[pbleighton]

Questions on these, after reading a number of sources:
1) Do most players play these as showing either weak (12 or less) or strong (17+), or do a lot play them as being only weak? Does the strength range include length. i.e is xx-x-AQxxx-KJxxx considered weak (doesn't seem weak to me).
2) The writeups imply that these are forcing over competition.  If the bidding goes 1S-2S-4S, are you required to bid?

[Codo]

Hi,

1) I know only people, who play it very weak or very strong. The sense is: You do not loose much, if you play it both ways, but sometimes it pays, even if I cannot remember many hands, where I saw the strong type of hand.
Of course the strength includes the length. For me, your hand is a typical un2NT. One in the upper range, but still... What else do you bid after a 1 Heart opening from your opponent? 2 Diamond to bid x Club after their X-1 Heart raise?
May work too, but is very dangerous.

2) I never saw, that unu2NT or Mikes is considered forcing. Should be really silly to play it forcing. You perfectly described and limited your hand. And in that case, their is never ever a forcing situation. BUT: Your pd should  try to buy the hand. With your bid, you did not just described your hand perfectly to your pd but too to your opps. It is very easy to play a hand, after an opponent announced a 5/5 two suiter. So, if in doubt, better compete.

This is the big flaw with these twosuiter bids: You make declarer play or defence very easy for your opponents.

Kind Regards

Roland

[hrothgar]

Quote

Questions on these, after reading a number of sources:
1) Do most players play these as showing either weak (12 or less) or strong (17+), or do a lot play them as being only weak? Does the strength range include length. i.e is xx-x-AQxxx-KJxxx considered weak (doesn't seem weak to me).
2) The writeups imply that these are forcing over competition.  If the bidding goes 1S-2S-4S, are you required to bid?

I normally don't play Michaels cue bids or Unusual 2NT, since these bids are very easy to compete over.

For example, following the auction 1S - (2NT), its very easy to adopt defenses like the following:

X = Cards
3C = Limit raise + in support of Spades
3D = Game forcing with 5+ Hearts
3H = Competitive
3S = Competitive
Pass followed by X = weak takeout

If anything, you are making it more easy for the opponent's to describe your hand.

Wit this said and done, on those occasions when I do need to play these conventions, I strongly prefer to play a Good / Structure.  However I normally treat bad as about 0 - 10 HCP and good as about 17+

With your example hand, I would  bid 2D and rebid 3C.

[inquiry]

Quote

Questions on these, after reading a number of sources:
1) Do most players play these as showing either weak (12 or less) or strong (17+), or do a lot play them as being only weak? Does the strength range include length. i.e is xx-x-AQxxx-KJxxx considered weak (doesn't seem weak to me).
2) The writeups imply that these are forcing over competition.  If the bidding goes 1S-2S-4S, are you required to bid?

Most players indeed do play unusual notrump and some form of a two suit showing cue-bid, despite hrothgar's statement that they are too easy to compete over, or the correct warning from Roland that these bids make the defense or declearer play too easy for the opponents. The reason being for instance, when the auction does indeed go (1S)-2S-(4S)-?  your partner my have a perfectly good save in 5H despite them knowing how to defend the hand, etc.

Do most players show these as weak or strong? I am not sure what most players do. So I will address what I do, which is to play it both ways, depeding upon vulnerabilty conditions. That is, my minimum values depend upon both mine and the opponents vulnerabilty. When I am not vul, and they are vul, I bid on almost anything with useful shape (as long as it is weak). Certainly the need for even 12 hcp is not a requirement, in fact at this vulnerabilty, 12 hcp is often too strong for my 2NT overcall, simply because my partner will expect little defense and lots of offense in that situation. I use this vulnerablity to suggest to partner the chance for a sacrafice, but I do not shade on the 5-5 or better requirement (I have seen people do this not vul versus vul with 5-4 and a few times with 4-4), because I am encouraging partner to take a sacrafice if right when I make this bid.

This invite to take a sacrafice is also why I will not have fair defensive hand to make this bid. What good does it do to suggest a sacrafice to your partner only for him to take it and you show up with two defensive tricks so no one can make anything? Your example hand (AQxxx and KJxxx) has too much defense for me to use as a non-vul versus vul 2NT bid fo this very reason.

On the other hand, if I am vul and they are not, I certainly will not be making these two suited bids to suggest a sacrafice. It is not good to be taking sacrafices at this vul, so these are offensive bids, and I use them to so very strong offensive hands. Once again with your example hand, I would not bid 2NT when vul versus not vul (at least on the first round of bidding). I will be darn close to being able to make 3 of my suit opposite three small in either of them in partner's hand for this bid at unfavorable vul. And partner with a few tricks and a fit will expect that we can make a game, and will bid on. This is especially true of Michaels. If I was a passed hand, I might 2NT with your example hand if vul versus not vul if I had useful spot cards in both suits (KJ98x is much, much better than KJ432).  

So my two suited bids are very strong when I am vul and they are not, and they are very weak when they are vul and I am not. When we are both not vul, they tend to normal overcall strength tending to frequently on the minimimum side of this range. Not vul versus not vul, your example hand would be a fine 2NT overcall, and not even a minimum. When we are both vul, I would bid 2NT with your example hand as an unpassed hand (and especially if it included a few 98's in the long suit), but this is close to a minimum at this vulnerabilty and I really would like better suit quality.

Ben

[JRG]

A expert bridge player friend of mine (now deceased) said of the Unusual NT, that you should not make the bid unless you believe there is a reasonably good chance that you will buy the hand.

Regarding what sort of hand to make the bid on, he said that you should not make the bid unless you are willing to have partner bid at the 5-level with doubleton king in one of your suits and tripleton queen in the other. If you don't want him to jump to the 5-level, then don't make the Unusual NT bid.

[inquiry]

Quote

A expert bridge player friend of mine (now deceased) said of the Unusual NT, that you should not make the bid unless you believe there is a reasonably good chance that you will buy the hand.

Regarding what sort of hand to make the bid on, he said that you should not make the bid unless you are willing to have partner bid at the 5-level with doubleton king in one of your suits and tripleton queen in the other. If you don't want him to jump to the 5-level, then don't make the Unusual NT bid.

John's comment represents a different way to express my variable unusual 2NT treatment. That is, when they are vul, and we are not, I use it as a preemptive bid to ENCOURAGE partner to go the five level. I will not have much if any defense. When we are vulnerable and they are not, I use it as an offensive bid to ENCOURAGE partner to bid the five level with the type of hand John described to make.

At equal vulnerability, I use it as a competive bid (thus stronger than when they are vul and we are not, and weaker than we are vul and they are not) to try to buy the contract at the three or four level, based upon the law of total tricks. At equal vulnerability, if they outbid  us at the three level, partner can count on me for some tricks. When the vul is equal, I expect to play the contract about 35-40% of the time (they do have the majors after all).

I know a lot of player use these bids as weak or strong (or intermediate), that is very wide ranging. They will make the bid and then bid again when strong. The problem I see with this is that partner never knows what to do, because he has to guess which hand type you have. Does he bid on to sacrafice, double them for penatly, or bid on to make? If you can be anything from extremely weak and distributional, to very strong plus distributional, he can not bid intellegently. I am not certain my method is best, but I am pretty sure you should agree on the range of hands you can hold for these bids. And I find basing this range on the combined opponent and your own vulnerability works best for me.

Now as an aside but related topic, there are other situations in which you can show two suit without the cue-bid or the jump to 2NT. For instance you can always enter the bidding on the second round. If the bidding goes (1S) to you, with a two suited hand that is  unsuitable for the vulnerabilty conditions for either michaels or Unusual 2NT you can pass. If the bidding goes (1S)-P-(2S)-P-(P)-?  you can balance back in with 2NT. This should show some unknown two suiter (you could have H+C, H+D or D+C). Your partner responds up suits up the line in suits he can stand to play in if you have five cards. I play this auction similiarly (1S)-P-(2S)-2NT <<--- even though this is without a jump, I show a two suiter (any two suiter), and partner bids potential trump suit for us up the line, bypassing only suits he would hate to play in if I held only 5 cards in that suit.

BTW, many people (yes including me) also play sandwich 1NT on auctions like:

(1D)-P-(1S)-?   <-- where 1NT, 2NT, and dbl all shows the two unbid suits. 2NT more distribution, 1NT sort of weak and less distribution, and double more defense. The theory is that after both opponents have bid, a natural 1NT showing 15-17 or 16-18 in the "sandwich" position is not a good bid even the few times you hold that hand.  Better to separate the weak competive (1NT) from the highly distributional competitive (2NT) and more balanced hcp takeout (dbl). You and your partner have to agree what cue-bids of either of their suits mean. I have tried several methods, where they show 6-4 hands in the unbid suits (depending upon suit you cue-bid), played them both as natural and non-forcing, and played cue-bid of the last suit bid as very strong takeout forcing and the minor opened as natural.

[Codo]

Hi Ben,

your comments are great and thoughtful, of course they are, as they always are :-)
Just one comment: I see no problem with handling big and weak two suiters with one bid:
Pd always acts as if you have the weak one. Just because you have it about 95 % of the times you bid a two suiter.
With a strong two-suiter, you just act again: cuebid, or double, or whatever...with a weak hand you just pass, or with a weak hand, but more distribution then promised, raise pds suit.

So really never any problems.

Kind Regards

Roland

[Rado]

Hi Pbleighton,
For many years in our Varna bridge community the treatment for 2 suited overcalls was weak or strong, while with intermediate range and 5-5 we overcall with higher ranking suit and bid the other on next round (if possible or reasonable). With my regular partners we played abt 6-11 or 16+ min 5-5 (of course always having in mind vulnerability). Also our 1m-2m cue was S+another(excluding opponents' suit). This worked enough well:
1. When opps pass and partner gives suit preference only the overcaller may bid in different ways to show different strong types (new suit, new que, NT, jump.....)
2. When opps continue bidding the overcaller may act again with DBL, new suit, que.....
In the last years we tryed the modern view of playing 2 suited overcalls with continuous range (good description in Marshal Miles book "Competitive bidding of 21st century"). This way also seems workable but requires more judgement and a little bit higher minimum for the  ovecall abt 8-9 good points.
In my view the weak or strong way is better for new partnerships and less experienced players, while continuous range is for well established experienced players and pairs.
Hope above to be helpfull
Best regards, Rado

[hrothgar]

I'd like to extend on Rado's comments, since thet seque nicely into some of my own beliefs.

I mentioned earlier that I prefer not play Michaels cue bids or an unusual 2NT overcall.

Instead, I prefer to play Roman Jump Overcalls.

A jump overcall shows an intermediate hand, ~ 9 - 16 HCP.  The bid promises 5 cards in the bid suit and 5 cards in the next higher unbid suit.  (I've been know to make this bid with a decent 5-4 / 4-5 hand)

This solves many of the problems that I have with Michaels and Unusual 2NT.  

The overcaller is bidding one of his real suits, so advancer has the option of passing.  This puts much more pressure on LHO.  Coupled with this, te opponents only have one defined cue bid.

Advancer immediately knows both of partner suits and can bounce the bidding with a double fit.

Obviously, there are tradeoffs to this approach.  the most serious is that you need to give up weak jump overcalls.  

Suppose that RHO opens 1C and I hold a hand like

KQT863
3
873
T62

Normally, I'd love to bid 2S, however playing RJO this would promise Spades and Diamonds.

At the table, I would probably flip a coin and bid either 3S or 1S.  [Hate to be too predictable]

[inquiry]

Hi Roland

Thanks for your kind words. I use to play the wide ranging 2NT and michaels cue-bids. And yes, I had lots of good results (bidding on when strong, passing when weak). But I had a lot of disasters unrelated to the opponents knowing how to play the cards on offense or defense. That is we overbid too frequently. Here are two real world examples of where this crops up....

Vul versus no-vul I held a "monster" minor two suiter, just the kind of hand I like at this vul today to hold

void  AQ  KQJTx AQTxx

Bidding...  

(1S)-2NT-P-3C
P---?

Of course I bid on (this was prior to my new "understanding" after all, and my hand was so much better than it could have been). Do you bid on? Playing the way I play today, the answer is no. Partner will expect at this specific vulnerability a hand like this. The fact that he was willing to sell out at 3C suggest a misfit. Partner held the yucky

S-J9xxx H-xxxx D-xx C-xx

and bidding on was a mistake.

Likewise not vul versus not vul, and my partner holds....S-JTxx H-Qxxx D-Qxx C-Ax.

Now the bidding goes (1S)-2N-3S (competitive)-?

Partner knows he has good fitting cards, but the LOTT suggest that we have only 8 card fit, and the opponents rate to have 8 card fit as well. Since I am neither overly weak or strong for my 2NT bid, partner passed despite the excellent fitting cards. The opponents ended up losing 2S (I had stiff Q), 1H, 1C and 1D for down one. Despite my fair values (I had S-Q H-Kx D-KJT9x CQJTxx) We can not make 4D (we lose 1S, 1H, 1C, and 1D). Of course, if the club KING was on side, you could make 4D exactly, but they would be down two in 3S. I think playing a wider-range 2NT this hand has trouble passing 3S and in fact, if RHO leaped to 4S, this hand might bid 5D as occured at many, many tables. But my partner knew I had some defense for my equal vul 2NT bid, and surely would double 4S instead of taking a sacrafice.  

Does these two hands prove me right? Of course not, just as many example hands could be constructed that illustrate how well bidding 2NT on a hand that my "rules" will not allow me to work equally well. But the way I play (narrower limits on these bids), works for my bidding personal bidding style. If you do want to play the bid as weak or strong, that is fine, but then ELIMINATE all the intermediate hands from consideration. With these hands, overcall in the higher ranking suit, then bid the lower ranking suit (if you get a chance). I prefer (at equal vul) of getting in with both suits at once, increasing the chance of finding a fit. Also when you hold intermediate hands, the auction is most likely to be highly competitive (if you are strong, they will drop out, if you are weak, they will out bid you) so getting both your suit in at once is big advantage in that situation.  

[Codo]

Hi Ben,

nice hands:
"void  AQ  KQJTx AQTxx

Bidding...    

(1S)-2NT-P-3C
P---? "

This is easy: IF I bid this as STRONG two suiter and I will, but I wonT with much less.  I have no problem with bidding 3 Diamond and play there.
If Pds hand was Jxxxx,xxxx,x,xxx 4 Club will still make.
So I will loose to Jxxxx,xxxxx,x,xx. I think that is no big deal.

"Likewise not vul versus not vul, and my partner holds....S-JTxx H-Qxxx D-Qxx C-Ax.  

Now the bidding goes (1S)-2N-3S (competitive)-? "
This is easy too, just pass. If they bid 4 Spade, pass again. In my world, pd has a weak or a strong two suiter. With the first, we may beat 4 Spade, with the later, he will bid again and I may look for 6 Diamond.

You way may be the better one, but has one big disadvantage:
If you decide to show two-suiters, you always need to show weak/strong and intermedeate hands.
Your system needs four systems to show these hand according to vul.
F.E. (I had S-Q H-Kx D-KJT9x CQJTxx)  is fine for you with all white but not to show in different vul. So you and your pd have to remember, how you bid different strengths according to the vulnerability. This sounds like much work for this specific problem.
It is like the complete relay systems or any highly unusual systems: They should work better in theory then natural bidding styles. But very few people have the skills to use them without accidents.

Kind Regards

Roland

[the hog]

Richard raises some interesting points regarding Roman overcalls. IMHO the UNT and Michaels are 2 of the most abused conventions. If you don't win the auction you have give a distributional blueprint to the opponents. Also, 2NT allows good partnerships far too many ways to compete and puts little pressure on the opps.
Consider:
1H (2NT) 3C = good H raise, 3D = forcing in S, 3H/S are merely competing.

Rather than UNT we play that 3C shows 5/5 in the ms. Naturally you cannot play this as weak or strong - we play it as about 7-12 with strength/suit quality varying according to vulnerability.

Other possible methods are:
(1M) 3C = ms 7-12,
       3 same M = Either a Californian cue bid - bid 3nt with a stopper, Or both ms strong.
With an interm hand and both ms you bid Ds followed by C as suggested by Rado.

Michaels suffers from the major defect, (excuse the pun), of only showing one suit. It is much easier to sacrifice if you can evaluate how well your cards in both of partner's suits are working. Roman, Ghestem or similar allow you to do this. Two disadvantages - you better not get them wrong, because the police will have no sympathy at all, and you lose your WJOs. We feel the latter is not a problem as we pick up enough on these bids anyway.

For those interested, we play:

(1m) 2D = interm j o in an unspecified M
       2H = Ms 7-15
       2S = Ms 16+ or 3 level pre empt in the other m
       2NT = the other m and H
       3C = the other m and S
(1C) 2C = natural if C can be 2 or less, else interm in D (could also be played as an unspecified weak 2 in a M)