luis

I don't think we have asked the right question... 'who bid 2s?' With my current pd we have two "sets" of doubles, one we use in weak or club fields and one we use in strong fields. In set-A (normal) we play this dbl as penalty for the reasons that most posters describe, if they are nuts so it be and we collect our money. In set-B (strong) we play no penalty doubles at all based on the assumption that our opponents don't bid a new suit at the 2 level to go for 800 and having freed all doubles let us compete better. I think this can't happen in a strong field because the 2s bid doesn't make any sense but if it does then I assume the player who bid 2s WANTs to be doubled in 2s so we won't play dbl as penalty. A dbl would then be "general values".

Disagree completely, 1♠-2♦-2♠ doesn't show 6 spades. Unless you are going to bid 3d with 3 bad cards or 2NT without stoppers in hearts and clubs. The rebid of opener's major in modern 2/1 is used to deny other bids, not to show 6 spades. Responder can usually sort out if pd does have 6 spades or not in the next bids but in principle 2♠ is just (I can't bid 2♥ or 2NT, or 3♣ or 3♦) I also disagree that 6-2 fits play a trick or better than 3NT, that's like saying that hammers are usually better than screwdrivers to prepare milkshakes.... 2/1 is better than SAYC I agree but is also a very flawed system, I'm still looking for somebody that can solve the famous "endplayed in the bidding" 2/1 auction 1♠-2♦-3♦. Now responder can be lacking a stopper in clubs or hearts or have both or have 3 cards in spades or 2 and he has only 3 bids before 3NT so mathematically there's one bid that is ambiguous and forces opener to take a nasty guess. If 3♠ is for example 3 spades and 3NT shows stoppers in hearts and clubs then what is 3♥ ? :-)

I wonder how could you answer this question without asking "who is my pd?" isn't that the real question to decide what to bid? I can think about different pds and I can think about 2c, 3c, and 3NT as options. About your second question: I want to PLAY 3NT :-)

I think 4h is automatic and other bids are probably horrible since they can quickly find a defense in 4s if your LHO has long spades and opener can support. Now if they are going to defend to 4s LHO has to bid 4s on his own without knowing if the 1NT opener has 2 spades, 3 or 4. The vulnerability, your hand and the singleton spade make 4h a perfect bid IMHO. Luis

Hi all, I'm going to share a diary of the trials I'm playing to see my friend's ideas on some decisions or deals. You will be playing IMPs on a supossed-to-be strong field your pd is an expert junior that loves to use some "original" ideas. You are playing Fantoni-Nunes system, 1 level openings are 14+ and forcing, 2 level openings are 9-13 and 1NT is always 12-14. Problem 1: You are vuln they are not. A87654, -, AJT62, Ax They open 1h on your right your options are "2h michaels, 4h spades + minor (big hand), or a normal overcall" What do you bid? What is your plan for this hand? Problem 2: All Vul you are in first seat with -, 7642, A9765, AK32 Do you open 2d (9-13 5+ diamonds unbalanced) or pass? (1d would be 14+) Problem 3: You are vul and they are not x, J9754, AKx,QJxx Lefty opens 1 spade, pd doubles and righty bids 3 spades. What do you bid and why? How do you feel? Problem 4: Nobody is vulnerable xxxx, T9xx, Axx, Ax RHO opens 1 spade, you pass, LHO bids 1NT, pd bids 2 spades (hearts+minor) you bid 3h and pd bids 4h, what do you think about 3h? What now ? Problem 6: Nobody vulnerable K962, 9742, A32, 42 RHO opens 1NT (15-17) all pass. Your lead?

I think I agree a lot with Roland's comments. The biggest problem when dummy says "claim pd" is what happens when dummy DOESN'T say "claim pd" then declarer can inferr that the hand is not laydown and for example make plans to win against bad splits. So I think that even if the hand is very cold if dummy says "claim pd" he should be penalized in a very very severe way. I'd rule the hand to be down 1 declarer can always forget about a trump or misscount his tricks and based on misscounting take a losing line. Then I'd rule a procedural penalty of about 5imps to the offending side, if it was MPs maybe 2% of the scoring. Finally dummy must be instructed not to do that again and a note must be taken if he repeats the incorrection he should be suspended. Luis.

5♦ I agree a slam will be to pushy and I think a minor suit game should be equal or better than 3NT, since it's better to play from my side I'm bidding 5♦ first because it protects the sK from the lead and then because my second heart can be discarded in the clubs but pd's 4 hearts can't be discarded in my diamonds.

Both :-) but North more than south. To me 1♠ is fine, since in my partnership 2♠ shows more values and less spades than this hand. Both hands have a strong O/D (offensive/defensive) offensive ratio so I think that both should go to 3♠ and specially North.

Spade to the ten, inmediately and looking happy if that wins or brings the ace I have 9 tricks (2 spades, 5d, a heart and a club), if that doesn't win then I have a psychological advantage since they won't be able to determine that I can go down attacking spades.

With all my respect I think that would be a really horrible horrible idea. The software should allow you to distribute the load between multiple servers in a way transparent to the user. If that implies a cost that you can't afford then it can even be better to start a collect to raise the needed money than to split BBO, splitting BBO will ruin the fun of having a centralized place where you can play, chat, learn and watch bridge. You can distribute the communications between the client an different servers depending on what you are doing, you can have a "lobby" server, a "tables" you can even have multiple "table" servers if needed each server hosting some tables and you can have a "vugraph" server for vugraph. The only thing you need is to handle messages from a user in one server to a user in another server but you can easily share a table of user-server locations so you know where to send the messages.... Just some ideas I have no idea about the code.

As a follow-up to the alerts and disclosure threads I must say that whenever we open 4h or 4s we alert indicating that we have 4c and 4d available as good 4h/4s openings.

Inmy partnership we are using Namyats and the requirements are very relaxed, mostly depending on the vulnerability. For example NV vrs V QJxxxxx of spades and out is a 4s opening so AKxxxxx and a side ace or King is a 4d opening. In general the 4c opening is stronger than the 4d opening since the 4s preempt is weaker than the 4h preempt for us. Answering your questions: 1) Do you need a side ACE OR KING? No 2) Can you have a void? Yes 3) Do you need control in two of the three side suits (distibutional or A/K) No 4) What is your suit requirement (that is do you require good enough to play slam opposite small singleton) No, no requirement. 5) If you play a big club system, how does that affect your namyats bid (after all, you can safely open 1C). We play the 1s opening bid as forcing (14+) so with really strong hands we open 1s, with weak ones 4s and in the middle we use 4d. 6) IF you include acol two bids in your 2C opening bid (or play acol 2 bids), how does that affect your namyats? Doesn't apply. Usually by rule a 4m opening has 2 or 3 keycards missing for a slam, so pd is allowed to check as long as he has at least two of them. This doesn't apply when we are NV vrs V in 1st/2nd position where a 4s opening can be very weak, in this position a slam requieres not only 2 keycards but extra values. Over 4c and 4d we use the relay as 2 keycards, and not much else, for example 2 aces or an ace and the trump king with little on the side. Luis

4♥ just a guess will be hard to tell pd you have 6 hearts if you start with anyuthing else. I think anything can work great or badly, flip a coin...

In a recent f2f tournament in the last session there were 1 kibitzer following the leaders and about a dozen following a pair that was 6th... :-) Even when some boards end up badly some pairs regardless of their level are worth watching. Because they can be fun and entertaining... I'm sure yours maybe one of them!

Not only that, but luis is going to slap you with a procedural penalty! Exactly. The example is a clear MI case, you are giving your opponents information that your pd doesn't have. I don't know if you can understand this but you are saying you have an agreement that you don't have so your pd may not be bidding based on what you said you have but something else he imagines you may have. All this can lead to self-inflicted MI. Alerting 2h as 6-11 because you have 6-11 without agreement IMO deserves a procedural penalty and it's MI and it's also unethical since you are giving unfair advantage to your opponents in turn.

75-C When explaining the significance of partner's call or play in reply to an opponent's inquiry (see Law 20), a player shall disclose all special information conveyed to him through partnership agreement or partnership experience, but he need not disclose inferences drawn from his general knowledge and experience. When you open 2♥ I guess you do have an agreement with pd so you must alert. If I ask about style "natural" is not an answer. I think what I've said was quite clear, if you don't have agreed the meaning of some bid with your pd then there's no alert and there's nothing to explain about the bid. I think this is not over-disclosure it's just showing cards to your opponents, I can't find a specific law saying that you should play to win and not to lose but if you play to lose I think you can be suspended or something. Telling the opponents what you have is playing to lose. Of course for beginers this will only merit a warning and an explanation of the proper procedure. Full disclosure of agreements is one thing, explaining what you have for each bid is something entirely different. As Ben said you are giving unfair advantage to your oppoents compared to the field so it must be a violation of the conditions of contest.

One split that won't hurt is to have one server for the playing area and another one for vugraph. After all either you are playing or watching vugraph. Even then the list of players can be "shared" between the servers so messaging will work even if the players are on different servers. This I think will reduce the load a lot, and eventually can lead to an independant application -sort of- for vugraph with it's own server and everything that you need for a better vugraph experience. For example how far are we from installing an el-cheapo webcam in the place where the players are and have a table image while watching vugraph ?

I would contend that the basis for your "guess" is at least in part based upon your agreement to play lebehsohl rather than on any general bridge knowledge. But, There is a big difference between being asked to explain your partner's call (as is usually the case in FTF bridge) and being asked to explain your own call (which is the norm in online bridge). "We have no agreement" is often appropriate in FTF bridge where you are left to figure out what your partner intends. But, when explaining your own bids, there's never any guess about what you intend. (Well, if the "what do you bid" threads on this forum are any indication, some people actually don't know what they intend! :) ) Part of the trouble, I believe, is in trying to duplicate the ftf environment where partner answers the questions regarding my calls. I think partner explaining the calls is actually a compromise put in place for FTF play in order to reduce the amount of unauthorized information. In a perfect world, the person who makes the call would also do the explaining since he knows exactly what the intent (presumed agreement) is, but his partner would not hear the explanation in order to avoid the possibility of UI. Online is that perfect world. Gee, the WBF should publish some kind of booklet about alerting with screens and that is the rule that we have to use when self-alerting online. I'm too tired to explain that it's unlawful to say what you have. In fact when a bid is not alerted then there's nothing to ask about since all the bids that carry some meaning either by explicit or implicit agreement must be alerted. That's why I think that 99.99% of the non-alerted bids when asked should answer "no agreement" or "natural" because there's no conventional meaning. Somehow some players requiere others to explain what they have and somehow some players think they are ethical by telling their opponents what they have I think those players should be punished with procedural penalties as if they were helping or showing their cards inentionally to their opponents.

In the first hand being BAM I overcall 2♥. Once I have passed the double of 2♠ should be takeout so I take out to 3♦. In the second hand I would say the blame is 50 to North for playing with South and 50% to South for playing with North. Seriously every single call is terrible. North passes with an opening bid. South doesn't act over a weak 2 specially playing with a pd that doesn't open with opening values North that considered his hand not enought to open 1♥ now thinks he can bid 3♥ maybe looking for a 1100. And south finally decides that if pd can bid 3♥ alone his hand won't produce a 10th trick to try the heart game. Funny!

If there's no agreement there's no agreement opps should disclose even implicit agreements but if they don't have it they don't have it. You bid intending your pd to understand your hand, not your opponents.

Since we self-alert on BBO,if I make a pre-emptive bid that is what I disclose to opps,not if we have or have not an agreement. I simply tell them what my bid is,not how anyone will interpret it. :P This is so wrong, so wrong, and there're so many players doing this... Your opponents have no right at all to know what you have for any particular bid or what you intend any particular bid to be. You must only tell them what agreements you have with your pd. If your pd can figure out the meaning of non-arranged bids better than your opponents then you will win and that's just because you are a better partnership or because your pd is a better player. Why, oh why, would you want your opponents to have a better understanding of your hand than your pd? Does this make any sense to you? Your pd will have to guess or figure out what you have while your opponents will know exactly, a complete nonsense.

If you are declarer there're no excuses for not asking since there's no UI to pd. If you don't ask and you refuse to take a finesse then don't cry, I'd have ruled strongly against that pair in the ACBL tournament, upheld the TD decision and retain the deposit. Some days in jail would also be fine but an AC can't do that...

I like it a lot, of course I think your rules for not bidding are exaggerated, I thgink that the proper way to say it is "pd won't bid with many hands that would over a normal preempt" but of course with an exceptional hand pd will act, specially with support for the suit or when 3NT seems to be a reasonable gamble.

If I understand your post, your cc says 5-9 hcp but in third seat you may often have 0-5 and your cc does not say or infer extreme 3 seat bids? Are you suggesting in a Nat pairs event I need to ask questions every board about such issues or I am fault and should just accept the result? If so what other bids, special understandings not on cc should I be asking about? Seems as if I will have little time to play with all my time asking questions and reading the cc if opp are not going to be alerting. Yes you should ask about such issues and yes you are at fault if you don't and take a wrong decision. What other situations merit such a question, well any situation where valuable style information might influence the line you take to play the hand. And I don't think you will be asking so many questions in the 80% of the hands there's nothing to ask about or if there is the information is irrelevant to the play. Using a technicality in the CC to ask for TD to make you take a finesse you refused to take at the table is disgusting specially when you didn't ask anything at the table before taking the finesse.

3♥, if we are needing results I might try 3NT since it can be the right hand to try such a bid but I really prefer 3♥ as a very normal bid in most normal situations. I don't think 2♥ is an option.