Jlall

The point here is a common theme; if partner has a club void we probably have some natural club tricks anyways, whereas if he has a diamond void we have no tricks and MUST get our ruffs in immediately. For instance a diamond lead would be auto with xxxx diamonds and KQJxx of clubs. So what is the cutoff? IMO it is just an illusion that we're going to still score club tricks if we fail to get partner his ruffs. They might have a finesse in clubs, and they probably have pitches on the diamond. I don't think theres much equity there either way if we fail to give partner his ruffs esp when they have tried for slam, so I will just go with a club as it's most likely to be partner's void.

Definitely finesse, if anything your read when they echo should be that they have Qxx rather than xxx if you had to guess one way. With Qxx they are often demoralized when you lead to the ace staring at the KJ in dummy. They know you have guessed which way to finesse correctly (they were just praying you'd play the king :P) Now since you're going to guess correctly, might as well try a desperation echo to confuse/ mind F you and hopefully you outthink yourself into going for the drop now. With xxx they are happy with what's happened and it looks like you are going to finesse the wrong way for sure so they won't rock the boat with an echo. Also, if you might have a 5-4 fit the echo is much more likely to be from Qxx trying to get you into the "they would never give real count with Qxx" mentality so that you go for the drop. Anyways don't give up such a huge math edge unless you're sure of your read, but in this case I think the read definitely points the other way so it'd be even worse heh.

Huh? How is double penalty? What do you do with any hand that wants to get to 3N? 3S shows spades so I guess you're just outta luck if you want to play 3N and have no stopper!

lol

I told Clee I would duplicate both actions fwiw. I really think 3H is a must though, passing and then bidding 3H later should just be a worse hand than this imo. 4H is probably too much but I would bid it too. Even when it can't make, it puts big pressure on them, and they usually bid 5D on this type of auction imo. And as you said, its a great dummy opposite a five card heart suit. It seems like you have a bunch of ways to win with this bid, as usual. I guess I always like to bid game in this type of auction where it's competitive and both sides have a fit and have shown some game interest and there is shape all around. Nobody ever knows if they can double or what can make, and people generally just take out insurance and bid over it. It seems unlucky that you hit partner with 5 diamonds and no heart honors and no fifth heart, so it's both easy to double you AND easy to beat you a lot. This is a really unlikely scenario I think.

I totally agree with this. I don't understand the point of doubling here, I want to defend, and double is takeout. I thought it was between bidding 4H (maybe partner has 3!) and passing. I don't like my chances of making 4H, partner will often have 2 hearts and on a bad day just 1, and my hearts are terrible. On the other hand my defense is pretty good, my SQTx which is wasted on offense is probably a trick on defense. It's ok to just defend a partial at the 3 level sometimes...

I think passing is really bad if opps are good, esp if they are conservative and good. Just bid 3N imo. I don't like the double either, north should not really be interested in playing 3N opposite one stopper. I think just bidding 4C is better. Oh and welcome back clee, hope you're makin a comeback!

I beat you to it, though mine may not count. Jlall and JLOL are different people ftw!

LOL

Thanks Ben, you are an excellent moderator and always have been. Every move you make is transparent, and whether we agree or not you always take the time to give a thought out explanation for your decisions. Obviously not everyone will always agree with the decisions you make, but I think we all agree you make them with good intentions for the community every single time. It is too bad nobody sent me a message about why my thread was deleted, or to tell me that they were the one who deleted it. It is interesting that that respect and common courtesy was given to the people who had their posts deleted, but not to me when my whole thread questioning the decision of a mod was deleted. I wonder, is the mod who deleted my thread trying to hide the fact that it was them, or trying to give me a passive-aggressive "Screw you," or perhaps trying to imply that I do not deserve the same respect and courtesy given to the others who had their posts deleted. Or perhaps my crime of creating a constructive thread discussing the decision and their judgment was so great that it should be treated the same way spam is treated; undignified with a PM/explanation. I hope that whoever deleted my thread (obviously I have no idea who it was) understands how bad it looks to the community when a discussion about their decision that was quite constructive is deleted without any explanation or any clue as to who it was. I also hope that the mod who deleted the other posts (I do know who this is, but no idea if it's the same one that deleted my thead ofc) was able to read the thread and take note that very few forum regulars if any found anything wrong with the deleted posts. Maybe that means nothing to them, but I like to believe all mods are like Ben and try to help the community in good faith by doing their job well. Hopefully the mods realize they are fallible, and when a large majority of the community they're modding for feels like they have gone overboard, that is cause for some introspection. We don't expect you guys to be perfect, but we hope if everyone says you made a mistake that will be a learning experience. In this way the mods and posters can help keep each other in check, and learn from the others where the boundaries are/should be, and there is a harmonious balance. Also, one other thing Ben if you don't mind. I brought this up later in the thread but: Another yellow posted almost the exact same thing about the exact same member that the member got their post deleted did (sorry if that is hard to read, I am trying not to use anyone's name). His post did not get deleted, despite having the same connotations and implications. Do you think this indicates a double standard in play? Of course I understand a mod not wanting to delete the post of a yellow, but surely one who feels that when someone else made the same post it was a personal attack can back their convictions and delete both posts, else they can delete neither. This definitely bothered me. Also, I will ask this flat out. Is it perfectly fine to openly criticize the decision or judgment of a mod in the community as long as no personal attacks are used? Or should we expect posts of that nature to be deleted. Honest question, it would simply be nice to know and get on record. Also, imo if someone in my thread made reference to the people involved and did not keep it anonymous, their post should be edited or deleted. Deleting the whole thread imo does not make sense. In the past I have seen people like Uday warn in a thread "if the discussion continues this way, the thread will be deleted" after deleting a post or two. This makes sense to me, especially in such a sensitive situation where it may look like the mods are deleting the thread to cover up a bad decision. AFAIK the content of my poll thread was very legitimate, if one or two posters made bad decisions it shouldn't kill the entire thread, again IMO. So again, it would seem that the mod who deleted my thread used at least questionable judgment. Again, I have no idea who that mod might be since no one wanted to take credit for deleting that thread.

Cool, I'm about to get a top a vast majority of the time then. What could be better? Does anyone really think they're so good that they can win a pair game by avoiding good slams routinely? I mean this IS your edge over the field, you get to good slams and they don't. If you always pass up on your edge so that you can do what the field does you will perform as badly as the field. Unless you are some kind of bridge god I don't see how you can pass up on this kind of chance in a 1 session MP game. The NS hands were: [hv=n=sajtxxhat9xxxdkcx&s=sq7xxhdatxxxcatxx]133|200|[/hv] The traveler was: +710 x 3 = 6.5 +680 x 6 = 2.5 +1430 would be an 8. So slam is 99 % or so. I'm gonna guess you want to be in it :) Again if slam was 51 % or something but you knew nobody would be in it you could pass, but this is a perfect spot to take advantage of the fact that you have better judgment than the field and thus can get to a good slam that they can't. People go insanely overboard on trying to avoid zeroes. I mean seriously 95 % of the players should be WELCOMING variance/top-bottom swings. I don't know how often you win at the club, I know you're not in that 95 % obv you're much better than the field, but you still have to be winning a LOT of 1 session random pair games per time that you play to even start thinking about passing up some edges to avoid a zero, and even if you do win that insane amount of time, you cannot pass up an edge this huge! As I said, this IS your edge, this IS the reason you are well above the field, so push that edge hard.

hmm, are you assuming a 5332 hand with this post or assuming a 6322?

Why on earth are you all committing so early in the play? You figured out the 2 possible lines, wd, now try to figure out which one is going to work. Cash the HA, cash the CA and ruff a club and then hook the heart. Has RHO dropped the CK? Sure he always "should" but if he hasn't we have some more info. Has RHO dropped the HQ? Maybe he "should' but he probably won't. Note this is why it's better to cash the HA first, it's easier to drop the queen if you just play heart to the jack then ace of hearts than it is if you cash the ace, cross, and act like you're going to hook. I mean from RHOs point of view if he has Qxx of hearts maybe his partner has Jx so he will look quite dumb to drop the queen. Anyways, it's not an obvious play to everyone. After you have all of this information, figure out what you want to do, you will be much better placed.

Very surprised by all the doublers on the second one, I would just pass. I expect partner to have 6 spades almost never and a stiff heart rarely. I expect him to have 15+ HCP never. If he is just 5233/52(42)/53xx minimum then I don't see why we want to bid anything. I mean if he removes to 3N that is very likely bad, if he removes to 4C and he has a 3 card suit it's bad, if he bids 3S it could be ok but I'd rather be defending than having him play a 5-2 fit. Even if we catch a 4 card club suit with partner it doesn't seem so clear that we should be bidding, our values are in diamonds where he's short and we have shortness in spades. If he has 4 diamonds I guess it's always good to compete, and I should add in he could be 52(15) as well with a min so that's a case for Xing. Meh dunno, I feel pretty strongly about pass on that one.

lol this is such a good policy, well said!

Standard. Lots of old people use facebook now too.

Don't we have 24 with no jacks on the last hand?

Freaky when I saw this auction I misread it and thought it was michaels (didn't see the 1C bid).

Obv this is penalty lol, you could have 5 good ones of their suit very easily on such an auction.

yeah +1 on learn to play bridge

lol you're such a hero!

Sure just ask it nicely

What does this mean? You can still play in diamonds, hearts, spades, or defend. Partner can still have 4 spades, or 5 spades. You can still have 5 hearts or 6 hearts. Partner might have only 1 or 2. You could still belong in a 5-2 major suit fit. You could have 3 diamonds or 4 diamonds or 5 diamonds. Partner could still have the same. Maybe you don't have a great fit and can't make any game and partner will pass with a balanced hand and you get an ok sized number when you can't make anything. There is still an incredible range of strengths/shapes/strains left, I don't see how you can not play X as takeout.

Declarer miscounted trumps. If declarer had claimed without cashing 2 trumps then obviously I would allow that (it is irrational not to pull trumps etc).

Since when does a slow 3N suggest extras? It usually suggests that responder has 5 hearts, and is considering whether to try for the 5-3 heart fit imo. I think the second most likely possibility is that responder is thinking whether or not to bid 2N or 3N. A slow 3N showing extras seems like the third most likely possibility.