[dvd]

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play 2/1,now your bid/plan?
4h，4c，x or others？

[the hog]

I would bid 4C, knowing full well that a x may be best.

[benlessard]

I would bid 4S if this show a void. With a D fit and a stiff S I would start by a double most of the time so that why in my reg partnership this is a sure void. Im not sure if ill be able to often play 5C or 5H instead of 5D but making a slam try & showing a void at the same time is seldom wrong.

North is favorite to hold 4S because of east pass but partner may have extras 4153 or a 4162. I dont think its that likely that 4H is making and 5D is going down.

Very close 2nd is 4C because it allow to stop in 4H. I dont really like double here because Im an agressive passer of high level takeout.

[Fluffy]

double!

[dake50]

Are DK with 3S bidder? HK opposite? Does partner have SK10xx so we get 2xS +HA+DAQ+CAK for down 3?
I doubt any near that. Will partner over my double choose 4H with HKx?
I see little chance double gets this hand best.
I have great offense: 6xH, 3xD support, AND S-void!
I try 4C: partner, "I DID NOT DOUBLE" Are we going up? He should reason just
about this hand. Some support (a misfit would double), good stuff in clubs
(that's why I'm bidding them), and my hearts are prime topped (HAK, HAQ).
I expect he repeats 4D then I try 4H to show a 6th heart. Off to the races
or 4H/5D quits. Partner will make a good decision here.

[MrAce]

benlessard, on 2013-August-07, 23:47, said:

I would bid 4S if this show a void. With a D fit and a stiff S I would start by a double most of the time so that why in my reg partnership this is a sure void. Im not sure if ill be able to often play 5C or 5H instead of 5D but making a slam try & showing a void at the same time is seldom wrong.

North is favorite to hold 4S because of east pass but partner may have extras 4153 or a 4162. I dont think its that likely that 4H is making and 5D is going down.

Very close 2nd is 4C because it allow to stop in 4H. I dont really like double here because Im an agressive passer of high level takeout.

First of all you do not have a ♦ fit. How did you come to a conclusion that pd has long diamonds just because he is likely to hold long spades ? You are dumping ♣ fit forever, if there is any, by bidding 4♠ imo. Of course you are dumping the possibility of playing 4♥ as well, which is also very bad. (I did not understand how 4♠ can show a void and a spade stiff at the same time anyway.) FYI, 4♠ is the only cue available for you at this point and it does not even promise a shortness necessarily.

Second, you say you are an aggressive passer of high level take out. Since when 3♠ has been a high level ? It does not matter that it forces you to bid at 4 level, they still need only 9 tricks to make when doubled. If my pd passes double i have plenty of defense, probably more than average expected tricks for this double.


Sorry but imo you are all over the place with your analysis. You are dumping our most likely contracts by 1 man conclusions and taking control of the bidding with assumptions which are not as likely as you think they are imo. After 4♠ pd will be your slave in the bidding most of the time and i do not think you have that kind of hand. Trust your pd, give him some space and let him involve in decision process.

Tbh, i can live with anything but 4♠

[JLOGIC]

Fluffy, on 2013-August-08, 01:48, said:

double!

Perfect post

[mikeh]

Begin rant:

I must be seriously out of touch.

I could have sworn that the current US team won a lot of imps in the Trials by converting relatively low level doubles on auctions like this one.

I do know that for everyone under the age of 50 all doubles below 7N are takeout, but I can't fathom this one.

Would we not double with, say, xx AQxx xxx AKxx?

What would you have opener do with say Jxx Kx AKxx Qxxx?

Clearly he should pass when we hold the 2=4=3=4.

Clearly he should bid when we hold the 0=6=3=4.

Maybe I'm wrong. Maybe the doublers have some way of handling the 2=4=3=4 hand other than double. Given that on that layout, we need to be defending 3♠, passing probably only loses a few imps

But if, as I strongly believe, the current doublers would have doubled with the 2=4=3=4 hand, and sneered that the problem should be in the N/B forum, how on earth can it be winning bridge to make the same call with the OP hand?

Yes, I know that maybe we belong in 3N and can't get there otherwise. Well, on this hand I am bidding 4♥ over 3N anyway, so you can have all of your 3N contracts.

Yes, I know that maybe he is sitting there with AQ10x in spades and is salivating over our double. I just don't think that that is the percentage action. We are unlikely to get 800 and unlikely to fail in our game, and we need both to happen before doubling is a big winner. That seems too small a target given the far likelier possibility that he is sitting there with no place to go and no trump stack.

End of rant

[JLOGIC]

mikeh, on 2013-August-08, 14:48, said:

What would you have opener do with say Jxx Kx AKxx Qxxx?

This is your worst case scenario, but if partner bids 4C it will be easy to get to 6C, and if he passes and leads a trump we will often get 300 which is not great but not a huge deal. On top of that the opps might have bid more if partner really just has Jxx of spades (depends on the style of the 3S bidder but I assume RHO would almost always bid 4S with 4 of them and LHO would sometimes bid 4S with 7 solid or w/e). It's true it might go all pass and we get 100 if LHO has 7 spades and 3 diamonds and that would be a pretty big loss. But partner might bid and we get to 6C because of it. And that is a worst case scenario type of hand.

More often partner will have 2 trump tricks than zero by a lot when he passes. It's not really about our shape, it's that we have AK AQ and partner probably has spades behind LHO, that seems good. On top of that, partner can just have a stiff heart and 4H doesn't do well and we belong in diamonds or clubs or 3S X. I really don't think it will happen that often when partner passes that we get 100, I'm not saying it will never happen but surely it's gonna be rare when we have AQ AK and partner has opened the bidding and has spades behind LHO and not length in our AQxxxx. It is easy to me to imagine crushing them (800+) when partner passes, it is possible to me that 4H will go down, and it's possible to imagine partner bidding 4 of a minor and then we can bid 6m. I do think 300 vs 450 type hands are a more significant loss than people think, however I think it's worth investing that for the upside of getting a bigger number or getting to 6m.

I agree that it's strange to double with 0634, but at some amount of quick tricks it must be fine, I think this hand is over the cutoff. If I didn't have the ace of hearts and it was the king obv I'd bid 4H because I'd be way less thrilled about all pass.

I guess I think all pass is pretty likely but I'm pretty happy with it and think 800 is def in the game, and obviously I'm thrilled if he bids 4C or 4D. And 4H might well make opposite a stiff but I would obviously rather be defending 3S X when partner has a stiff spade than playing 4H (or playing 6m if partner is not going to pass the X and has a stiff heart).

It definitely seems live that we hold them to 5 trump tricks and nothing else when partner passes, or 4 trump tricks and some other trick on a less likely but possible day.

[JLOGIC]

Also I just realized we are only getting 300 if LHO has 7222 on mikeh's hand assuming they have 7 spades (very likely given RHO's pass) since even on a trump lead they can set up a diamond as long as dummy has a trump honor (likely), so sorry for that it doesn't require LHO having 3 diamonds. I personally would pass with that hand all day fwiw but I doubt everyone would, I still think 100 on all pass is really an unlikely worst case scenario and I'm willing to risk it.

[PhilKing]

mikeh, on 2013-August-08, 14:48, said:

Begin rant:

I must be seriously out of touch.

I could have sworn that the current US team won a lot of imps in the Trials by converting relatively low level doubles on auctions like this one.
End of rant

To exploit this tactic, the opposition may need to start passing 3♠ with four-card spade support. Until that becomes common, the assumption here is that partner will usually have length.

[JLOGIC]

mikeh, on 2013-August-08, 14:48, said:

Yes, I know that maybe he is sitting there with AQ10x in spades and is salivating over our double. I just don't think that that is the percentage action. We are unlikely to get 800 and unlikely to fail in our game, and we need both to happen before doubling is a big winner. That seems too small a target given the far likelier possibility that he is sitting there with no place to go and no trump stack.

We don't need both to happen for doubling to be a big winner. If 4H is failing partner is probably passing the double, in that case even 300 is a big win.

Also if partner bids 4 of a minor that is probably a big win, we probably have 6 of a minor (he apparently doesn't have too much in spades to bid 4m).

And of course 800 would always be a big win, we seem to disagree about how often that will happen but obv it's not the most likely outcome.

I think that analysis is fair, but we must analyze it compared to when is 4H a big win vs Xing? When we make a game vs 100 that is the big win that you are playing for, do you really feel it's that likely? Surely we will oftne just get 6 tricks on power imo, it's not like they are going to catch a good dummy I think the most likely win is vs 300 but you need a lot of win 3s or 4s there to make up for the possible upside involved in X imo (and X will sometimes win some 2 balls when we get 500 to offset these). I think it is bidding 4H that has lower and less likely upside.

[mikeh]

JLOGIC, on 2013-August-08, 17:32, said:

We don't need both to happen for doubling to be a big winner. If 4H is failing partner is probably passing the double, in that case even 300 is a big win.

Also if partner bids 4 of a minor that is probably a big win, we probably have 6 of a minor (he apparently doesn't have too much in spades to bid 4m).

And of course 800 would always be a big win, we seem to disagree about how often that will happen but obv it's not the most likely outcome.

I think that analysis is fair, but we must analyze it compared to when is 4H a big win vs Xing? When we make a game vs 100 that is the big win that you are playing for, do you really feel it's that likely? Surely we will oftne just get 6 tricks on power imo, it's not like they are going to catch a good dummy I think the most likely win is vs 300 but you need a lot of win 3s or 4s there to make up for the possible upside involved in X imo (and X will sometimes win some 2 balls when we get 500 to offset these). I think it is bidding 4H that has lower and less likely upside.

All valid points (altho I would argue that bidding 4♣ affords a slight increase in our chances of scoring 920 compared to double)

If my only concern was that doubling would cause us to miss too many 4♥ contracts, then I'd be happy(ish) with the double. Hoping that 4♥ is the right target is even narrower than hoping that 3♠ doubled, when partner passes it out, is the right target.

I didn't vote for 4♥. I chose 4♣.

In my view, 4♣ should get you to the best game all the time, if you are prepared to stay in game. The main knock I see on 4♣ is that we may not yet be finished....we can reasonably enough consider slam and we may end up too high if we do or too low if we don't.

If I ignore that issue, and I don't really think I should, then the argument isn't about defending 3♠ x'd or bidding 4♥. It's about defending 3♠ x'd or playing a good game contract (ignoring 3N as not on the cards...as I said earlier, I'd pull 3N to 4♥. If you'd sit for 3N, then that alters the dynamics a bit).

Not ignoring the problem that one might end up in the right strain at the wrong level after 4♣ does make the double more attractive. However I still don't see it as an action I'd choose at the table. I confess that having read the responses to my rant, I don't feel as strongly about it as I did then.

Btw, I wasn't persuaded, in the least, by Phil's argument about RHO's spade length. Maybe some players robotically raise partner's 3♠ here with any 3334 hand, with no cover cards, but I don't and I don't think it winning bridge to routinely offer 500 to 800 when partner's 3♠ may already have wrecked the opps' constructive auction. Look at the number of posters here doubling 3♠...why take an action that can almost never turn out well? I would expect partner to hold 3 spades a significant amount of the time, tho I concede that he'll have 4 much of the time as well.

[JLOGIC]

Apologies... for some reason I thought you were a 4H bidder. 4C is interesting, it leaves open a 4D bid or a club raise, I'm a little worried that we might miss a 6-2 heart fit so I'm not sure that you will always get to the right game but it does seem better than 4H. And obviously partner will often bid 4H with Hx and might with xx.

I agree with you the main discussion should simply be how good will 3S X be for our side.

[dvd]

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This is all hands ,I sit E,after pd 3s,I bid pass.
Do you agree this pass(E)? or you bid 4s?
which one is better? This is my second quention.
Thanks for all answers!
IMO,I bid x(S) and hope pd bid 4c,4d or 4h,then I will try slam. If he can pass 3sx,I will accept it.

[gszes]

the hog, on 2013-August-07, 22:25, said:

I would bid 4C, knowing full well that a x may be best.

I agree with 4c but feel the target window for 3sx is so small it is like trying
to hit a speeding bullet while riding on horseback. We have a tremendous
amount of offensive potential and only the smallest % of the time will our
p have 4/3? spades good enough to make a penalty x worthwhile. The
opps preempt is perfectly timed as they have hit a 9/10 card fit.

I am actually quite surprised anyone on this forum is considering x as
even 3n would seem to be hugely anti %. 4c leaves us in superb position
for future bidding with the only drawback being we may miss a heart contract
even at the slam level.

for what its worth I would consider 4s a splinter for hearts and promising
a very nice heart suit (probably max 2 losers opposite a void. Not a bid
I would use with this hand. I would avoid a 4h bid also due to poor suit
quality and the fact that it virtually extinguishes slam bidding.

IMO 4c=10 4h=6 4d=3 x=2 4s=1

[han]

If you double and partner bids 3NT (the most likely bid?), what would you do then? I think that 4C would show a good hand with 4 clubs, but couldn't it also be a strong 2-5-2-4? I'm thinking that 4H would be a sexy bid.

[benlessard]

Quote

(I did not understand how 4♠ can show a void and a spade stiff at the same time anyway.Posted Image)

In standard partnership I bid 4C partner may easily have a 12-14 bal . In my reg partnership where 4S show a void and our 1D openings are unbalanced I bid 4S. Sorry if this wasnt clear.

3Sx is a high level takeout for me. In standard I really hate doubling with a void and my systemic preferred style is that X show pts and at least 2 cards in their suit.