[Cyberyeti]

mike777, on 2024-December-03, 15:24, said:

Yes much more, minimum gf is generally 7 LTC, hands:

1. 8.5 adjusted LTC
2. 7.5 adjusted LTC
3. 7.0 adjusted LTC

I don't know how you're adjusting your GFs but you're not GFing straight off the bat, you're GFing in the knowledge that partner has clubs and spades, hence stiff ♣K almost certainly covers one of partner's losers for example, I can't imagine staying out of game on any of those hands is percentage, and I get much lower loser counts than you do.

[akwoo]

I bid 5♣. I really wish partner had shown something better than a dead minimum game force with 2♦, but I'm hoping that partner wouldn't have bid 4♥ with some dreck like QJxx KQJx QJxx x (and even then 5♠ isn't hopeless).

In response to your next question - if partner bids 5♠ I pass and if partner bids anything below 5♠ I bid 5♠. If partner bids 6♣ I bid 6♦.

[mike777]

Cyberyeti, on 2024-December-03, 15:38, said:

I don't know how you're adjusting your GFs but you're not GFing straight off the bat, you're GFing in the knowledge that partner has clubs and spades, hence stiff ♣K almost certainly covers one of partner's losers for example, I can't imagine staying out of game on any of those hands is percentage, and I get much lower loser counts than you do.

3S, to me, screams you have more than minimum gf, much more than these examples.
1. You did not bid 4s over 1s
2. You did not bid 4s over 3c
3. Whatever last train promises on this auction..
4. You use LTC only after a known fit, unfortunately many ignore this rule.

As Paul Newman once was told " we have a failure to communicate"
😊 💜

[mike777]

akwoo, on 2024-December-03, 15:45, said:

I bid 5♣. I really wish partner had shown something better than a dead minimum game force with 2♦, but I'm hoping that partner wouldn't have bid 4♥ with some dreck like QJxx KQJx QJxx x (and even then 5♠ isn't hopeless).

In response to your next question - if partner bids 5♠ I pass and if partner bids anything below 5♠ I bid 5♠. If partner bids 6♣ I bid 6♦.

I don't understand, what is your belief based on responder could have this?

[Cyberyeti]

mike777, on 2024-December-03, 15:55, said:

3S, to me, screams you have more than minimum gf, much more than these examples.
1. You did not bid 4s over 1s
2. You did not bid 4s over 3c
3. Whatever last train promises on this auction..
4. You use LTC only after a known fit, unfortunately many ignore this rule.

As Paul Newman once was told " we have a failure to communicate"
😊 💜

OP told you last train might just be a heart control. 4♠ over 1 certainly the way I play is A10xx, KQxxxx, xx, x, not really in this argument, 3♠ just says I don't have a 12 count that's barely a game force, to me every 14+ count will bid this way and some 13s.

[mike777]

Cyberyeti, on 2024-December-03, 16:12, said:

OP told you last train might just be a heart control. 4♠ over 1 certainly the way I play is A10xx, KQxxxx, xx, x, not really in this argument, 3♠ just says I don't have a 12 count that's barely a game force, to me every 14+ count will bid this way and some 13s.

Thank you for your thoughtful response.
We agree on your 1s-4S bidding.
An adjusted LTC of 7. 😊

Yes, going through 4sf or XYZ, same auction, and rebidding 3S or 4S is clearly different to us. Again thanks for engaging.
😁

[smerriman]

My usual bid here would be 4NT, because I struggle to know how to ensure we have the trump queen by cue-bidding. But we'll have a tricky decision over a 5♥ response.

But trying to learn from past threads, if I start with 5♣, hear 5♥, and then bid 5♠, partner won't be passing with two aces and the queen, so maybe that's a better way forward.

(Side point - having denied a diamond control, that frees up a 5♦ bid for partner. What would that mean - could it be used as something else last-train-ish, or does it just show 3rd round control?)

Going based on your definitions, 5♦ by me now is a rather funny choice - the club king is a crucial card, and if partner has it they'll immediately know we've lied, and perhaps why..

[DavidKok]

mike777, on 2024-December-03, 15:55, said:

3S, to me, screams you have more than minimum gf, much more than these examples.

Mike, with your agreements you'll get to play 4♠ when I reveal the hands.

Cyberyeti, on 2024-December-03, 15:38, said:

I don't know how you're adjusting your GFs but you're not GFing straight off the bat, you're GFing in the knowledge that partner has clubs and spades, hence stiff ♣K almost certainly covers one of partner's losers for example, I can't imagine staying out of game on any of those hands is percentage, and I get much lower loser counts than you do.

This is exactly right. At the decision point for bidding 3♠ partner knew of our spades and clubs, and also had negative inferences about our heart and diamond suit holdings. This helps inform hand evaluation away from crude MLTC or other simple formulae. This is one of the downsides of playing 4♠ as a value raise - your hand might have been worth an upgrade in light of new information, but you'll never find out.


More generally, if we have two ways to confirm the trump suit, once with a jump (4♠) and once without (3♠), from a bidding theory point of view the jump should contain about 3% of the hands and the non-jump should contain 97%. This is because there are 32x as many auctions from 3♠ to slam compared to 4♠. In practice nobody has agreements that efficient, so ~10% is more reasonable. But since most hands in a strong range are minimum, you probably don't exhaust even the minimum HCP value for your range with this 10% rule. That doesn't mean that 3♠ is garbage, but rather that it's a good idea to play it as wide ranging. Especially since opener still hasn't limited the hand all that much, and may well have slam interest opposite the right minimum game force but not have 5-level safety depending on the controls and side suits.

I'll resume the auction later today, this was just an aside.

[mike777]

DavidKok, on 2024-December-04, 02:10, said:

Mike, with your agreements you'll get to play 4♠ when I reveal the hands.

This is exactly right. At the decision point for bidding 3♠ partner knew of our spades and clubs, and also had negative inferences about our heart and diamond suit holdings. This helps inform hand evaluation away from crude MLTC or other simple formulae. This is one of the downsides of playing 4♠ as a value raise - your hand might have been worth an upgrade in light of new information, but you'll never find out.


More generally, if we have two ways to confirm the trump suit, once with a jump (4♠) and once without (3♠), from a bidding theory point of view the jump should contain about 3% of the hands and the non-jump should contain 97%. This is because there are 32x as many auctions from 3♠ to slam compared to 4♠. In practice nobody has agreements that efficient, so ~10% is more reasonable. But since most hands in a strong range are minimum, you probably don't exhaust even the minimum HCP value for your range with this 10% rule. That doesn't mean that 3♠ is garbage, but rather that it's a good idea to play it as wide ranging. Especially since opener still hasn't limited the hand all that much, and may well have slam interest opposite the right minimum game force but not have 5-level safety depending on the controls and side suits.

I'll resume the auction later today, this was just an aside.

NO.

All I request is that 3S over 3C promises extra. How much extra is open to discussion, but something please.

You under estimate the South hand.
If North has his bid South will seriously consider moving over 3C then 4S.
The problem is many of these examples of responders hand are drek as I fully explained.

Again the main point of discussion here is bidding 3S or 4S over 3C. To include these example hands in 3S is where we disagree. To play 3S as such a wide range is where we disagree. We clearly disagree but I love your informed and helpful posts.

The entire point of going through 4Sf or XYZ, same auction, is to show possible slam interest before jumping to 4S over 3C.
That South hand is an adjusted 5.5 loser hand so South knows slam is a consideration, granted not 100%.

Again I love your posts and problems, they are extremely thoughtful and insightful. Thanks.

[mikeh]

So…..the auction to date, put in words

1C. Says very little, and what it says depends on methods

1H. Ditto

1S. 4+ spades, longer clubs, conveys nothing about strength other than not a gf.

2D. Ambiguous about shape but forcing to game opposite a minimum opening hand, and may, depending upon methods, deny certain minimum hands with 4 spades and enough to bid game.

3C. According to DK, in the agreed methods could be 4225. For me, 1S already showed 4=5 blacks. Thus for me, if I were 4225, I’d deny a diamond stopper

3S. 4+ spades, almost always only 4 but rarely 5=6 etc in majors. Since that’s very rare, assume 4=4 or 4=5+ majors. Again, methods count but I’d allow responder to bid 4S over 3C with a minimum just a tad too good to have bid 4S over 1S.3S doesn’t announce slam interest but it does say ‘if you’re interested, we may have slam’. It could also be based on even stronger hands

4C. I have some mild slam interest…I’m not dead minimum and here’s a club control

4H. I don’t like last train here, but in fairness I’m not a big fan of last train…I use it rarely and wouldn’t use it here.if I had no red suit control, why on earth would I still show slam interest? Try constructing a hand with no red A or K that should continue a slam hunt? Good luck. But DK thinks, it seems, that such hands exist. I don’t. So for me, and I think 99.9999% of good players, 4H has to promise a control and ongoing willingness to consider slam.

Ok, so here we are. What are our options and what do they say/ask?

4S. Signing off. Responder can’t move because we imply no diamond control. So that’s out of the question.

4N. Keycard. Are we able to make good decisions based on every possible response? He must have at least two keycards else he shouldn’t have bid 3S then 4H. So a 5H response leaves us at the 5 level. We have no assurance that we’ll make but we’ll always have play. A 5S response makes slam no worse than a 3-2 break and brining in the clubs, and slam may be cold…grand may be very good.

So 4N is certainly a viable option. Can we do better?

5C. Has to promise a diamond control…we’d not go by game without one. Where does it leave partner? He has to assume that we felt that keycard wouldn’t give us what we need….now, if 4H didn’t promise a heart control (and neither did the auction imply one) then we couldn’t keycard with xx in hearts…so that’s how he’d think if he thought that he hadn’t yet implied a heart control. Given DK’s views, I think 5C (or 5D) is preferable to keycard, but I simply don’t think that last train here makes any kind of sense without a control.

5D. Clearly forward going. I don’t understand why it denies the club ace. But it suffers from the same problem as 5C.

5H…makes zero sense with my hand

5S. Why not keycard? No matter what you think 5S means…more importantly no matter what you think partner will think it means….it can’t be better than keycard


So I bid 4N. If he bids 5S, I bid 5N. If he admits to the club king, 7S….far from cold but almost surely has good play….likely needs 3-2 spades but can survive one 4-1 splits.

[DavidKok]

Very close, mikeh. In our methods 4♣ is a serious slam try, not just a mild one. Also I agree that 3♣, if 4=2=2=5, denies a diamond stopper. However, 4=x=y=6(+) with a diamond stopper is also possible (case in point). And, in the spirit of being 100% accurate, 1♠ could still have been 4=1=4=4.

smerriman, on 2024-December-03, 22:19, said:

My usual bid here would be 4NT, because I struggle to know how to ensure we have the trump queen by cue-bidding. But we'll have a tricky decision over a 5♥ response.

But trying to learn from past threads, if I start with 5♣, hear 5♥, and then bid 5♠, partner won't be passing with two aces and the queen, so maybe that's a better way forward.

(Side point - having denied a diamond control, that frees up a 5♦ bid for partner. What would that mean - could it be used as something else last-train-ish, or does it just show 3rd round control?)

Going based on your definitions, 5♦ by me now is a rather funny choice - the club king is a crucial card, and if partner has it they'll immediately know we've lied, and perhaps why..

If we choose 5♣ partner will surmise that the problem that we have isn't solved well with RKC. Since spades are trump the issue can't be the response getting us too high. Nor can it be a specific king for a grand slam. Only two concerns stand out: a heart control, or our clubs are soft. On this auction I think North has practically guaranteed a heart control, even if it is not 100%. A game forcing hand without red suit control on this auction is simply quite rare. So instead partner will likely suspect that we are looking for ♣(A/K)QJT, to establish the suit.

mike777, on 2024-December-04, 08:52, said:

All I request is that 3S over 3C promises extra. How much extra is open to discussion, but something please.

You under estimate the South hand.
If North has his bid South will seriously consider moving over 3C then 4S.
The problem is many of these examples of responders hand are drek as I fully explained.

Again the main point of discussion here is bidding 3S or 4S over 3C. To include these example hands in 3S is where we disagree. To play 3S as such a wide range is where we disagree. We clearly disagree but I love your informed and helpful posts.

The entire point of going through 4Sf or XYZ, same auction, is to show possible slam interest before jumping to 4S over 3C.
That South hand is an adjusted 5.5 loser hand so South knows slam is a consideration, granted not 100%.

Keep in mind that North bid 3♠, not South. The evaluation of the South hand is particularly relevant on the 1♣-1♥; 1♠-4♠ auction, which I think would be systemic with your agreements. Would you bid on then, knowing that all the hands you dismissed on my auction are now possibilities?
3♠ on my auction does promise extras - though only by virtue of not being 'in the worst 10% of hands I could have had on the auction thus far'. The resulting range is still very wide. If you want to reserve 3♠ for stronger hands you have more tough decisions when partner jumps.

---

Good news, we dodged the dreaded 5♥ response. Our options now are:

• Pass: To play.
  
• 5NT: Specific king ask. With 3 kings partner will bid 6NT. With none, 6♠. With one, that suit. With two, the third suit. A 6-suit response therefore shows "exactly this king, or exactly the other two".
  
• 6♣: Asks for third round club control, to ruff out or establish the suit.
  
• 6♦: Asks for third round diamond control.
  
• 6♥: Asks for ♥Q.
  
• 6♠/6NT/7♠/7NT: To play.
  
• 7♣: Offer between 7♣ and 7♠
  
• 7♦/7♥: Offer between 7♠ and 7NT.

P.S. I know several commenters have already said what their plans were over the 5♠ response, but I'll wait a bit to allow others to contribute if they wish.

[mike777]

Wow super detailed,
Please explain 5NT options with examples on this deal, ty. Understand 3kings, love it
Understand zero kings.

[Cyberyeti]

So over 5N replies are unambiguous as we know already he doesn't have K♦ from the 4♥ bid ?

In that case will bid that

[DavidKok]

Cyberyeti, on 2024-December-04, 13:10, said:

So over 5N replies are unambiguous as we know already he doesn't have K♦ from the 4♥ bid ?

Correct.

Not that many responses, but here's the next round anyway (before the thread goes cold):

---

Your options, as always:

• Pass: To play.
  
• 6♦: Asks for third round diamond control.
  
• 6♥: Asks for ♥Q.
  
• 6♠/6NT/7♠/7NT: To play.
  
• 7♣: Offer to choose between 7♣ and 7♠.
  
• 7♦/7♥: Offer to choose between 7♠ and 7NT.

[Cyberyeti]

So partner has ♠AQ ♥A without K, ♦ no A or K, ♣K and all I need is spades 3-2 to guarantee making 7♠, but I can't have 13 top tricks in NT unless partner has a 5th spade.

Looks like 7♠

[Tramticket]

Yes, I'm counting only 12 tricks in NT, but 13 in spades if spades are 3-2 or maybe 4-1 (partner holds ♠J and good chances if partner holds ♠10)

[Cyberyeti]

Tramticket, on 2024-December-05, 12:37, said:

Yes, I'm counting only 12 tricks in NT, but 13 in spades if spades are 3-2 or maybe 4-1 (partner holds ♠J and good chances if partner holds ♠10)

The reason I said 13 in spades if they broke 3-2 was opposite AQJx, AJxxxx, xx, K a club lead messes up your entries as you can't get back to the clubs after ruffing a diamond and drawing trumps if they're 4-1.

You don't have 13 of course if partner doesn't have a diamond to ruff. Not sure if a splinter would have happened at any point to rule that out.

[mike777]

Great thread, ty very much for sharing. Informative conversation with all the posters.

Sounds as if responder is an adjusted 7+ hand, plus for KC. In between a 3s and 4S rebid over 3C for me, if so....
Opener 5.5 LTC

If either partner does bid 4nt, seven spades pretty easy to get too....
I would add I believe that these 5 level cuebid auctions and assumptions are far beyond most of us...though the discussions are fascinating. Will stick with Kickback for now, and learning play of the hand and defense...


Wonderful problem, interesting discussions about 3s or 4s rebids.....

Again ty.

[DavidKok]

Cyberyeti, on 2024-December-05, 13:12, said:

You don't have 13 of course if partner doesn't have a diamond to ruff. Not sure if a splinter would have happened at any point to rule that out.

Partner had the opportunity to splinter in diamonds immediately after 1♠.

---

I chose 7♠, for the reasons stated by others above. The lead is the ♣7. Opponents lead 1st/3rd/5th and signal low = encouraging or even, but they might well choose to falsecard against a grand slam like this.
What do you think of partner's bidding, and of the resulting contract? And, more importantly, plan the play.

[apollo1201]

 DavidKok, on 2024-December-07, 05:40, said:

What do you think of partner s bidding, and of the resulting contract? And, more importantly, plan the play.

I thank partner for doing so much noise with their moderate hand, giving full appreciation to their Aces and fillers (SQ, CK). 4S over 1S it out of the question but 4S after 4SF looks enough, we play that 3S shows more (at least 16 bal, or if unbal, an establishable H suit with nice trump support, 14+ with concentrated values).

I also blame opening leader for not following the very well known advice to lead trump against grand slams. Of course, with Jxxx you find sth else.

I will try, therefore, to guard against this holding and a sg C (while on earth lead my suit that could be Kx facing AJxxxx?).

So CK, DA, small to SQ, D ruff, SK revealing the break and my last trump to finesse J. Would be even nicer er with S10 and 9 reversed, you need to unblock when ruffing.

At the end I count 6 C + 5 trumps + 2 red aces, making 13.

And I probably do not go down should trumps be 32. Unless I am over ruffed in D when LHO was asleep during the auction.

Is there better line?

For sure but this one looks as good as one can get when typing in the metro😁😁