el mister

The rebate is definitely the strongest field for a bbo robot game but you still get a lot of variance - sometimes it feels like you're playing a room full of experts where any sub-optimal line is a bottom. Othertimes you can feel comfy sitting at 60% all game - just depends who is on. Zenith is not best hand so that is going to be a different, harder game - you'll be defending more often with a robot. I don't think best hand needs a mad exploitative style, but obviously there are quite a few things you need to do differently. So you need to adjust your rebate best hand style for zenith if you're not doing that already.

Thanks - we'll try that latter simple structure out and see how we go with it.

Thanks David - one follow up q if I may, how would one deal with the loss of a normal negative double over their 1S (to show hearts) as this seems quite significant? e.g. 1C (1S) ? Is it playable to actually define X here as hearts, and then have 1N from responder as a natural bid?

We play transfer responses for our 1M openings with competition - works very well. Is there any reason not to do this for our 1m openings? We have 1C as T-Walsh and 1D as unbal D. With competition (apart from X) we've just played systems off as that seemed like a good starting point to learn the system. Now we're more fluent would it be a normal thing to introduce when opps overcall? e.g. 1D (1H) then X would be spades, 1S would be 1N type with a H stop etc?

Thanks for all the responses - very helpful. One follow-up question - if you play a transfer structure over 1♦ - p - 1M - p does it make sense to keep it on with 1 level interference? Say 1♦ - p - 1♥ - 1♠ back to you. Without the overcall 1N would be clubs, 2♣ would be 6 diamonds, 2♦ would be 3 card H raise etc. Systems on feels right to me but could well be missing something.

We are learning an unbalanced 1♦ opening to go with our transfer walsh 1♣ (ty to Gwnn for his excellent yt vid on T-Walsh which got us started). Using a transfer response structure from 1N which seems popular from stuff I've read on here and BW. My question is about the specific hand type 4-1-3-5 / 1-4-3-5 ie three diamonds. Is it common to open this 1♦? You obv have a lot of options with follow ups so in an uncontested auction I guess it's fine. But with interference it seems like you could run into difficulties with opener potentially only having 3.

Do you adjust your preference for playing in 3N v 4M when playing with robots? Feels like I've got on the wrong side of quite a few of these decisions recently, so wondered if the experienced rebaters might be looking at things differently - e.g. does Gib defend 3N worse than a suit contract so there is more value playing there if it is a close decision?

Oh right I see - club before heart. Thks both, looks like I erred with AS and needed to cash KD earlier.

I was wondering if there was an endplay situation as I know Gib can take some actions that seem strange, but are logical to avoid an endplay. Here, though, if they win QH correctly they are endplayed in spades - but can't they just exit a club? There's no way to get three diamond discards so they must concede KD to go with the QH = down one. May well be missing something...

Played this hand recently where Gib lashed a certain winner into the bin - After A trumps has gone Gib holds Qx trumps over KJxx and puts the Q under the king. [hv=pc=n&s=sak4h864dkqjcjt74&w=s2hkjt952dat983c9&n=st853hq73d64ck863&e=sqj976had752caq52&d=s&v=b&b=7&a=1n(15-17)2hp2np3dp3np4hppp&p=s3sqsks2djdad6d7h5h3hah4d2dqd3d4sah2s5s6hkhqc2]399|300[/hv] No words for this doubleplusungoodantibridge - until I realised why it had happened (spoilered if you want to try and figure it out)

Adding to this after playing it a while - it seems to be working ok for us. Certainly the core idea of discriminating major suit raises is massive, but we've had a few times where pard is stuck for a bid holding a natural 2N sort of hand. e.g. 1♠ - 2♥ (overcall) to pard holding something like a balanced 10 no fit. We don't currently have 3♣ defined - is it reasonable to use this bid as a catch-all invitation? Like 10+ no fit.

Say you have a GF auction agreeing hearts, and pard bids 4NT. You've agreed to play 4S as keycard asking for hearts, so almost certainly pard has had a memory lapse and thinks you're playing normal RKCB. What are your options here? Assuming 4N has no meaning in your system, that would make pass unreasonable so you just have to bid 5H? Say then pard takes your 5H bid as two without the queen, thinks that looks great so bids 7H which makes. Have the opponents being damaged and are due some level of adjustment?

Playing a simple T-Walsh system where acceptance of the transfer denies 4, we seem to be wrong-siding 1N quite a bit when p has a weak hand. e.g. 1♣ - 1♦ - 1♥ (3 or less, typically a weak 1N-type hand) pard with a weak / flattish hand will often have to bid 1N, and then get to play it. Is there any way around this or just the way things are with a structure like this? Still early days for us with T-Walsh but I've noticed this issue come up quite a few times as it is a common hand type.

Just started playing a basic transfer response structure after we open a major. If RHO doubles, or overcalls 1♠, is it reasonable to play an iterative one-under ladder of responses e.g. after 1♥ X then: XX = spades 1♠ = 1N 1N = clubs 2♣ = diamonds 2♦ = solid heart raise 7-9 2♥ = weak heart raise We're just starting with it so something easy to remember is good, but wasn't sure about the 1N bid - is there value in having a natural 1N there for responder? What's a typical structure here? Thanks.

Ty nullve I made a mistake with the bidding and have corrected the diagram. It wasn't quite what you suggest - it was the wk2 opener who raised ♦ which I (S) doubled, passed out.