junyi_zhu

2D(19-20, one suiter) 2H(relay) 2N(S one suiter, 6 or more, no side suits) 3H(4 +card support, relay, asking H) 4C(stiff H) 4D(relay) 4H(3 Diamonds) 4N(rkc) 5C 7S

if she can't beat 3C, it's unlucky IMO.

I think the most important thing is not to make simple mistakes, no matter it is bidding or playing. Tough hands are tough, you may solve them sometimes or sometimes, they are just too tough. However, simple hands are the most important components in the game. Very often, I see a lot of imps or mps are earned not because how well you play this game, but because how badly your opps play this game, no matter at what levels of this game. Very rarely, players play a perfect game in any levels of competitions. Often, you make quite a few mistakes in even one hand and as long as you don't make the last mistake, you still can win.

Gib's bidding over takeout doubles is very messy. I think the constraint is very wrong for now. Basically, when you make a takeout double, gib thinks that you must hold at least 3 cards in unbid suits and bids according to that. So when you hold a very strong one suiter and double first, be prepared to find gib bid another suit all the way to 5 or 6 levels.

Strange, a direct 6D seems very insane when he can double then raise partner's possible 4D to 6D, suppose he makes this hand. So probably his partner doesn't know this hand and he worries that his partner may bid 4C if he doubles. Anyway, 6D is certainly not a logical alternative IMO.

Well, one should usually pass with most 8 HCP hands without shortness or 5 card suits. With shortness and 4 card major(s), it's probably OK to gamble with some 8 or 7 HCP hands. Of course some 8 HCP are so good that you shouldn't treat them as 8 HCP, AT9x AT9x xx xxx, it's probably fine to push to 3NT if you don't find major suit fit, because your T9 in majors are very important. Such kind of hands are very rare though. Also, if you hold 17, then partner would pass with normal 8 HCP balanced hands, and you still think you have a reasonable chance to make 3NT, you should open 1m then.

gotta open the bidding with 11 HCP two aces and 4-4 in black suits.

I really don't think it makes a lot of sense to rate individual's bridge skill since it's a partnership game. So a simple rating system like what those chess players have should be good enough to evaluate bridge partnership strength. If you really want to evaluate individual strength, you can use the results of gib tournaments I guess, which shows your strength partnering with gib.

I don't think that's what Tyler said. I think that it would be strange to believe that bidding theory is currently as good as it will ever get. I'd guess there are improvements to be made and that some of the improvements would run afoul of current system regulations in some jurisdiction or another. I do think some things are disallowed because of randomness that comes with unfamiliarity. And, that randomness increases the likelihood that lesser players will win an event. If that's what you mean by "are better" perhaps we are actually in agreement. Bridge history is full of inventions. Curbertson's system was revolutionary and certainly a stranger to those old experts who had no idea what a forcing bid was. Precision was also such a stranger, weak 2, Stayman, almost all the conventions we play were not standard and may create confusions to those who were unfamiliar with them when they were invented. That's what has made this game so great. Now we are really in a period of lack of innovations. In my observations, in the past 10 years, there were not many new stuffs in bridge bidding theory at all. Also, few really have the ability and willing to promote creativity in this game, as Ely Curbertson did in his time. Now the law basically says that if your opps are unfamiliar with your method, your system have a good chance to be barred. Even a convention which has been invented for more than 30 years was barred by the director in this nation's most prestige competition because the players didn't bring the printed defense (they did have a handwritten version) against their world champion opps. Now, the whole competition system rewards rich people, lazy people, not creative people.

A strict rule to bid the longest suit would make GIB bid the 4 card suit of 4333 shapes, bid ♣ if you have 5♣ and 4♦ or bid a 6 card minor prior to a 5 card major. Are you sure you want that rule? I guess that GIB also has a rule that reverse bidding promises extra strength and perhaps it knows that AKQJT might be a better suit than 765432. If you ever tried to make a set of rules for bidding, you would have noticed that often rules overlap/conflict. We can assume that GIB is allowed to ignore (some) rules to resolve a conflict. Well, if you like the way gib bids now, you don't have to join this thread. Of course we are not in the same school of bidding. I really like those who usually open 1D with 4D-5C or open 1M with 5M 6m as my opponent. Still, that's even not the point of this discussion. I am talking about general bidding principles, not exceptions.

Easy pass. This hand is rather bad and you will often find the split will be bad too. Facing a minimum opener, the maximum I want to commit with this hand is 2S, which has been bid already. So, it is really an easy pass. The defensive potential is also excellent for this hand.

1D/ 1H or 1NT are all not too bad. Pass is very very bad.

Well, bridge bidding is a tough matter if you want to handle well against any other systems. And averagely speaking, bridge players don't work hard at all to improve their game. Chess or go, or poker players work way more harder than bridge players. And we have a system awarding laziness and bad players. Bridge itself is pretty much a dying game.

Of course solving all those problems case by case is possible. Still, it will be a very tedious work and a general guideline is still very important, IMO, to avoid major disasters like passing a forcing bid, failure to pull to the right suit contract when opp makes penalty doubles ( it does happen sometimes, I sometimes showed 5-5 and opp doubled me in one suit, gib failed to pull to the right 5-3 fit and left me playing in the 5-1 fit). Also, a subroutine to evaluate the number of tricks is certainly very important IMO.

Of course if 4C shows a slamish hand, it's a wrong bid. Also, even if 4C shows some slam interest, 4NT is an overbid, which is also wrong IMO. Still, the most blame goes to the bad system in my opinion. After so many rounds of bids, none of the players defined their strength before the 4C. When you can only define your strength at 4 levels, it's usually too late.

Because there is no strict rule that Gib has to bid its longest suit first.... The basic framework of gib system is very flawed. Gib doesn't follow any strict rules of how to bid a two suiter. Often, you may find gib in competitive auctions rebidding and only promises 4 or more. Often, you may find gib rebid a 5 card suit and bypass a 5 card lower ranked side suit. As I said again and again, the bidding should really be based on rules and seldom the bidding should be based on simulations, because the results of simulations are random in a limited sample size, which usually leads to unpredictable weird behavior and unpleasant experience. Also, because the bidding system is so bad, in gib's simulation, it assumes that the human's bidding is as bad as gib is. Basically, the original programmer is very poor in basic bridge bidding, a lot of basic bridge bidding rules are lacking in the gib system, including the one I mentioned above. Also, to make simulations effective, a set of basic rules still should be implemented, like: 0, respect the rules. If an auction is forcing, it is forcing. If an auction shows 4 or more, you can't bid a 3 card suit frequently. 1, bidding one's longest suit first, except when raising partner. (response to takeout double can be considered as a raise). 2, understand that bridge is a single dummy game. For example, bidding NT when it's a reasonable spot, which should never be based on a double dummy analysis because bridge is a single dummy game and many double dummy unmakable NT are very decent in a single dummy base. 3, limit the strength range as fast and as narrow as possible. For example, 1x 1y double pass 2z, this 2z shows something like 12 to 22. And when x = z, this rebid only promises 4 cards. This is actually a problem coming from the rule 2, since gib doesn't like bidding NTs, it has to invent a lot of bad or faked suit bids. Often NT bids defines the playing strength very fast and well. 4, Evaluation in a trick taking base in many situations. In competitive auctions, often it makes more sense in a trick base not HCP base. Often, you may see something like 1S p 4S 5C: showing 20 points or more, which is a nonsense. 5C just shows a hand that plays well in clubs with a lot of tricks. Also as a result, gib often raises the bid to 6 with some very bad cards, including KQ in spades. Also, if you can have a expectation of how many defensive tricks you can take, it's not difficult to make penalty doubles, which gib rarely makes.

Over the 2C 4sF, if you really want to improve your bidding accuracy, you should try a convention of 2D to show minimum. Then the responder would have a good sense where he should play before pushing it too high. Another option is to rebid 1NT over 1H. I know most don't play this style. However, this style also defines the playing strength of this hand well in the cost of a few partials. Anyway, 4sF isn't a good convention for most bridge players. It's very rough, without possible ways to distinguish the wide hand strength range from 11 to 18. Of course you can improve the 4sF a little bit by gadgets I mentioned above. Still, it has other problems.

Interesting finding. Why diamonds are so special? Aren't clubs vulnerable as well? As I remember, there was an old list, stating that diamonds are specially good for the preemptive opening value....

I think 4C should be an asking bid. 3NT's range is very very wide(about 15 to 23 HCP, sometimes good 14). So really, you want the opener to tell you more if you think 4NT is very safe. For example, when you hold 14 to 15, you may only make 4NT or you may sometimes make 7NT facing a 3NT overcaller.

Well, the tradeoffs are that: By balancing opponents may find a good lead against 3♠ when they'd otherwise be guessing. Opponents may find a way to compete to the four-level after their balance. Opponents have an easier time doubling 3♠ after the balance pushes you there. ------> With all this said, I'm not a big fan of this style. Certainly it can sometimes help you to bid to the three-level when you're not forced there (for the reasons above), but I think opponents sell to two of a major just often enough (and 3M goes down just often enough) that I'm better off waiting to be pushed rather than bidding up to 3M on my own. While the point has been made that you have a lot of other ways to try for game in a major, the big advantage of 1M-2M-3M as a game try is that it doesn't disclose much information to the opponents on defense. Well, those are minor concerns. Lead directing value is never a big concern here, because the frequency of the balance is rather low. Penalty doubles are also not important when you hold a 9 card fit playing a partial. If they can find a playable spot at 4th level, they should probably act earlier. 1M 2M 3M as an invitation is indeed not bad IMO, because often, you don't want to bid a game very clearly.

Nonsense. Go is the most difficult individual game ever invented. Without a time limit, the worse player can never beat the better one in any ten games, computers are just quite hopeless in beat human in my life time. Bridge is probably the most difficult partnership game ever invented. I also don't think computers have any realistic chance to beat human in my life time. Poker is a skilled game with a lot of luck involved and justice may not really serve in one's lifetime...When you play 10K hands, your sample size may still be too small to convince you that you are a winning player at a certain stake.

Even against weak players, it's unnecessary IMO. First, both have passed; Second, they may balance for a very small amount of time; Third, if they are really fans to balance, you can always trap with some pretty good hands once in a while to make big penalties against them at 3 level. Fourth, if they balance, they may play in the wrong suit and you may want to actually defend it. So bidding 3M only achieves when they balance and they can find their best fit which you don't want to defend, even at that time, you can still bid 3S if you don't want to defend.

This would cover auctions such as. P-1C-P-1H P-2H-P-P X Are you sure you want this double to be penalty? It would be easy for me to make it so, and to disable partner from ever simulating or pulling the double Please write out the exact rule that you would like me to implement and I'll apply it towards the next release. This double as takeout doesn't make sense to me at all. If the bidder can make a takeout double, he should double at the second round, not the third round. Of course if you implement this as a rule, a lot of bidding sequences would be much easier. Of course some "balancing" fans may not like it. That's their problem though. Another change I hope you can make in the next release is that 1x p 1y 1NT, this should be natural. Otherwise, with strong NT, you are out of bids. Quite a few players take advantage of this system flaw and psyche when white frequently.

This is just a nonsense. It's really not a tough task at all to program a pure penalty double in such kind of situations. A double after two or more passes should be penalty and shouldn't be pulled. Any simulations should not be allowed in this kind of pure penalty double situations.

Good idea. Now the program doesn't take rules very seriously. I think a few rules should be reinforced here: 1 With combined 25 HCP or more, game has to be bid. 2 With combined 33 HCP or more, slams has to be bid (except that bidding shows no controls in one suit) 3 with combined 37 HCP or more, grand slams has to be bid (unless miss trump K). I think any simulations should never override this 3 robots' fundamental laws in constructive bidding. Simulations just override way too many rules. That's why we often see gib bids 6NT with only 30-31 HCP no fit.