[Knurdler]

If one of us opens 1 heart, that shows at least 5 hearts. The question is, holding 3 or 4 hearts and 4 or more spades, should we support hearts or show spades?

My partner says that, regardless of strength, with 3 or 4 hearts and 4 or 5 spades, we should always bid 1 spade. His arguments are 1. If we can find a double fit, we can bid more 2. Bidding the spade may discourage the fourth seat from coming in with a spade bid.

Whilst his arguments have some merit, I disagree with always bidding 1 spade.

I propose:
1. with 4 hearts, always show support immediately (single, limit or Jacoby raise)
2. with 3 hearts and less than 10 points, show support by bidding 2H immediately, even with 5 spades. My reasons are that I only expect to bid once and I think 2H is more constructive and more obstructive than 1S and, with a known fit, partner is better placed to decide to sacrifice or not.
3. with 3 hearts and 4 or 5 spades and more than 10 points, I am leaning towards bidding 1 spade. A 44 fit is supposed to play better than 53 and I can rebid 3H if partner rebids 2 of a minor.

I appreciate that there is probably no right or wrong answer and would value more experienced members’ views.

Thank you

[jillybean]

I am a support with support advocate. I've had many disappointing auctions where partner has bid their own suit first where a subsequent bid of my suit appears to be simple preference and we have missed our game or slam.

[DavidKok]

I really prefer "support with support". I have in the past bypassed a six card spade suit to show three card support for partner's hearts, though this is pretty extreme and I'd make my choice based on suit quality.
The start 1♥-1♠ is one of the weaker sequences in bridge bidding theory. Over partner's rebid it can be difficult to show a weak hand with three-card support (usually pulling 2m to 2♥ shows a doubleton, false preference) as well as a game force (1♥-1♠; 2♦ and now you kind of have to bid 3♣ 4SGF first, and who knows how high you get before you can show support). Also if partner makes an unexpected bid (e.g. rebids 2♥ or jump rebids to 3m) how do you show your 3-card support and playing strength? 3♥ might be needed as a punt probing for 3NT on those auctions, so it still doesn't show support.

I play Maas, 1M-2NT showing approximately 9-14 ish with 3(+) support. This way I can bid 2♥ with approx 6-9, 2NT with 9-14 ish, and 2♣ with stronger hands. I will bypass the spades almost always with a hand with support, as it lets me set trumps and show my strength earlier. The other day I held ♠AKxxx, ♥Kxx, ♦Axxx, ♣x and responded 2♣ to 1♥ - pretty extreme, but the auction continued 1♥-2♣*; 2♦-2♥ and now I've shown a good GF hand with heart support and we can start our slam investigation. Easy.

Without this gadget you probably have to put the 10-11 HCP hands through some other route, and you will inevitably lose on this some amount of the time. Also if your 2♣ is Clubs or Bal, rather than Clubs or Bal or Fit, you can't respond 2♣ with my example hand. I'd still aim to bid as closely as possible to the above, so:

• With approximately 6-9 points, raise the hearts immediately and ignore the spades.
  
• With a game forcing balanced hand with heart support, bypass spades and bid 2♣.
  
• With the invitational hands go for the system bid. If you have ways to show invitational with 4-card support (e.g. Bergen raises or 1♥-3♥), use them. If you have to put these through 1NT you will likely have to respond 1♠ here and I expect to be stuck on this auction with some frequency.
  
• With a game forcing unbalanced hand with spades as well as heart support I prefer to bid 2♣ as well, but if your system does not allow this you probably have no option other than 1♠. This is the sort of auction where I expect you will be stuck very often.

Lastly I would not be worried about spade overcalls when we have the spade suit. If anything I'd be more worried about overcalls in other suits if we don't show our support immediately. 1♥-(P)-1♠-(2♦); 2♥-(3♦)-? and now how do you show two or three different ranges with three card or doubleton support?

[mw64ahw]

I only show the ♠ first with a weak hand and 5+♠ where my suit as trumps tends to score better, or an invitational hand with 3-card ♥ support where a double fit may be encouraging for game, but that would be playing Kaplan Inversion. If playing 1♠ as natural then I would use the same approach using delayed support.

[fuzzyquack]

There are some tricks for GF hands like 1♥-1♠/2m-3♥ as GF. I generally bid 1♥-2N with long ♠ and four ♥, which implies than in the previous sequence you show 3=♥. For the worst sequence in bridge, 1♥-1♠/2♦-3♣ must agree what's the punt bid.

No matter what you agree, there will be difficult hands to bid.

[HardVector]

In general, the weaker you are, the sooner you should support partner's hand. So, with 6-9 pts, you should support immediately. Imagine the auction goes 1h-1s-2d and now you bid 2h. That 2h bid is not support, it is preference. Partner has bid 2 suits and you are picking one, so partner is going to underbid their hand from there and you may miss a game. Only if you have game invitational values or better should you mention a good suit first. This will allow partner to evaluate their holding in that suit to make the decision to bid game easier.

[Tramticket]

---

I was pondering this very question a few days ago after this deal. There are 12 easy tricks with spades as trumps, but only 11 available with hearts as trumps.

We play four-card majors, so after West passes, North opens 1♥. I held the South cards, but could see no reason to mention the spades, in preference to supporting hearts. Every pair finished in hearts except one pair, who responded 1♠ and finished in a four spade contract - for a complete top.

You would presumably open a minor, if playing five-card majors, but South will respond 1♥ and it still seems that all roads lead to a heart contract. Does anyone have a reasonable auction to the unbeatable six spades?

[Cyberyeti]

 Tramticket, on 2024-January-05, 02:45, said:

---

I was pondering this very question a few days ago after this deal. There are 12 easy tricks with spades as trumps, but only 11 available with hearts as trumps.

We play four-card majors, so after West passes, North opens 1♥. I held the South cards, but could see no reason to mention the spades, in preference to supporting hearts. Every pair finished in hearts except one pair, who responded 1♠ and finished in a four spade contract - for a complete top.

You would presumably open a minor, if playing five-card majors, but South will respond 1♥ and it still seems that all roads lead to a heart contract. Does anyone have a reasonable auction to the unbeatable six spades?

This hand is particularly difficult, but the spade fit conundrum is real. I would respond with a 5 card spade suit every time if I only had 3 hearts, and most of the time with 4 hearts. We also play fit jumps so some of the time with 5-4 we get both suits in immediately.

Consider:

---

The fact that you have 2 discards with spades as trumps and only one with hearts as trumps makes all the difference

On your hand we would have a chance:

1♥-2N (limit or better)
3♠(we bid long suits here not shortage)-4♠

And now the difficulty is working out that the major suit distributions are what they are and not mirrored for the slam, but we might play 4♠

[sfi]

 Tramticket, on 2024-January-05, 02:45, said:

Does anyone have a reasonable auction to the unbeatable six spades?

I do, but it requires me to dust off the strong club relay system I used to play. I'm not finding spades in any other partnership I play though.

[DavidKok]

In my opinion you are trying to fix niche luxury problems while ignoring more frequent bigger issues. Most bidding systems simply aren't good enough to reliably show support and introduce a second major, especially if it is the same length or shorter. I know systems that will get to the superior contract, but I would not want to get there at the cost of supporting with support.

 Tramticket, on 2024-January-05, 02:45, said:

---

I was pondering this very question a few days ago after this deal. There are 12 easy tricks with spades as trumps, but only 11 available with hearts as trumps.

We play four-card majors, so after West passes, North opens 1♥. I held the South cards, but could see no reason to mention the spades, in preference to supporting hearts. Every pair finished in hearts except one pair, who responded 1♠ and finished in a four spade contract - for a complete top.

You would presumably open a minor, if playing five-card majors, but South will respond 1♥ and it still seems that all roads lead to a heart contract. Does anyone have a reasonable auction to the unbeatable six spades?

Modern Dutch Doubleton bids 1♣-1♥; 2♦¹-2♠²; 2NT-3♠ where North has shown 17-19 balanced and South has shown SI with 4♠5♥ opposite that range, after which we might get there. But it's tricky.
¹17-19 bal or clubs-dia reverse or GF single suited clubs.
²SI facing the right strong hand.
It is plausible that Dutch Doubleton gets preempted in diamonds, in which case all bets are off. In a similar vein I expect strong club systems to stand a chance here, but again they might get preempted.
In a more standard system I would probably bid 1♣-1♥; 2NT-3♦* (transfer to hearts) and then superaccept with North, missing the spade fit.

 Cyberyeti, on 2024-January-05, 03:17, said:

This hand is particularly difficult, but the spade fit conundrum is real. I would respond with a 5 card spade suit every time if I only had 3 hearts, and most of the time with 4 hearts. We also play fit jumps so some of the time with 5-4 we get both suits in immediately.

Consider:

---

The fact that you have 2 discards with spades as trumps and only one with hearts as trumps makes all the difference

On your hand we would have a chance:

1♥-2N (limit or better)
3♠(we bid long suits here not shortage)-4♠

And now the difficulty is working out that the major suit distributions are what they are and not mirrored for the slam, but we might play 4♠

I do not think the South hand is worth a 'limit or better' raise. There is little risk to just bidding 2♥ - partner will move with almost all hands that are worth a game try. Again I expect a strong club system to have a better chance unless they get preempted in clubs, and in a standard system I expect to have the auction 1♥-2♥; 4♥-P.

[sfi]

 DavidKok, on 2024-January-05, 03:31, said:

I do not think the South hand is worth a 'limit or better' raise.

Cyberyeti's comment about the limit raise referenced Tramticket's hand with 5-card support, not the 5332 single raise. It took me a few moments to parse the change in hands.

[Cyberyeti]

 sfi, on 2024-January-05, 03:33, said:

Cyberyeti's comment about the limit raise referenced Tramticket's hand with 5-card support, not the 5332 single raise. It took me a few moments to parse the change in hands.

Is why I said "On your hand" but yes I was referring to the original.

[DavidKok]

Sorry, I misread.

[Tramticket]

 Cyberyeti, on 2024-January-05, 03:17, said:

On your hand we would have a chance:

1♥-2N (limit or better)
3♠(we bid long suits here not shortage)-4♠

And now the difficulty is working out that the major suit distributions are what they are and not mirrored for the slam, but we might play 4♠

Yes, showing second suits in a limit or better 2NT would identify the spades, but it needs you to treat the hand as two-suited rather than strong and balanced? Unfortunately, in this partnership a 2NT would be game-forcing and we show shortages at the three level, so we don't even have that option.

[helene_t]

In general it is best to show support immediately. It makes partner better placed to make a decision when opps interfere, and it makes the auction much simpler, especially with strong hands that would otherwise have to first bid spades, then bids 4th suit or similar to establish a game force, and then show the support in 3rd round.

We can make an exception for strong hands with 3-card support where a slam in a different suit may be better. And we can make an exception for very weak hands, say 4-5 points that woud encourage partner too much if raising directly. So we bid as if we merely take a false preference for spades.

We can also make an exception for hands with 10-11 points and 3-card support, if we have agreed to require 4-card support for an immediate limit raise. Even if we don't have that agreement, these hands are not that difficult to bid as we can bid for example
1♥-1♠
2♦-3♥

It is particularly important to raise immediately with some 8-9 points, even with five spades and three hearts. Suppose it goes
1♥-1♠
2♦-?
Now 2♥ sounds like 6-9 points with a doubleton spades so your hand is too strong for that, but 3♥ would show a stronger hand.

[AL78]

I'm inclined to show support with support although I mostly play Acol and the recommendations might be different here, but I have seen it advocated to respond 1♠ with 44 in the majors so if you have a double fit, you end up in the 4-4 fit with a 5-4 side suit fit and can often get an extra trick from the discard. It is similar strategy to the way some players frequently blast 3NT even with a big major or even double major fit, gambling there are the same number of tricks in 3NT as in 4M (i.e. matchpoint-itis).

[AL78]

I'm inclined to show support with support although I mostly play Acol and the recommendations might be different here, but I have seen it advocated to respond 1♠ with 44 in the majors so if you have a double fit, you end up in the 4-4 fit with a 5-4 side suit fit and can often get an extra trick from the discard. It is similar strategy to the way some players frequently blast 3NT even with a big major or even double major fit, gambling there are the same number of tricks in 3NT as in 4M (i.e. matchpoint-itis).

[AL78]

P.S. Why am I frequently getting a 504 Gateway Timeout Error message when trying to post and sometimes when trying to access a sub-forum, and has anyone else had issues? It just happened now and was unsure for a while if my post had come through which it seems it has.

[pescetom]

 Tramticket, on 2024-January-05, 02:45, said:

---

I was pondering this very question a few days ago after this deal. There are 12 easy tricks with spades as trumps, but only 11 available with hearts as trumps.

We play four-card majors, so after West passes, North opens 1♥. I held the South cards, but could see no reason to mention the spades, in preference to supporting hearts. Every pair finished in hearts except one pair, who responded 1♠ and finished in a four spade contract - for a complete top.

You would presumably open a minor, if playing five-card majors, but South will respond 1♥ and it still seems that all roads lead to a heart contract. Does anyone have a reasonable auction to the unbeatable six spades?

No chance for us. We would bid this 1♣-1♥;4♥, where 4♥ is a picture bid showing 18-19 balanced with fit. So 4♥+1, maybe even 6♥-1 on a Friday night

This space-consuming natural bid looks out of place in our system and I know Davidkok will hate it, but it assigns meaning to the jump and warns about balanced shape, while still not excluding RKCB to check out Aces and Kings if necessary.

IIRC GiB will stretch to bid 3♥ with the same hand: I imagine a successive 3♠ will be a control-showing cue, but if played as natural then 4♠ would be found. Not that success with the occasional hand like this makes it a better system choice than showing the first control at 3 level.

[helene_t]

 AL78, on 2024-January-05, 06:08, said:

P.S. Why am I frequently getting a 504 Gateway Timeout Error message when trying to post and sometimes when trying to access a sub-forum, and has anyone else had issues? It just happened now and was unsure for a while if my post had come through which it seems it has.

Yes that was discussed in a different thread, some people have had this issue on and off over the last two weeks. I would say it has been going on for years but is probably worse lately.

Sometimes your post has actually been posted, though, even if you get the error message. This is one of the reasons why you sometimes see the same poster post the same post twice or thrice.