HeavyDluxe

And may explain why my answers lined up with the smart folks (though I'm still giddy about it)....

I typically don't get too bent out of shape over 'experts' giving me some 'tips' at the table... But this hand went to far. Cap'n America suggested that I either should've upgraded to a 2NT open or *jump-shifted* to 2♠ on my rebid. He passed my 2NT holding a lame 7-count, but it was still a 7-count. LHO & RHO, who seemed to be his darling fans, had a good chuckle. I made a bet I could post it on the B/I forum and find no one who agreed with his pontifications. Thread closed. :D

Thanks, guys. I at least win the public post-mortem. :D

This definitely doesn't qualify as an interesting hand, but it was sure a source of unpleasantries... [hv=d=s&v=n&s=sakjthqxxdqjcaqxx]133|100|Scoring: IMP[/hv] I suppose there were two issues being discussed: 1) Are you upgrading this to a 2NT opener? 2) If you open 1♣... 1♣ - 1♦ ?? What is your second bid and why?

Interesting that this thread has gotten new legs... I suck. And I suck enough I'm not sure all the reasons I suck so bad, but I suspect: Impatience -> I tend to be a "let's get on with it" kinda person. So taking the time to form a plan, think it through, etc seems difficult for me. Laziness -> Related to the point above, expending the effort to go slow, count carefully, think deeply could be better spent typing ?????s at pard on the next hand where he blows a cold contract. ;-) Lack of experience/mentors (particularly live) -> Living up here in the boonies means that there's no local game aside from the rubber at the local senior center. I think online bridge can promote the 'fast and loose' play that I'm prone to. Plus, I have never had really good players to talk with in the post-mortem and learn. But, I do love playing... I think I've gotten consistently better, to the point that ADV players won't get a total headache sitting with me. I just wish I could go back and discover the game in college.

Congrats, Peter!

Great advice above! Keep it simple (SAYC, 2/1, or BWS as a base), agree to a few key conventions, discuss competitive and defensive bids, and nail down leads/carding. Have fun! And good luck, Peter!

One other little, minor thing I noticed: When you're defending a hand and declarer makes a claim, the software exposes declarer's cards so you can validate the claim. I was kibitzing a particular player (kibitz south, for example) who was on defense. When declarer made a claim, their cards remained 'face down'. It would be helpful to be able to see the table behave as if we were playing while watching a particular player. Again, small potatoes... :lol:

IMO, whether or not to reveal scores progressively depends on the type of match you want to create. If you want to reward consistent, steady, top-notch play, then keeping with the current score reporting makes sense. We have mile-markers to know whether we're up or down, and can adjust our play (to some degree) accordingly. If you want to create excitement and gambling, announce scores more frequently. We're able to tighten/loosen our play more dynamically based on the situation. And, when behind, we can start 'swinging for the fences'. Personally, I think the 'low-variance' approach of less score updates is better. I would think it sad to a BB/VC/SB decided in the final few boards because one team took a handful of wild shots that, against the odds, happen to make. I recognize, however, that I'm not a very good player... And so, my expectation of the risk/reward in that kinda scenario may be off. *shrug*

Happy birthday, Justin. And thanks for your posts here.

This is probably by design, but I'll throw it out just in case... When the WHO's/RESULTS sidebar is minimized, the effect of the BIG CARDS check box becomes almost nothing. Toggling the check box moves the bidding window to the upper-right of the screen and blows up a little of the text. However, the cards are mostly unaffected. FF3.5.3 on a Mac running 10.6

Thanks for all you do, Roland. Happy birthday!

Thinking of Ken only bidding "in a strictly natural sense" makes me giggle.

I've played with the new client on and off for a couple days. Personally, I really like the new navigation and I think it works well. The other night, I had my wife (a non-BBOer) look at it. Her only suggestion was to have arrows on the ONLINE and RESULTS tabs. It would point 'in' to the playing area when closed - indicating that if you click it, something will pop that direction. If one of the tabs is expanded, the arrow would shift and point to the margin of the screen - showing that the thing will hide if you click it again. Otherwise, I really, really like it.

First shot looking at this from the office... We are interested in knowing: Is this relatively intuitive? I certainly think so. The navigation makes total sense and seems obvious. My eyes went right to the sidebar buttons as soon as I logged in. Do you think we have to try to make it more obvious (perhaps by making the new "results" button below the table stand out more)? Perhaps it could be highlighted. A different color, perhaps? Bolded text? You could format the sidebar button to match. My other initial thought was that, while I'm not running at the problem resolution, the two side buttons for RESULTS and WHO'S ONLINE could be a *little* thicker to call more attention to them. Is the way I explained how to show/hide the results area sufficient? This last question is important because we will want to try to explain this to all web-client users (in the lobby news for example) in a concise and clear way. I thought your explanation was very clear and sufficient. OFMMV. As always, thanks for the use of this wonderful site...

Cool! Months offline, and I return to the land of the 'virtually living' right before the start of the BB. How keen. Of course, I miss the cut off for the pick'em. How sad. Good luck to all the competitors! I know the pool made watching fun last time 'round. Just for that purpose, here's my BB picks. QF: Bulgaria, USA1, Netherlands, Brazil SF: China LZ, Norway RU: Italy WI: USA2

Happy Birthday! And thanks for your posts...

The first action seems the most questionable... I would occasionally open this hand 2♦ at favorable. What does occasionally mean? Depends on how good I'm feeling or how bad I'm steaming at a given moment, I suppose. As far as what to do over 3♥, I'm passing. As Jill said, this strikes me a 'good bridge' decision. Are we getting robbed? Maybe, but I can't come up with something redeemable that makes me want to bid.

I picked "Other". Most of the time, I don't mind these kinds of posts... Often, [talented person] has articulated a reason for why they would do what they do. Repeating all the same things would be a waste, so "I agree with" serves as a vote of affirmation. In threads where there are a number of seemingly viable options available, this helps sort the consensus position. And since there's often more than one way to skin a cat in bridge, such posts are helpful. However, if "I agree with [talented person]" refers back to a post where [talented person] just said, "4♥, obv" it is decidedly less helpful. A substantial amount of my errors still come from failing to think enough or faulty reasoning. So, the more 'exposition' there is, the better. The LOL posts raise a di'rent set of issues, methinks. Personally, I have no business LOLing at anyone but myself in this game. I wish I had the talent that some people who post here have (and/or the time to study). I understand the frustration that people who actually understand this game must sometime feel with people whose opinion of their skills far exceeds reality. And I agree that such over-confident folks - maybe I'm one of them - need to be corrected. Nonetheless, the LOL meme has become overused and almost exclusively 'hostile'. Bottom line: I wish all posts had something hinged on the word "because"... "WTP because pard must have at least AKxx Kxx for his bid." "LOL because you didn't even think about the possibility of a 4-1 break in ♦s." (One last thing... It took me months to figure out what WTP was when I got on here. My own fault for being to proud to ask. But, another sign that typing more, more often, will help people get more from the discussion.)

I believe that mikeh's post is entirely too level-headed and reasonable to be fit for the internet. Well said.

I asked. AWM answered before I posted.

When I see auctions like this, here's my thinking: It's a bidding fight. Opener needed to pass 3NT. From there ensues a series of jousts and likely misunderstandings landing us in a doomed contract. My guess is that 4♣ and 5♣ were intended as Goober (sadly, an 'out of the mist' 4♣ after a NT bid is always goober by my pickup pards). The 6♦ response snapped openers eyes open, and so he ran to 6♠.

An observation: Scanning through this thread, I've started to notice that it sounds a lot like our rants for/against self-ratings on BBO. If that's an accurate observation, perhaps the solution is not a new forum to lock out 'pretend experts'. Maybe it would be better to simply leave their threads bare, without replies. Let them die the slow death of silence... Anyway, I still have no problem with the forum idea in principle. I think most of the people on here whose opinions matter to me are gracious enough with their time in the other forums on here. As such, affording them a 'big boy' sandbox of their own may be both a respite to them and an education for me. Clearly there are administrative and other 'costs', as others have pointed out. I can't judge which case trumps the other, though. (As an aside, thanks to everyone who posts here... I'm grateful for your time!)

What matmat said... I'm somewhere between 'suck' and 'slightly better than suck'... I like the idea of a forum where I could read the thoughts of people who actually know what they're talking about rather than needing to always rely on my own (flawed) bozo-filter. However, as an B/Iish player, I imagine such a forum would be far more helpful to me if I (and others like me) could occasionally ask a clarifying question on a given thread. "I'm glad the answer is '3♦, obv' but could you unpack that?" etc etc I'm not as frustrated with crap posts as others, again because I don't have the discernment to always tell what's good and what's garbage. But, if it's bothering the solid posters (like Justin) who make this forum such a great place for people like me to learn, I'm even more in favor of a more restricted forum that serves them and keeps them posting.

Agree with Little Kid and Helene. I think ♦s are in focus here. I also agree with gnasher that, absent a clear agreement on whether 'first raised' or 'last bid' takes priority, a natural bid at the 4-level would've helped.