dkham

Agre this is basically unenforcable, what counts as a single convention? I'd like to alter it to promote a global standard for all new players. I'd still allow other bidding systems though, just talking about a simple system that all beginners would start with. My choice for the global standard would be SAYC, even though I don't like much makes sense as much of the world already plays it (a bit like English becoming the de facto global language, it's too late for Esperanto).

In the scenario where partner raises your artificial club bid (and indeed even for the OP if you're really stuck), I think the best guess is to go for 6♦. Or is this Matchpoint scoring?

I would take (1♠)-3♠ as having a long minor and asking for a spade stop to bid 3NT, bound to end in disaster when you then try and bid hearts naturally. It's true that (1♠)-x might get passed out, but so might (1♠)-2♥ and at least if (1♠)-x is not passed out then you've shown the hand better. If you're not going to double with this hand, is it even worth having "suited hand too strong to overcall" as one of the meanings for a takeout double?

Declarer did not have both majors then! Can you post the whole deal? [Edit: I've got confused too about who declarer is. There's no chance of a heart ruff is there. But can you still post the whole deal?]

Do you mean East shouldn't have doubled? I think that bid can (and should) be made even with a weak hand.

Yep I meant that I'll bid hearts next time, even if it has to be a high bid. Hopefully I can just bid 4♥, but even if the opponents are already at 4♠ I'll bid 5♥.

If double is definitiely takeout I'll do that.

Also I would have doubled.

Too strong to overcall 4♥, so I'm just in favour of doubling then bidding whatever number of hearts I have to.

Ace of trumps, then probably another trump.

Partner must have short hearts - I'm going to ruff, cash the ace of hearts then another heart.

My first thought was 3♠, as even if partner has short spades we're unlikely to have many trump losers. But then if partner bids 3NT over 3♠ I'm forced to bid 4♠. Now I think 2♠ is best, and if opponents balance we can then bid 3♠.

So your slam is only beatable if they lead trumps twice (once on opening lead, once on winning heart). Or can you make it by not playing hearts and getting back to hand in diamonds three times instead - can you post the full hand?

I'll guess that you went up with the king of hearts; this lost and defence returned another heart. You ruffed this and made by ruffing three spades in dummy then dropping singleton king of clubs. Well bid!

I've lost two tricks so far. Could finesse diamonds or spades now, or play for spade nine to drop. They way they're bidding with only eight diamonds and not many points must have some shape. Think LHO is 5-4-3-1, RHO 1-4-5-3. If so LHO could now be down to ♠ 9xx ♥ ♦ Kx ♣ in which case he's in trouble if I play trumps, either he gives up spade guard or goes down to bare diamond King and can be endplayed. Even if that's not quite right makes sense to play more trumps before playing spades.

Is 17- shorthand for a bad 17, or did you mean 17+?

I wouldn't have thought of it myself but I like the reasoning behind leading the King of Hearts. Also, and I'm new to these forums so this might be a old issue, is it possible to put West and North in the right relative positions in the hand diagram?

Interesting, thanks for explanation barmar.

I'm happy with 2♠ now. A pity we're (presumably) not playing a system where we could have opened the hand 1♠ or 1NT.

Ah I see it now, ruff four clubs in hand (high) to establish dummy's clubs. Winning 3 spades (the ace and two ruffs), 6 hearts (the six in your hand), 4 clubs (the last four in dummy).

Interesting to hear how GIB works. I like the simplicity of its algorithm. Stephen was saying it can't easily be improved, but perhaps in the final stage: 4. pick randomly among cards that tie for highest score. it could try and guess better, by using some logic. It wouldn't matter if this logic wasn't great, as after all it this is only a tie-break among cards which are supposed equally good. For the OP I presume at trick two all of the trumps tied for the highest score (and possibly a club too), so a rule of thumb such as "play honour from shortest hand first" might have worked here to help GIB identify the ♦K as a better card among "equals". Note this isn't a practical suggestion that I'm proposing anyone actually do, just an observation. I'm a computer programmer too and know how messy these things get!

Can you make 13 tricks without a trump lead?

I think 2♣ here shows 12-17. Assuming your 1NT is 15-17, I'm guessing I didn't open 1NT as the hand is too unbalanced. But if I didn't open 1NT just because the hand is too strong, maybe I should bid 2NT now. If I'm going to overbid though I prefer 3♣.

Is this poll to settle an argument?

Aha!