bid_em_up

I will assume that I misunderstood something (it certainly isn't the first time, nor is it the last), and retract the original post here.

Yes you will, unless you seriously believe trumps are 2-2 on this hand. Somehow, I don't think the question would be posted if that was the case. Edit: If trumps are 2-2, you will not need the spade finesse, but you will when trumps are 3-1. And you cannot cash the AK trumps to find out, because then it will be too late. The spade finesse must be taken first. So........ A clubs, club ruff, spade to the J.....if it loses, then we play for 2-2 trumps (and I think spades will have to be 3-3 also). If it wins, club ruff (has the club king dropped?), If the club K has dropped, we cash the heart AK and claim 6 or 7, depending on the trump break. Otherwise, cash the Ace of hearts, spade to the king, and lead dummies last club: When clubs are 4-4, RHO will follow to this trick, as you ruff with your remaining small trump, Ace of diamonds, ruff a diamond, heart K, and again claim 6 or 7 depending on the trump break If clubs are 5-3 (LHO starting with 5), and RHO pitches, ruff, followed by Ace of diamonds, ruff diamond, and claim as above. If clubs are 5-3 (LHO starting with 5) and RHO Ruffs, then pitch a spade or diamond. Win whatever he returns, play the king of hearts (hearts were either 2-2 or 3-1 and RHO ruffed with a natural trump trick) and claim 6. If clubs are 3-5, we ruff and LHO: Discards. Ace of diamonds, diamond ruff and claim. Overruffs. At this point, I think the only return he could possibly make that will hurt us would be a third spade, where his partner started with a doubleton trump and a doubleton spade. If thats the case, I think I just have to accept defeat. (Anybody got a better line? I'm sure there is one.)

Assuming I ruff and cash the spade Ace, do both opponents follow? (And I am thinking about whether or not I am ruffing trick 1 with the spade K, to possibly retain an extra entry to my hand, but haven't decided yet) At first glance, it looks like the only losers should be the spade Q and the diamond Q as long as trumps are at least 3-1. It's just a matter of figuring out what order to establish this in.

That hand has been discussed at some length a while ago. ......The reason I posted the new auction was to get the opinion of those posters You revived this thread from the dead, instead of starting a new one, and then complain when somebody answers the original question on page one, and doesn't answer your new question that is on page 4? How f*&^d up is that? Seriously, the temperment of this thread was terrible from the beginning, and if you wanted reasonable answers to the new problem, you would have been much better off starting fresh, instead of reopening old wounds and then pouring salt in them to boot.

Ok, I'll restate it then. Would you want to be in slam opposite as little as Axxxx AQx x xxxx, and surely this is a dead minimum for the auction given, right? Ok, so you may not have bid this hand this way either, but assume for a minute that you did. If so, what reason is there not to show the heart king? And not that it matters much, but personally, I think that the 4D splinter MUST imply at least a mild interest in the minor suit slam. Otherwise, why did you not just bid 5C on a hand that had no interest in 3N with a big club fit? And the only way to find the slam is by showing the heart King. 4S simply does not allow you to evaluate your hand properly. jmoo.

Imo, yes. You made a game force. You agreed clubs. You showed diamond shortness. Your hand is still unlimited. What reason does he have to not show the heart control?

1 & 4 are essentially the same question. #2, no. #3 no. (it would be forcing, but I don't think he should make one on this holding 1♥-(1♠)-2♦-(2♠); 3♠*- * This should either agree diamonds, OR show a solid heart suit (imo). After this start, the remaining auction is dependent on what the opponents do. If West doubles 3♠, North should cue 4♣, if West bids 4♠, North can bid 5♣. After either one of these calls, South should drive to slam, imo. It's just a question of whether he ends in 6♦ or 6♥. Because it's MP's, he'll probably choose the heart slam, but at IMP's, I would favor the diamond slam instead. jmoo

or shubi :D

Somehow, this doesn't surprise me. :D

This is so wrong, I can't even manage to LOL at it* *Unless the 2D opening shows some sort of diamonds+another, and even then, it gets an LOL.

In my early days of playing, when I hardly knew who anybody was, we arrived at the table of one of the local pro's. On one of the boards he was declarer and he snuck a trick through via some devious play. When I remarked that he "stole" the trick, he replied "Well, I thought everybody knew that there is a thief at this table." My partner busted up laughing as did his partner, but I had no clue what was so funny. After the game was over, my partner informed me that the pro had been convicted on embezzlement charges and served jail time because of it!!

deleted.

If partner really wanted to "takeout", he would bid 4N. Additionally, it's somewhat difficult to construct a hand that could not make a takeout X of 2S but now wants to make one of 4S. I don't even need to see my hand. Pass, wtp?

Well, this would be true, except we haven't preempted, they did. :)

And they say Chivalry is dead....

To address what kind of mistakes can be made: On defense, the most common mistakes are: Failure to count (partner's hand as well as declarer's), Failure to signal properly/signalling carelessly, Failure to pay attention to partners signals (count, attitude or suit preference). In declarer play, the most common mistakes are: Failure to count winners, Failure to count losers, Playing too fast (especially at trick 1), Failure to count suits/distribution, Failure to count hcp. Failure to establish any sort of a plan for making the contract. jmoo.

What jjbrr said, but in a longer version :huh: Example #1: Mistake#1: Applying a rule for one scenario in a situation that is not relevant. Mistake#2: Not necessarily your fault, but partner's underleading the K is also a mistake unless he has a specific reason to put you on lead. Mistake#3: Partner assumed you know what you are doing. :) Level of Severity: Depends on your level of play. A World Class player would never defend this way, so if he did, it would be off the charts in terms of severity. For an advanced-expert defender, it would be a serious error. For a beginner to intermediate, it would be a low-level error as it is simply a misapplication of principle that can be resolved in time and with practice. Being on vugraph doesn't have any actual bearing on the level of severity of the error. That only affects how many people saw you make the foolish mistake, and will only help to insure that it never happens again. :D Example #2: Although you say "two mistakes?", imo, there is only one. The initial double. Why would you want to encourage partner to do anything with this pile of garbage? Furthering the preempt in hearts (if thats what he holds) is futile. Their suit outranks ours, and we're liable to go down way too many. Even if partner's suit is spades, there is absolutely no guarantee that we can beat 2S, so that is silly as well. I disagree that not pulling the redouble is a mistake. As far as I am concerned, pulling the redouble would be another mistake. Partners failure to bid 3H should indicate one of the other hand types besides the weak heart hand, imo. So he should be expecting to beat 2S xx'd. We were headed for disaster no matter what as soon as we initially doubled on this holding. Example #3: Would you have made the hand if hearts had been 4-1 and the other declarer would have gone down? Was there any logical reason for you to play for a 4-1 break as opposed to the 3-2 break (i.e. one opponent preempted)? If this is the case, then I would not consider this to be an error. It is simply an unlucky choice. However, if you just randomly concluded to play for hearts to be 4-1, then it would be an error, the severity of which would again depend on the level of the player. Of all of the above, for the "average" player, I would rate the error in example #2 to be the most severe as there is simply no rationale behind making the double.

I think we could tell that simply by looking at our own diamond holding!! :) Maybe, but then again, they may be able to cash 3 spades first. Why do we expect spades to be 4-4? Wishful thinking? I think this is the wrong way to approach the problem. If spades are 4-4, 5D will make whenever 3N does, for the same score at IMP's, so our concern really should be what happens when spades are not 4-4. Ok, if diamonds are 4-0, and partner has the club Q and the diamond Ace, we would have 9 tricks in NT and 5D will go down, however, this is too specific to worry about, imo. If a spade is not led (against either contract), both 3N and 5D will again likely make, regardless of how spades break, so this isn't a consideration either. However, 5D gains when partner holds two small spades, spades are not 4-4 and a spade IS led. This leads me to choose 5D over 3N. jmoo.

Just curious, do you always make immediate limit raises when holding only three card support?

3♦ and X each have reasonable arguments on both the plus and minus side, I would not fault either. Personally, I tend to lean toward the negative double with this sort of holding since I can raise a rebid of 2♠ to 3♠ and if partner manages to find a 2♥ bid, I would prefer to play 4♥ instead of 4♠ on this holding. If partner converts this to a penalty X (gulp), well, at least I have two aces on the defensive side. 2♠ gets a negative score assigned if possible. jmoo.

Let me rephrase it in a less frivolous manner then. If you and your partner do not agree on what kind of hands constitute an overcall and which hands are a preempt, then you are unlikely to ever have any sort of compatible partnership. You will continually be frustrated by the differences of opinion since you will never have any idea of what kind of random hand is being bid on from the other side of the table. In the other thread, it was not the 3♣ call that created the problem, it was the 2♣ overcall. If your partner thinks that he can hold that hand one time, and then the partnership agrees to treat this hand as a preempt, the two of you will never be on the same page. This hand, while 4♣ or 5♣ is debatable, is much closer to a simple overcall than the other hand was. And that is the point I was trying to make. Take it for what its worth. That and a dollar might buy you a soda. :)

I did not know this. Evidently, Rain didn't either!! :lol: Thanks for the info, maybe that will encourage me to try the web interface more. :D

I'm aware of this all too well. That's why I asked if it had been resolved. :lol: :D Personally, I do not like the new web interface, so I don't use it, but thanks for the information. I did not know that could be done. :) BBO is no longer making any non-critical changes to the Windows client, so there's no reason to expect something like this to be resolved there. Thanks, but I don't really see how asking if something got resolved has anything to do with having an expectation of it being done in the future. Considering that the problem was originally presented nearly three years ago (and probably before that as well), it was entirely possible that it had been fixed in a prior release and I simply didn't know how to make it happen. And btw, I would consider this to be a somewhat critical issue anyway. It allows something to occur on the site that is offensive in nature. But that's just my opinion.

Given that it is the weak hand bidding 4N and also asking about the trump queen with 5H, I think its somewhat unfair to label asking about it as redundant...... :lol: What do you think 3♠ shows? Then I misunderstood what you were saying. I thought you were implying that it was redundant because the spade hand is looking at the spade queen and you had simply misread the auction.... Sry. :D

Given that it is the weak hand bidding 4N and also asking about the trump queen with 5H, I think its somewhat unfair to label asking about it as redundant...... :lol: