[Echognome]

Scoring: MP

1NT(1) - 2♥(2)
3♠(3) - 3NT(4)
All Pass

---

(1) 13-15
(2) Transfer
(3) Super-accept, lower end of range
(4) Undiscussed

All of this talk of masterminding brought back a recent painful memory from last night's duplicate game. We were playing at the local club, but practicing mainly for team play.

Partner opens 1NT and super-accepts your transfer. You foresee the problem of a club cue-bid and bid 3NT to see if partner will cue-bid clubs (in which case you will sign-off). If partner cue-bids hearts instead, you think you have a reasonable chance at slam. Alas partner decides you are 5332 and passes with:

♠AJTx
♥AQxx
♦xx
♣QTx

I did my best not to look disappointed when we were one down in 3NT and the rest of the traveller had 4♠+2 written on it.

[coyot]

Hmm, I would guess that blame should be split 50:50.

Why bid 3NT undiscussed and presume that it is slam-going?

5♣ would most likely do the trick - and certainly would not be passed . I mean, partner anyway statistically rates to have 4 clubs - and if they're small ones, you should have most of the remaining HCP together, so he would bid the slam. Yes, there is the risk of him having AKQ in clubs and losing 3 heart tricks from the very start, but that would need extremly bad lie of cards.

From the other side of the table, passing 3NT with a small doubleton in diamonds is a crime as well.

And, I would certainly prefer bidding stayman with 5-4. Here, discovering BOTH major suits and playing in 6♥ would be nice.

[Blofeld]

I'd also prefer stayman if the system will allow me to show 5 spades after a negative response - then I can splinter in clubs opposite a 2♥ or 2♠ response.

I think that having transferred 3NT is right, though. Playing in 3NT with a 5-3 major fit is ok, but looking to play there with a 5-4 fit seems a bit extreme even at matchpoints.

[Gerben42]

Solution: Tell partner that after superaccept we do NOT stop in 3NT.

[mr1303]

Tell that to Ron Klinger. His Keri super-accept structure is designed exclusively to get to 3NT.

[Al_U_Card]

Seems to me that this is a good place for voidwood. That being said, would not any 4 level suit bid other than S be a slam try q-bid? 3NT sounds like it is to play unless pard has seen your hand....

[hrothgar]

Hey Matt

Congratulations (and I mean this seriously). You trotted out Serious 3NT without prior discussion. As a result, you and partner have clarified an important part of your slam bidding. In doing so:

1. You achieved a bad score. The new agreement is going to be memorable...
2. This all happened in the contex of a club game. Are you really that concerned with tanking this particular board?

[cherdano]

Gerben42, on Feb 17 2006, 01:42 PM, said:

Solution: Tell partner that after superaccept we do NOT stop in 3NT.

I like the other solution better: agree with partner that 3NT is always an offer to play after a 1NT opening.

Yeah I know, sounds a little artificial, but I love those little gadgets...

(In my understanding of serious-3N default understandings, it is always off when one of the partners is clearly limited.)

Arend

[hrothgar]

cherdano, on Feb 17 2006, 05:55 PM, said:

Gerben42, on Feb 17 2006, 01:42 PM, said:

Solution: Tell partner that after superaccept we do NOT stop in 3NT.

I like the other solution better: agree with partner that 3NT is always an offer to play after a 1NT opening.

Yeah I know, sounds a little artificial, but I love those little gadgets...

(In my understanding of serious-3N default understandings, it is always off when one of the partners is clearly limited.)

Its far from clear that 3NT "to play" is a desirable treatment.

Recall the auction: The 1NT opener has already shown 4+ card trump support with a minimum 1NT opening bid. His last bid was 3♠. There are NO intermediate bids available below the level of 3NT. Lets consider 3NT "to play" as a asking bid. It asks partner to pass with one set of hands and to correct to 4♠ with a second set. I'd be very interested to see the the "natural" 3NT advocates provide a good description of the set of hands that should pass, along with an estimation of the frequency... (Personally, I suspect that the natural 3NT will lose on one of two criteria: The bid will either be too rare to worry about or it will be so poorly defined that the NT opener will be rolling dice when it comes up. Given the fact that we have already established a 9 card trump fit I'd prefer to use 3N for something more practical).

I have no problem referring to an artificial 3NT in this auction as something other than "Serious". With this said and done, I'm not quite sure what to call it.

[MickyB]

mr1303, on Feb 17 2006, 12:18 PM, said:

Tell that to Ron Klinger. His Keri super-accept structure is designed exclusively to get to 3NT.

But he doesn't play 3♠ as "a minimum with 4 card support"

Not sure if 3NT should be natural on that sequence, but if it should, I'm never passing it on opener's hand.

[cherdano]

hrothgar, on Feb 17 2006, 05:31 PM, said:

Its far from clear that 3NT "to play" is a desirable treatment.

Recall the auction: The 1NT opener has already shown 4+ card trump support with a minimum 1NT opening bid. His last bid was 3♠. There are NO intermediate bids available below the level of 3NT. Lets consider 3NT "to play" as a asking bid. It asks partner to pass with one set of hands and to correct to 4♠ with a second set. I'd be very interested to see the the "natural" 3NT advocates provide a good description of the set of hands that should pass, along with an estimation of the frequency... (Personally, I suspect that the natural 3NT will lose on one of two criteria: The bid will either be too rare to worry about or it will be so poorly defined that the NT opener will be rolling dice when it comes up. Given the fact that we have already established a 9 card trump fit I'd prefer to use 3N for something more practical).

Richard, I think you have it the wrong way round. 3N is a showing bid, not an asking bid.I would never define "what hands pass 3N" in any partnership (if we even got to discussion this), if I would discuss anything, it would be opener's 3N bid:

This is a 5332 hand with no weak doubleton; also it won't be a hand full of aces and kings, but rather slow values. A little extras for a GF wouldn't hurt either. Opener will pass this if he thinks 3N is a better contract opposite this hand type.

Opener will tend to pass with 4333. He will tend to pass with slow values. He may pass with 4432 and Hx in the doubleton. Judgement. (I agree with Mike about the actual hand, this is an extremely clear 4♠ bid.)

I feel very weird about writing this post, because it seems like I am just stating the obvious. For non-relay people, this is just bridge, I would assume all of the above without ANY discussion.

Of course it won't be so often that we will play 3N (but probably a lot more often than you think). But as opener's hand is pretty well-defined, an artificial 3N ask also will only very rarely make a difference for your slam decision.

Arend

[han]

I agree with Arend and most others. Bidding 3NT with a void is asking for a disaster, and passing 3NT with a small doubleton is obviously very bad.

You don't need to discuss 3NT.. normal bridge logic will suffice.

[cherdano]

Btw, since some think you shouldn't play 3N with a 5-4 major fit: this reminds me of a hand Cohen-Berkowitz had on vuegraph. One of them, I think Berkowitz, opened 3♠ on QJT9xx. Cohen had a 5332 hand with Axxxx support and bid 3N. (Both 3N and 4♠ were making, I think.)

The dialogue after the hand:
"So will you raise me with 6, partner?"
"I didn't expect to have a spade guess."

The kind of humor I like at the table...

Arend

[hrothgar]

cherdano, on Feb 17 2006, 07:02 PM, said:

Richard, I think you have it the wrong way round. 3N is a showing bid, not an asking bid. I would never define "what hands pass 3N" in any partnership (if we even got to discussion this), if I would discuss anything, it would be opener's 3N bid:

Scientific systems often have bidding sequences that clearly that unambiguously differentiate between bids that ask and bids that show. A relay bid is a simpliest example of an asking bid.

Players who use more natural methods often face more ambiguity: Consider the "natural" 3NT bid being discussed. If we describe the bid in one way, 3NT shows a specific type of hand. You say that 3NT is a

>This is a 5332 hand with no weak doubleton; also it won't be a hand full of aces
>and kings, but rather slow values. A little extras for a GF wouldn't hurt either.

However, its equally valid to describe the hand asking partner to bid 4♠ unless he holds suitable for 3Nt opposite a 5332 hand with no weak doubleton (yada, yada, yada). Two flip sides of the same coin. Either framework is equally valid...

In this example, I wanted to focused on how narrow a target the natural 3NT bid caters to. I want examples of hands that chose to pass 3NT rather than correcting to 4S. Accordingly, it seems appropriate to frame this as an asking bid.

I'll note in passing that even highly scientific systems often contain this same duality between asking and showing bids. Most realy systems have well defined rules that assign specific meanings to relay breaks. According, even a relay often asks and shows. (This duality is an very important consideration in systm design. A system based purely on first asking bids is going to have a large number of vacant bidding sequences, which can't be good)

[Echognome]

I should first note that at the club, I am more keen to try out a strange or unusual bid. The point is to have these things come up now before they count in something important. I do well with this partner in part because we have discussed many many sequences. (But of course there are always more.)

Now I had mentioned that partner thought 3NT showed a 5332 hand and everyone readily agreed. I, however, disagreed. I cannot imagine trying to stop in 3NT on this auction with a 9 card spade fit. I am not saying it is impossible to be the best spot. I am saying that it is too narrow a target. I think with a 9 card fit, we shouldn't be trying for that magic 3NT that plays better than 4M. We should use 3NT as either a cue in ♠ or a waiting bid. Partner agreed with me afterwards that we now have the following meta agreement:

If partner super-accepts your transfer bid, you are not playing in any other denomination than that suit.

[han]

I think that that's a fine agreement Matt, you could make it more general:

If we find a 9-card major suit fit *at the 3-level* then we cannot play in any other denomination.


I disagree with you though about the meaning of 3NT when you have no such agreement.

[han]

I had two accidents yesterday after a superaccept, perhaps this is a good place to discuss these auctions.

2NT-3H
4C-4H

4C showed a doubleton and good support. Should 4H be a cuebid or a re-transfer?

I had Q10xxx J QJxx xxx and I really wanted partner to play 4S. Matt jumped to 6S, ouch! (off two aces)

1NT- 2H
3C - (dbl) - pass

Again 3C showed a doubleton, what is the pass here?

We often play fast arrival in competition, so I thought partner was interested in game with nothing in clubs. My hand (AKQx J109x AJx Jx) looked really good (1NT = 14-16) and I just jumped to 4S. Arend tabled two measly red kings but lady luck was with us, both queens were onside.

[han]

In retrospect I absolutely agree with you Justin, my 4H call without agreement was an unnecessary risk, perhaps similar to Matt's 3NT call in this thread.