fromageGB

Ken, you would be in trouble if, as you say, the call SHOWS a known suit, because even though you know it, you haven't shown it. But in fact, you are OK to pass because the "rule" actually says that you HAVE a known suit, not that you show it. All's well that ends well.

Actuall you have had such a hand, I'm sure, a hand with a couple of undisclosed extra length, so with a 10+ card fit you don't need to bother about the queen. But of course you would then just make the king ask and not bother to ask for the queen.

I see that aquahombre types quicker than I do !

My partnerships all play Kickback, and for me this is always the queen ask. I agree with Nigel that there is room in this particular auction for it to be natural, and similarly fear the possible consequences. However, I think it is costless, but maybe that depends on your methods. Why are you asking for the queen? It must be because if partner has it, you will not sign off in 5♦ but will go on to ask for kings, committing to the 6 level. Otherwise you would not ask, but simply bid 5♦. Therefore the response to the queen ask is to sign off in 5♦ without the queen, but with it you bid higher with your normal king response. Nothing lost. My king ask is 5 of the asking suit (ie 5♥ with diamonds agreed) and the responses are to bid the grand with all 3, bid the minor slam with 0, and with 1 or 2 bid the cheapest. The king of the asking suit is shown by bidding NT. Therefore there is always room to find every king. (If partner's cheapest king is not the one you wanted, you bid the wanted suit for him to bid the grand if he has that as a second king, but the small slam if not.) In fact there is a minor gain if the answer to the queen ask is the king response if the queen is held. If 5♥ asked for kings, 5NT would deny the king of spades and show the king of hearts. But if 5♣ asked for the queen of trumps, teller with the queen would bid 5♥ to show the heart queen. What you have gained is the loss of the need to remember that NT shows the king of the asking suit!

I can't really understand this comment, either. (1) The RUNT 1NT is not intended to be left to play. Partner is supposed to bid something. It is therefore a takeout. (2) You are quite prepared to play in any of the other 3 suits. It is therefore a 3 suited takeout. Destructive? It is partially destructive, but so is a mini NT, or a weak 2, or a weak 3. And it is also constructive. You will be bidding to the correct level of the LAW. Partner may have a 5 card suit, so an 8 card fit at the 2 level is good, and even if he does not, a 4 card suit puts you into the right level if it is a lower ranking suit than theirs. And face it - a RUNT does not guarantee 4 cards in opener's suit. You are allowed to make this bid with 4 cards in the takeout suits.

Ths comment ( and other similar ones) do not make sense to me. Do you have a rule - call it a gentlemen''s agreement - that against weaker opponents you do not open or overcall on ANY hand with less than 12 HCP, and that you do not bid at all once both the opponents have bid, because the weaker opponents may not know how to cope effectively? To me, the rules of the game apply to everyone. This is a legal bid, and Ken correctly explains it. If you do adopt a more restricted set of methods against weaker players, then how do you know whether opps are weaker or not, unless you have played against them for years? Some LOLs are good and highly experienced players. (EBU level 2 means that you can play it at the knitting circle's bridge evening. All bridge clubs that I know allow level 3 or 4.)

I would have thought a forcing or semi forcing pass puts a big strain on a partner who is balanced. Do you want to defend 1NT doubled when the NT bidder often has a long minor? Maybe the onus is on opener to protect if he does not have a balanced hand. Like AWM I think bidding a lower ranking 4 carder is worthwhile. If responder has no support but does have a 5+ card suit then he should bid it non-forcing, or if you give up a penalty double, transfers are better.

Yes, I would open 1♣. After the double I would be very happy to bid 2♥ so am happy over their 2♠ to bid 3♥.

Absolutely with peachy. If double shows hearts (not guaranteed!) then 4H is natural regargless of what their bid means.

At least with a convention card you have an opportunity to write something that describes what you do. Not so with announcements. Here in EBU-land I am compelled to announce "weak" when my partner opens 2M on a 5 card suit and 9 to 11 HCP. If that is not misleading, what is?

Certainly it is a help if opener can be sure that you have 4 trumps, as he can then plan on ruffing in your short suit. But there is another reason to have 4 - if you only have 3 card support, you must have a 5 card suit you can make a 2 over 1 or other natural bid with. Then when you follow with trump support, cue bidding enables either side to determine how many tricks the side suit is worth, and you also show the control in your shortage suit. (Opener does NOT cue bid a shortage in your long suit) Much more information is conveyed than would be by making an initial splinter.

I would have said myself that the top limit is considerably lower, probably more like a 12 count. The problem with having an unusually strong hand is that you are contradicting yourself. By making a splinter you are describing your hand so that opener can make a judgement as to where to go. If your range is huge, how can opener make a decision? You have to make it yourself, so there is no point in making a splinter. With a stronger hand, it is probably better to start with an artificial bid such as 2NT. Now opener can describe his hand so that you are in a better position to make the judgement.

I would open neither of these as a strong 2, and am happy to bid 1♦ with both. However, according to the EBU, both qualify as strong 2s if you want to.

Making the jump shift game forcing seems to have negatives when opener may have anything up to say an 18 count and therefore has to rebid 2♣. Responder with his 8 count has to go on, so rebids, maybe 2NT, and then finds opener has only 12 and you're playing 2NT when opponents have half the pack. Surely 12-18 is far too big a range for a 2524 shape 2♣ rebid? 3♣ one-round force would be nice ...

Well, I never knew that. I thought it was still just a one round force. Most people round here open 2♣ with the sort of hand that would want to GF opposite a random 6 count, with 2♦ (perhaps as part of a multi) being the GF open. I think the answer is that the jump shift is only GF if 2♣ is your only strong open.

Agreed. A key point here is the doubleton spade. Make the hand one spade and two diamonds, then I'm stuck. I pass.

4♠ is kickback self-agreeing hearts. I certainly use kickback without explicit trump agreement, though it needs loads of discussion of principles when there is no explicit agreement and it is not a jump. But I don't like opener's bidding as 3♥ would have been game forcing, and a better prelude if he intended hearts as the only possible contract. 4♦ would have asking in clubs, 4♥ would have been natural as he failed to support diamonds earlier. 4♠ doesn't make sense as a cuebid with clubs as trumps, because you get much more info starting with 4♦. On these hands, good bidding upto 3♦. I prefer 3♥ to 3NT. 4♣ is definitely right, you want to emphasise the suit and slammish nature. However, opener is rock-bottom minimum : having bid 3NT on the last round I would now choose 4♥. That makes it tricky for responder...

With one partner I play transfers, and have found this very useful. It gives up the ability to defend 1NTX but I have never missed it. 1M (1NT) X is a transfer to clubs, 2♣ a transfer to diamonds etc. Transfers of course put the overcaller on lead when partner is playing in your long suit. The transfers also come in handy when you can show a lower suit and then rebid 2M to show secondary support. We play transfer to M shows a full strength raise, possibly with a shortage, as opposed to a 2M that may be bid on few values and just length. Having said that, I do not think the ability to show 2 types of raises is worthwhile with a strong NT over opener (do you ever want to invite game?), so you could play this with Andy's good idea to show 52 in the majors. (Our methods fail when the opener has hearts and responder has spades.) So over 1♥ (1NT) : X = clubs 2♣ = diamonds 2♦ = heart raise of any sort 2♥ = specifically 5 spades and 2 hearts The OP specified a major open, but again, in agreement with the others, over a minor open I agree it can be handy to show both majors. X does that for me, as we play standard defence to a 1NT open, where X = both majors or 5cm+4cM. As this X shows some values (~7HCP) opener has the option of passing with a stronger hand. (Not the case with the Major open, as a transfer to clubs may be made on a weak hand.)

Agree with Mbodell, I think Bergen takes away their room and wins the day. If you keep the 3m bid for the rare jump fits, you will be giving the hand to the opponents too often. But why reverse Bergen? 3♦ is useful as an inquiry over the wider range normal 3♣. Is it for the additional preemptive value with weaker hands?

Yes :) Like - what on earth does that mean.

My partnership agreement is to ignore the double and bid the hand as you would with no double, so for me 3♠ is preemptive. In a pickup I would expect 3♠ to be preemptive in the absence of discussion, and an invitation to go via XX then 3♠, while an initial 2NT would be natural.

Actually, I think the bidding for the first 2 rounds makes sense. The basic system was not mentioned, but it seems to be a sort of benjamin style : 2♣ = strong hand, 8+ playing tricks, not game forcing, not good enough for the game forcing 2♦ open. 2♦ = almost obligatory relay, as one of the options included in the 2♣ open is a weak 2 in diamonds. 2♥ = strong 2 in hearts. 3♣ = I have something useful here It then gets a bit murky. Opener may not have been sure that 3♥ would have been forcing, given that the opening is not GF, so made sure with 4♥.

This is where I beg to differ. Assume you have agreed that 4 clubs shows a control in the suit and confirms diamond support (as my partnerships do - ignoring your reference to "expert") then when you follow his 4♦ with 4♥ this says " I know you have not shown club control, but I have, so don't worry". Partner knows you are acknowledging his limitations but still continuing with cue bidding. Nothing is going to stop him bidding the slam with ♣xx. As Jlall says.

True to a degree, but opener's 4♦ was bid when 3♥ was available, and he already knows you have 5 hearts while you may not necessarily have shown 5 diamonds. So he is emphatically supporting diamonds in preference to hearts. In my view diamonds is the suit. If not playing kickback then I certainly would expect partner to take 4♥ as a cue. Having said that, I don't think I want to cue. Partner's rebid of 2M followed by nothing spectacular in my book shows a 12-14 hand, and his lack of a club cue probably denies ace or king, so I think I'll just bid 5♦. (To play :-)

Prompted by a related thread, I thought it would be worthwhile to create a discussion on the responses when you use kickback. In kickback the ace asking bid is one up from the trump suit at the 4 level. Often the trump suit is explicitly agreed, but in a possibly ambiguous situation you might want to adopt the guide-rule "if a jump to 4 could be ace asking, it IS ace asking". For a simple but silly example, if it goes 1♥ 2♦(GF) 4♥ then 4♥ is not to play, but is ace asking in diamonds. If you wanted to play in 4♥ you would make some other bids that did not show diamond support, then bid 4♥. A partnership considering kickback needs to discuss this. The following is a good method of responses, but I would be interested to hear of any better. Some play RKCB responses, but I don't like the possible uncertainty over the 0 or 3 and the 1 or 4. If you only play 4NT as the ace asking bid you have to compromise like this, but with kickback you have the room for something else. This is my preferred method. There are 5 aces, the king of trumps counting as the 5th ace. 1 step = 0 or 1 ace 2 steps = 2 aces 3 steps = 3 aces without the queen of trumps 4 steps = trump suit = 3 aces with the queen of trumps Very simple, almost Gerber :) What about 4 aces? If you did show 4 aces somehow, asker will then want to continue to bid the slam directly or ask for kings, so if you have four aces, in response to the ace ask you immediately bid above the level of 5 trumps and give the answer you would have made to the king ask (see later). If asker does not have the queen of trumps, but is interested in bidding a slam if teller does, over the first 2 of these she will bid the next step to ask. The replies for the 0 or 1 ace response are : 1st step = the one below trumps = 1 ace without the queen 2nd step = trumps = no aces bids above 5 trumps are therefore showing one ace with the queen, and the bid the teller makes is to immediately give the response he would have made to the king ask. The logic of this is that by making the queen ask, asker is saying she wants to bid a slam if teller was the maximum for the reply. If not, she would have signed off in trumps at the 5 level. For example, if asker has all the kings she needs, and 3 of the 5 aces, she wants to bid 6 if teller has an ace. If he has no ace, she will stop at the 5 level. So by having the ace and the queen, teller is justified in giving the kings straight away. Whatever the king, it is still below the small slam level. Similarly if the ace response is 2 aces, the response to the queen ask is 1 step = trumps = no queen higher bids, the king response, = has the trump queen. Of course while the queen of trumps is normally a critical card, if you know from the bidding (but maybe your partner doesn't know) that you have 10 trumps between you, you can take it as if you did have the queen, as you expect it to drop, and even if it doesn't, there's half a chance it will finesse. If asker knows the partnership has all the aces, and wants to know about kings to decide whether to bid the grand, she makes the king asking bid. This is a bid of the same suit as the ace asking bid, ie one above 5 trumps. As the king of trumps counted as an ace, there are now only 3 kings to show. These can be shown explicitly, as sometimes it is not the number of kings that matters, but specific kings. A point sometimes forgotten is that king asking commits you to 6 anyway, so there is no point in asking if you are missing an ace. Another point to remember is that by king asking, asker is saying the grand slam depends upon the right kings being held. The kings are shown as follows. No kings - sign off in the small slam. 3 kings - bid the grand slam. 1 king - bid that suit to show it. 2 kings - bid the cheaper king. What do you do if you have the king of the asking suit? You show it by bidding NT. This is the "displaced king". When you have 2 kings, you bid the cheaper. The cheaper king is the one that can be bid at a lower level, not necessarily the lower ranking. If teller has the ♣K and ♥K when diamonds are trumps, to the 5♥ king ask he replies 5NT. This is a cheaper bid than 6♣. If asker was needing the spade king, the reply of 5NT denied it, so she signs off in 6♦. However, if the grand depends on holding the club king, location as yet unknown, she asks for it by bidding that suit. Over 6♣, if teller has that king he bids the grand slam, but if not he signs off in the small slam. Of course once asker knows the situation, she is at liberty to convert the suit slam to no trumps if desired. It is an easy and useful method. Whatever the trump suit, the ace and queen situation is known and you can always stop in 5 if necessary. You can show exactly what kings you have, and you can always stop in 6 if insufficient. You will notice that there are limits : if partner has no aces at all, you cannot ask for the trump queen. But I cannot remember the last time I had all 5 aces myself.