sfi

Sure there are ways within the interface to deal with this, but they are clunky if you don't know where the delay is.

Seems reasonable, and I'd have no issue with that. One of the advantages of BBO is that it meets the needs of many different groups within the bridge community.

For me that would be a real step backwards. I use BBO to play practice matches with people I know. It's easy to check with the person who needs to act when there is a delay, but would be hard to do if you can't tell that. And we aren't concerned about anyone in the game varying tempo for that purpose. Obviously, we're in a different scenario than the one you talk about. But the proposed solution wouldn't work well for everyone.

Fair enough. A well-placed simulation would probably go a long way to answering it, but meh. I agree with game before slam, but IMO partner has already answered the question of strain.

It looks like I'm in a minority, but I think 4NT as natural is a rather poor agreement even compared to RKC (although clearly there are improvements that can be made here). At IMPs, the number of hands where 4NT is right and 5D is wrong seems to be much smaller than the number of hands that want to know about trump quality via key cards. At matchpoints there is more going for it, but partner knows it's matchpoints and has chosen to bypass 3NT with the opening bid. So that reduces the likelihood of 4NT as natural working, and it is still useful for slam purposes. Luckily, the two regular partners I have so far polled agree with me. What is the counterargument?

NFBs are fairly normal in Polish systems, with the most common treatment at the moment seeming to be non-forcing only at the 2 level.

That's rather an overreaction. Everybody has stories about dreadful making slams - mine involves QJ tight of trumps, a 3-3 break, a finesse, and a squeeze. It happens, but getting to it does not instil confidence in partner, teammates, or your captain. Because the next 50 times you will be losing 13 imps rather than gaining them.

Whether or not 7S is better than 6NT is basically irrelevant in practice. Getting to a bad 6NT is defensible bidding on these hands, but getting to 7S is a clear sign of poor bidding judgement and/or system. Which one would you prefer to try and explain to teammates?

Without useful agreements I'm not sure I have enough imagination to avoid playing 6NT on the hand (something like 2C - 3C; 3H - 3NT; 6NT), which is a lucky make. And I'm definitely losing out here to the 7S bidders.

Others seem to be focusing on South's bidding, but North is just as culpable IMO. I can live with the 1NT rebid, but failing to raise 2H immediately with a perfect hand for hearts is poor. Doubling 3D rather than competing to 3H is even worse, and shows a misevaluation of the offensive power of the hearts and the defensive power of the diamonds.

I want to show a forcing 2-suiter over 1NT. If I can't do this, I'll show a 1-suiter in hearts (assuming I have a forcing way to do that) and then jump in diamonds. If I can't do any of this, I'll bid 4H and see if I get to bid again. Game is good opposite xx xx or better in the red suits, so I'm never playing in a partscore. Over 1D, I try 1H and then 3H.

An ex-partner long ago tried 4S with this sort of a hand (mixing up a suggestion about what to do with a good 6 card major and weak 5 card minor). Easy +420. Partner's a world champion now, so who am I to argue?

How do N/S suggest they would have entered the auction? If 3H is preemptive, North might have a takeout double, and this would get them there. But South hardly has a 4S bid after choosing to pass over 1H for some reason. I would like to poll people about action with the North hand and see how much more likely they would be to act over a preemptive 3H, and assign a weighted score based on that. Maybe something like 50% 4H, 30% 4S= and 20% 4S-1.

I was struggling with what a putative hesitation might mean. My first thought is that it shows a hand that wants to defend doubled, so this should be ruled out. But the vulnerability makes it highly unlikely partner could have a hand that warranted hesitating here, so I'm not sure what to do. We do have a fair bit of defence though, so a double could easily work out well for us even here. In the end I didn't get anywhere useful so gave up and did something useful with the Sunday morning.

Don't you want to let people choose more than one option from the first poll? I think only 4H and double are serious options for most people.

Much tougher then. I'd probably bid, but I'm not sure there's much in the decision.

Is this IMPs or MPs? I don't see any reason to bid on the second hand unless we're playing matchpoints. The upside is a partscore, but the downside is a medium-sized penalty. The first one looks normal to bid on though.

D10 is a standout for me. If it works I score lots of IMPs because they won't find it at the other table, and if not then everyone sympathises and tells me it was a good shot. Win-win.

The key thing about balancing is that you have to ask yourself whether it's safer to bid now than before. If not, why are you doing it? In this auction: - the opponents have exchanged enough information to know what to do if you bid - there is no expectation either you or they have a fit - double by them now is penalty If it's wrong to bid it might be pretty expensive, and they are not likely to make a mistake. The only thing you now know is that opener doesn't have significant extras, but that doesn't mean it's your hand. All in all, if you choose not to bid 2S on the previous round there is little reason to do so now. I would have bid 2S earlier on many of the hands presented (certainly the first one in this topic and the one just above this message) and bidding spades over 1NT isn't as dangerous as bidding a minor, but wouldn't balance on any of them.

The almost cult-like hatred of Cappelletti never ceases to amuse me. IMO it's a fine convention, and far better than swapping the meaning of 2C and 2D. Why? Whether or not you bid 2D to show equal length, much of the time the other side knows the complete major suit distribution the moment dummy hits. Even knowing dummy has equal length in the majors improves the opening lead. I am certain I have gained far more over the years playing against "reverse Cappelletti", as it is called here, than lost by playing in the weaker major fit at the two level or by not being able to compete when we don't know where the suit is. It's not even close.

I think not being able to redouble to show good clubs is very poor. You take away the opponent's risk of doubling and stop yourself from getting lucky occasionally. I've never discussed other continuations, but would expect that pass is a suggestion to play clubs and 2D is a catch-all denying a major. Time to discuss it...

A concrete example might be that Widget is a set of agreements about overcalling the opponents' NT. Overcaller bids 2D believing it to show the majors. Partner believes 2D is a transfer to hearts in Widget. The actual write-up, which neither of them has ever read, is that 2D shows spades or both red suits. To complicate matters, Widget is not played by anyone else in the area, so there is no local assumed knowledge.

I choose 'none of the above'. Your opponents are entitled to your actual agreement, which is 'Widget, but we have not discussed it any further and in fact have different understandings of the convention'. This is, in effect, 'no agreement'. If this explanation was actually given, I don't believe the other side would be entitled to either person's private understanding of the convention. Of course you'll never give that explanation - you will say what you believe it to mean and your partner will correct it at the appropriate time. So anything you say is likely to lead to both UI to your side and MI to their side. Good luck landing on your feet :).

True - that's a harder question. I think I fold up my card after most tricks, and certainly when declarer is thinking for a bit. That means it's harder for them to take inferences when I fan the cards and find the right one no matter what. But I've certainly picked these sorts of situations when opponents play too smoothly as well, so it's not clear what to do.

Sorry for being unclear. I was saying that you, as defender, should have a standard way of reacting when declarer pauses for a guess. That way you don't stress trying to work out how not to give information away. You could decide to always remember where your last holiday was, for example, or study the design on the back of the cards, or whatever. Now when something like this comes up (and you don't need to think about the hand), you know how to react. I don't have any real insight about when to think about whether to play the King or the Jack - I suspect I do a bit of both. The only additional factor that I don't believe has been mentioned is that if you have this guess early in the hand, is it's worth doing your thinking before the trick. It may not be clear to the defence that this is the critical decision and they may go wrong. If you hesitate after one opponent plays, it's much easier to work out what you are thinking about.