TimG

[hv=n=shdq8765432caqt84&w=sakqjhakqjdakckj9&e=s65432ht9872djt9c&s=st987h6543dc76532]399|300|[/hv]James Bond played this hand against Hugo Drax in Moonraker (making 7CXX). But, I seem to recall that the hand has its roots in Whist as the subject of a bet. Can anyone provide the details of the origin? Thanks.

That doesn't work on some of the deals I have concocted, and isn't necessary on others. I'm quite curious about what Mike's point was and what the actual hands were. Tim

How do you do that over the opponents' 5♦?

I think you are looking at things the wrong way. I would guess that I lose more IMPs on defense than on bidding or play. And, that in general your objective should be to minimize your losses rather than look for ways to gain. The opponents' losses will be your gains.

Can I wait to find out what partner and RHO do before deciding on my call?

Doesn't 2N simply invite responder to bid 3N if he is near the top of his range?

Club, for the same reason as Hans.

♥K, ♥A, ♥ ruffed with the Queen. (Making 11 tricks.)

Far better than hands with more than one thread.

Much better. Of course. I was just caught up in the space consumed by 3D without giving any information and totally overlooked 2S.

I don't think so. Couldn't south be bidding this way with two small clubs instead of QT? I agree with Han, the 3♦ bid clogged the auction. I think lots of people play that the cheaper of 4th suit and 2NT is the bid responder makes when he does not want to force game. That would have allowed responder here to take a forcing preference to 3C which would have helped, I think.

And, this one?

The post count that is given is his total number of posts, not the number of that specific post. When he next posts, the number on all his posts will change to 9999. I'm hoping for a drunken OMG-I-kissed-a-girl post that he doesn't even remember making.

Suppose instead this is the auction. What is your action?

At New England regionals, there are mid-chart events. Just which events I am not exactly sure. For the 7500 masterpoint pair who is "relegated" to the second bracket: in some cases a request to play up into the top bracket will be honored. I know that does not fix the problem, but it mitigates it to some extent.

I don't mind that sometimes people will raise the minor on this instead of doubling and that their minds can never be changed, but they always make their choice in opposition to the "flexible" other choice. I don't negative double because it's flexible, I do it because it shows four spades and certain other bids (for me?) such as raising partner's minor deny four spades! Sorry if I sounded dogmatic -- I do recognize that there will sometimes be a cost to not showing ♠J853 and could probably be convinced I am wrong (I recognize that it is not your obligation to convince me and that I have not given any more argument for my approach than you have for yours). I also freely admitted that my opinion was unlikely to be met with any agreement, though I do think it is worthy of consideration. I put flexible in quotes because, as you seem to agree, the negative double isn't really flexible, rather it is very rigid: double with exactly four spades, take other action without exactly four spades more or less regardless of the rest of the hand.

I know this will be met with nearly unanimous disagreement, but I'd rather raise clubs over the 1♥ overcall than make the more "flexible" negative double. As for what to do in this case: I don't really know. Perhaps partner will know and can place the contract after I bid 4♥?

At MP, you hold ♠Q7 ♥KQ96 ♦K9874 ♣62. P-P-1♦ to you. What do you think about a 1♥ overcall?

I haven't read all of the posts in this thread, so pardon me if this repetitive. In the ACBL, organizers of Sectional and Regional events are pretty much on their own in deciding what convention charts to allow (or even in allowing parts of some charts). There may be some regulations regarding mid-chart or higher in limited masterpoint events. But, in general, Units and Districts (the bodies that run Sectionals and Regionals) can do what they want. Seeing a Open Swiss at a regional limited to GCC or allowing mid-chart in no way means that an Open Swiss in another regional will be run under the same convention chart. It doesn't even mean that a similar event at the same tournament will be run under the same convention chart. This probably seems strange to people in other parts of the world who can note that a tournament is a certain type and know immediately what level conventions will be allowed.

Disclaimer: I've used Double Dummy Solver to help me. We agree with hatchett: LHO can survive by reading the position correctly. As for the other way to make it: HQ at trick one followed by a spade to the nine. I played with this problem yesterday, but could not come up with a sure fire solution that took into account both jacks with LHO and the H9 at trick one.

OK I'm taking you up on this bet, will post results later. I regret to say that I lost the bet. I gave south the hand that started the discussion, ♠A ♥KJ75 ♦Q852 ♣QT63, and gave north a 33(34)/(23)44 12-14 count. I produced 1000 hands to fit the criteria. I found that game in NT (34.2%) and game in a minor (33.0%) were nearly identical propositions. (I think the difference will be significant once you add in the real world factor of a relatively blind opening lead after 1N-3N compared to the revealing auction to 5m.) Some other findings: Game in NT made 24.3% of the time when responder had two spades and 35.9% of the time when responder had three spades. When responder held Kx(x) or QJx in spades, 3NT made 51.6% of the time; when responder had worse spades, 3NT made 27.4% of the time. When responder held Kx(x) or QJx in spades, 5m made 13.9% of the time; when responder had worse spades, 5m made 40.5% of the time. When responder had 12 HCP, 3NT made 22.7% of the time; when responder had 13 HCP, 3NT made 32.7% of the time; when responder had 14 HCP, 3NT made 53.5% of the time. The middle two items suggest to me that this is a situation where an exchange of information will help the partnership land in the right spot -- the difference between making 3NT 51.6% of the time responder has spade help and 27.4% of the time responder has no spade help is not going to be overcome by putting the defenders to a blind opening lead (and defense). Of course, this is only a subset of the possible hands facing a 1444 opening 1NT, so there may be lots of responding hands where an exchange of information won't help our side and will help the defenders. Below is the input file I used with mdealer for this simulations. [space] [space]predeal south SA, HKJ75, DQ852, CQT63 [space] [space]shape_ok=shape(north, 3343 + 3334 + 2344 + 3244) [space] [space]hcp_ok=hcp(north)>11 && hcp(north)<15 [space] [space]spades_ok = hcp(north, spades)<4 [space] [space] [space] [space]north_ok = shape_ok && hcp_ok && spades_ok [space] [space]tn=tricks(north,notrump) [space] [space]td=tricks(south,diamonds) [space] [space]tc=tricks(south,clubs) [space] [space] [space] [space]diamond_fit = diamonds(north)==4 [space] [space]club_fit = clubs(north)==4 [space] [space] [space] [space]kx = hascard(north, KS) [space] [space]qjx = hascard(north, QS) && hascard(north, JS) && spades(north)==3 [space] [space]bad_spades = !kx && !qjx [space] [space] [space] [space]game_nt = tn>8 [space] [space]game_m = td>10 || tc>10 [space] [space]condition north_ok [space] [space]produce 1000 [space] [space]action [space] [space] [space] [space]average "Tricks in NT" (tn), [space] [space] [space] [space]average "Game in NT" (game_nt), [space] [space] [space] [space]average "Game in minor" (game_m), [space] [space] [space] [space]frequency "Tricks in clubs by club length" (clubs(north), 3, 4, tc, 9, 10), [space] [space] [space] [space]frequency "Tricks in diamonds by diamond length" (diamonds(north), 3, 4, td, 9, 10), [space] [space] [space] [space]frequency "Tricks in NT by spade length" (spades(north), 2, 3, tn, 7, 8), [space] [space] [space] [space]frequency "Tricks in NT with bad spades" (bad_spades, 0, 1, tn, 7, 8), [space] [space] [space] [space]frequency "Game in minor with bad spades" (bad_spades, 0, 1, game_m, 0, 1), [space] [space] [space] [space] [space] [space] [space] [space]frequency "Tricks at NT by HCP" (hcp(north), 12, 14, tn, 7, 8),

Some people always thank partner when they put down dummy (in ftf or online). Some people always say "wdp" when partner makes a contract and "ntp" when they go down. They view these things as being courteous, no different from saying "hi, how are you" to the checkout person. To me, sometimes people go so far in an attempt at civility that their actions are almost the opposite. Isn't it a bit condescending to think that partner will be pleased with the "wdp" or "ntp" when partner's effort wasn't well done or nice? I once played against someone who, when he played a card from dummy, always called the card followed by "please, partner". "King, please, partner"..."Queen, please, partner"..."small, please partner" etc.

3NT?

I think this explains why there wasn't much more discussion about the standard sequence. FWIW, I did rebid 3H over 3C and it was harder, so hard that we could not bid the slam.

IMO, "23-25" is enough of a clue that East's description is wrong. As you point out, north can also look at his own hand, consider his partner's opening bid and know that "23-25" is not accurate. Perhaps the director should have been called, but that does not mean that an adjustment should be made. At the end of the auction, West should have informed the opponents that the explanation was incorrect. And, perhaps the director should have been called at that time.