BillHiggin

I kind of agree with the director - "generic game try" did imply artificial, but the wording could have been better (a crime of which I am too often guilty). Will you feel better if I point out that your suggested defence does not set the contract - they will lose the first three tricks but then discard a club on the establised ♠10 and another on a diamond and still take 10 tricks. A double dummy line does beat the contract - small spade to the A, then three more rounds with W ruffing the 4th round so that a club loser remains.

You nailed it in your title! GIB is very much a Walter the Walrus. GIB has zero imagination and less judgement. GIB counts points - or sometimes generates trial hands, but does not do anything imaginative. If you make a splinter - GIB will count points. If you make a game try (any kind) - GIB will count points. Playing with GIB is like playing with Walter the Walrus. Don't use subtlety, blast and pray.

GIB does not really have the ability to revalue its hand based on fit with partner (well, it could kind of do so via simulations) so it just plods along based on HCP over LSGTs as well as over splinters. Of course, if it is GIB making the trial bid, we humans are allowed to use our little grey cells (apologies to Herule Poitot).

Thank you Phil for a well thought out reply. Unfortunately, the OP did what you have just labeled as "silly" by replacing a sequence showing one of the GF 5-4 major holdings (which depends on Smolen or No Smolen) and not specifying the replacement. Perhaps your suggestion of trans to 2♥ then 2♠ is adequate - without knowing further details, I cannot offer any opinion. In fact, it was questions about the "standard" meaning for that sequence (when I returned to bridge after a 20+ years sabbatical to raise a family) that led me to study a lot of 1N response systems. I rather quickly discovered that when it comes to standards for responding to 1N that the good news is that there are ever so many such standards (all different). For 1N 2D; 2H 2S: 1) Common with systems using garbage stayman - shows invitational values with 5♥ and 4♠ (as shown by 1N 2C; 2D 2H with invitational stayman) 2) In BBO Advanced - shows invitational values with 5♥ and 4+♠ (adds in the invitational 55 hands - but seems awkward to me) 2) With invitational stayman systems - Variations of Walsh relays - perhaps a basis for the 5-4 f1 meaning you mentioned 4) With intermediate players - whatever they happen to hold at the moment (good luck partner). +) I am sure there are others.

How nice of you to repeat the original statement slightly reworded but still with the same ambiguity. Perhaps if you used all caps or bold face then I might see the light [/sarcasm] I assume that these others are speaking of the transfer aspect of Smolen. This bothers me because the sequences used to show the GF 5-4 major suit hands before Smolen were the same sequences except with the long major being bid. Yet, I always see such statements in the context of "I want to abandon Smolen and use those sequences for some other purpose". This ignores the need to constructively bid those hands whether with or without the transfer aspect. Now, if the "others" actually do not care about finding the correct fit with 5-4 major hands then I will simply and happily avoid those "others".

Would you be so kind as to clarify: Do you mean to say that GF hands with 5-4 in the majors are not important? Or do you mean that it is not important to assure the strong hand declares the possible 5-3 fit? Or is there some other intended meaning? I would not favor giving up a way to establish a game force with a 5-4 major hand (but do not feel so strongly about the transfer) to accommodate any invitational pattern. The range for invitational hands is too small compared to the gains from improved slam bidding - but my opinion may be suspect.

If there had been no alert of 4H, then what would North think the 4S bid meant? Over a natural call of 4H (presumably to play), a 4S call could mean: 1) South just discovered a hidden mother lode spades and is trying to correct the initial miss bid of 2N. (nope - that is absurd) 2) South has an excellent heart fit and is cue bidding a spade control looking for a possible 6H contract. (aha - this makes sense) So, North who is ethically ignoring the UI that partner thinks he transferred to spades can reject the slam try and again sign off in hearts - which he did. South learns from the 5H call that either: A) His partner forgot about the Texas Transfers (but since this comes from the call he made it is AI) B) His partner is cue bidding a heart control looking for 6S (and North loves that) So, South may hedge and bid 6H (partner will correct with B) without worry (and not based on any UI). It is clear that there has been no UI infraction! Result stands!

I am going to disagree with the bidding so far! Specifically with the 1♠ call. With this shape, finding the possible 4-4 fit will often NOT work well. This hand pattern is called a "swan". It was given that name by Culbertson and he specifically warned against looking for the second suit fit. The problem is that this hand is too likely to become an entry-less pile of diamonds when it gets tapped once in a round suit early. In spite of the meager point count, it may play quite well in a diamond contract. I prefer a simple 2♦ rebid, reserving enthusiasm until partner indicates reasonable diamond support.

Hehe. Gib has been reading newest books on leads. Us olds-timers would have stuck with the tried and (possibly) true 4th best spade lead at trick one and would have had no problem. Of course, all the match points go to the defender that leads a high honor and continues with the other one (assuming East does not block the suit).

It is not allowed to use "logical thinking" and "GIB" in the same sentence! GIB does not do that! For play of the hand, GIB uses a limited number of simulations and then chooses a play base on those - which may result in very poor plays some of the time - that is just the nature of the beast.

IMHO, yes! West has a huge hand, and no fear of any two loser suit. After finding the heart fit, RKC will answer the only real questions. Splinter and then quit was way too mild. East certainly bid all of his values!

They are significantly better at "being larger". Of course, they are significantly worse at "being smaller".

Unplayable is too strong a word - unsound is certainly true. No matter what you do via game tries, you will either be missing a significant number of games where responder fits well and holds a hand in the higher end of your single raise range or you will be overboard at the three level when he holds a minimum. But, perhaps I can make a semi-constructive suggestion of a method for dealing with the large range of a single raise: Here I will specify point count ranges simply for brevity purposes - I think you should be able to translate into your favorite evaluation system. (note that when hearts is the agreed suit, that no-trump will stand in for spades) 1) Use a single step over the single raise to ask "If you have 11+, bid game, if you have 9-10 bid the cheapest suit suitable for accepting a game try, if you have 6-8, bid 3M" 2) Higher steps are a game try requiring a fitting 7-8. Responder always accepts with 9+ and rejects with any 6. By use of counter tries, one can somewhat simulate short suit tries. It is far from perfect, but then we are dealing with an unsound situation anyway. At least you will have a foundation which rules out the absurd sort of acceptance shown in the OP. Good luck (I think you will need it)

Actually, I can only speculate on the other responses possible since this was lifted from another thread. But it looks like it might well be Swedish Jacoby. I would speculate that 3♦ shows any strength with no shortness (3♥ relay for strength) and 3♥-3N show specific shortness (in steps for the other suits). In the actual given auction, this hand bid 3♣ and then showed heart shortness with a 3N call over the 3♦ ask, and a fine slam was missed when responder signed off. If I recall Swedish Jacoby correctly, a second round bid of 3♥ instead of 3N would show the heart void. If their agreements included that option, then I would call 3N a serious error. This came from the Grant Baze Senior KO, so we should not expect inexperience to be an issue.

In a Bridge Winners post, I saw an interesting issue with regard to "extra values". [hv=pc=n&s=sa5432hda5432ca32&d=s&v=0&b=11&a=1sp2n(mod%20jacoby%202N)p]133|200|spot cards are not in any way accurate.[/hv] The particular version of Jacoby 2N uses 3♣ for all minimum hands with a shortness. In my experience, it may be hard for partner to seriously consider slam when he has an Ace poor hand (and he certainly does today). However, I cannot make up my own rules for defining "extra values" on the fly (at least not if I want partner to trust me). Should our definition of "extra values" include such a control rich hand? What does make a good working definition of "extra values"?

One nice thing about standards is that there are so many to choose from. But, if you have agreed to play 2/1 with a new partner of some experience and have not had further discussions then assuming "four suit transfers with garbage stayman" will serve you well more often than not. That still leaves areas of potential misunderstanding. Without the double, I think that stayman followed by correcting a 2H response to 2S should show an invitational balanced hand with 4 spades (and certainly fewer hearts). I would not be surprised if partner had some other idea, but this is where I would place my bets.

Let us please not ask to have the bots taught a bad convention. Note that on this hand, the main advantage to a western cue auction is that we get to watch partner fail in 3N instead of us failing in a heart contract.

Call the director! "Bid out of turn!"

I have a simple reason to prefer 2N over a splinter under these conditions. Since I have a bot for a partner, I must keep in mind that bots tend to be walter the walrus when it comes to hand evaluation (they count HCP and have zero or less actual judgement) so, I choose the path where I will most likely be the one to make the judgement call. So, I ask about its hand rather than tell about mine and with this deal, that works well.

OMG - what a turnaround.

I would not for even one second consider any invitational sequences for this monster. If partner has a heart-club two-suiter, then I may get us too high on the misfit, but that will not be a first (or last). For much of my life, I would have always chosen to start with diamonds and reverse into spades (but we must be careful about our agreements re 1C-1D-1H-1/2S sequences). I have now switched to a more pragmatic approach to bidding 5M-6m hands. I tend to bid them as if they were 5-5 (i.e. major first even when minor is longer) unless we have some specific agreement. Too many times, the auction has gotten out of hand before I am actually able to convince partner that the major is really a 5 banger. So, I would start with a 1♠ bid intending to make a game-forcing call in diamonds next. If partner rebids 1N (I will be elated as now the misfit is no longer an issue) and we are playing normallish xyz, then a 3D rebid would seem appropriate (5S-5D, GF, values concentrated in long suits).

Given the op assertion that they play walsh responses, then it most certainly is NOT both natural and only forcing for one round. I thought the more common agreement was 1S as artificial FSF and 2S as natural and GF - the other way around is also playable, but certainly responder would have skipped the 1D bid holding 4 spades and less than GF values (some may have a different threshold for walsh, but that would have been mentioned).

Or - there are three kinds of bridge players, those that can count and those that cannot!

Give it your favorite sugar coated name, the rest of us know "masterminding" when we see it. This is NEVER a good foundation for a partnership.

No, it may be somewhat fair but "absolutely" is absolutely too strong a word here. It is quite possible that the two top teams from the round robin are not the two best teams, but are simply the best at really stomping on the bottom teams.