Jlall

You answered how often you have 6+ hearts vs 4+ diamonds. That is only very vaguely related to the frequency issue I brought up at best.

I had fried tofu once at a sushi place, it was surprisingly good.

Are those numbers supposed to have any meaning with regards to the question I raised?

Ok lets go over this. 1) 3D, you didn't ask about this bid, but it is a bad bid imo. South should just double. 2) 4S. Every time I think about this situation I come to the conclusion that 4S should be a strong 1 suiter in hearts (too good for 4H). Else 4C or 4D should be bid. It's the only hand that has no bid. On the other hand that's an infrequent hand type, maybe it's just better to play 4S shows a control and coming in either a specific minor or both of the minors. Sometimes if you don't bid 4S you never get to send the message I have short spades and a slam try in your minor. If it is going to show support for 1 minor, it should be for the highest ranking minor since that is the time you're most likely not to be able to cuebid spades. For instance if you bid 4D always with diamonds, and partner can't bid 4H you won't be able to get your 4S bid in. So if you're going to play 4S= 1 minor I would say diamonds is the obvious choice. Playing 4S as coming in either minor sucks, how can opener evaluate if he doesn't even know what trumps are. Ambiguous trump suit slam auctions happen, but that's out of necessity not desire. So the question is, should 4S be coming in diamonds or in hearts? The advantage of coming in diamonds is that it's way more frequent, the advantage of coming in hearts is that there is no other way to show that hand really. Most people seem to automatically assume it's coming in diamonds so I guess that's some evidence that that's a superior way to play. The other question is should 4S always be shortness, or can it be the ace? I think it could also be the ace, but usually it's obvious from openers hand if partner has shortness or the ace anyways (based on his own length). 3) After that 5S is pretty terrible if you think 4S was coming in diamonds with shortness, just bid 4N for crying out loud! And if you want to cuebid for some reason (again, why?) then bid 5H. The only thing I can think of is south wasn't sure if north was coming in hearts or diamonds so he opted for 5S to see what was going on. But 5S denies the HA so wtf. People make bridge too hard by not bidding keycard when all they want to know about are things like the CA, the DK, and if you have both of those the HK. That is what KC was invented for. North who thought he was coming in either minor and thought partner denied the HA tried to sign off in 6C. At this point south thought north was coming in diamonds and bid 7D. He probably should have figured out that north would never cuebid the CA on this auction when he has denied the HA, and 6C is probably trying to play there. So 5S was really the worst bridge bid, it's just bad, but 4S was the cause of the problem because south thought it agreed diamonds, north thought it was suit ambiguous.

As I said earlier I think that hand should bid 5N over 5S.

Fair point, playing precision I also don't rebid 2C with either 5-3 or 6-4 because I expect partner to pass with 1 more club than diamond. I don't think this is a great style in standard because if 2C could be up to 17 or even a bad 18 (or a good 3154 too good for a raise immed) you NEED partner to be able to false preferece freely so that opener gets to make a third bid frequently if he can and game can still be found opp 8-9 counts.

I'm not a huge fan of pass then 5S rather than 5S direct because sometimes partner just bids 6C. Or sometimes partner bids 5H and they bid 6D. In general I don't think when there's room like this that pass then 5S should exist. Does anyone really know what the line is between their hoped for pass and 5S rather than 5S direct anyways? What is a hand you would bid 5S with vs passing and bidding 5S (rhetorical, but you get my point, everyone might have a different cutoff). I think it's just splitting hairs way too finely, I prefer to clarify my intentions immediately while I still can.

There was a good one where I argued 2C>2D in general, definitely with this suit quality though. It's all moot because I love 1N!

Hate 4C, would strongly prefer a 4D bid. This makes our intentions clear: we have a great hand for clubs and are interested in a slam. We also have a diamond control. Partner is undoubtedly void in diamonds, and 3 small hearts is terrible. I would have been close to saying this hand is a slam force after 3C but the auction isn't going well for us. After constructing some hands for partner I think we are still a slam force. The question is how to get to 7 while staying out of 7 when it's wrong (usually meaning a third round heart loser). The other question is what is 4H. Natural and forcing? Natural and non forcing? Cuebid? If partner can have 4306 our hand becomes much better. I'm really worried that bidding 5S at some point will get us to 7 with a third round heart control missing... At the same time I'm scared of missing 7 if partner has a major suit queen and the HK. I think if I bid 5S partner will not drive with Axx AKxx --- AKQxxx but he will bid 5N. So if I trust partner I will just bid 5S but my first instinct was just 6C tbh.

I have been very careful to continually say things like in an expert vs expert match I think that the players can self correct this rule. In fact, I think that is what happens regularly. You're right that not everyone is an expert. My point is that the optional or non use of the stop card allows people to self correct the problem that after many skips in bridge nobody is ever going to bid, so making them wait 10 seconds is silly. Thus I think forcing people to use the stop card and wait 10 seconds on every skip..well..sucks Anyways as others have pointed out the truth is that many non experts will give away whether they're thinking or not anyways. Especially if it's your own partner, you know their mannerisms etc, and not everyone is a great actor, especially most non experts who don't understand why they should be or tempo issues in general etc. I doubt England is some magical promise land where all the bad players act exactly the same whether they're thinking or not if they're a non expert. Of course I'm sure there are a few non expert bridge players who are expert in understanding the rules, but they would definitely be the exception. Those players would not need a "reminder" to keep an even tempo anyways, so the stop card is not really helping in that situation either. I think the references to looking at a watch were a joke, but I could be wrong. I do not even mind any of this, people play bridge to have fun and most players are not nefarious, they just don't understand tempo related issues. That's fine. I just don't understand how the stop card is helping anything. Either the players understand the rules enough to keep an even tempo, or they don't. If they are in the latter group they will not suddenly give no hint of if they have a problem or not when the stop card comes out. It is a silly rule, and I still maintain that 10 seconds is a silly amount of time. If you're going to set an arbitrary amount of time that everyone must pause over every skip make it 5 seconds. 5 seconds is an eternity. But best of all is to be allowed to set your own tempo in certain situations. Yes this gives more room for cheating, but if that's what you want to do you will find other ways anyways. Yes it will lead to situations where someone says HE HESITATED, and the other guy is like NO THAT IS MY NORMAL TEMPO. Let the directors or committees figure it out based on the auction and what is a reasonable normal tempo in that auction, etc. If it's close give the guy the benefit of the doubt that it's his normal tempo.

You might make a game! Or like happened here, you push them higher! Or, they might make a game and you have a save! Or partner might bid 5H over 5D and you instantly bid 7D and make! edit: OK that is very unikely but I got to use an ! Axxx --- Axxx xxxxx one time?

I'm sure he did this on purpose so that you can make these bids with an unlimited upper range without fear that partner is going to pass.

I like this. Surely partner is looking at a mile of spades and can work it out. I'm not concerned about -1 vs -2 when -1 vs making is huge. Why would it be a lightner double. We bid at the 5 level which could be quite a good hand, then we doubled what sounds like a save. We are just saying we are beating them if we double.

This, sorry again lol. I thought we had to bid 3H to cue. Oh well it was still one of my best drunk posts ever!

Don't understand what's wrong with 4C just to check that partner can bid 4D. It is definitely possible partner has no diamond control. Also is 3H a non GF splinter or a GF splinter? North can slam force opp a GF splinter if partner has a diamond control. If 3H could be like a 13 count with a stiff heart obviously north cannot slam force. Perhaps the problem here was south thought 3H showed GF values and north thought it showed less than that (else 4H). The south hand is worth a GF splinter so playing mini splinters 4H would be better.

Definitely don't double you have 0 points in the black suits and 0 aces...You can't even double 5C with this hand. I would lead the DK.

1. Pass. 2. LOL? 2S I don't understand the alternative.

I have no clue what this auction is, if they were bad maybe I'd spite double, but in general if partner can't double them no way am I with this hand. If partner is good I expect them to go down 1, but that doesn't mean I should double. Making seems way more likely than down 2 if partner doesn't double.

Pass

What does 4D even show? It's preemptive right?

2S, partner is just an overcaller no reason to bury them. We might buy it here, and if they bid 3H we have a perfect X.

lol wtf how is south not the most auto pass of 3C ever? I think north could double 2S rather than bid 3C pretty reasonably even playing good/bad

I've made better overcalls but 2♥ on AJx QJTxx AJx xx is hardly comparable to felinicide. It seems clear to me, even opposite a passed hand. Have you forgotten that we are favorable? The opponents are unlikely to go headhunting at these colors with at most 2 trump honors and 2 aces. And if you don't overcall, good luck pushing them up or finding a nice distributional game (x Kxxx KTxxx xxx, QTx Kxxx x xxxxx). It even has lead-directing and obstructive value. It's not perfect, but I would much rather bid 2♥ than pass here. heh you don't know fluffy very well. Opposite fluffy this might be a 4H bid.

In this case I like the ST. Where the goal of imps is to lead and maximize our chances of beating the hand, often our goal at MP is to lead and minimize the chance of blowing a trick (within reason). Our spade holding is so attractive for the sake of passivity while also being reasonably likely to set up some spade tricks or set up an entry for partner to shoot the HJ through that I like it. Basically the thought of often blowing a trick KNOWINGLY when we have a three card sequence to lead from is too much for me.

Is this MP or imps? At imps, I like a heart. If they have the king and the jack of hearts between them I need to lead a heart even if partner has the entry because they have a solid stopper even if partner is in. Hopefully we can knock that out, get in, and take 4 hearts and whatever we got in with via partner leading a heart through after our lead, or us just being able to cash out. Even if they don't have the heart jack it could be right to lead a heart if WE have our sides entry (Jxx of diamonds could easily be our entry if partner has Qx or Kx). If our Jxx is a possible entry we definitely need to get hearts going. If partner has our sides entry and the HJ then leading something else could be right, but remember we aren't dead just because we gave them a trick. It has to specifically be their NINTH trick. So leading a spade is a parlay that partner has an entry and the HJ, but they have nine tricks if I lead a heart into them. Oh sorry meant to also write, there is the question of WHICH heart to lead, low or the queen. I like low even though the queen is a winner if if declarer has Kxx, and dummy has Jx, and we have our entry. If we for sure had our entry I'd play for that, but since partner is likely to have our entry then low might be ok even on Kxx Jx, but the queen will ALWAYS be a disaster on Kx Jxx regardless of who has our entry. So even though Kxx is more likely than Kx, low seems superior. Also in favor of a heart at imps, don't completely discount declarer having J9xx of hearts and partner having Kxx! It's unlikely but there's a non zero chance of that.