0} {if {$sc1 == $sc2} {1v2 add 50} {1v2 add 100} } if {$sc1 < $sc3} {1v3 add 0} {if {$sc1 == $sc3} {1v3 add 50} {1v3 add 100} } if {$sc2 < $sc3} {2v3 add 0} {if {$sc2 == $sc3} {2v3 add 50} {2v3 add 100} } {accept} } deal_finished { set a1v2 [1v2 average] set a1v3 [1v3 average] set a2v3 [2v3 average] puts "$a1v2; $a1v3; $a2v3" }

My experience is quite similar to blackshoe's. A late play is given to help the other N-5 people in the room leave early. The 4 players involved and the director already signed up to play the board and are expected, within reason, to stay for it. I have seen (and directed at) venues where we had to be out by a certain time - though I can't imagine anywhere routinely promising to be out less than 4 hours after starting time for a 3 1/2-hour game, given the need to clean up, etc. I gaped in stunned silence the first time a table informed me they "will take an average" rather than playing their late board. Where on earth did they get the idea that they could choose to skip boards they didn't want to play and choose what score they'd be assigned on them? If people have reasons to need to leave - and this is very rare, in my experience - I am fine with just giving the A-. The ones who decline for no reason will be fined. (No experience with people catching last trains. I did have one club where occasionally someone caught the last bus of the day -- to get to the game starting at 7.) Admittedly I gaped in stunned silence the first time a pair walked out of the game after 2 hours without saying a word to me, because they 'felt tired', too. Yet somehow this has happened to me three times so far, and only one of the pairs were novices.

I am surprised you gave 50/50 the second time. I can't remember a situation in which I didn't immediately award A- to a pair earning a second late play in the same session; it would require some very interesting circumstances to convince me their opponents were at fault. (On your facts I might well have given 50/40 the second time.) I don't care for the no-late-plays approach, either. Among other things, it takes away an option from you -- in effect, requiring the people who were slow the first round to stay late when they don't want to is their 'punishment', and if they refuse to stay late they will getting somewhere short of 30 for the board.

Playing most any majors-first method, you will have some way to show 4-and-only-4 spades and longer diamonds at your rebid. If you are willing to get to 3D later, you might as well explore on the way. On the other hand, if you make a response which suggests no major, partner is going to suppress his 4-card spade suit to (for instance) bid 1NT over regular 1D or transfer 1S.

A lot of people bemoaning the loss of the natural 2NT response here... But getting in the habit of passing 1 or bidding 3 with those flat invitational hands, rather than leaking information and getting too high with 2NT - or leaking even more information with 2C-then-2NT, can be added to the "advantages" column. There are so few hands that legitimately benefit from a pure point-count invitation that giving it up probably saves you from yourself. I haven't missed it the last 2 years or so.

You may reasonably define (basic) LTC as expecting to lose at least N tricks opposite a balanced yarb. The posted 26-count WILL lose at least five tricks opposite xxxx xxx xxx xxx, if the opps always push back the same suit you exit in. You might lose six if you had to make the opening lead yourself or you get a bad diamond break. It's a 3 1/2 loser hand opposite a balanced yarb with three entries.... but balanced yarbs don't have very many entries.

I am much more a believer in having 2 defensive tricks to open at the 1-level than most players I know.... but never even heard of requiring 2 1/2 unless we are going all the way back to Culbertson.