gszeszycki

i would X if club K was small I am even happier to X WITH club K in case p wants to convert. Both opps have limited their hands and opps pretty much have a known club fit so we probably have one also. Also note that the vast majority of my power is not subject to bad lie of the cards this enhances my offensive potential and has a tendency to mitigate disaster. This PRE balance is safe because both opps have limited their hand and we do not want to force P to decide between pass and bid with say 4243 hand and scattered values.

most play a principle that when BOTH transfers are available then we use them for transfers here both 4d and 4h are available for transfer thus 4h is a transfer to spades when using texas

p p p 1h (unlimited) p (very reasonable) 2h p (why step into unknown waters with such dreck and unlimited opp to your left thats why we have partners to protect our backs (pre balance bah) p NOW we know that Partner has some power and not many hearts (opps have a heart fit so we probably have a fit also) so a nice simple take out X here is safe simple and effective (support for ALL unbid suits) I assign 100% to N for being too cowardly and not acting to protect partner who was in poor position to act.

S lost all science when they decided to go slamming after 3c. Once the search for MAJOR SUIT FITS has ceased NT is the next viable game spot. after 3c bid S should bid 3d N should then bid 3s to ask for a partial stopper (they would bid 3n with full stop). so far we have 1h 2c 3c 3d 3s at this point S hand improves since N has shown little power in the spade suit. Now a nice simple 4s bid will show slam interest by S and a 5c sign off ends the auction. I assign complete blame on S for going off deep end too soon.

PASS i have basically one entry to my hand and can contribute 2 tricks on a good day----It is difficult to imagine too many hands where p will take EIGHT more tricks with the ability to finesse ONCE. Bidding with this collection seems to increase the probability of negative score vs any chance of a reward. I will admit however that with Axxx xx Axx xxxx i would bid 1s because i can imagine a pretty large number of hands where TWO finesses might allow 10 tricks to be made imagine 1h overcall looking something like xx AKxxxx xx AQJ opposite the posted hand you lose 2s 1h 1d and almost assuredly 1c opposite the 2 ace hand the ability to finesse TWICE means 1s 1h 1d and NO CLUBS as long as club K cooperates. Note that even adding a 7th heart to overcaller (assuming hearts break 22) still makes GAME VERY unlikely opposite the posted hand.

♠ 65432 ♥ A3 ♦ A65 ♣ J92 ♠ AKT98 ♥ J4 ♦ KQ3 ♣ AQ8 Unless you have strong reason to suspect LHO has an 8 card heart suit headed by the KQ you should DUCK trick one. This helps protect you against certain aggressive opening leads since there is nothing lho can do that will hurt you at trick 2. Assuming they continue the heart to the ace THEN you can lead a spade to the AK ♦ to ace and lead the CLUB J. Assuming it is covered play ♦ until done then exit with spade and await endplay. You cannot afford to wait until 2nd or 3rd round of dia to take A and follow the club finesse because the more rounds of DIA you play the greater the risk of a ruff and club exit.

NO matter HOW GOOD (or bad) robots become at declaring there is no substitute for practice. Temporarily switch robot to dummy and human to declarer any time human/robot pair win the auction (a patch may have to be introduced to keep dummy from seeing all 4 hands under these circumstances). The benefit of increased practice alone is worth the switch but there is an additional benefit. The strongest declarers will get to bring their skills to bear more often and they wont be so fearful in the bidding because they are worried about a robot butchering their bidding with horrid play. The human player may also practice damage control much more effectively than a robot will. When faced with a truly horrid contract the human player may take a line of play that offers far less chance of getting totally slaughtered. Robots are ok for practice but nothing is gained by watching them play as dummy.