jdeegan

:P Alas, no time to talk in a timed one board partnership typical of indies.

:P One of the original suit preference signals in bridge was that when one returns a card for partner to ruff - a big card asks for a return of the higher ranking suit, a low card for the return of the lower ranking suit, and a middle card for no preference. This was one of the first things I was taught back in the day, even before I graduated university. Recently, I have enjoyed playing in the BBO one dollar individual tournaments. They offer good rough and tumble bridge games where everybody plays SAYC. You do have to have a standard way to play in such a situation. About 10% of the players have BBO stars. The rest of the players are either already good or are else striving to get better. My question is why when I return a high/low card for a ruff I almost never seem to get the return I asked for? Has the old standard convention changed? Is it no longer taught? It keeps happening to me. WTF is going on?

:P Hard copy magazines of all kinds are being supplanted by electronic media. The people who publish the hard copy bridge magazines are splendid, imo, but they represent no exception.

:P Not my favorite treatment, but legitimate. So, now you still have to bid something. How about 3♦? Maybe this is even better? Saves bidding space, at least. I still cannot terminate this auction at 3NT opposite an unlimited partner. I do not like your suits, so a major suit preference is out of the question. You have denied five hearts. I can't bid ♣ again w/o showing a genuine two suited hand. Once again we are down to 4♦ or 4NT. I guess I would bid 4NT, and you would either pass or bid on. As far as I can see 4NT is the limit of the hand opposite your minimum. It looks like one way or the other, we are going to blunder into 6♦ or 6NT.

:P Whatever your system, the N hand might best offer 3♣ over 2♥. After a 3NT reply by S, another encouraging bid is in order. Maybe 4NT? Holding 16 nice looking HCP and an obvious source of tricks in the ♦ suit opposite an unlimited opener, you can't afford to give up on slam right away. Give it just one more chance. Maybe 4♦ would do the job? To quote the late, great Dorothy Hayden, "slam bidding is conversational."

:P No offense, but right siding a highly putative if not totally impossible 6 NT contract is, imo, a bit too much to worry about in this crowded auction. The spade contract is already right sided. The prospect of, maybe, getting to a makeable small slam is objective numero uno. Somehow, with luck, the rather remote prospect of bidding a makeable grand slam has to be next. This whole situation boils down to whether asking bids or telling bids are the percentage way to go in this auction. Maybe the French are right. Almost 100 years of bridge history argues against this, but, as far as I can see, that view could easily be wrong.

:P I can see the obvious merit in an asking bid approach. I guess it comes down to which approach is the more useful. Maybe a simulation could answer this question.

:P In the absence of some sort of silver bullet heart asking bid understanding with partner, and nobody really has that, you have a problem that has only an imperfect solution. 4NT control asking (RKC or ordinary Blackwood) with a small doubleton heart is just plain wrong. 5♠ asks for trumps, and you already know the answer you will get to that question. Imo, best is a 5♣ cue bid. If you get a 5♥ cue bid response, then bid 6♠. Otherwise settle for 5♠. A second thought, if partner does cue bid 5♥ over your 5♣, you might consider cueing back with 6♦ playing with an expert. That way you have a chance to get to a makeable seven if partner has the ♥ace.

:P I am used to playing with players who are better than I am. You learn not to put them under pressure based on analyzing some kind of low probability chance. Partners get tired, so making the game harder for them is not conducive to overall good results. Blasting also can make things tougher on the opponents both in the bidding and on defense.

:P You are sitting fourth seat, vul versus non-vul playing matchpoints. You hold: [hv=pc=n&s=sj87432h8d8732ca9]133|100[/hv] The bidding opens one club on your left. Partner overcalls one heart. Right hand opponent passes. Your call?

:P As usual, your analysis seems correct to me. Fishing for 3NT is seriously problematical at IMPs. 4♣ is evidently the technically correct bid, but sometimes my partners screw up. 5♣ eliminates the prospect of future human error.

:P OK, I can see you might get close to 50% plus or minus a little. Partner might have six clubs and the diamond jack, and no heart lead with the king offside - kind of an unlikely opening lead. Even with five clubs, taking 4♦, 5♣, one ♥ and two ruffs is possible - easy if clubs are 2-2. Of course partner needs the diamond jack or three diamonds with a 3-3 split and no bad trump split. We are speculating on how to climb out of a known 10% deficit with a bunch of mystery hands with features that are unlikely to get in the auction. Plus, the opponents seem to be bidding on some sort of unbalanced distribution. Why bother just to get to a 50-50 spot?

:P I can think of quite a number: 'ex-partner', 'former partner', 'someone whose name I just can't quite remember'.

:P Playing slam opposite ♥ Ax or Axx is well below 50% (assuming no ♠A+♣A from partner). I was thinking it to be 30%, but the handy dandy Pavlicek suit calculator makes it out to be 40% - again assuming LHO would have made his preemptive bid equally with or without the ♥K. In any case, you know it is significantly less than 50% when the holder of the putative on side king has 7 vacant spaces versus 10 for his partner (more or less).

:P Now that I can finally see what everyone else is looking at, I still have a question. 3♣ shows a club suit and 8-10 HCP according to the information given. Might the 3♣ bid show more strength than that? If so, you should continue to fish for slam. If not, you need a perfecto and ultimately subsiding at 5♣ (or even in rare cases 3NT) is correct. On the actual hand, you have a chance for slam - maybe 30-70 and not worth bidding. You can do almost anything right now since you are in a forcing situation. Even Pass is worth considering. You are in an asking rather than a telling situation. You are also very much in a tactical mode since the opponents are bidding as well. Personally, I would be more concerned with hearing more from partner and the opponents. I can always bid 5♣ later as a fall back solution. Your idea of possibly locating a hypothetical heart king is good, but only one of many attractive possibilities. I guess my new answer is to Pass. It will probably put my partner in an agonizing situation - the downside of that has to be considered. Otherwise, the upside seems unimpeachable. If it goes Pass on my left and partner doubles (I would certainly hope, for penalties), I bid 3NT and let partner make the final decision. Furthermore, concealing our monster club fit for the time being may cause the opponents to either misjudge entirely or else possibly reveal more about the situation than is prudent for their side. I really don't mind the idea of playing in 5♣ doubled. So far, so good. I feel in control of this auction and want to hear more.

:P Thank you very much. No yellow square highlight with my browser, but when I clicked on the bid as you suggested, it gave me the appropriate response.

:P When forum posters reproduce hand diagrams, my browser reproduces it in black and white AND the yellow part containing comments does not reproduce at all, showing up as blank white space. Any suggestions?

:P My browser in its current set up does not show any yellow part of the bidding diagram. There is a blank white space there, however. Any ideas on how to fix this?

:P I now see the subsequent posting. If 1♣ is just an artificial big bid, then 3♣ must show six or more very playable clubs. Again AK A is unlikely, so 5♣ is even more to be advised.

:P Just a quibble, but why not open one diamond? Having opened one club and heard partner bid three clubs, well, unless he/she has the 'magic' hand (AK A), slam in clubs is not there. I would just bid 5♣. Perhaps, everyone is still in the dark, and we can get rich if they bid again. No sensible way to investigate 3NT, so put it to the opponents. Given the conditions, 4♣ may work out OK, just not my style in an ambiguous auction that is not at all ambiguous from my seat.

:P Oh dear. This is really a promising thread fraught with some peril. Ask yourself, fundamentally what are we really up to? If we respond: 1. 2♥ it says no game opposite a balanced minimum and possibly many other suited minimums 2. 2♦ you get to begin to hear what the big hand is all about 3. 2♠ as 8-10 HCP balanced - a sensible recycling of the old 2NT response After this, you get into the old dilemma of whether to ask or tell after partner advertises a really exceptional strong hand of some unknown sort. If partner has the big balanced hand, you have plenty of tools to proceed. So, absent that, what should your higher level bid best show as a descriptive bid? Mostly, it comes up so rarely, it really does not matter much. 4. 2NT, then, makes a nice relay bid into something. IMO, it may be better used as showing a certain minimum of controls (or aces) and some potential slam interest opposite whatever partner may have. 5. 3♣ through 3♠: the old fashioned six bagger to two of the top three The watch word here is whether the emphasis is on asking or telling.

:P I guess that rules out a spade lead. It is between a diamond and a club. Some earlier posters suggest that a club is better because declarer may have a stiff club and will almost always eschew a first round finesse if he/she has any alternatives (with no alternatives, you are screwed anyway). I agree. Maybe a mildly deceptive club spot is the ticket here since declarer may have two clubs and need to develop a thirteenth trick. You want to try to convince him/her that the ♣Q is offside and that the suit is splitting 4-3. The situation looks bad for us unless partner has a natural trump trick. The ♣Q is almost surely onside, any spade hook is on and any minor suit squeeze is probably going to work as well. Maybe a club opening lead will take out a crucial entry assuming declarer has a stiff. Maybe it will convince him/her to go for a 'normal' club division or possibly a diamond division. Anything but the successful spade hook. This argues against the passive diamond lead. It seems to me that a club and a diamond lead are equal in terms of partner having a void. A void in either minor is rare. A void with no Lightner double is even rarer. On a percentage basis the club lead makes more sense, at least to me. What a surprise! A top level, world class player and three of his counterparts appear to be correct.

:P Your original question is a good one. Using natural SAYC or 2/1-style bidding systems, the general rule for non-balanced hands is to open the strong bid according to the rule of four losers and four quick tricks or better. If your suit is a minor, then you may want to upgrade your minimum by close to one playing trick. A significant exception arose back in the 1960's when 2♣ became an artificial initial bid for the old two of a suit opener. The problem was that to show some genuine two suited hands, opener had to drive the bidding too high too fast. Hearts and a lower ranking suit are not so bad. Spades and another (esp. a minor) are awkward. The practical solution is to take a chance on an opening one bid unless the hand is extra strong. Your example hand is not a two suiter. Therefore, you open two clubs. Once in a great while, you will lose a playable 4-4 or even 4-5 ♥ fit. Opening one spade really doesn't improve your chances of finding this putative heart fit all that much. Considering that you are almost laydown for 5♠ opposite the stiff ♠Q and out, not opening 2♣ with the intention of rebidding 2♠ is just plain wrong.

:P The answer is very simple. You normally give attitude. You give count only when partner needs it. Once in a while, you will find the opportunity to give a suit preference signal. That said, there are a few conventions like the Smith echo some (but nowhere nearly all) expert players use. Also, most play that the opening lead of an ace against a no trump contract demands you play an honor if you have one, otherwise show count. Lots of seemingly ingenious signals have been devised over the years (e.g. odd/even discards), but most have been abandoned except for very specialized situations. It's mostly regular or UDCA these days.

:P Any idea what the opponents' bidding showed?