brianshark

Just to clarify, declarer showed exactly 4 ♠s?

Since partner really wants to know about your keycards, in my opinion your bids should definitely show your keycards in some shape or other. I think intending 4♠ as to play or reject and double 5♥ as penalty is anti-partnership. Partner asked you a question, so answer. The confusion is whether, for example, 5♣ is the 5th step in D0P1 or whether it's 1 or 4 keycards as without interference. But pass must surely show 1 keycard. And if you force a correction and say you hear 5♥, I also expect pass (and other bids) there to be D0P1. (Sans other agreements obviously.)

Maybe I'm just not seeing it but I don't see any reason for a ♥ return. Even if we give partner a ruff, won't he be ruffing a natural ♥ trick of ours anyway? It seems likely (?) that partner has a stiff K or Q in ♥s. I don't think declarer would bother make a game try if he had AKQxx. If that's the case, then we have 2 natural heart tricks. Combined with our ♦ trick means we need one more. If the minors are 1-2 then we always get our setting ♣ trick so we set unless we lead a ♣ now and potentially set up ♣s for a ♥ discard later on. If the minors are 3-0 then our setting trick is a ♦. And we only need one of the diamonds which means we can afford to let him ruff a diamond which means that after returning a trump and he plays a low ♦, we must rise with the Q to protect against declarer having ♦Jxx. So trump return and rise with the Q is my play.

5% of the blame for opening 2♣. Only a small judgement issue really and tbh it's not certain opening 2♣ isn't better. 40% of the blame for the hasty 4NT. 5% of the blame for the failure to bid 6♥ which normally would show odd keycards with a void in a higher ranking suit, low because they might not play that method and maybe you don't want to risk confusion. 50% of the blame for the anti-percentage punt to 7♥.

More likely to be non-forcing playing 2/1 10+ sans other agreement.

Good defence to take 12 tricks. Declarer missed a club ruff at trick 2 though. :P

My 2 cents:

I kinda just count the tricks. Round of diamonds, so that's 4 gone. Another round, p showed out, 7 gone. I'm holding 3. Dummy has one. Dec must have 2 left. I usually can just remember who showed out when. And later in the deal, I just go by how many more or less I have in that suit than declarer. I had an extra diamond so I can pitch one safely. I had two less trumps so force him twice and I have trump parity. I also keep track of honours played but on a suit by suit basis rather than trick by trick. (But usually not to hard to recall who played what if needs be.) I also find it easy to transfer to high spots if honours get captured en masse if I'm concentrating properly. So if I want a hand pattern analysis or missing honour placement analysis, I recall the hand so far using the above counts and calculate those also using inferences from bidding, the way declarer played the hand and suit preference signals from my p. I'm not great at picking up on partner's count signals though. Probably my biggest fault as a defender.

2♦ for me.

My preference is 2♥. I like to bid my 5 card majors. Dbl second.

I vaguely recall Rodwell doubling over a 4NT intended as keycard in a similar-ish auction some point months ago on vugraph and he appeared to intende it as purely random just to test the opponents' keycard over interference methods.

I always thought the lower cue-bid is game invite, and the higher cue-bid is game forcing. I think I'd go with the fit jump, as it is perhaps the most descriptive (apart from that uber 2NT bid) and forces us to the right level as well.

About a year ago, I was playing in an individual with a field of experts and a few world class Irish players (obviously I was way out of my depth but I do well in indys for some reason). In the last session, I was playing with a certain European silver medalist, and I was concentrating so much about various suit combinations, squeezes and exit cards and when would be best to ruff with my last trump, that I forgot basics like following suit, so I revoked and ruffed a suit I still had a card left in. Then I started to ponder what was my safest exit card, and 10 seconds later, still completely oblivious to what I had just done, I exited in the suit I had just revoked in! Also, more recently, I was playing with a good player in a small club one evening, and I was particularly tired that evening that I made a few silly mistakes. Throughout the session, I opened the bidding out of turn twice, led out of turn once and I made an insufficient bid of 1♠ over partner's 1♠ response (I intended 1NT). Apart from those, my card play and bidding was spot on though and we did really well! :P

That statistic about Romanian bridge club attendances scares me. I would choose face to face over online bridge any day. It's good practice, but no substitute and not as much fun as playing in person, imo.

I suggested the two situations were similar because in both cases, 2♥ is forcing, and therefore the strong 5-5 hand *can* technically be shown by bidding ♥s twice. Theoretically, I do believe both are better as splinters. But I am wondering that absent explicit agreement, which should be the norm. I still believe splinter is, because 2♥ is forcing. But others believe 5-5 should be the default. The reason I ask is that my team mates in a teams match got that mixed up, one thought he was showing a splinter and the other interpreted it as natural. 14 IMPs out. That won't happen again in their partnership, opr in any partnership within our team because it came up. So I guess I'm just asking out of curiosity so see if there is at least majority answer.

Opps pass throughout: 1♣-1♠ 2♣-3♥ Is 3♥ a splinter or strong 5+5+ hand? 1♣ is 12-14 bal or 15+ with ♣s or any 18+ 1♠ is 7+ pts or so, and 4+ ♠s 2♣ is 15+ pts with 5+ ♣s I also think this is similar to the auction (in a natural system): 1♦-1♠ 3♥ Is 3♥ a splinter or strong 5+5+ hand?

If you have more than one 4+ card Major, you bid the longer. If they are equal, then you bid ♥s if you have 4-4, or ♠s if you have 5-5 or 6-6. The auction above need only be 5+♥s and 4♠ I think. It's just a normal reverse by responder, showing 5+4+ and GF values.

I see the relaxed club getting decent numbers though, which is nice to see. I don't really play in the masters bridge club because usually when I'm looking for a decent game, I'll join a tourney, or more likely, set up a teams match. Teams matches are the best. I suspect that that may be why the numbers aren't there that often, at least right now, but I do think it will pick up in time.

It seems that the nature of the problem suggests that North/South had an agreement that the double was not take-out but penalties. So South's not as bad as having passed a take-out double. Perhaps I will refine my original blame ratio...

And not a slam try for hearts? Either way, it's probably a cue, and 5♠ is probably a void, and 6♠ is probably asking about the ♠ ace for 7NT or something.

Dbl = "Extra points, no clear bid... do something intelligent." South's pass was not intelligent, I gave him 100% of the blame. It's possibly closer to 95%, but I have no problem rounding it to 100%.

Double is silly: Show support immediately in competitive auctions. In this example, if LHO jumps in ♠s your in trouble, because partner may have extra ♥s but can't show them because he doesn't know of your 3, so neither of you can judge whether it's more profitable to dbl for penalties or bid your game. In reality though, you've a flat hand, your NV, opps are vul, they are highly unlikely to bid 3♠ in this auction. So reason number 2 why double is silly: The only reason to delay support, or use game-tries is either because systemically you have to to show invite hands (which doesn't apply here because of the friendly overcall) or because your partner's acceptance of your game try is reliant on him soft honour values (Ks, Qs, Js, Ts... not As) in certain key suits. In this deal however, you have an easy systemic invite bid, no need to dilly dally. And you have feck all in the minors worth showing. You have a balanced hand with a decent 10 count. This is the hand for a generic invite, and 2♠ is that generic invite. I see no tactical merit and a certain amount of danger in bidding something other than 2♥ or 2♠ or whetever gadget you use to show 3 card support. As for whether it's an invite or constructive, I'm fairly neutral. I guess I'd take into account on how good my opps are, hope light my partner opens, etc, the form of scoring, etc. I don't think it's that clear at all.

in order to play systems on, you really need to be assured that partner has a 15-17/18 point hand and fairly balanced, or else the overcaller just isn't limited enough to make transfers and stayman and the like work. If that's the case, then probably a jump to 3♦ shows his hand? The idea being that there's usually little point penalty doubling with wild unbalanced hands as the opps usually have a cheap 2-level retreat spot and you still haven't shown the nature of your hand.

I guess that the only problem is that when you win cheaply in hand, cross to trump K, cash K then A of ♥s, and ruff a ♥, you've no immediate entry to hand to draw the last trump and there's a risk of a ruff or a trump promotion if they break 3-1. The only alternatives to this risk is to win the trump K at trick one, then ruff a ♥, then you have a trump as an entry... but this hopes for a 2-2 break so seems sub-optimal... or the slightly better 50% shot of the ♥ finesse instead of ruffing a ♥. But surely the risk of losing a trump while getting back to hand in a minor is less than 50%?

Right, after reading the thread and all the arguments, I'm very much of the opinion that this bid is about as legal as can be. It's just a punt. Just an educated guess as to a reasonable final contract having decided against the scientific way of investigating. It's almost an anti-convention, which in this day of scientific bidding, complex and specific treatments and regulation is somewhat of a black sheep, but there's nothing wrong with that. I think a reasonable description for it, if asked, is "To play, sometimes either strong balanced (23-27) but usually weaker with a long suit which may not be solid, and may not have stoppers in all the side suits, generally wide-ranging punt and partner is expected to pass most of the time."