[pescetom]

 jillybean, on 2025-February-16, 22:47, said:

How are your N/B's fare in today's highly competitive auctions?

They get bullied out of game occasionally, but that is inevitable (even for the idiot who knows they are beginners, it would seem). But otherwise surprisingly well, because they tend to have their bid and assume partner has it also.
There again, it may be that what your players consider normally competitive would be judged downright silly in an Italian club. An overcall on a good 6 would be considered unusually aggressive, to give you a litmus paper reading.

Maybe we also have different ideas about the boundaries between Beginner and Intermediate, or you have better (younger) Beginners than we do. I would already be happy if they could defend against interference and make sensible overcalls: Advancing can be left to common sense at first IMO except for replying to a takeout double.

We discourage our beginners from entering the competitive tournament until they have been doing better in the friendly tournament, which usually takes a year or more. By that time they will have been mentored by an advanced player and picked up more effective methods like cue raises. We used to have an intermediates course beyond the beginners course, but don't currently have resources for that.

[jdiana]

I think it's fine to teach beginners about cue bid raises when advancing an overcall but, if you're going to use this hand as an example, I think it would be good to discuss the difference between:

(A) (1♦)-1♠-(P)-? (responder passes) and
(B) (1♦)-1♠-(2♦)-? (responder raises opener's suit)

In (A), a 2♦ cue bid would be almost automatic I think. It describes your hand, shows interest in game (which is plausible, given responder's pass) and asks partner about the strength of his overcall. With a bare minimum, he can safely bid 2♠.

But if we cue bid 3♦ in auction (B), then we can no longer stop at the two level. That makes the analysis quite different, IMO. We have to decide whether it's right to go to (at least) the three level. Given normal bidding*, we probably both have about half the deck. Game for us is less likely. With our 4-3-3-3 shape, our hand is probably a 10-point hand. We probably have 8 spades; the opponents probably have 8 or 9 diamonds, for a total of 16 or 17 tricks. We're safe bidding at the two level. Using Losing Trick Count, a simple overcall typically shows about 8 losers, I believe. How many of those can we cover? About 3 or 3 1/2. (One each for the ♠Q, ♥A and ♣K. Maybe 1/2 for the ♣Q.) 8-3=5 losers which, again, suggests bidding 2♠.

If opponents bid 3♦ over our 2♠ bid, then we have a decision to make.

*Our range for a simple overcall is 7 to 18 HCP, but we usually expect a minimum of 8 or 9 points not vulnerable, or 10+ when vulnerable. I would assume that responder's 2♦ shows the values for a simple raise, about 6-10 points, including support points.

(Of course, responder could also make a negative double or bid a new suit, but I would save those for the advanced class. Really, most beginner material I've seen on this subject only deals with situation (A).)

[mw64ahw]

jdiana, on 2025-February-17, 08:20, said:

I think it's fine to teach beginners about cue bid raises when advancing an overcall but, if you're going to use this hand as an example, I think it would be good to discuss the difference between:

(A) (1♦)-1♠-(P)-? and
(B) (1♦)-1♠-(2♦)-?

In (A), a cue bid would be almost automatic I think. It describes your hand, shows interest in game (which is plausible, given responder's pass) and asks partner about the strength of his overcall. With a bare minimum, he can safely bid 2♠.

The analysis for auction (B) is quite different, IMO. Given normal bidding*, we probably both have about half the deck. Game for us is less likely. With our 4-3-3-3 shape, our hand is probably a 10-point hand. We probably have 8 spades; the opponents probably have 8 or 9 diamonds, for a total of 16 or 17 tricks. We're safe bidding at the two level. Using LTC, a simple overcall typically shows about 8 losers, I believe. How many of those can we cover? About 3 or 3 1/2. (One each for the ♠Q, ♥A and ♣K. Maybe 1/2 for the ♣Q.) 8-3=5 losers which, again, suggests bidding 2♠.

If opponents bid 3♦ over our 2♠ bid, then you have a decision to make.

*Our range for a simple overcall is 7 to 18 HCP, but we usually expect a minimum of 8 or 9 points NV, or 10 V. I would assume that responder's 2♦ shows the values for a simple raise, about 6-10 points, including support points.

You may like to clarify the difference between A and B for the N/B

[mycroft]

The cue-bid in B forces us to the 3 level opposite a (8+?) overcall when we could bid 2♠ (and not push to 3).
The cue-bid in A doesn't remove the opportunity to panic out in 2 (or pass 3♦ if LHO bids before partner gets to call).

Yes, that seems obvious (and probably is when it's pointed out that way), but to those who are new to "cue-bid = strong raise", you're right it's not clear.

[mw64ahw]

mycroft, on 2025-February-17, 11:38, said:

The cue-bid in B forces us to the 3 level opposite a (8+?) overcall when we could bid 2♠ (and not push to 3).
The cue-bid in A doesn't remove the opportunity to panic out in 2 (or pass 3♦ if LHO bids before partner gets to call).

Yes, that seems obvious (and probably is when it's pointed out that way), but to those who are new to "cue-bid = strong raise", you're right it's not clear.

I'm not sure the 2-level cue bid in B A forces to the 3-level. A 2X response opposite 15 with no support could Pass.

[thepossum]

People playing GiB soon learn about unnecessary cue bids, beginners or experts

I have no idea if the sim says chance of one down is still a good outcome. Maybe if it doubled itself more etc

Not my preferred style

Sorry about all the dupes. Something wrong with a gateway

[mycroft]

mw64ahw, on 2025-February-17, 12:23, said:

I'm not sure the 2-level cue bid in B forces to the 3-level. A 2X response opposite 15 with no support could Pass.

What 2-level cue-bid in B?

A reminder, the auction:

---

That, exactly, is the difference between the two auctions - in A, the cue-bid is 2♦; in B, it would have to be 3♦.

[mw64ahw]

mycroft, on 2025-February-17, 16:05, said:

What 2-level cue-bid in B?

A reminder, the auction:

---

That, exactly, is the difference between the two auctions - in A, the cue-bid is 2♦; in B, it would have to be 3♦.

Yep meant A

[akwoo]

pescetom, on 2025-February-17, 02:57, said:

They get bullied out of game occasionally, but that is inevitable (even for the idiot who knows they are beginners, it would seem). But otherwise surprisingly well, because they tend to have their bid and assume partner has it also.
There again, it may be that what your players consider normally competitive would be judged downright silly in an Italian club. An overcall on a good 6 would be considered unusually aggressive, to give you a litmus paper reading.

Maybe we also have different ideas about the boundaries between Beginner and Intermediate, or you have better (younger) Beginners than we do. I would already be happy if they could defend against interference and make sensible overcalls: Advancing can be left to common sense at first IMO except for replying to a takeout double.

I think what some of you are missing is that beginners who don't play cue raises still have a limit raise - they're playing (1C)-1M-(P)-3M as showing something like 12-14 hcp, 3+ card support. So they aren't missing their games. What they're missing is the pre-emptive raise, but if their opponents are also beginners who are timid, you don't lose much giving up the pre-emptive raise, since your opponents are going to let you play in 2M anyway.

A local (intermediate, maybe advanced) pair I sort of mentor keeps having trouble remembering Lebensohl, because no one at the club ever interferes over their 1N openings and so they never get to use it. Then they go to a tournament, get bombarded with interference left and right, and mess up.

Also, most beginners don't pay much attention to their overall results. They don't question why they bid well and play well and still end up with 45%. If they did dig into that they'd realize it's a lot of getting -110 instead of -100 or +100 instead of +140, but they don't.

[thepossum]

If in doubt bid 3 clubs

[jillybean]

Obviously, I am out of step here and concede, this hand is not worthy of a cue raise.

I do not attribute much value to 2m after 1m (1M) 2m. It is the weakest bid available and often used as noise, at least in the games I play in.
I might have to change my approach for A/X,

There's actually more to this hand, I will post the full hand later.

[jillybean]

North opens 1♦
Does East have a 1♥ or 2♥ call?

---