[inquiry]

IMPs, you vul

RHO You LHO Pard
1N Pass 3NT All pass

Your lead from?

S - T 9 8 5
H - Q J 9 6
D - Q J 8
C - T 9

This is a hand from yesterday, and in keeping with the thread below about leads versus Notrump, I was wondering what people would lead. You have a plethora of intermediate cards (Tens, nines, even eights). There is no right answer per se, I thought it might be interesting to see choices.

[hrothgar]

This one is really tricky.

RHO did not bid Stayman. Odds are that LHO does not have a 4 card major, increasing the expected major suit length in the NT opener's hand. This makes me a little leery about leading a major.

On the other hand, the Ten of Spades is a very nice passive lead. It is very unlikely that this lead will give anything up.

In short, I am very much confused.

Lets call it

50% to lead the Spade 10
50% chance to lead the Diamond Queen.

Happy to be shown a good convincing arguement for most anything.

[hallway]

This is interesting !


We play Acol weak Nt 12-14 (bottom level Intermediate !! - be kind now : )

RHO opens 1NT = 12-14 balanced (no 5 card major)

LHO goes straight to 3NT = 13+ did not transfer, no 5 card major : did not Stayman, no 4 card major

I wd therefore be "hopeful" of establishing one of the major suits !!

And yes, I wd stick to 'longest/strongest" and lead 6H

But then I never have gotten the hang of what to lead /when ;D

[luis]

I covered this situation in my study the results are interesting:
First of all the "sound" leads are a high spade, a high heart, a high diamond or a club.
The 4th best heart or spade are really inferior leads and must be avoided. If the contract is down on a heart/spade an honor lead is best.
That's point #1.

Spades and hearts are really close as the best lead, clubs are third and diamonds are the worst option. Why? Because a diamond lead can give away the 9th trick to declarer more frequently than a neutral club lead.
So the decision is between a top spade or a top heart.
Both leads are close close.
I'd choose a spade because the heart lead gives too much information away to declarer and can also present him with an easy way for an extra trick when dummy has HTx(x).

Good leads:
1) Top spade
2) Top heart

Average leads:
A club

Doubtful leads:
Top diamond

Bad leads
1) Low heart
2) Low spade
3) Low diamond

Luis

[luke warm]

i'd lead the spade 9, and hope my partner wouldn't yell to much back at the bar about 'top of sequence'... i seem to have had more than my share of bad luck leading the top honor from suits like those hearts and seeing dummy come down with A, 10, x

why spade 9 and not 10? mainly so declarer remembers the lead at some later time

[hallway]

Well now I still fancy my H6

You see Ben got us visualising hand shapes instead of counting sheep :

And this is what I see - (of course this won't be the actual hands Ben was quoting from :'( )

Opener J74
732
K954
AKJ

Weak NT 12-14

Me T985
QJ96
QJ8
T9

LHO AK6
T85
AT76
Q87
no 4/5 card majors 13+ pts

Partner Q32
AK4
32
65432

My Lead H6 P takes it with the A
Partner KH
Partner 4H I take it with the QH
Me JH

;D

now how does Declarer stop either myself from taking a trick with my QD and/or my Partner from taking a trick with her QS ??

I have run out imagination now - but I am happy with my lead : This learner will need to learn a lot more before she gives up on 4th longest/strongest against NT (even with no guarantees)

You see what can happen when you stop counting sheep

[Codo]

Hi all,

I lead a top heart:

needs the less from pd to succeed. The chances to get dummy with the ten is 33 %. To get him with A or King and pd with nothing in H is much smaller, so the risk is not too big.
I don´t think that this is a hand for a passive lead: Dummy may have just a long running minor and just speculates.

And Maureen: If the hand you visulised is correct, my pd should be good enough to see that I have at least QJ9x to lead the queen, so he should overtake the queen, play the king and his third heart. So no need to play a low one...

Kind Regards

Roland

[mishovnbg]

Hi all!
My lead is Q HE.
As I wrote, I use very simple rule for my leads. If opps play limit- contract = passive, if limit+ - active.
If bids was 1NT-2NT-3NT I will lead 9 SP(2/4). After 1NT-3NT I will lead Q HE.
Misho

[Free]

My lead is S10...

[EricK]

I gave this problem to the computer program Jack, and got it to analyse 1000 deals consistent with the auction.

The results were that HQ was best, followed by the S10.

This was true whether 1NT was 12-14 or 15-17.

So I have voted for the Heart Queen, but it is not really my vote, it's Jack's!

I couldn't decide between these two leads. I would probably have lead the heart. because the pay off is bigger when it is right.

Eric

[kfgauss]

Quote

I gave this problem to the computer program Jack, and got it to analyse 1000 deals consistent with the auction.

Does anyone know how Jack does this? It's not double-dummy, as it gives different answers for e.g. HQ and HJ (as ideally it should). It can't just "play the hands itself" as it uses this method to decide what to do (I suppose a dumbed down version of Jack could play out the hands... analysis seems too quick for even this though).

Andy

[Free]

Jack deals some random gifts which could be possible to the current auction (I don't know if he deals it and checks if it's right OR if he constructs the hands), and then he tests which card / bid is the best at the current moment. So if 50% of the cases 3NT goes -1 with HQ and 40% down with S10, he'll lead HQ...

[EricK]

Quote

Quote

I gave this problem to the computer program Jack, and got it to analyse 1000 deals consistent with the auction.

Does anyone know how Jack does this? It's not double-dummy, as it gives different answers for e.g. HQ and HJ (as ideally it should). It can't just "play the hands itself" as it uses this method to decide what to do (I suppose a dumbed down version of Jack could play out the hands... analysis seems too quick for even this though).

Andy

It does a double dummy analysis, but then applies a deduction to cards which are not the "correct" lead from that suit (as defined in your convention card set-up).

So if you had a suit of 865 and had set it to lead MUD, then it would give a higher mark to a lead of the six than to either of the others, even if double dummy there was no difference between the leads.

Eric

[ReginaldF]

I believe a Major must be led, ops have not looked for a major suit fit ,OK so one of them could have 5 small or 2 weak 4card majors , but hopefully my partner has some majors. I have ten high S suit my partner needs a lot of points a couple of good honours correctly placed for us to get tricks If they R placed right ops will maybe give them to him anyway. So H QJ9X i NEED p to have Kxx or Txx , I,d lead H 6 ,but I'm only beg ReginaldF