Minor Ailment

[uva72uva72]

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Match points, ACBL robot individual

 

At any form of scoring, humans will strain to respond to partner's take-out double in a major suit, often bypassing longer minor suit holdings in favor of 4 small - the risk/reward ratio simply renders the apparent safety of a minor suit contract illusory in the vast majority of cases. For some reason, this very basic point doesn't seem to be part of the robot's analysis. In the display hand, for example, 24 of 32 Souths acted over West's 2♠. Of those, 19 doubled and then passed North's "constructive" 3♦ response - if they were like me, having concluded that a minor suit game was not sufficiently likely to justify the risk of climbing higher at match points. None, I wager, guessed that North was hiding a 5-card ♥ suit. In the real world, I think most North's would bid 4 ♥ directly and would not even consider 3♦; and I think North's failure to bid ♥ is a major bug. In all but the rarest instances (i.e.,when South has a huge hand) North is guaranteed at least an 8-card fit in ♥s; there is no such guarantee in a minor suit, particularly when South him/herself holds 4♥ (note South's ♣ holding on the display hand). On the other hand, two Souths, probably having caught North's act before, elected to overcall directly with their chunky 4-card holding, an action that I don't think you'd see twice in a decade in live tournaments. Is it not possible for robots to give the same preference to major suits that humans do in responding to take-out doubles?

[1eyedjack]

Not sure that I entirely agree with your risk v reward analysis between bidding a weak 4 card Major in preference to a longer minor. But that said and done, to conceal a 5 card major (per example hand) is bizarre, more so as the minor is not longer.

[georgi]

Thanks for reporting.

 

Fixed in v31.

[lycier]

Thanks for reporting.

 

Fixed in v31.

 

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Even though Gib N have 4-card ♥ and 5-card ♦,I found Gib usually respond 3♦ ,not bid 3♥.

So hoping it will be fixed in v31.