WellSpyder

2♠ in response to an opening 2♥ in 1st or 2nd seat would be an artificial relay implying at least invitational values, but all responses to a 3rd or 4th seat 2-level opening are natural (and non-forcing). Over intervention, most bids would be natural and non-forcing anyway, so I think that is what both members of the partnership assumed applied here.

[hv=pc=n&n=sk94haq983d842c76&d=s&v=e&b=3&a=pp2hd2sdpp3hppdppp]133|200[/hv] Match points. North's 2♥ opening is ostensibly Fantunes style (intermediate (10-13 HCPs), unbalanced (either 6H, or 5H with a 4+ minor and more shapely than 5422), but potentially undisciplined in 3rd seat. West's double of 2♠ is for penalties. Should North be bidding 3♠ on either the 2nd or 3rd round of the bidding? If South turns out not to have a genuine 2♠ bid, has North fielded this psyche?

I know we have discussed this aspect of the laws before, but it does seem to be a genuinely difficult area. However, it seems completely obvious to me that the whole concept of how the game is supposed to work in a fair way requires it to be impossible for West to lead ♣2 in this example and to gain thereby, without some offsetting adjustment to the score afterwards. I don't understand why anybody would want to support an interpretation of the law that allows that to happen if there is any possibility of interpreting it differently.

There are a number of occasions after bids that are loosely described as game-forcing where it can be desirable to be able to stop in 4 of a minor, which does, after all, require you to make as many tricks as a number of game contracts, and more than the most common game contract. However, my experience has been that it simply isn't worth the effort of worrying about them and the possible confusion that can arise, so you might as well play "game-forcing" bids as actually forcing to game.

Al, would you like to interpret some of your acronyms for those of us who don't follow the debate in quite as much detail as you do? What about those used to distinguish the different type of measures in the chart, for instance?

When I told someone last night that I was trying to calculate the odds of averaging only 16.375 points between my hand and partner's over 24 boards, their immediate response was that it depended on whether I was playing rubber bridge or not. Sounds like it might also depend on who I am playing against...:)

Brilliant! - thanks, Helene. That sounds pretty convincing to me. 3.74 SDs below the mean occurs around 1 time in 11000 in a Normal Distribution, so with luck if I play once a week it won't happen again for another 200 years or so.... (No 7 card or longer suit for either of us over 24 boards is likely to happen around 1 time in 7, I think. Putting the two probabilities together - I know they won't be strictly independent, but not far off, I would guess - suggests I should be OK for the next 1400 years or so.)

Thanks, everyone. Some useful pointers, there. I thought an approach like weejonnie's would understate the odds against what happened, since, as barmar points out, the HCP average of my partner's and my hands aren't independent - if partner averages 8.5, for instance, I can expect to average 10.5 rather than 10. However, it seemed a good place to start. The problem is that, according to Excel at least, the chances of getting an outcome from a Normal Distribution as far away from the mean as 6.08 SDs is about 6E-10. In other words, 1 in about 1.7 billion! I guess my assumption that it would be OK to use a normal approximation for what obviously isn't exactly a normal distribution breaks down at such extreme values.... Anyway, I stand by the title of this thread!

Any statisticians out there who know the standard deviation of the number of (Milton Work) points held in a bridge hand? I played a 24 board match last week in which my partner averaged 8.25 points and I averaged 8.125. My partner commented that our combined average of 16.375 was "statistically off the scale", and I just wondered how far off the scale it really was... Incidentally, we also held a grand total of zero 7 card suits or longer - not surprisingly, perhaps, we seemed to end up doing an awful lot of defending....

I think the paucity of responses indicates that no-one knows what to do, not that it isn't a problem! FWIW, I would completely reverse the order of Nigel's choices....

Maybe I have misunderstood, but how is partner supposed to play his H in order to signal that it is stiff?

Generally, I would also be reluctant to raise a jump to 6♠, since partner has implied that he thinks he knows what the contract should be. But if I am looking at the ace of trumps which partner cannot possibly know that I have, then I am inclined to think that when partner knows he can make 12 tricks without the ace then he must be able to make 13 with it.

My answer was just to bid 6♠ since I "knew" partner wouldn't have ♠A as well as ♦A, but it is rather a good point that if he is looking at ♠A he will know when you bid 6 that he should raise to 7! He won't do this with ♦A and ♣A, of course, since he won't know ♣A is useful or that ♦A is a surprise.

4S for me. Does everyone actually play splinters over RHO's double?? I would play 4♣ here as a fit bid....

Fair point. I confused the issue by using non-psyche here as shorthand for both non-psyche and non-misbid. It is quite possible to bid on the assumption that partner hasn't got what he has shown, even when he actually has. Mostly you do that at your own risk, but if you do this because he has a tendency to psyche or misbid in this situation then you actually still have a CPU of a sort even if the U was missing on this particular occasion....

We do?? You have been able to ignore the UI issue since you posed the hypothetical question of how people would view the situation if South had asked about the alert of 1♦. But since be didn't do this, you can't use people's answer to your hypothetical question as a way to gauge agreement about the appropriate ruling in the actual case. While that makes a lot of sense in terms of pure logic, I'm not sure it is an accurate summary of how the issue is dealt with in practice - probably because a) no-one ever complains about a fielded non-psyche and b) there is much less chance of damage if the non-psycher doesn't actually hold the hand his partner has illegally allowed for.

Agreed. Not agreed. If South has psyched his double and North's subsequent bidding appears to allow for that, then there is evidence of a possible CPU, and that is exactly what aardv has been saying. Agreed. There are possible UI constraints, whether South asks or doesn't ask, but I don't think aardv or anyone else is arguing that there would be relevant UI constraints in this case if South had asked. But that doesn't affect the CPU issue, of course. No, of course not. Giving UI is not an irregularity, There may not be one. But if UI has been used to influence a call, or if there is a CPU, then of course there has been an irregularity. So the TD will still want to consider these possibilities.

-1 Looks a pretty clear answer to me! It is not a plain and simple question, it is a judgment question, and Aardv gives a clear steer as to what his judgment is likely to be, while leaving his options open since presumably if actually called to make such a judgment as a TD he would consult first.

Congratulations! Was it luck or skill :) ?

My partner made 2CXX+2 at IMPs last month, for a pretty useful score. And teammates brought home 2CXX earlier this year, too. (Curiously, on the latter hand the contract at our table was 2CX= our way!)

If I wanted to show diamonds and didn't know why 1♦ had been alerted then I would certainly have asked first - and no, I don't know that that is cheating. Pran seems to think that if I want to show diamonds and don't know why 1♦ has been alerted then it is OK not to ask first, so partner will know that I have assumed the 1♦ bid is artificial, even if it actually isn't. I thought that I did know that that was cheating!

Not where I come from. It might be entirely natural, but non-forcing, for instance. Or it might be natural and forcing, but showing at least 7 cards in the suit! Or......

Please tell me you are joking! Surely it isn't legal to take advantage of alerts in this way? Supposing oppo are playing Walsh, and alert in this position because this natural 1♦ bid denies a major (unless holding a stronger hand). Now I can show diamonds, too, provided I don't ask about the alerted 1♦ bid??

Was it? The fact that south doesn't have what he apparently showed does not necessarily mean that it was a psychic bid. Did south actually intend to show diamonds, or the unbid suits (ie the majors)?

At the end of the day, though, it is not up to the rules to protect you. It is up to the TD. And if the TD suspects that you had a pretty good idea that the bid wasn't natural and thinks you may be trying to have your cake and eat it by asking for an adjustment, then you may find you are unprotected after all - however valid your argument might be that the opponents left you no option but to follow the course you did unless you were prepared to risk damaging your own side's interests as a result of their infraction....