Pict

If my choices are 3H and 4H - then amazingly I am for 4H.

I vote (sorry don't vote) that 'duck the King' quite literally means nothing to me.

Hands up as someone who has never opened 1NT with a singleton. I just have a fondness for bidding 5+ card suits, with a side four card suit. I find the idea of treating 7222 as balanced interesting, but not for my treatment of the first round of bidding. As for oppos, if they have methods and base any bidding and plays on the shape of partner's 1NT, I'd like to hear about it, otherwise I don't care I understood Bluejak's earlier point to me that in defence I might be affected by the idea that partner had a singleton or extreme distribution. This is problematic, but I'd rather not worry about it.

The ACBL regulations seem reasonable to me. Without methods, how can you take advantage of knowing that partner might be, say, 5431.

I'd say West is bidding 6C on this auction except for the lack of alert. So I'd make a small attempt to change 80-20 to 100-0.

Well Bluejak, I tell you what, you review the post and you tell me.

Well I happen to disagree with some of what of you say. The reasonable possible bids for East at the critical point are: Pass Redouble 2H 3C We have concentrated on some of these to indulge discussion about 'psychs', but for no other good reason. In the continuing absence of the views of the many TD's we have online, I will now withdraw my objections to jallerton's logic. I have always preferred the idea that players can continue to play Bridge, in all circumstances. This thread has confirmed my conviction.

I may have missed why declarer knew the position of the club King. Seems critical to me.

I hesitate to intrude, but I still think pass by East is so blindingly an option (LA) that I still am reluctant to accept jallerton's position. Of course jallerton is honest and was there, but I think he might admit to an extreme position on the importance of AI in UI situations - would he?

I'd pass the first and bid the second. The risks of bidding on the first are much greater.

Considering the case where partner alerts and passes is just a useful mental exercise to validate any notion that you 'had to' bid on. I agree with Lamford that playing with screens is not a good analogy, because you have no UI in that case, so there seems nothing to compare. I would not personally base any argument on the notion that West has psyched since it seems to me very much less probable than a misbid - system, mechanical or temporary aberration. I don't see how I can claim to avoid catering for an extremely unlikely pysch while catering for a much more probable forget. Of course if you tell me this pair never forgets and partner often psychs that is different in general, but hardly fits this particular case, which will immediately falsify your proposition!

I can see that if I have no choice about what to do, then I can't breach 73C. But it can hardly be said that East has no choice in this case. What would you bid if partner had alerted, explained the 2C as inverted and then passed? Do you believe you have no choices to make? Perhaps you just meant to explain how AI could narrow choices, without relating it to this post. By the way, 73C does not mention 'demonstrably suggested'. If we decide that 73C, despite what it says, is exactly equivalent in its effect to Law 16, then I don't mind, because then I have one process to understand: I might wonder why we have both Laws but that is another matter. The bottom line for me is that I view the OP as describing a blatant violation of Law 73C. Of course I can be wrong (though not just because you don't like my attitude). Many posts relate to MI or to Law 16, or to inadequacies in the stated reason for appeal, or to what it means to say someone has an agreement. I just wonder why the TD and AC chose to ignore or discount Law 73 in their decisions. I can't see that they are allowed to do that, and I'd like to understand because currently I regard myself as bound by 73C.

Why? When East bid 2C and there was no alert, he immediately had UI that his bid had been misunderstood. When East bid 2H, without any extra values that I can see, rather than pass, he rescued the situation for his side, in seeming contravention of Law 73. It appears from the discussion that many posters believe it possible to argue away Law 73. 1. Because West's pass gave AI of the misunderstanding (but we are often told that subsequent AI does not 'trump' UI. I've been told this myself in this Forum) 2. There was no agreement, because East and West had a different idea of their system. But what has this to do with Law 73 - which applies to the responsibilities of an individual player in receipt of UI. So all I was saying is that for this AC, or at least a majority of them, Law 73 could be argued away, despite the absolute way it is written. This leaves me with a great uncertainty as a player. With UI and AI, can I prefer the injunction to play to win, to the injunction to avoid taking advantage of UI, or can I not . I'd just like to know.

Perhaps, as I suggested earlier, we have had some absolutist posts about Law 73 - 'can't take any advantage'. But it seems in the real world of TDs and ACs Law 73 is strictly deemed unworkable?

My partner and I often discuss some aspect of system after the next board has started - it is not ideal, but it is widespread, and I try to say "next board, please" if I can. I can recall many occasions when opponents have said "Can we play this board, please?", so I disagree that it is not objected to. Moreover, where a convention has been forgotten, a comment during the auction period of the next board would seem to me to be a clear aid to memory under 40C3(a) regardless of whether it is information that can be used under 16A3. So I am surprised that you would not rule against that a pair that made such a comment and it turned out to be relevant. Just for my orientation, are we back in SB mode? The quoted post said 'while counting' but not yet looking. Are we now to get interested in the idea that that the bidding phase has started before you look at your cards? Are we now beyond BLML?

It is said that in the early days of Chess playing programs, a situation arose where a program could give checkmate on the next move in more than one way. The program had not been given a means of deciding between identical outcomes, so didn't make a move. Naturally the programmer added an arbitrary means of breaking the deadlock. In your case it appears declarer could find no basis for deciding between playing for the drop or the finesse. So he made a play determined by an unrelated fact - as indeed he must logically do if he is to play at all. Were a player to apply coin tossing all the time, they would be failing to take the game seriously.

Can't see much a leg to stand on.

Fair enough, just a difference of opinion/evaluation. Looking at East's hand and the auction, double would be the furthest thought from my mind. I would say that East, prematurely assuming the death of his moribund partner, took his time to review the auction and consider the risks of bidding on before passing. I replied to the OP as if I were being polled by a TD - I assume Lamford did too, and perhaps the OP's expert friend, but I don't know. I would always double finding myself in the kind of position West is in (without the BIT). Whether I would have bid 5D as West or 4S as East is interesting enough in a parallel universe. And with the BIT? Not sure bit too late in the thread to get into that, but if I was TD I'd take some convincing that 6D could stand.

So you think partner after 4D/5D/pause was not thinking of 6D?

Double

Stern stuff, but you need to read back a bit to understand what you are supposed to be talking about - which you don't.

Isn't that precisely the meaning of the word "inadvertent"? Pran I'll do you the courtesy of replying. It's easy to see, historically, how bid correction worked. I say "One club, no I mean One spade". Minimal punctuation implying no time spent thinking. No problem with people's obsessions about how far things are apart in the 'bidding box'. But now you, experienced TDs, have decided that although the words haven't changed, the requirement for immediacy has. I am allowed, competitively, to slip off into Vampyr's fantasies and awake some time later when partner says: 'You seemed a bit distrait when you bid there, my old friend. Are you sure you bid what you intended to bid. I know diamonds are not close to NT, but maybe you were thinking of the song about diamonds and friends". As I say, this is all fine for me, because the main thing, apparently, is to have the TD do moral judgements on the players and decide from their relative state of apoplexy. So much for rules that level the playing field for all players.

Not quite. Because the "time" could be spent thinking "oh, shi t, I forgot the system -- that bid is not correct". This, obviously, is not legal. It does require a bit of mind-reading if a player chooses to lie, but there must be a reaction of genuine surprise -- eg what the %$!@ is that bid doing on the table in front of me? In practice there may still be a pause if the player doesn't know what he is supposed to do about it, and no action may be taken anyway, because I would think that Mr. Burn's misapprehension is fairly common. OK so we have reasoned away 'pause for thought' and replaced it with 'did you mean to make the bid'. Actually that's fine by me. I would generally prefer openness about things in the Laws that we want to de-emphasise or reinterpret, but I understand it's an imperfect world where transparency can create controversy and muddling through feels more comfortable.

Yes, and before partner's call you may have been thinking about what colour your girlfriend's underwear was, but the "pause for thought" described here is thought about the bid you have made. It "starts ticking" when you have noticed what bid you actually have in front of you, not when you physically make the bid. In which case it would appear the pause for thought phrase adds nothing to the Law (would better have been omitted) and Pran was right to ignore it, and concentrate on correction 'in time'. Is that what you are implying?

This is an odd statement, if you look back at dburn's contribution that triggered this part of the discussion. He seemed to think that a player could not ask to replace his bid after an alert wakes him up, rather than later facing an adjustment.