Opening Lead System?

[relknes]

I have been playing around with opening leads. There are a lot of systems out there (standard, journalist, rusinow, etc), and each has their strengths and weaknesses, much like different bidding systems have their strengths and weaknesses.

I tend to like the idea, as an opening leader, of being able to ask for pertinent information. For instance, I liked the idea that a lot of players use where an A asks for attitude, while the K asks for count. This system came out of an extension of that principle.

So here is what I am thinking:

 

A = asks for suit preference

K = asks for attitude (from either AK or KQ)

Q = asks for count (from AKQ, KQJ, KQT, QJT, or QJ9)

J = 1-gap "internal sequence" (AQJ or KJT)

T = 2-gap "Internal sequence" (AJT or KT9)

Spot card = 3rd from something or top of nothing

 

 

The rationale for the A, K, and Q meanings is that most of the time you lead a bare A it is because the other suits are even worse options (better to lead a bare A than to under-lead a bare K, for example), but if partner has values in one of those side suits they are often important to attack, so it seemed like the A was the best of the top 3 to use to ask which side suit to switch to. Most of the time that count matters most in a suit contract seem to be when the opening leader is wondering if it is safe to take the third round of a suit, and most of those combos contain the Q, so I though that made sense as the lead to ask for count. That left the K as attitude, which seemed pretty reasonable. My concern with these is that the ability to ask pertinent questions comes at the cost of conveying accurate information to partner and, in particular when the lead is a Q and partner has the A, put them to a guess.

 

The J and T leads are the type of lead that will almost guarentee partner can play the suit perfectly. Seeing any one of 4 cards in either their hand or the dummy will place every honor in the suit, and if they don't see any of those 4 cards then they know partner has one of those combos while declarer has all the missing cards, so they should still be able to play the suit correctly. Of course, the same is true for declarer, but one would hope that the information would be more valuable to the defense.

 

The "Third from something" leads will give partner more information about honors, as well as allowing them to finesse against the board more often, but communicate less about shape when compared to fourth best leads. My concern about them is whether they might "blow a trick" once in a while, and if so how often? Maybe someone who plays "Third and fifth leads" could speak to that...

 

There could also be other problems I haven't considered. I'd appreciate any thoughts. :)

[awm]

It seems like from JT9x you don't really have a lead, since J and T both promise internal sequences that you don't have. And of course 9 looks like top of nothing, and x seems pretty poor from this holding.

 

From QJTx/QJ9x you are pretty much leading queen and getting a count signal (again since J/T shows something else and low seems bad), which is fairly often not the signal you want.

 

There is also some question about the ace, since there are often more than two possible "suit preferences" that are possible (including continuation, partner could have the king). So it's not clear exactly what partner's signal will mean some of the time.

 

The more I see opening lead threads, the more I'm impressed that obvious shift solves almost all problems in a much simpler way.

[Nabooba]

Look at Slawinski's Combine leads.

[relknes]

OK, the system sucks. Good to know. Thanks for those who took the time to weigh in, especially AWM for giving some guidance and input.

I'm abandoning the "honor leads ask" concept, for the most part. Still curious about the tradeoffs of 3rd best compared to 4th best, though.

[Zelandakh]

Look at Slawinski's Combine leads.

They are really good if you play them

.

[Siegmund]

Late to the party, but will chime in anyway...

 

My experience has been the opposite of yours: opening leader is almost never well-placed to demand a certain signal. Third hand, who has seen dummy before he chooses his card, is much better placed to give the information opener is likely to need, if he has a clue what opener has. I won't even play A-attitude K-kount.

 

The way of dividing up interior sequences is new to me, and there is certainly room for sensibly re-apportioning the interior sequence leads. Journalist, Standard, and 0/2 Higher are not the only ways. I could entertain a variety of new lead systems -- provided they are 'showing' systems not 'telling' systems.