luis

It's interesting to know that both Justin and me were concerned about intervention and that we choose a different bid :-) 1♥ shows your suit if the auction gets competitive and 2♣ tries to prevent the auction from getting competitive :-) who knows... :-). I have the feeling that when you open 2♣ they will pass unless somebody has a very special hand while a 1♥ opening seems to attract 1♠ overcalls from all sorts of holdings that's the theory behind my bid. While I do understand Justin's reasoning behing the 1♥ opening and I think it's quite valid I really don't understand arguments such as "I don't like opening 2C if I can avoid it." Is this serious? Like I don't like to open 1♦ or I don't like to double on Mondays... or "2♣ opening is also possible, but I don’t have enough defensive tricks." Defensive tricks? Why do you need defense to open 2♣? I respect all the bids but can't resist the debate :-)

1NT, I'm close to pass and double will be my third option. I really don't like 1♠ with this particular hand.

Upside down world :-) Justin and Me passing with the majority opening and this happened in TWO problems of this set... The world might end soon....

I think Coca-Cola is already sponsoring vugraphs "I bet a coke...." Maybe Fred can contact Pepsi to see what they offer if we start betting Pepsis instead :-) I also think it's easy to install a cheap webcam for vugraph shows, after all who doesn't have or can't borrow a webcam? Then players can get paid to wear hats or t-shirts from sponsor companies and BBO can get paid for broadcasting the live image of the players...

Giving pard the final call is all fine and stuff but you're forgetting one very important thing: Chances are pard won't have more than 6-7 points. By bidding 3C, he has already streched his neck to help. The last thing he wants is you bouncing the final decision back to him. By passing now, you can be 95% sure pard will pass 3S and North will get away with murder. You know better than no one that North, under pressure, streched far more than he should (South has a yarbourough and you know it - just count points). It is the duty of the stronger hand to be brave enough to take the final decision and double. It is a partnership game and your hand screams "defend", so just do it :) Well I disagree with your view. As Justin said I also think thet you need some trump tricks to double a partscore. In this particular deal they bid badly, but some day they will bid 3♠ seriously and make it. You can't just risk it is one of those days and double.

West has an Automatic opening, in fact at MPs he looked for a zero and got a 33% so he was quite lucky. Balancing with your cards after your pd passes in 3rd seat and they end playing in the 4th suit forcing would be insane.

The question is if the double was sound or if it was succesful? Because I think that it was or should have been a success but I don't think it was sound. Actually I hate the double, There're many hands where 3♠x will make spcially if dummy has a singleton in diamonds and North knows what he is doing. Furthermore pd should be able to compete with a long suit and no values if he wants without fearing that you will double the opponents if they bid one more, this is the fundamentals of competition. Luis

Er... no, declarer can't duck unless he sees through the cards, Imagine the leader has AJxxx of spades, low lead to the Q, declarer ducks with Kxx, spade back.... Mmm.....

I think you can get away with 1NT without a stopper, because parnter, if having game value, will check back without a spade stopper and shortage. Opposite a 2NT call by you, he may have more than enough for game in theory but you can lose five spade tricks off the top. So while any bid works out ok, 2NT I think sets up your for problems more often than not. Ben There're some problems that I like to face :-)

Hi, Playing the J with KJx against a suit contract is universally standard. In fact if you do play the King pd will assume that declarer has the J. Luis PS: If pd thinks for ages and leads the suit the King is safer :-) Just kidding....

I wonder why players that rated 1NT as 10 or 8 rate 2NT as 4 or 5 I think both bids should have very close scorings. If 1NT is 10 and 2NT 8 or 2NT 10 and 1NT 8 is a matter of style but what really doesn't make sense to me is that you can like 1NT and hate 2NT. Look at all the intermediates, JT8 in spades, J9 of hearts, 8 of diamonds, Q98 of clubs to play in no-trump I think the hand is more close to 12 than 11.

I have no intention of wrong-siding NT by bidding any number of notrump. How do you like it when partner tables Ax? Roland If he tables Ax I feel bad. I feel good if he tables anything else Qx, Kx, Kxx, Axx, Qxx, xxx, AQx :-)

If 2NT is invitational then 2NT: 10 exactly what you have, a flat hand with 10-11 HCP. 1NT: 8 Underbid but with 4333 you can be pessimistic Dbl: 7 2d: 0 2s: -5

Pass this should be universal. Pd has something like: AQxx AKxxx xx xx Or something like that. He doesn't have a club control and he is not interested in slam, he could have bid 3NT with slam interest and lacking the club control.

3♣, automatic.

2♣ relcutant. I hate the problem!

A club... I wonder why this is a problem. Without the double I'd probably lead a red suit...

I'd bid 5♣ directly forget about hearts and I think double is reasonable but too dangerous if the hand is a missfit and pd has a zillion diamonds.

2) "You don't need extra high card strength to make a splinter bid beyond what is needed to force to game. After 2/1 game is already forced. What you do need is the right distribution...4 trumps and a singleton equals the right distribution. Bidding 3 diamonds would not show this great distribution for playing in diamonds..." I think I have to disagree with this tehory, the risk of going beyond 3NT wich is often your only makeable game when you open light and have a minor suit fit is a lot greater than the chance of finding a magic slam just because you show shortness now.

I'm ok with being a panelist this can be a lot of fun.

I'd double and bid 5c then as a way to show pd that I'm happy to hear 6 from him if he has useful cards. A direct 5c in contrast would be expecting some useful cards to make so pd won't go to 6 if he has them.

thanks for post. 1) I can tell you that responder is the old buddy who along with a couple of other his pals taught me bridge back in 1971. Sends me email quizzes as I try to relearn bridge as a novice now. 2) Haha maybe yes to all of who is responder :P The other pals have won a bunch of world championships and all I can say is he may still despite playing little real bridge because of family and job. 3) Opener is almost over 10,000pt guy 4) Assume your opp are top flight 5) Need to win this hand for second place in Swiss. Want to know what style, treatments others prefer assuming 2/1 and not force only one style on this post. thanks. Under those conditions I think I'm going to open 1♠ because I need to win the hand and I don't think I'm going to win the hand passing. You asked about what style of 2/1 I prefer so: I like being able to open light. After 2/1 support is 4 cards and doesn't show any extras to me but it always shows exactly 4 cards. I never support with 3. I only bid 2NT with doubleton in my pd's suit and stoppers in the other suits. I rebid 2M very frequently as a catch all bid.

I don't really believe most of the answers. I really can't answer without a good list of information: - Who is my pd is he solid? crazy? young? old? stable? unstable? emotional? - Vulnerability? - How are we doing? Are we 1st ? Last? Mid of the pack? - Who are my opponents? Style? are they bad? good? solid? crazy? - What kind of result do we need? Depending on many of those I can either open 1♠ or pass. Assuming I decide to open 1♠ over 2♦ it's quite obvious that we need to have agreed weather we bid 3♦ with extras or with any hand including my usual sub-minimum openings. So I guess this question doesn't make a lot of sense to be asked as a poll. The answer is "it depends"

2♦ for me first. Then No, I won't double 2h.

I've been playing Viking for some time so right or wrong here's my view: 1) It's a system that requires constant practice and good memory and concentration, there're some sequences that are not very "logical" and if forgotten will surely lead to disaster. In fact you need a pd and at least a weekly practice. The worst thing about this system is that you quickly forget it. I know Moscito and once I learned it I never had to re-read anything, but Viking.... oh boy I have a sheet titled "things I usually forget, idiot!" that I carry around with me in tournaments. 2) If you like "light" openings then I strongly suggest changing the 1M-1N structure so 2c is not maximum and the others minimum, use 2c=I don't have a true opening and 2d+ as I have a normal opening. Then over 2c you can use 2d as game forcing ("I don't care") 3) The crash relay and super-relay are inferior to control-asking + denial cuebids so we also changed that. If you want once shape is shown you can use the first relay as control-asking (followed by denials) and the 2nd relay as the traditional crash relay. So you can decide which path to take. 4) The system does badly in partscores, competitive auctions that start with 1d and is quite sensible to interference, If I were to play against it I'd overcall in every hand creating major havoc in all the system structures. 5) It's great to pick the best game and find slams or grand slams, I'm not sure but sometimes all your 13 or 14 imp pickups are overrated and the 3 or 4 imp loses in partscores and competitive auctions are underrated. 6) Shape resolution is not great, Moscito does solve common distributions at a lower level giving you more space to explore. So if you love relays and you are a freak that must know the exact distribution always I recommend Moscito or Symmetric relays as better tools. 7) The NT structure is bad, change it to Keri or "revised Keri" works great! I like the system a lot, there're a lot of great things about it. It's flexible and fun but for me it's stressing. Now I'm playing Fantoni-Nunes style (simplified) and I'm so happy that I may be unfair with Viking just because I'm biased at this moment.