wank

i would bid 4d over 3h. as an aside, it's pretty much universal among stronger players to play 2h as forcing. as 2h is forcing, 3h is available for something more useful. common uses are a splinter in support of diamonds or an invitational hand with 55 majors, with a stronger hand bidding 2h and 3h.

there are other refinements you can make to the sim that would favour returning to hearts. would you transfer with 5 low and a balanced 6 count? i know i wouldn't. i'd content myself with stayman. there is a bias towards partner's suit being chunky just because he bothered to show them.

playing normal methods it would go 1c-1h-1s-2d-2nt-3h-4h-4nt-5h-6h. north doesn't have enough space to get enough info, so he'll just play the odds and bid slam.

obviously you hope to get to 3nt by partner's hand. the way to get there is to bid 3d. not making a game try would be beyond pathetic - it's not hard to count 6 diamonds, 2 bangers and 1 trick from partner to give him enough to open the bidding. i would much rather jump to 3nt than pass 2d.

what zelandakh said, but don't be surprised if partner passes 1♠ - even many very experienced players don't know what's forcing and what's not in response to an overcall, particularly at the 2 level where you can very reasonably play it different ways.

i think you have the wrong idea about the EBU thing. noone in england would know what was in/not in which version and i suspect most people have never heard of them. we don't have a culture of playing with random people at events, so we don't use standardised methods. this is just a teaching aid. however, acol is the most natural system (no opening 3 card suits, etc) and as such, it's perfect for beginners.

it's a crap slam, but if south opens the bidding with 1♣, which would be fairly normal, it's impossible to avoid it.

having only 1 is a downside in so much as you can't play them again and it means the opps have more of them, but ruling it out would be wrong.

judging by what you're doing with 16-18 it sounds like you've got the wrong idea about the so-called no trump [balanced hand] ladder. assuming you're playing standardish methods it looks like this: 12-14 open a suit and rebid NTs at minimum level 15-17 open 1NT 18-19 open a suit and jump rebid in NTs. if it's 2NT, it's forcing if responder really had enough to bid originally, i.e. 6+. in the real world, partner's response might be a bit of a joke, in which case he can pass now. 20-22(21) open 2NT (22)23-24 open 2C and rebid in NTs at minimum level 25+ open 2C and jump in NTs of course if you open a suit and partner responds in another suit you hold, you have to raise (beit a simple raise or jump raise, etc) rather than rebidding NTs

and i'm sure that relative to its usefulness it generates more threads asking for clarification of when it applies than any other convention.

of course i don't have any evidence of this partnership's style, aside from the fact that one heart was opened, but i didn't claim to have any, did i? i did say 'stylewise' and 'most people' so i would think it's obvious that i was basing my opinion on what i consider to be a centrist style (well, centrist among people good enough to know what their style is). i consider myself to be easily on the solid side of average style wise and open weak 2s on hands many people open at the 1-level, and pass many hands others pre-empt on. as for you, i suspect everyone here considers you to be more solid than the rock of gibraltar.

pass should be forcing imo and that's what we should have done. as for what to do now, our hand is very pretty with 3 bangers and 3 trumps, but our ace of hearts is obv opposite a void. i would like to bid 6 clubs, which should be a grand try imo. i don't see how you can have a hand that makes a penalty X of 5h and then pulls 5s to 6c. still, i wouldn't wheel it out at the table for obvious reasons. 5nt is a good compromise. encouraging with much less chance of being misinterpreted.

eh, a super accept? a super hand for hearts raises hearts.

i'll bid 4c to give them a chance to smack it for the lead and then bid 6h assuming partner's got a banger. i expect this to be pretty cold on a non-diamond lead.

yes often with 4522 and just short of a reverse. however you play after 1nt you will have some sort of issue. playing a non-forcing upto 11ish 1NT response whereby 2m rebid promises 4+, you're stuck between passing and missing game with 15 opposite 11 and reversing and going overboard opposite a 5 count. playing a forcing NT, you can rebid 2c on your doubleton, already a bit perverse, and can still have an issue on the 3rd round over 2H preference.

east is obviously an arsehole. you get them everywhere, it's not a spanish monopoly.

your best one of these so far imo btw i'd make it clear that you have to click the board to get the lead to the next trick, because i keep sitting there waiting for something to happen

opening 1h is fine. most people play that stylewise 2h at this vulnerability is a much dirtier hand than this. in club bridge though, most people would be surprised to see you open 1h,this is because they've got no idea of hand evaluation now you bid 4d. you have a great hand in support for diamonds and a bag of crap of defence. double shows a good hand so you can't do that. btw in general, good players play far fewer penalty doubles than club players. penalty doubles are simple, but hands where you want to make a take out orientated double (often double just shows a maximum for one's bidding so far which i call take-out, in so much as it's not penalties) are far more frequent and if the opps have made a massive error in the bidding such that you want to double for penalties you will often get a good score just by defending undoubled. it's easy to make some basic rules about when doubles are penalties, for example: 1) after our partnership pre-empts 2) after our partnership made a take-out double of another suit, thereby implying the suit we're now doubling 3) after we've already found a major suit fit 4) after we attempt to pass out our own contract with both of us having made a bid 5) when we double a suit we could previously have made a takeout double of

i don't know why this is all so perplexing. there's nothing unreasonable about playing penalty doubles here. they're in a forcing pass situation (totally different to when one hand's yet to show values in which case you need your t/o X). south's pass implies a willingness to defend - with a shapely hand opposite a positive without a heart stack (i.e. what the original double showed) he would have bid himself. opposite that, north might easily want to defend. after all, that's normally the easiest way to a plus score with 2 random balanced hands and no big fit. imagine the north hand with 1 extra heart and fewer diamond. where would you want to play then? 3hx obviously. and who do you think is going to X it (or convert a t/o x) if north can't double for penalties?

double's not takeout of hearts. partner will pass it 99 times out of 99. once i've got myself into this pickle, i'll just pass and hope it goes off

north should bid 4h over 3h imo. i don't think he wants to play 3nt opposite a hand which didn't double.

to the people bidding 2d, your parternships must have very low standards for what comprises a negative double, because back on planet earth whenever partner has something like a flat 7 or even 8 count he passes 2c and 2d

obviously it's not 'top level bridge' which is why 2 people overcalled on 108xxx

double.... i've got 2 places to play

easy double - i've got nothing in spades and this hand will play well in hearts if partner has a fit - partner can ruff spades (over-ruffing the short hand)