[Chamaco]

Hi all,
I am looking for some online material that describes in detail Slawinski leads (a few practical examples too would be great).


The old link: http://www.new-bridge.net/Combine.htm does not work anymore ....

Any suggestions ?

Thank all

Mauro

[paulg]

My regular partnership use the leads from the Slawinski book, Systems in Defence, that is no longer in print but I have a rare (1st Ed, 1983) Roman Smolski translation of the Polish original.

With honour leads the principle is to reduce the number of unclear honour leads. The book goes through all the major honour leading systems and, naturally, believes that his is the least confusing.

With doubleton honour (AK, KQ, QJ, etc), you lead the lower card.

With HHx(+) lead the top honour (Akx, Kqxx ...)

With a broken sequence, HHhx(+), lead the second honour (kQ10x, aKjx)

With an interior sequence, Hhhx(+), lead the third honour (aqJ, kj10, q109)

When you hold a run of three honours, such as QJT, you have the option of leading the top or second honour. Leading the second honour emphasises the third honour and so is generally only used against notrump.

With leads of small cards, the aim is to combine the suit quality and card length. So from good suits we lead 3rd and 5th (except 4th from 6 or more). From poor, long suits the highest non-important card is led, and the second play in the suit will tell the length. The lead from xx is a low card, as this is really a "good" suit.

The reason to lead 4th from six is that it makes it easier to distinguish between Hxxx and Hxxxxx when the second card in the suit is played.

When signalling, unless clear to show attitude or length, Slawinski suggests a mixed signal by indicating the number of low cards held. So the same signal would be used for holdings of xx and Qxx when partner leads the K. The idea is that partner should be able to distinguish between xx and Hxx, similarly between xxx and Hxxx.

Slawinski made a Fermat-like comment that it is would be interesting to play leads based on this mixed signal. Fantoni and Nunes are the only pair that I know who actually do this. So they lead small from an even number of bad cards or an odd number of cards to an honour (xX, HxX, xxxX, HxxxX) and high from the opposite (HXxx, Xxx, Xxxxx).

Paul

[Cascade]

Try the internet archive

http://www.archive.org/web/web.php

here is there active link to that page

http://web.archive.org/web/20060218195607/...net/Combine.htm

The internet archive is an amazing place to find old stuff.

[rbforster]

I was recently reading more about Slawinski's leads in an April BW article. Does anyone currently use them and have opinions?

Also, a friend was able show me some of the book "Systems in Defense" which covered some of the mathematical approaches Slawinski used to design his system of leads. Any pointers on where to find the whole book would also be nice too.

[barryallen]

Some notes from Fantunes, which may be of help

SLAVINSKY LEADS:
When we have one or more honours we lead in direct counting: small with an odd number of cards, high with an even number of cards.
When we have no honours we lead in reverse counting: small with an even number of cards, high with an odd number of cards.
i.e.: K6532 = 2; K653 = 6; 9832 = 2; 983 = 9; 92 = 2;
10 is not considered an honour but with 10x we lead with 10.
Exceptions are logical, i.e 1062=6; 10962=10(vs Suit),=2(vs NT); 10654=4; H98x(+)=9;
KJ92 = 2
COUNT:
On partner's suit, but only if it wasn't supported, we lead signeling count: LOW with ODD, HIGH with EVEN. With 10x, Jx, Qx, Kx, Ax we lead 10, J, Q, K, A.

[rbforster]

Here is more information in detail about the book "Systems in Defense" by Slawinski. His approach could probably be extended via computer analysis these days, but he makes a pretty good case for his preferred system of leads. I found it interesting the that other "more modern" leading systems (like Journalist) were found to be worse, rather than better, than standard. He's very mathematical, so if you're not a math theorist, you might just skip to his summary.

[Free]

Rob F, on May 22 2009, 09:05 PM, said:

Here is more information in detail about the book "Systems in Defense" by Slawinski.

Does anyone have page 39?

[jdonn]

Rob F, on May 22 2009, 03:05 PM, said:

Here is more information in detail about the book "Systems in Defense" by Slawinski.

I was interested in reading this, but I find it absolutely unreadable. I just can't understand what I am reading.

[rbforster]

Free, on Jun 1 2009, 10:20 AM, said:

Does anyone have page 39?

Thanks for pointing that out - I'll see if I have it mislabeled somewhere.

Josh - if you start reading about page 34, he gives some description of what all the funny symbols mean. Roughly speaking, he's asking the question - in a given potentially ambiguous 3rd hand defensive situation, can the defender figure out what's going on using a particular system of leads from the cards seen at T1 in the suit? If not, how much partial information does he have at T1? What about seeing the cards from T2 in that suit?

[the hog]

I have the whole book on jpgs

[Cascade]

The_Hog, on Jun 2 2009, 05:05 PM, said:

I have the whole book on jpgs

Do you have page 39?

[Gerardo]

I downloaded it all but page 39 is a copy of page 38.