[dustinst22]

With a 2452 hand and good values (slam invitational), whats the best way to handle the auction after a 1D opener from partner (assuming inverted minors deny 4c major).

i.e.

1D - 1H ; 2C - ?


2S seems like a very poor choice as we really preempt the auction, esp if partner now bids 3H or something.

Does 3D now show this type of hand?

[JLOGIC]

You have to start with 2S to set up the game force, if you bid 3D it just shows an invitational hand (what you would do with 2443 and an 11 count for instance).

[JLOGIC]

You wanna talk about ridiculously preemptive 4th suit forcing auctions, take a look at 1H 1S 2D 3C. Having to do that just to create a GF is awful and many methods have been devised around specifically avoiding that auction.

At least in this auction typically if partner goes above 3D to bid 3H you will know he has extra values with 1354 (since he would raise with 1354 with a min opener directly). Though you do need to know what you do with 2254 and 3154 with no stopper over 2S which is also problematic (if partner could bid 3H on say xx Ax AKxxx Jxxx and also with x KQx AQxxx Axxx that might be problematic).

You could play some artificial here also I'm sure, this is the 2nd most preemptive fourth suit auction, but it's not nearly as bad as 1H 1S 2D 3C at least since having 2N available alleviates a lot of stress.

[Winstonm]

My view is that inverted minors shouldn't say anything in particular about major suits. Opener, IMO, should rebid his shape rather that stopper-hunt, i.e., with a balanced minimum he bids 2N over 1m-2m, and otherwise bids naturally (or he could bid shortness, if you prefer).

[aguahombre]

IMHO, there are threads where a challenge of the OP methods is appropriate. Here, he stipulates a quite common practice (inverted raise denies a major), and we can move on from there.

As JL says, we also don't find the 4SGF gobbles up useful space. If it were not G.F., then there could be annoying situations.

[jallerton]

 dustinst22, on 2013-May-16, 12:24, said:

With a 2452 hand and good values (slam invitational), whats the best way to handle the auction after a 1D opener from partner (assuming inverted minors deny 4c major).

i.e.

1D - 1H ; 2C - ?


2S seems like a very poor choice as we really preempt the auction, esp if partner now bids 3H or something.

Does 3D now show this type of hand?

Your bidding problem on the second round of the auction illustrates why it's not a good idea to play an inverted raise as denying a 4-card major. A 2♣ rebid is not the only one to give you a headache. Suppose the auction goes 1♦-1♥-2♥. What do you bid now? Many play 3♦ as NF, but even if it is forcing, how will partner know that you are making a slam try in diamonds rather than probing with hearts agreed as trumps?

[JLOGIC]

Jallerton do you have good methods for bidding 2D with 4cM that you could post or roughly outline? I tried to come up with some and it was a nightmare and I decided it wasn't worth it (the only really bad 4th suit forcing auction is when it's 2S, and even then it's not that bad, 2H is easy to handle via use of 2S as a punt hand over it). Competitive auctions over the inverted minors are not that common but scare me even more.

[jallerton]

 JLOGIC, on 2013-May-16, 12:40, said:

You have to start with 2S to set up the game force, if you bid 3D it just shows an invitational hand (what you would do with 2443 and an 11 count for instance).

That's the solution with standard methods, of course. An improvement might be to invert the meanings here, playing 2♠ as any invitational hand with direct 3-level bids as natural and game forcing. In other words the continuations have similar meanings to the ones often played after 1♣-1♥-2♦.

[gnasher]

You could play transfers:
2♠ = 4+ clubs, invitational+
3♣ = 3+ diamonds, invitational+
3♦ = 5 hearts or 6 self-supporting hearts, game-forcing
3♥ = 6 less good hearts, game-forcing
3♠ = 3433, no spade stop, game-forcing

This solves another problem too: when responder has a game-forcing raise of a minor, he finds out whether opener has extra values.

[Zelandakh]

 JLOGIC, on 2013-May-17, 00:43, said:

Jallerton do you have good methods for bidding 2D with 4cM that you could post or roughly outline?

Could we use the first step to distinguish between balanced and unbalanced and make 2NT show hearts? So

1♦ - 2♦
==
2♥ = balanced
... - 2♠ = 4 spades
... - 2NT = 4 hearts
... - 3♣/3M = asks for stop
... - 3♦ = min, no major
... - 3NT = to play
2♠ = unbal, nat
2NT = unbal, 4 hearts
3♣ = unbal, no major, extras
3♦ = unbal, no major, min
3M = splinter
3N = club splinter

That would mean that we cannot stop in 2NT though. To be honest, it feels that if we include 4 card majors in the raise that we should also make it game forcing and move the invitational raise elsewhere. That makes everything much easier.

[jallerton]

 JLOGIC, on 2013-May-17, 00:43, said:

Jallerton do you have good methods for bidding 2D with 4cM that you could post or roughly outline? I tried to come up with some and it was a nightmare and I decided it wasn't worth it (the only really bad 4th suit forcing auction is when it's 2S, and even then it's not that bad, 2H is easy to handle via use of 2S as a punt hand over it).

Perhaps I should point out that I play that an inverted raise can only have a side 4-card major if Responder has a game force.

Opener's most common hand type is a weak NT, so that goes in step 1, which is played as 2-way. With some partners the second option is 18-19 balanced (as Zelandakh suggests - then 1♦-2♦-2NT = unbalanced with 4 hearts). With other partners I play the second option in 2♥ as natural unbalanced, leaving 1♦-2♦-2NT to show the 18-19 balanced hand.

After 1♦-2♦-2♥, Responder bids 3♦ or 2NT as invitational opposite a weak NT, or anything else as a game force (step 1 being a neutral relay)

With an unbalanced hand, Opener shows a second suit. Over this, Responder returns to 3♦ with a minimum or bids step 1 or 2NT to invite Opener to pattern out or show strength [can opt to use a formal relay structure here].

 JLOGIC, on 2013-May-17, 00:43, said:

Competitive auctions over the inverted minors are not that common but scare me even more.

Why? If I knew 4th hand was about to overcall 2♠ or 3♣, I'd much prefer to have shown invitational or better with 4-card ♦ support than to have shown responding values with 4+ hearts.

[straube]

A reason not to include hands with a 4-cd major in an inverted raise is that you frequently will have had much simpler auctions after a 1N rebid. 1D-1H, 2C is annoying but also hopefully descriptive. 1D-1H, 1N and you have lots of room...which would not be true after 1D-2D.

[Siegmund]

Simplest solution is to have the jump to 3D be GF by agreement. Playing all of responder's 2nd round jumps as GF beats the pants off "everything invitational, FSF only game force." Don't know why so few people do it.

The transfer solution is interesting but I'd only do that in the context of a system where we used a lot of 2nd round transfers and had a unified approach to them.