[hanp]

You hold x AKQJx A10xxx Qx, partner opens 1S.

1S - 2H
2S - 3D
4D - ??

What's your call and what does it mean?

Partner's 2S did not promise a 6th spade.

[Jlall]

4D has denied a club control, else partner would bid 4C. I would offer 4H as a choice to play there. That is especially important in this auction where 4M is natural over 4D, and 4N is keycard. AKJxx xx QJxx Jx one time?

[jdonn]

Well it's certainly clear 4♥ and 4♠ here are offers to play. I agree partner has denied club control so 4♥ is a good bid.

Not an easy auction. Maybe there is a good meta rule under which 4♣ could generically agree diamonds and then 4♦ by responder could just be ongoing if he is stuck on a slam investigating hand.

[kenrexford]

Agree with what has been said so far.

[Siegmund]

Quote

I would offer 4H as a choice to play there. That is especially important in this auction where 4M is natural over 4D

Quote

Well it's certainly clear 4♥ and 4♠ here are offers to play

This came up in another thread a week or two ago, too... stepping back from this specific auction, would you gentlemen share your rules of thumb for when you think returning to a major after minor-suit agreement is an offer to play?

My own tendency is that if you've passed up only one previous chance to support a suit, delayed support is obvious (e.g. 1♥-2♦-3♦-3♥) but having passed up two previous chances to support a suit - as with spades in this threads auction - my default is to treat the 4M bid as a cuebid in support of the agreed minor.

I am aware of the fact that I use cuebidding more (and RKCing a lot less) than is popular these days... but the whole subject of continuing to explore for a 2nd fit after having already found one strikes me as a low priority area of a system.

[Jlall]

Siegmund, on Jan 26 2010, 03:15 PM, said:

Quote

I would offer 4H as a choice to play there. That is especially important in this auction where 4M is natural over 4D

Quote

Well it's certainly clear 4♥ and 4♠ here are offers to play

This came up in another thread a week or two ago, too... stepping back from this specific auction, would you gentlemen share your rules of thumb for when you think returning to a major after minor-suit agreement is an offer to play?

My own tendency is that if you've passed up only one previous chance to support a suit, delayed support is obvious (e.g. 1♥-2♦-3♦-3♥) but having passed up two previous chances to support a suit - as with spades in this threads auction - my default is to treat the 4M bid as a cuebid in support of the agreed minor.

I am aware of the fact that I use cuebidding more (and RKCing a lot less) than is popular these days... but the whole subject of continuing to explore for a 2nd fit after having already found one strikes me as a low priority area of a system.

IMO being able to get to 4M instead of 5D should be a very high priority in your system, higher than having those bids assigned for slam bidding.

I mean for starters you could easily have a 6-2 fit in either major here (responder could be 6-4/6-5 with opener having 2 hearts, or responder could be like 2551 with opener being 6-4 in the pointed suits), and it is important to find that out rather than play a game that needs 11 tricks. Being able to play your 8 card major fit has to be a top priority imo.

Add to that that in an auction like this you could easily belong in a 5-2 fit (as here), and it becomes super important to be able to have 4M as natural. It's not like being unable to cuebid either major is going to stop you from ever bidding slam effectively. The truth is that 4M natural will ALWAYS help you when you need to play in that contract (it's the only way to get there at that point), but 4M cuebid will only necessary to bid slam effectively a fraction of the time, so even though 4M cuebid would be more frequent, it does not mean that it is better to play it that way.

[fromageGB]

True to a degree, but opener's 4♦ was bid when 3♥ was available, and he already knows you have 5 hearts while you may not necessarily have shown 5 diamonds. So he is emphatically supporting diamonds in preference to hearts. In my view diamonds is the suit.

If not playing kickback then I certainly would expect partner to take 4♥ as a cue.

Having said that, I don't think I want to cue. Partner's rebid of 2M followed by nothing spectacular in my book shows a 12-14 hand, and his lack of a club cue probably denies ace or king, so I think I'll just bid 5♦. (To play :-)

[jdonn]

If you had a generic rule that in any game forcing auction where a minor is agreed 4 of any previously bid major is natural if it possibly could be, you might not be doing perfectly but you would be doing well.

It's funny you speak of this being a low priority area of a system. Games are a higher priority than slams. Majors are a higher priority than minors. And as Justin pointed out, if you want to play 4M you have to be able to bid 4M whereas if you want to go to slam that can be done without bidding 4M.

[peachy]

4H, suggest final contract. If partner takes it as showing heart control for diamonds instead of offer to play, I'm fine with that and in that case he will cue clubs if he has it. Also fine. If he bids 4S, I'll correct to 5D after which ir is 100% neither has a club control. But without club control and couple of hearts, opener probably passes.

[straube]

I'm with the folks who say 4M is an offer to play.

[Codo]

Again I do not play something mainstream. 4♦ shows a fit and a really unbalanced hand. 3 NT had shown a semibalanced hand with clubs stopped and 4 ♣ had be the no club stopper not sure what to do hand.

I would play partner for something between 6142 and 5044.

[CSGibson]

Bidding 4♥ in the auction is a no-brainer to me, even if you and your partner aren't entirely sure what it means. Either partner takes it as a cue-bid, which is fine, or partner takes it as an offer to play (my preference), which also describes this hand well.

[Jlall]

CSGibson, on Jan 28 2010, 11:25 AM, said:

Bidding 4♥ in the auction is a no-brainer to me, even if you and your partner aren't entirely sure what it means. Either partner takes it as a cue-bid, which is fine, or partner takes it as an offer to play (my preference), which also describes this hand well.

Why is it fine if he takes it as a cuebid? I see this argument a lot, but if partner has denied a control in a suit and you then cuebid another suit, you're showing a control in the suit he has denied a control in. As such he might just bid keycard if he thinks you're cuebidding and you get to slam off the AK of clubs which is not really "fine."

[CSGibson]

Jlall, on Jan 28 2010, 10:12 AM, said:

CSGibson, on Jan 28 2010, 11:25 AM, said:

Bidding 4♥ in the auction is a no-brainer to me, even if you and your partner aren't entirely sure what it means.  Either partner takes it as a cue-bid, which is fine, or partner takes it as an offer to play (my preference), which also describes this hand well.

Why is it fine if he takes it as a cuebid? I see this argument a lot, but if partner has denied a control in a suit and you then cuebid another suit, you're showing a control in the suit he has denied a control in. As such he might just bid keycard if he thinks you're cuebidding and you get to slam off the AK of clubs which is not really "fine."

You may play that 4 diamonds denies a club control, but it is also common to play that partner can choose not to cue a singleton or a king in favor of supporting diamonds, especially if you have the agreement that you may not stop short of game in this auction, as I do in at least one serious partnership*. If partner cues 4 spades, then I'm fairly certain he'll read my 5 diamond bid as an inquiry into the club situation. If he key cards, then I might survive on the opening lead, I might not, and we'll have an understanding of the auction next time around.

Anyway, while I respect that you would cue 4 clubs with 2nd round control and a hand that looks slammish on this auction, I don't think it would be a given for the vast majority of advanced/expert players on a hand such as AJxxxx xx KQxx x (acknowledging that this is the perfecto, of course). And the players for whom it would be standard probably have an idea whether 4 hearts is a cue or an offer to play in this auction, so we can probably throw those out.

*italics added to emphasize that this is not a standard agreement, though I don't believe it to be extremely unusual, either

[CSGibson]

CSGibson, on Jan 28 2010, 06:46 PM, said:

Anyway, while I respect that you would cue 4 clubs with 2nd round control and a hand that looks slammish on this auction, I don't think it would be a given for the vast majority of advanced/expert players on a hand such as AJxxxx xx KQxx x (acknowledging that this is the perfecto, of course).  And the players for whom it would be standard probably have an idea whether 4 hearts is a cue or an offer to play in this auction, so we can probably throw those out.

I'm going to reword this so it's clearer: If partner is expert enough to bid 4 clubs with a control in the suit, realizing that it confirms diamond support, then partner is also expert enough to realize that 4 hearts is an offer to play instead of a cue. Alternatively, if partner does not realize that both 4 clubs and 4 diamonds confirmed diamonds, then he's more likely to take 4 hearts as a cue bid supporting diamonds and cooperate/understand the rest of the auction

[PhantomSac]

CSGibson, on Jan 28 2010, 08:52 PM, said:

CSGibson, on Jan 28 2010, 06:46 PM, said:

Anyway, while I respect that you would cue 4 clubs with 2nd round control and a hand that looks slammish on this auction, I don't think it would be a given for the vast majority of advanced/expert players on a hand such as AJxxxx xx KQxx x (acknowledging that this is the perfecto, of course).  And the players for whom it would be standard probably have an idea whether 4 hearts is a cue or an offer to play in this auction, so we can probably throw those out.

I'm going to reword this so it's clearer: If partner is expert enough to bid 4 clubs with a control in the suit, realizing that it confirms diamond support, then partner is also expert enough to realize that 4 hearts is an offer to play instead of a cue. Alternatively, if partner does not realize that both 4 clubs and 4 diamonds confirmed diamonds, then he's more likely to take 4 hearts as a cue bid supporting diamonds and cooperate/understand the rest of the auction

I accept this rewording.

I was simply taking issue with you saying it is fine if partner misinterprets 4H as a cuebid, it seems like a common error for people to cuebid even when they have no control in a suit that partner has denied a control of.

However, as you say people who don't realize 4H is an offer to play probably don't realize that if it was a cue it should show a club control.

With your example perfecta I would expect any expert player to cuebid 4C (unless they decided 5C was the right bid I guess), they have the spade ACE (obviously good for slam), great trumps, and a stiff club. If partner does have a stiff spade and 5-5 in the reds obviously that hand is massive, if he has a doubleton spade or 6-4 he will clarify it now.

I don't see the advantage of partner not cuebidding with a control by agreement, especially in an auction like this. If 4M is natural, and 4N is keycard, partner is going to have only 5C available as a slam try. Clubs is the unbid suit, so knowing whether you have it controlled is very important. "Everyone" is very aware not to endplay partner in certain auctions, this auction is maybe deceptive because it looks like we have a whole level left before partner gets endplayed, but in reality bidding 4D with a club control might do just that.

The lesson here is really to be careful to show your control in the unbid suit if it is going to be your last chance before partner has to sign off without one himself, and that applies here with bidding 4D.

[hanp]

Moneybridge Phantomsac?

[fromageGB]

CSGibson, on Jan 29 2010, 02:52 AM, said:

If partner is expert enough to bid 4 clubs with a control in the suit, realizing that it confirms diamond support, then partner is also expert enough to realize that 4 hearts is an offer to play instead of a cue.

This is where I beg to differ. Assume you have agreed that 4 clubs shows a control in the suit and confirms diamond support (as my partnerships do - ignoring your reference to "expert") then when you follow his 4♦ with 4♥ this says " I know you have not shown club control, but I have, so don't worry".

Partner knows you are acknowledging his limitations but still continuing with cue bidding. Nothing is going to stop him bidding the slam with ♣xx.

As Jlall says.