[cherdano]

 gnasher, on 2012-October-18, 11:05, said:

How about switching the meanings:

3NT = non-serious, not specific about strain
Four of the minor = setting the major as trumps
Any cue-bid = setting the minor as trumps

 gnasher, on 2012-October-19, 01:10, said:

If we have two trump suits, that means we can't cue-bid in either of them. It's useful to be able to agree diamonds, then have one partner cue-bid in spades.

 cherdano, on 2012-October-19, 01:19, said:

I think opener will very rarely have the hand that can commit to not playing in 4♠.

 MrAce, on 2012-October-19, 02:26, said:

I didn't understand why you said this, please tell me if i missed something.

The way I understand Andy's suggestion, you can no longer play in 4♠ after opener set the minor as trumps.

Maybe I am missing something, but to me this looks like the worst post from Andy that I can remember. Opener will be forced to bid 4m or 3N most of the time, and both bids don't add too much information.

In fact, I don't even recognize the description of standard bidding. The way I understand this auction, 3♠ set spades as trumps for game purposes, while both partners know that the minor is the more likely slam strain. Cuebids don't change any of that, they just show a control and interest in slam. Bidding 4m shows a good holding in that suit in context - whether you call that a "cue in our side fit" or "showing good trumps" I don't care. I would play 4NT as 6KCB with spades as the "queen suit", since you had a chance to indicate your strength in the minor earlier (by bidding or skipping 4m).

[cherdano]

P.S.: If you want to add artificial meanings in this auction, I think it should be about shape - mostly about side shortness.

[gnasher]

 cherdano, on 2012-October-19, 02:39, said:

The way I understand Andy's suggestion, you can no longer play in 4♠ after opener set the minor as trumps.

Yes, that's what I meant. I have four categories of hand:
- A hand that signs off in 4M
- A non-serious slam try
- A serious slam-try which sets the major as trumps (or at least isn't willing to set the minor as trumps)
- A serious slam-try which sets the minor as trumps

Only the last one won't be able to stop in 4M. I hate going down at the fivel-level, but if we're seriously considering bidding slam I'd expect the five-level in our (usually) nine-card fit to be fairly safe.

[bluecalm]

Quote

Playing 2/1 openers 3m can be as weak as 11 hcp or a giant with 5422 shape.

This is the problem. This agreement is very weak, especially combined with 2D being 4+. Both 2D and especially 3D are high bids and should have more descriptive meaning. You are shooting yourself in the foot playing the way you described. You are at 3S level and the hands could still be anything in very wide range. You would need like 3 steps of non-serious/serious 3NT to untangle it (3NT serious ? 4C - not really ? 4D - maybe ? 4H - yup ! or something) not to mention other things like shortnesses in responder hands, controls in round suits and amount of diamonds (and spades) we have.
That might be playable in precision (although I still doubt it) but in 2/1 it's a disaster.

[cherdano]

 gnasher, on 2012-October-19, 02:50, said:

Yes, that's what I meant. I have four categories of hand:
- A hand that signs off in 4M
- A non-serious slam try
- A serious slam-try which sets the major as trumps (or at least isn't willing to set the minor as trumps)
- A serious slam-try which sets the minor as trumps

Only the last one won't be able to stop in 4M. I hate going down at the fivel-level, but if we're seriously considering bidding slam I'd expect the five-level in our (usually) nine-card fit to be fairly safe.

Maybe we have different notions about serious slam tries. If I have a nice looking 15 count, I very much prefer being able to bid serious NT. That hand is so much nicer than my typical 11 count that I can't catch up after a non-serious 3NT. And nice-looking 15 count up to "just below bidding RKCB in any case" it not too wide a range for a serious slam try.
But with that nice looking 15 count I prefer to play 4M instead of 5m if partner's hand doesn't fit.

[Fluffy]

 MrAce, on 2012-October-18, 21:45, said:

To make it clear, 3m promises 4 card support. I thought that was obvious when i said 2m promised 4+ (not 5+)

It was pretty clear untill I read that no shortness was allowed and then... why didn't you just say that the only shape is 5422? looks like a very small target to me.

[jogs]

 gszes, on 2012-October-18, 17:25, said:

One of the things that people hate about j2n is the opener jumping to 4 of M with a dead min hand.

It is correct to jump to 4M with a minimum hand. The problem is players think in terms of minimum in HCP. They need to think in terms of controls.

1. ♠ AKxxx ♥ Axx ♦ xxx ♣ xx
2. ♠ KJxxx ♥ QJx ♦ QJx ♣ KJ

For purposes of slam 1. is better than 2. 5 controls is better than 2.
Bid 3♠ with 1. Close out with 4♠ with 2.

[kenrexford]

This is getting more and more bizarre.

1♠-2♦

3♦-3♠

OK, we have a double fit. So, what are the options?

First, we could be sane and cuebid as if spades are agreed, a novel concept. 3NT is serious or frivolous, whatever you like, with an ability to cue three suits -- clubs, diamonds, and spades. Then, we use RKCB or such to clarify spade honors.

Alternatively, we could dedicate a call to force a diamond-agreement override to allow cuebids in spades. If this is the absolute cheapest call, that would be 3NT. We then apparently can cuebid 4♠ at some point. Thus, we enable cuebids in spades in situations where we lose RKCB for diamonds (we bid too far), and only oif by bidding 3NT we force the contract past 4♠ already, and only when for come reason RKCB as the solution for spade cards is a bad idea. I cannot imagine what hand that would possibly be, but apparently someone has this in mind.

I mean, if you desperately want to cue spades, then there is a completely different solution that at least makes some sense -- ditch serious/fricolous 3NT and instead make 3NT a spade cuebid. (Or, similarly, re-define "serious" as "I have good enough spades to cuebid them.")

[PhilKing]

I have to agree with Ken here.

The number of bizarre "solutions" for what is basically a non-problem is quite staggering.

Personally I would never play 3m as 5422 any range, but if I did, I certainly wouldn't feel any urge to reinvent the wheel.

[gnasher]

 PhilKing, on 2012-October-19, 09:04, said:

I have to agree with Ken here.

Everyone finds themselves in that position at some point in their BBF lives. Alcohol may help.

[PhilKing]

 gnasher, on 2012-October-19, 09:27, said:

Everyone finds themselves in that position at some point in their BBF lives. Alcohol may help.

When the nutty professor suggests "standard", he is probably right!

I fully expected two different types of 6 ace RKC, one of which would involve the spade jack.

[MrAce]

To those who are complaining about 3m showing mostly 5422 shape. What did you understand from my first post that says ...

 MrAce, on 2012-October-17, 15:14, said:

1M--2x
3x--3M(openers major)

*Assume that 2x showed 4+ if it is minor (not 5+) and 3x denied to hold a stiff in unbid suits.

I am aware when responders suit is diamond, it is not easy to show club shortness. So in 1M-2♦-3♦ opener can have a club shortness if he is not willing to splinter at 4 level. But still responder knows that opener can not have a stiff ( or void) in the unbid major).This alone reduces the 5431 shape possibility by a lot and letme know if you suggest different continuation after 2d-3d auctions due to this.

Or do you guys require some certain strength for those splinters ? Because by the time i took my break from bridge it didn't require any extra strength by opener (in 2/1 system though) for 3 level splinters. We were doing it with something like x AQxxx Qxx Axxx 1♥-2♣-3♠.

Another question, to those who are complaining about 3m has a wide range, AKxxx Kx xx QTxx aren't we supposed to raise clubs to 3 with this as well as with AKxxx Kx Ax Axxx ? Because it may not be perfect but i can write down much more problems for those who thinks these hands should start differently over pds 2♣, when they know that 2♣ showed 4+ and gf values. I am aware most of you play 2♣ response different than what i wrote in my OP, and your solution can make sense in a different context, but obviously thats not the case here.

[bluecalm]

I feel that establishing diamonds is not that important here. Just play 6RKCB and 6d afterwards as to play.
Remember that 6M opposite 6m is +2imps. Those adds up and make hunting for a perfecto much less attractive.
I feel that non-serious/serious mechanism + cuebids is the way go.
Let's say we choose non-serious. I would go a bit more serious with it than usual and just bid 4S on most 11-13hands leaving 3NT for (13)14-15 and cuebids for serious slam tries even opposite 4 diamonds.
I think that finding out about our range with some decent accuracy is more important than other stuff herre. I really want to avoid a situation when we are often making 5 level tries and ending up playing something silly just because we were afraid partner could have much more.

[MrAce]

 bluecalm, on 2012-October-19, 19:50, said:

I feel that establishing diamonds is not that important here. Just play 6RKCB and 6d afterwards as to play.

 PhilKing, on 2012-October-19, 09:44, said:

I fully expected two different types of 6 ace RKC, one of which would involve the spade jack.

I am not ashamed to confess that i never played 6 ace keycard. Sounds interesting. Can you guys write it for me please ? (If you think it will hijack the topic pm ing me will be appreciated as well)

Thanks

[PhilKing]

 MrAce, on 2012-October-20, 02:50, said:

I am not ashamed to confess that i never played 6 ace keycard. Sounds interesting. Can you guys write it for me please ? (If you think it will hijack the topic pm ing me will be appreciated as well)

Thanks

I play a simpler version than Kantar where we just aggregate the queens, so the responses are exactly the same as RKCB. If we have the queens of both suits, we count it as 1 ace. If we show 1 key card, the step asks for either trump Q.It can be as simple as that. It's not the technically correct method, but it works fine.

After 3♠, I would certainly play 4m as 6 ace, but it's obviously not mandatory.

[Fluffy]

I know 2 versions, one is the half a keycard for each queen that phil described above where the number of keycards answered are :

5♣= 4/4.5 or 1/1.5
5♦ = 3/3.5 or 0/0.5
5♥ = 2
5♠ = 2.5

as usually next step asks for half a keycad extra (a queen)

The other is this one:

5♣ = 4 or 1
5♦ = 3 or 0
5♥ = 2 + no queens
5♠ = 2 + minor queen
5NT = 2 + major queen
6♣ = 2 + both queens

[MrAce]

 PhilKing, on 2012-October-20, 03:33, said:

I play a simpler version than Kantar where we just aggregate the queens, so the responses are exactly the same as RKCB. If we have the queens of both suits, we count it as 1 ace. If we show 1 key card, the step asks for either trump Q.It can be as simple as that. It's not the technically correct method, but it works fine.

After 3♠, I would certainly play 4m as 6 ace, but it's obviously not mandatory.

Sorry my bad, i should have been more clear

I meant to ask "When do you guys know it is a 6 ace rkcb situation and when normal rkcb ?" Is it always when have shown double fit or is there any exceptions ?

[aguahombre]

One of us has shown two suits, and the other has shown at least two cards in the suit which isn't established as trump. There are six prime keys. We let the off-suit queen take care of itself if showing two (five?) keys. This works for us because we don't lie about shape bids. If it is unknown whether two cards are held in the other suit, there are only 5 keys.

[bluecalm]

Most common situation is bal hand opposite 2suiter which often happens after 1N/2N/2C openings or in sequences like:
1C - 1S
1N - 3H

You need to make agreements if it always applies in such situation or if you need 5-5 in general and 5-4 in specific cases (say only after 2NT opening).

[PhilKing]

I would start by playing it only when you have shown two guaranteed eight-card+ fits (no exceptions).

You could add in the hands where the second suit is known not to be facing shortage at a later date.