kfgauss

In these situations, I think it's best to trust partner, potentially with an exception for important events (for which you'll hopefully have ironed out your agreements, however) in which, if you really believe partner is more likely to have forgotten, you should perhaps just do what's most likely to win. Of course, if you play partner to have hearts in such a situation and are wrong, partner won't be very happy. In any case, in any online play I would always trust partner. This is of course much less of a problem now that I'm not worried about partner having hearts. My hand is so good I'm just going to check on keycards (note that 5C is 1 or 4, which I pass) and bid 6NT or 7NT accordingly (6NT could be better than 6C if partner has !Sxxx and there's a spade ruff; 6C is better opposite xx AQx xxx KQxxx or some such, which makes 6C on a spade lead, if clubs are 2-2 [pitch 2 spades on a non-spade lead and use the extra trump entry to ruff twice in dummy] or !HK onside on a non-heart lead, but only makes 6N on a spade lead or if !HK is onside... tough decision). Of course, this decision isn't horrible even opposite hearts as it turns out. I guess if you have a close decision -- like 6NT or 6C here, it doesn't hurt to choose the one which is better when partner has hearts. As for lacking the heart control, I guess I'm choosing to payout when partner has A QJx xx KQxxxxx and similar in order to reach the grand confidently when it's there. Anyways, are people really stopping if partner bids 5!C over 4!S? Andy

Very nice system and write-up, Gerben! Some comments: This is a very natural system. One is presumably more than welcome to open this hand, which has a good 5-card club suit, 1♣ and then rebid 2♣ over 1♦ or 1♥ (=♠), and raise 1♠ (=♥) to 2♥. Perhaps this should be better documented, but in a writeup of Standard American, one would probably find that the 2m rebids are listed as 6+ but aren't really as well. On a different topic, I'm slightly worried about the very big hands as Gazilli is only 18+ and jump shifts by opener aren't GF. Things are fine if partner has 6+ and can force to game over Gazilli (but still partner won't know quite how big a hand we have), but having to jump after bidding Gazilli when partner shows 0-5 seems likely to hurt. It seems to me that with even wider-ranging 1-bids than standard that one shouldn't use the 3-level bids as one might in a Polish Club system where 1-bids are somewhat limited. I'd argue for at least one of Gazilli and jump shifts being GF. Does anyone know how Fantoni and Nunes bid really big hands? Andy

Playing matchpoints in a club game, you pick up K Qxx KQJ8xxx KJ in 3rd seat with both vulnerable. Partner passes and righty bids 1C. Your bid? If you'd make a simple overcall, which high cards would you have to remove to preempt? If you'd preempt, how much more would you need to make a simple overcall? Andy

My opponents basically never cover with the Queen here unless they have the 10 too, so I'll play for Q10 tight if he does cover. Andy

Do you mean takeout of clubs (takeout for clubs would just bid 2C I'd think)? Andy

Here was the full hand: [hv=d=s&v=e&n=sk9hak8dk9864cq42&w=sa2hj95daj10cakj98&e=sq10854hq76dq32c75&s=sj763h10432d75c1063]399|300|Scoring: BAM P 1C 1N P 2C X 2D P 2H P P P[/hv] 2H went down two, but the other table was in 2S making 3. West's double of 2C certainly doesn't show extras as far as I'm concerned, it just shows clubs (5 good clubs or 6+, I'd say). Would double now just be cards as all suits have been bid naturally? If not, what would double now mean? In any case, examples of hands where you would double here would be nice, given that very few people seem to be doubling on this hand. Also, should East be bidding 2S here (ie directly over 1N)? If none vul? Andy [Edit: seems we weren't dealer, but rather 2nd seat. This shouldn't change anything, though.]

I typically play that rebidding your 2nd suit at the 2-level, ie 2S here, is the catchall, and to show 5-6 you jump to 3S. Of course, playing that you've already promised 5+D or 4-1-4-4, perhaps this isn't best as then 2D is not needed to show 5. Still, it's perhaps nice to have it show 6 in your methods and so this could be bid with 4-1-5-xxx or 4-xx-5-2 hands. Andy

BAM, vul vs not, you hold A2 J95 AJ10 AKJ98 and deal. 1C 1N P 2C X 2D P 2H ? 2D shows 4+D (with fewer, LHO would pass the double) 2H is both majors, weak (4-4 or better) Do you act? If not, would you act if none vul? Andy

Why did Israel withdraw? Just not enough good players to make a serious team. Bad days in the ladies bridge for israel. What about the team they qualified with?

As far as I know, 2x (2S here) promises a rebid UNLESS partner bids 2NT or preferences (or rebid his own suit) at the 3 level. So basically, 2/1 here would promise a rebid ONLY if opener rebids 2 of a suit, but, being it impossible in case of 2S, indeed, from the practical viewpoint, 2S does NOT promise a rebid for lack of bidding room. If the 2/1 bid had been 2H, the over pard's 2S, responder would have been forced to bid. Elianna's right about 2/1's without interference in SAYC. See http://web2.acbl.org/documentlibrary/play/sayc_book.pdf (top of p.5). This is also the method given by Root in "Commonsense Bidding," for example. (SAYC needn't be taken as our standard, of course, but all Elianna claimed was that SA used this). Root suggests not bidding 2NT on KQ432 86 A52 A76 after 1S-2H;?, but rather bidding 2S so we can stop below game (he gives K10963 K2 A104 K109 as an example of something worth a 2NT bid). I do agree with Eric, however, that the competitive situation is quite different in that we have no catchall. There's also the point of shading a bit more than even a SA 2/1 in competition. Root (which we also needn't take as our standard), for example, states that a noncompetitive 2/1 promises 11 points but a competitive 2/1 may be shaded to 10 or a good 9, and thus, he reasons, competitive 2/1's don't promise rebids. To force responder to bid again, he claims, opener must bid a new suit or jump. Note that this means that even 1S (2C) 2D; 2S is NF for him. (NB: Root's "points" include distrib.) Root's book as a whole is certainly no longer standard (e.g. he plays 1M-3M as forcing) but the point is still valid. I do think that the "lack of a catchall" point is even stronger, though. Most of this is aimed at refuting Elianna's claim that "2/1 promises rebid" means competitive auctions too. As for what I think is currently standard, I think NF for both. I have no idea what's best, but will note that I play this as NF with all current partners (or so I believe). Andy

I'm having trouble finding any reference to this situation in the BWS document -- could you let me know where you find this? If there is indeed no reference to this situation, then I think both of these would be NF by the general agreement that if in doubt, calls are NF in competitive auctions. Andy

Why do H9 and S4 get better expected total points, but fewer expected imps vs the par contract compared with H7 and SJ, respectively? Aside from the inconsistency, I can see some merit for H9 instead of H7 gaining occasionally, but when would S4 ever gain (double dummy) over SJ? Andy

But then how could I ever invoke Law 25B? Andy

What if whether you bid depends on their methods (as was perhaps the case for partner here)? Then you run the risk of providing UI if you ask (and you run much worse risks if you don't ask). I advocate asking lots of questions. Some people dislike this because then the opponents get to explain their methods to each other, but I find it slightly distasteful to gain from this sort of thing, and also it happens quite infrequently in good competition. I don't ask about blackwood bids and such until after the auction as it'd just be a waste of time, and when the opponents are having a long constructive auction I may not to ask (though I do online as there's really no waste of time then and in fact it probably saves time since I'm not asking afterwards), but any situation where I might possibly bid, I tend to and try to ask. Andy

So nobody has found either of their lines yet. I hoped people would discuss the suit combo in the abstract before discussing their line of play, but I'll now ask explicitly (Mike has given an answer, but didn't give any reasoning): 1. What is the best play for 3 tricks with AQ53 opposite J97? (Max tricks may also be of interest here, as 3 spade tricks doesn't immediately give us 9 tricks.) 2. If the best line requires lots of transportation, are there nearly as good lines that don't? 3. If you're constrained to lead first from the dummy, what's the best play for 3 tricks? 4. What is your line of play on this hand? We can discuss/think about whether not playing on spades right now is best, but I will tell you that one of them played on spades right now and the other crossed to ♣A and played on spades. 4a: Which of these do you prefer, and why? (And what specific way do you play on spades in either case.) 4b: Do you prefer some other line (not playing on spades right now) more, and if so, why? Andy

1. I really hope not. In the ACBL I assume there would be no UI since there was a failure to announce -- calling attention to an irregularity should never be construed as giving UI. Unfortunately (if this was not in the ACBL) there probably was UI transmitted. I'm one of those people who likes to think I always ask (maybe, as Frances suggests, I don't really always ask, but if not I'll try to work on that). Is there something I should do to provide evidence that I ask lots of questions? Should I write "I ask lots of questions" on my convention card? 2. If you're trying to imply something stronger than simply the confluence of 1 & 4, then no (ie there isn't evidence that this player acted unethically and purposefully took advantage of the UI). If not, then yes, given my answers to 1 & 4. 3. I don't think so. I don't defend against weak NT all the time, but either side being vul makes it at best unclear I would think (and if none vul, well, then I'll think about it some more). In any case, I don't know what my bid would have been. (I do agree with Richard that it's hard to decide how clear a bid is -- or even what to bid -- if one is provided with the entire scenario. That said, it's irritating to have to do these things in multiple steps and people may lose interest, so I understand doing it this way.) 4. Yes, given my answer to 3. Andy

Do you really go all out and play that e.g. 1D (1S) 2C is the cuebid and 1D (1S) 2S is natural (or whatever you play this as in the auction (1C) 1D (1S) 2S)? I guess now that I've mentioned it, how do people play (1C) 1D (1S) 2C vs (1C) 1D (1S) 2S generally? Andy

I've declared 4♦= on a similar hand (south slightly stronger, north slightly weaker) after the auction: 2♠ - 3♦; 3♠ - 4♣; 4♦ - P. Of course, this North will probably bid more strongly, but we may still be able to use our judgement as South to stop in 4♦ on certain auctions. Incidentally, what do people bid with North over 2♠ - 3♦ (forcing)? If you rebid just 3♠, do you jump to 5♦ over 4♣, or do you in fact repeat the above auction? Andy

Here's another law-related issue I've posted both here and on the Bridgetalk Laws forum: At an ACBL club game yesterday, I heard as dealer: 1C P 1H 1S P 2S 3D P ? Partner and I had discussed that such bids were weakish and just competitive (usually only 4 hearts, long diamonds). I had forgotten about this discussion and bid 3NT. My LHO now sighed/chuckled (I don't know why; perhaps he "knew" 3D was weakish or perhaps he just had a good hand and was surprised at my 3NT bid), causing me to look at the auction again and remember our agreement. LHO was still thinking about his bid but I didn't try to change my call and 3NT was eventually passed out and I ended up down 3. Some questions: 1) I presume I would have been allowed under 25B to change my call to pass. Let me know if you disagree. [Law 25B states that you may purposefully change your call before your LHO makes a call if you accept that your maximum score for this hand will be Avg-. Your opponents get the table result.] 2) Would it have been ethical to invoke 25B here and change my call? (Decide for yourself what "ethical" means. E.g. it could mean "would you think poorly of someone who did this" or it could mean "would you yourself feel bad if you did this" or it could mean "would you yourself do this" etc.) 3) If no, would it have been ethical if I hadn't been woken up by my LHO's chuckle (which is presumably AI [= authorised info] to me) but had simply remembered on my own that 3D was weakish? 4) If no, is it ever ethical to invoke 25B? Does how quickly you correct have anything to do with it? 5) Is it more or less ethical to invoke 25B when you've [a] realized you misunderstood something compared with when you've simply made a bid you don't like or [c] realized you were mistaken about what the auction was (e.g. you didn't see partner's bid, etc)? It turns out that the difference between the average minus we would've gotten and the bottom we actually received would've been enough to win. It was just a club game, and I have no need to win it, but it was a bit surprising to have my decision not to change my bid "be the thing that lost it for us" (yes, yes, I know -- my initial misunderstanding "lost it for us" if anything, and it's of course silly to attribute the loss to any one of the many decisions one could've made differently). Suppose I'm playing in a big tournament and something like this happens. Should I correct my bid and save that 40%? Should I feel bad if I do? Andy PS A side question: do people play 3D in the above auction as just competitive or as forcing? What's standard? (My partner and I don't play good/bad 2NT here. With a forcing 3D bid we have to double first.)

AQ53 J97 In context: AQ53 A AK8xx J10x J97 108xxxx J AKx RHO (East in my [rotated] diagram) deals: P P 1H X P 1N P 3N P P P West (the 1H bidder) leads ♥K, taken in dummy perforce. What now? (Fantoni and Bocchi diverged here.)

Not that it's relevant to the appeal or bid here, but I wouldn't change my system here over a double. I think one should usually bid spades when you have them, even with a good hand, in this situation. Andy

I have an agreement with some of my partners that if we could have passed a double for penalty, a pass of a redouble means the same thing except in a handful of specified sequences (e.g. 1 of a suit, double, redouble). This would apply in this situation. It is perhaps a dangerous agreement if there are forgets, and that could easily be what happened here, as others have suggested. This doesn't come up so often, and one might think it's mostly to expose psyche xx's, but there are legitimate times it comes up. Playing in a regional, I opened 1C, strong, and my LHO overcalled 1D, suction, showing hearts or spades and clubs. Partner passed and RHO bid 1H, pass or correct. I doubled for takeout of hearts and LHO redoubled, pass, pass, back to me. They had no agreement about the xx, but it turned out LHO had meant it as "I have a good heart suit" (1S would show S+C, and pass would just show hearts normally). Partner had 6 hearts too and was trying to make a penalty pass. Sadly, this was with a partner with whom I had no agreement and so I pulled instead of taking our juicy penalty. Andy

A less ideal but much quicker method is to give extra points based on HCP. The way I've seen this done is to give the side with fewer HCP 60 points for each HCP they fall short of 20. For example, if your side has 26 HCP, your opponents will get 360 points above the line on that hand. Andy

I was at a bridge club in France and miscounted my points (I gave myself another Ace -- not sure how really, as the usual problem would be to think your 1's were small cards) and opened 1NT with 11 points. My partner aggressively invited with only 7 hcp and my RHO had something like a very nice 6-3-3-1 18 count and thought for a while and ended up bidding 3S, which was passed out and made 5. The other tables were all in 4S. The director decided to adjust due to the "double psyche" (my 11 hcp 1NT opening and partner's 7 hcp invite), giving both sides Ave+. This was probably an incorrect ruling, but everyone was happy and nothing good would have come of complaining. [There may be laws regarding psyches which are fielded, but this one seems anti-fielded to me (though partner did "extend the preempt" as it were).] In any case, it seems reasonably likely to me that your opponents were either feeling frisky or miscounted something (or both!) and got to a lucky game which made. If you play against these opponents again and something similar happens, perhaps you should start to worry (unless there are many more strange boards which go poorly for them -- then they're just bad), but I really wouldn't worry about it at this point. Andy

No it implies not enough values to raise immediately :D Great huh? This may not be ideal, but it works surprisingly reasonably in practice, largely because after 1S-2D;2S-3C;3D-?, we can bid spades with 2 (whereas we can't after 1S-2D;3D). Raising diamonds later needn't deny the values to raise immediately if you also have 6 spades or are otherwise worried about strain, I think (especially since the suit is diamonds and there are the various issues associated with not having enough room over 3D). Andy