PhantomSac

FWIW I totally agree with you, I would never pass 1D. I think people get caught up in "well we overcall light, we might be in 1N with LESS THAN HALF THE HCP!!!!," but RHOs pass is a huge clue. Either they are broke or have a trap pass. The latter is not that likely albeit possible when we have the DA and an 11 count, far more likely is that they don't have enough to bid. In that case bidding 1N is pretty safe and partner being at the higher end of his range is more likely. I mean I would overcall KQT9x and out without blinking an eye. But partner doesn't have that! RHO would not have a trap pass, nor would he be broke if that were the case. A large part of overcalling a 6-17 range (or even wider, I would overcall with 5 or 18 sometimes) and handling it is trusting the opps a little. When RHO passes partner is probably not airball unless a trap pass (again unlikely given our hand). When RHO starts bidding and we have 15, partner is always airball, bid accordingly.

People, especially top chess players I have talked to, often ask about this. Chess players are very regimented, they go over opening repertoire, their next opponents openings, study endgames, go over games of top masters, and do tactics problems. It is all easy to regiment. In bridge, I don't think this is really the case. What are we going to go over? How to do certain types of squeezes? Double dummy problems? That is the easy part of the game. The hard part is staying sharp, making good judgements in bidding and in play/endgames. Those are hard to study, they are all situational. The reality is that bridge is simple enough relative to chess to not go over technical parts that much once you reach a certain stage. It's about making the right inferences and improving your judgement (hard to tell). Those things are best done by playing and talking with good players about your thoughts and reasoning. You get feedback like "that play is too big" (translation: I understand your clues but you are weighting them too high vs a priori odds), or obviously this guy has the queen (meaning whatever has happened, it is obvious to good players who has what and just back that despite everything else), etc etc. Bidding is even more reliant on talking with good players so you know if you're crazy, in the game, or automatic. The things I think top pairs really go over in a regimented way are bidding system and defensive carding. If you play a lot, going over defensive ***** ups is really important, just go over what each of you was thinking, card by card, why you think your partner should have figured it out, etc etc. That exercise will leave you understanding your partner way more. If you understand how each other thinks, you will get much better and fluid at defense. Bidding, that can be done in partnership bidding or in challenge the champs or w/e. But I think at a certain stage everyones constructive bidding is good enough, its competitive agreements that matter. I don't play a lot of conventions in competitive bidding, but knowing what stuff like doubles and 2N bids are are very important. Knowing stylistically what to expect based on vul, opps, state of the match, etc is very important and hard to get down in partnership bidding. Bidding when they don't bid is pretty easy, bidding when they are pressuring you and in different states of the match is a lot harder and more complicated. A lot goes unsaid but going over boards in those kinds of situations is important. Basically, I think it's hard to just have a regimented practice session of bridge. The best thing the aces did was go over hands and talk to each other (top players). That helped with cardplay, judgement, etc. That is what happens at bridge tournaments (at least in USA). The top players go to a room and drink and hash things out and have really heated arguments. Sometimes fist fights are close! Sometimes bonds are formed, lol. But bridge is not such a technical game where it's all about studies. Yeah, I could know my squeeze plays better, and I'm no Michael Rosenberg. But I doubt there are many squeezes that come up in real life that I don't execute that a more technical guy would. More important is my judgement in bidding, my judgement in endgames about how to weight clues, my judgement in how my partner will play/bid in X situation, and my agreements in both bidding and defensive cardplay. Since those are all situational and non scientific, the best way to learn is to play a lot and talk things over with great players and also with your partner. I don't know the bridge climate in Australia but if you don't have that readily avaliable, I would suggest a skype study session (AKA ***** on each other and hash ***** out, preferably while drinking), or an email list where everyone involves argues vocally for their point and calls each other retards etc. I know most people will think I'm RETARDED for saying it that way, but the best bridge discussions I've had have been with Brad Moss or Bobby Levin or Geoff Hampson where they tell me what an idiot I am and argue their point passionately. Ofc I would not treat others that way, but your peers know they are your peers and don't have to be diplomatic. You are a poker player and this is exactly how you get better at poker. Know fundamentals, talk with people nonstop about spots and thought process, etc etc. Poker is way closer to bridge than chess is.

Heh, well it is one of the only layouts that enables us to beat it. If we are defending in reality they are basically always making with hearts 2-2 and diamonds somewhat friendly. We need to take 3 spades and 1 diamond... It is more like a textbook study to find a layout where we can beat it, the first one is the most obvious but I still don't understand showing 1 suited clubs instead of C+another with that kind of hand. Since this was posted I would have guessed that partner had either AQTx of spades and stiff Q of diamonds and the CA (overtake) or Qx of diamonds and AQT of spades and the CA (don't overtake). Both are obviously very unlikely but when posted as a problem it must be one or the other. Neither makes a lot of sense to me but in real life those are often the kinds of decisions you have to make; I don't think either of these things should be happening so which is more likely?

They play 2 different systems depending on vul, strong club or natural. In their strong club auctions they have some relays.

I prefer to bid 2d. The downside is that partner might be 1534 but won't be 1354, but it is a small range that makes a neg x with that shape anyways. The upside is partner is less likely to make an aggressive game try/game bid IMO. And if the auction gets competitive he can usually count on me having 4 hearts when I bid 2h (sometimes he can rule out 5323 or his guess is simply more likely to work). I am not at all sure what the general consensus is on this though, it's just what I do, interested in more opinions and your thoughts.

I assume the question is whether to overtake the diamond to ensure we get in when partner has stiff Q of diamonds. The obvious type of layout where this is necessary means declarer has 3 spades and is going to pitch one on the long diamond. For example Kxx Jxxx AJx QJx. The problem with this kind of layout is that partner has shown a 1 suiter on AQTx xx Q Axxxxx which seems silly. Also they superaccepted with a 4333 which is somewhat possible I guess since it's a competitive auction. I thought about maybe partner being 7-4 and declarer having 5 hearts, that makes showing a 1 suiter more attractive and superaccepting more attractive, however we asked partner to compete and he would have bid 4C with those hands. It seems like declarer must have 4 spades since partner shouldn't have 4 of them. I then considered if maybe it was necessary to overtake when declarer has FOUR spades in order to prevent a strip and endplay when partner has exactly AQ8 of spades. E.g. declarer has KTxx Jxxx AJx Qx. If duck the diamond declarer ducks. Partner plays a trump and declarer can easily arrange to ruff 2 clubs and lead a spade to the ten. If we overtake the diamond it seems like declarer can just do the same thing quite easily so it doesn't help. That being said I'm having a hard time coming up with reasonable examples of overtaking the diamond ever costing, just when partner has led the Q from Qx, stuff like declarer having Kxxx Jxxx AJ QJx. That gives a pretty bad 3H bid and a pretty weird lead (trump seems normal). So ya I dunno, I would probably overtake but it doesn't seem like it should matter unless partner (and the opp) made a weird bid or a weird lead.

I would basically always bid a 3 card red suit in this auction. Maybe I might try 2S on KQJTx or something, but I don't remember not bidding 2red with these patterns. With 5(31)4 I would usually pass, but obviously depends on my hand.

3n

It is definitely borderline, I think at this vul it's right to pass.

Absolutely this kind of hand is possible, but the opponents are going to do quite well in spades and probably not so well in diamonds when partner has this hand type. They can ruff diamonds to dummy etc, best case we probably get 2 clubs 1 heart and 1 spade so they can make 3S. Bidding 1H will probably hurt us more than it will help us in this scenario. Bidding 1N might work, but partner will bid at least 2N and if they lead a spade we won't make, if they lead a diamond we might not even make (or we might). But 1N has other dangers, for instance partner might bid 2S if he has 5 spades. Even given this scenario it's not clear that passing will not be best, and it will very likely be better than 1H. QJx of diamonds is really a bad holding.

Sry I crossposted with mike on my last post...coulda just said I agree with him. Bill if you are bidding 1H because you think your hand is good enough to justify it (ie, it might still be your hand even when partner has spades and was not strong enough to bid 1S or X 1D), I think that is a reasonable view. Our hand is pretty good and partner could have some 5233 4 count where it is our hand for instance. But I think you should back away from your approach of bidding since you don't want them to play 1m at MP. With this shape for instance you should basically almost always pass unless you have 17+ at least. And that applies to most hands that have 3 or 4 diamonds, you need significant values to balance. The same goes for something like 1444 if it goes 1x (where x is not spades) p p and you are w/r, you would need a lot of values to consider bidding because your partner didn't overcall 1S or make a takeout X so either the opps have spades or your partner doesn't have much values/has length in their suit (in which case you will do well defending as you have more trumps than them). Balancing too much just because is a common thing but it is not good. I also think people balance too much with Hx in LHOs suit but that is a different story.

Bidding 1D with AQxx xx AKxxxxx --- is totally normal, it will almost never go 1D AP. Doubling and bidding with a 13 count is often not going to end well. I think bidding 1S with KTxxx Axx x xxxx as a passed hand is normal, I would never consider passing esp white as a passed hand. You would probably find some support for Xing with AJxx A AKxxxx xx but doubling with underweight HCP hands and a stiff in a major is very dangerous, if partner bids a lot of hearts you have to go back to diamonds which could find you too high or overbidding your hand etc. I think most people would bid 1D, if the auction stays alive (which it is likely to) you will be well placed to double or bid spades later.

I am in the camp that leads a diamond on this auction, but had it been 1N 2D 2H 3N I would lead a spade

4S looks very normal, I expect to make it.

Looking for non americans in Bali I found: Buras-Gregorz http://www.ecatsbridge.com/documents/files/WBC2013/BermudaBowl/Poland/buras-narkiewicz.pdf Verhees-Rico http://www.ecatsbridge.com/documents/files/WBC2013/BermudaBowl/Netherlands/vanProoijen-Verhees.pdf Townsend-Bakhshi http://www.ecatsbridge.com/documents/files/WBC2013/BermudaBowl/England/townsend-bakhshi.pdf Korbel-Wolpert http://www.ecatsbridge.com/documents/files/WBC2013/BermudaBowl/Canada/Korbel-Wolpert.pdf But it does seem like it's much more common for top American pairs to not play puppet than anywhere else. I would guess more than half don't e.g. Greco-Hampson http://bridgewinners.com/convention-card/print/eric-greco-geoff-hampson Hurd-Wooldridge http://bridgewinners.com/convention-card/print/hurdwooldridge Berkowitz-Sontag http://bridgewinners.com/convention-card/print/david-berkowitz-alan-sontag Pepsi-Seamon http://bridgewinners.com/convention-card/print/copy-of-mseamon-jpszczola Rosenberg-Willenken http://bridgewinners.com/convention-card/print/michael-rosenberg-chris-willenken Bathurst-Moss http://usbf.org/docs/2014usbc/acblcards/MossBathurst.pdf etc etc etc. That list is largely youngish people, but I also don't play puppet with anyone nor does joe grue, roger lee, josh donn (unless he's changed) and most of the young US players. I think an older expert is more likely to play puppet than a younger expert here (except when you get to the over 70 range).

This is extremely common, I prefer to play this way when playing standard.

More total masterpoints are awarded with multiple sections.

You're right lots of people do this and it seems totally improper to me. Would it be ok to say out loud "partner, I am thinking about the hand, I have no problem on this trick"? Because that is also what you are doing when you do this. And what if your opp has never played against you and your partner has, if you don't put your card face down at trick 1 and you are thinking your partner knows you have a problem on this trick but your opponent does not (since it is not required and declarer will not know if you are thinking about trick 1 or the hand). That is unless of course you say to declarer "I am thinking about this trick, not the hand," which I have never seen anyone do. As declarer do you tell the opponents whether you are thinking about trick 1 vs the hand?

It's TRICK ONE! Did you read gnasher's post in this thread?

You want to give someone a PP for taking time at trick 1? Wat? I just want to clarify, was the trick 1 play slow or was the trick 2 play slow? That is a big difference. If he won and thought for a long time before playing the DQ that is bizarre but if he took time at trick 1 before playing what is the problem?

Playing strong NT I like for pass to be non forcing since 1N X might just be the best spot (and it puts pressure on third hand sometimes). So I just play: 2C=C+another 2D+D+major 2M=nat XX=1 minor or both majors Does not guarantee getting to the best spot but you can show your 2 suiters and you can bid 2M nat which is a good preemptive bid.

Did the hesitation also jedi mind trick you into believing that that is a valid argument?

It depends on your hand. High cards are not everything.

BBOskill no longer updates afaik

lol