Siegmund

Hoping for some good answers in this thread... I've only just started playing transfer advances at the ONE-level with one of my partners, in part because there were so many choices to be made we were a little bit paralyzed deciding how to play them. (We wound up opting for the description in the recent Hughes book.)

The majority of my partners would always open 1S with five, even with a longer minor. It is, however, a style thing, and one where different regions and cliques have different styles. It DOES make some difference to the rest of your bidding, whether you open 1S on 5-6 or not: if you open 1D, and rebid spades, and then rebid spades again when the opps bid 4H, playing the "longest suit first" style that shows 5-6 but playing "5 spades always opens 1S", the diamonds-spades-and-spades-again sequence tends to be 4-6 or 4-7, chunky spades, offering partner the choice of a 4-3 major fit or going back to the long minor.

The key to speed, if I recall, was to pluck the next board while the previous was being dealt, rather than pluck-deal-fill, pluck-deal-fill. There are certainly people somewhere in the world who like openable boards for dealing machines.

I haven't seen hinged Imperials. Our club has a set of New Generation boards --- which not only burst open if dropped just a few inches, but are so loose that they routinely "spill" a few cards onto the floor when the boards are beting carried from table to table. As such the openable boards are not popular with players or directors. In addition, the duplicators have found that taking cards out of normal old boards does not slow them down significantly. We primarily use our old sets of boards and do not foresee buying any additional hinged boards at this time. I realize it's non-responsive to the question you actually asked to say "neither" but that is the sentiment at our area. Several sectionals in the area have also used their local old-style boards with a traveling Dealer4 machine, and are in no hurry to buy hinged boards just because they have access to a dealing machine.

Someone -- I want to say Marvin French -- made up a rule for this situation: "Reopen with a double, unless you have a hand that would have pulled a penalty double by partner."

Are the dates going to be semi-regularly "every two weeks", or is it a bit sporadic, sometimes weekly sometimes two or three or more weeks apart? (I happen to be on a schedule where half my weekends work better than my others, and if it stays every-other-week, my next chance to try will be mid-december (but the 1st and 15th both would have been great.)

For me the #1-and-its-not-close problem is RKC wasting space that could have been used for cuebidding to pinpoint all the second round controls before we got to 5 of a major. I hate having to go to the 6 level to get specific kings out of partner. It's not so much RKC responses' fault -- it tries to minimize wastage-- as a fact of life that RKC after cuebids is spending about half its effort repeating information already known. Apologies for the threadjack. I am a believer in "4NT is never asking after cuebids" (but a waiting bid / trump cuebid, depending on style.)

I suppose there has been an evolution over time. I at least understand why people double on #1 now, which I would never have considered ten years ago. If I look at the spades, hearts, and diamonds one at a time, I can imagine hands where I would double with that holding in that suit; and in clubs, I can pretend the queen just fell on the floor. With Axx Kxxx KQx x (sic), yeah, I'd double. I remain a little bit skeptical that it is the best way to play it, unless you are in an overcall-structure-type environment. As for the hand on Mackinnons blog... oh my. Well, yes, there has been some movement in the last 10 years, or even the last 3. Ive seen a number of 4333 doubles with xxx in the opp's suit, but can't recall many with 4 in the opp's suit before.

Partner turned out to have a weakish 5-3-5-0 and hoped his double was takeout. Unfortunately, I was fingering a club before he doubled, but after the double, I decided on ace and another spade... dummy had Kxx xx x AQTxxxx. Declarer won trick 2, pulled trump, played 4 rounds of clubs, pitching his last diamond as I won the CJ. Minus 690. Yum. I am encouraged the whole world didn't say "bid 5D" or "obviously lead the club." :)

Now if we could just get a consensus...:)

Minimum for 2S the way I play, but probably a middle-of-the-road 2S for most others.

None vul, 4th seat. ♠Ax ♥Tx ♦AT9xx ♣J8xx LHO opens 3♣. Partner passes. RHO jumps to 4♥. 1) Supposing it goes pass-pass-pass, what do you lead? 2) Supposing it goes pass-pass-double-pass back to you, A) What kind of hand to you expect from partner, and B) If you leave 4HX, what do you lead now?

Let me practice my fortunetelling abilities. I see an image from the future... from 2013.... its.... its a symbol.... a number..... 1

In the old days, I believed that a line of play that sometimes lost but never gained was always "irrational," in a game-theoretic sense, and interpreted "careless or inferior but not irrational" to mean "any line that is not dominated by another line." But there was a thread on the Laws list, years ago, where we discussed AQT9x opposite K87x, and a majority formed the view that king-first was merely careless, because world class players had done it. Put me of the view that, if the laws said what I wanted them to say, no heart trick is lost here.... but as things currently stand... he's already said he is giving up on whatever remote chances he had of dropping the king, and if he wants to give the trick away I let him. On my more charitable days I would give it back to him if I were East.

A regular p of mine not active on the forums (dougd) and I would be interested in giving this a shot, if there is ever a saturday you run one that I am free - cannot play the 8th, but we'd be interested in the 15th.

As a passed hand 2D feels clear. Unpassed, I would be unhappy with both pass and X but probably talk myself into the double.

I was trying to draw a parallel. Hands that formerly always had to go through 1S-Pass-1NT-Pass-2any-3C, a few players are now experimenting with 1S-Pass-3C. After 1D-(1S), minimal hands with long clubs formerly always had to double first and rebid clubs. I am presuming that the people who think negative doubles promise 4 hearts have an alternative treatment here -- 1D-(1S)-3C to show the 7-9ish hand with 6 clubs is a reasonable thing to do. But not something I've actually seen anyone do at the table, or advocate doing on here. If you don't have any methods like that, I think that having X absolutely promise 4 hearts is on shaky ground. But it doesn't seem to worry forum posters.

The long-clubs meaning is the one in all the old textbooks and most of the new ones. Twenty or even ten years ago I would have expected it to be the 90+% answer in this kind of a poll. Having alternative ways to show the medium club hand (people playing 1S-pass-2C as GF and 1S-pass-3C as 8-10 with six clubs, for instance) is a very new trend. And from previous threads, "1D-1S-X is exactly the same as a 1H response" is a remarkably popular view on the forum, much more so than in real life anywhere I've been.

bluecalm's method is one of several playable versions, if you insist upon keeping the natural NT invitation in the pic. Another method I used to use was 2S = invitational (balanced, or clubs or diamonds), 2NT clubs (weak or strong), 3C diamonds (weak or strong). But -- you will actually be doing yourself a favor by cutting out the invitational 2NT bid. Just pass your flat 8s and jump to 3NT with your flat 9s. Almost everyone loses more from making an invitation than they get back in improved game decisions as a result. I didn't start playing 2S=clubs and 2NT=diamonds until after I had decided it was time to dump the invitational sequence. (Fine print: 1NT-2NT "8-9" gains when 8 opposite 16 or 17 makes game, loses when 8 opposite 15 takes 7 or fewer tricks, loses when 8 opposite 16 or 17 fails to make game, and loses when 9 opposite 15 makes game. It breaks even with 8 opposite 15 and you have 8 or more tricks, and with 9 opposite 16 or 17 when you make game, )

In more than one club I've played in, this is universal among the casual players to the point that you get blank stares if you ask them why they didn't alert it. (And I have learned to ALWAYS ask, or check the cc, rather than trusting the lack of an alert here.) A prime example of a very common and very bad agreement.

5-5 Sandwich seems pointless. I do like it to show minimum 4-5 and 4-6 hands, with 2NT for the weak 5-5s and double as takeout for responder's major (stronger and often 4-4 in the unbids with 3 or 4 cards in opener's suit; partner is allowed to bid openers minor to play, 2 of responder's major is the strong cue.) In the context of pairs who almost always have 12 when they open and almost always have 6 when they respond, I won't touch the 15-18 notrump overcall, and consider some conventional use of it obvious. A lot of good forum posters in previous threads have said they felt the natural notrump bid was necessary -- because they were being stolen from by people who opened on 10 and responded on 4 (or 2 or 1 or 0). But, for better or worse, that just isnt the way most people play in live games where I am, though it is increasingly popular on BBO and (so I am told) in top matches.

Shame your partner forgot to double it. @aqua/tim: does it really matter if it's called GB2N or not, if it does the same thing, give you a way to show some of the two-suiters that aren't good enough to bid 3H directly? The world would be a better place if some of these were chunked. Always seemed silly to ee to have takeout, negative, responsive, and reopening doubles -- if we could go back to the 1920s they would all be called "negative" (not penalty). In the same way, there are a whole heap of auctions where, even without any firm agreement exactly which meaning applies, 2NT is "not natural, I want to compete, possibly in either of a couple strains." The posted hand is about the weakest hand on which I would 3H rather than 2N.

I thought this sounded familiar. I am glad to hear the bug has been found.

We had a regular pair at my previous club who played (what they called) Precision, but with quite a few odd twists. 1C-Pass-1NT could include a 4CM and often did. 1C-Pass-1NT-Pass-2C was Stayman. Straight stayman responses. Heck of a way to make sure the 1C bidder is declarer as infrequently as possible. I think they played the same over 1D openings, but can't recall.

At matchpoints I would have said 2S was a standout. At imps the upside is small and the downside is large. I would consider pass a good tactical action, on a hand otherwise worth 2S.