bluecalm

Thanks Fred. Your posts here are among the very best resources on the net for learning to think about all aspects of the game. I am gonna read more archives now :)

[hv=d=w&v=n&n=sajhaj865d5cjt985&w=s632ht943dq72cakq]266|200|Scoring: MP[/hv] Bidding : pass 1♥ - pass - 1[♠] pass 2♣- pass - 3NT, all simple and natural; I lead A♣, partner played 4♣ (udca), declared played a 7. Second trick : I played K♣, partner played 2♣. Now we don't have solid agreements here. We signal as loud as possible and ww know for sure that 2nd card is suit preference (if partner had 432 he would use 3 and 2 as SP). We are not sure what we would play if we had nothing in both H/D. One of the points of me posting this is to start discussion about such agreements. What should I play now ? What should partner signal holding say Kxx and no other significant honor. What he should signal holding both red kings ? What about Kh and Qd ? (not possible on this layout). Do you have agreements in similar situations in your partnership ?

Not many polish players would open it with 2C. We for sure would open it 1C (and treat as 15+ natural opener).

Whatever is fine by me. I would prefer Landy as I like penalty double. Another option is 2C majors, 2D = d+M, rest natural. Capp sucks hard especially in casual partnerships. So many problems after 2C overcall and their bid (what suit partner have ? how to get to know this ? what if they are in 4H and we would like to defend if partner has spade ? How to inquire for longer major/invite game opposite 2D? is it standard ? etc. etc. etc.)

Double for me. I wouldn't consider anything else. I hate to wrong side NT with marginal strength and takeout shape.

3D with the first one. I bid 4H with the second one but I think I am going down a bit more often than making, no intelligent game try there though. I think that 4H with the first one is very serious overbid even for my standards and I am game basher by nature. I would prefer to pass than bid 4H. EDIT : I've got first and second confused; i bid 4h oposite 4 trumps of course

Yeah this sucks and no world class partnertship play it. Let's change it to something simple and much better like landy or multilandy.

THanks all for the answers. It seems the problem was too simple :) Actual layout was : [hv=d=w&v=n&n=saqjht4dk7cqj9764&w=s9875432hj7dj96ck&e=shaq6532dat8542c5&s=skt6hk98dq3cat832]399|300|Scoring: IMP[/hv] Both 5C and 4H were making. We played 4H doubled :-)

Amazing hand. I think I know this hand ( or I saw something very similar somewhere else) so I won't post it. I think it's solvable at the table, would win a prize for best defence though :)

wtp ? I would consider 3H opposite negative free bid let alone forcing 2H. I don't think we are in forcing pass situation here either. I don't like overusing the convention. Pass = nothing to say is my favorite treatment in bridge.

The problem is that by making support double you will almost always play in 5-3 spade fit with your xxx o the suit instead of in 6-2 heart fit with all cards being useful and only 2diamond "losers" to care for (while in spades you need to make a lot of club ruffs and you are vulnerable to losing a lot of spade tricks. My intuition says 2H is better but I need to generate some layouts to be more sure.

Double for sure. My only problem is what to do after 3nt from partner; 4C and 4H are both possible imo. After generating some layouts I believe 4C after 3nt is winning action. We can still have 6 hearts for double and 4H right ?

I think 3NT is much better than anything else. Partner may still have 5(6?) hearts for his negative double. They didn't raise spades so he has 2-3-4 spades with 3 being the most common holding. I think I slam will not be in sight often enough and we may end up in something silly if he has : J7xx AQTx J9x xx QTx KQTxx 9x Qxx or even something stronger like : xx AQ8xx A9x xxx That being said I accept that sometimes slam is a laydown and often 5 in a minor is making along with 3nt...

Our hand : KT6 K98 Q3 AT832; imps, we only vul; pass - 2C* - 4H - ???? 2C was precision polish style; 11-14hcp, 6+C or 5C-4Major. Opponents don't have agreement about how they play 4H here but it's reasonable to assume it's very wide range. In this problem I think one action is clearly the best and it's not close. My partner think the same but about different action :wacko:

Yup, 2nt promises 2H for me too. Actually it comes up quite often. Good to discuss. If I somehow end up bidding 2NT I bid 3nt now. Too big a chance to end up in somethign very silly after 3H. Partner may have : KQx KQJxx Jxxx x for example and wants to check club holding...

Hi, My opponent left during the hand and i was kicked out of the client. After relogging i can see a table with myself but I can "sit" there. I also can't start new table. My money balance is not displaying after restarting the client. Something seems to be terribly wrong. Help please !

Which system do you prefer, which do you think is better for MPs/IMPs. What do you especially like/don't like about the systems ? My opinion : Things in favor of Polish Club: -very good 1D opening (5+ in general, 4 only with 5clubs in most versions) which allow you to preempt/find suit in competition easily -Four free openings at two level (2D/2H/2S/2NT) which can be played as something useful (usually 2D as multi and 2H/2S/2D as 2suiters) -Easy handling of 15-17 twosuiters (natural opener and natural jump rebid) -You don't have to use strong 2 no trump opening Things in favor of Precision: -you can open every 11 and many 10 counts and easily get away with it -you can jump to game quickly in many auctions giving away less information than in Polish Club -you have better 2C opener (promising 6+) -in polish club very strong (gf) hands are not comfortable if responder has a weak hand (1C -1D - 2D = any gf which is quite high) in precision it's much easier -1D is higher than 1C which has preemptive effect on the opponents if you have 11-13bal; -I think but I have no arguments other than feeling that precision 1C fares much better in competition than polish 1C My overall opinion is that two systems are quite similar. I would prefer to play precision because it is probably more fun but I have a feeling that polish club is "sounder" which means that you will play less silly contracts using it. Any comments/thoughts welcome :P

There was old saying in chess (originated from soviet players from 70's i believe) that talent is willingness to work.

There may be many problems with polish club but those 4-4-1-4 hands are not one of them. Just open 1C and hope for the best. I can't remember getting one stupid result because of this and i play this system all the time. Changing the system from 5card majors to 4card majors because of basically nonexistent problem would be pointless. THere are more systems which huge design flaws which would benefit from the change though. Try SAYC or 2/1 :P

Some polish pairs actually play that way. There are few problems : a)you have a problem with 4-4-1-4 shape and 12-14pc b)weak nt have some implicationf for competetive auctions which some people don't like (like support doubles being on that good) c)Some auctions should be redefined. For example : 1C - 1H 2H doesn't really make sense as not forcing, not invitational if 1H is typical polish style (8+, good 7). Those problems may be serious or not. The real real reason for designing the system that way is how people in Poland play. wj2005 is an attempt to standarize some agreements which are the most popular among polish players so that two people can agree on one version of polish club easily. Weak NT is not popular in Poland so it will never be in "official" wj version.

Maybe good solution would be that every "serious pair" on "serious tournament" would have to fill a form of questions/typical situations and publish it ? Even if the poll is quite big (like 100 questions on bidding and 50 on defence) it would take 2-3 hours to complete and you need only to do that once. It really can't be done in "non serious" tournaments but could be applied to say national leagues finals and major WBF/ACBL events. I for one as aspiring recreational player would love to see this and read the notes of top partnerships especially if the questions were designed intelligently by good bridge players. I also want to thanks Michael Rosenberg for his work on cc with Zia. It's the only convention card I saw which actually contains a lot of carding agreements. Very instructional. I haven't seen anything like that for any other partnership.

I am not defending description of wj2005. Maybe Jassem made a mistake of omitting those hands. What I am saying is this : a)every polish player playing polish club including Jassem will open 4=4=1=4 shape with 1C and won't consider it "problem hand". It's just standard like opening 1D with 2-3-4-4 shape in SAYC. There are many varietes of wj you open 1C with that hand in all of them (excluding some 25+years old in which you had special 2D opener for 3 suited hands) b)same applies to 4=4=4=1 and 1D opener c)as to (41)=4=4 shape: These days almost all players open this 1D. Old school was to open 1C with red singleton and 1D with black one. I don't really see the point but it was the way in old polish club systems. Jassem did make a note of 4=4=0=5 hands. Those are opened with 1C not 2C. This one is not "obvious" in the sense that some polish club players would open this hand with 2C. I hope that helps.

Not likely because natural play would be starting diamonds but even if he someone had it after heart return he will take : 3spades, 2hearts, 3diamonds + Ace of clubs = 9tricks. Well.. probably we are talking about different categories of players. For me simple mistake is a mistake which could be easily avoided if given player took his time to count points/distribution/tricks and didn't make any obvious blunders in this analysis. Here the play is about as clear is it gets so it's "simple" according to my definition. It doesn't mean it's instantly obvious for anybody even elite players without giving it a thought. I think the way to improve for me for example is to work as hard as possible to avoid such mistakes. I believe that what separates me and other "advanced" players from national top players (but probably not from world's elite) is about 5% judgement/technique and 95% getting those "simple" situations right.

When I think about it you could switch to K of clubs because you knew declared had A!C while Hamman should've really played low club just in case declared had : KQx Axx AKx Jxxx when king of clubs play blocks the suit...

Look at it from the Hamman's perspective. Rgr showed :Axx of hearts (count to first trick + queen taking the first trick) He for sure has at least one spade honour. He didn't tackle diamonds so he has 4 tricks there. So his hand is something like: a)Qxx Axx AKxx Axx b)Qxx Axx AKx Axx c)KQx Axx AKxx Axx d)KQx Axx AKx Axxx e)KQx Axx AKx xxxx f)KQx Axx AKxx xxx He will take 2 spade tricks (we know they break 3-3) 2 heart tricks 4diamond tricks and a club ace = 9 or if he doesn't have club ace he has 3spades tricks instead. Against hands c) and d) nothing helps. Against a), :), e) and f) club return is necessary. The heart play probably resulted from simple failure of counting declarer's tricks at least that would be the case with me if I played a heart.