quiddity, on Jul 15 2009, 01:20 AM, said:
NickRW, on Jul 14 2009, 07:44 PM, said:
An excess of high cards, especially at MP, tends to suggest passing.
I think this should be "especially at IMPS". For 4S to be a winner at imps it has to be 2 tricks better than NT. At MP it only has to be 1 trick better.
No - I disagree. With an excess of high cards, both contracts are likely to make - and since at IMPs safely scoring your game bonus is far more important than worrying about an odd IMP here or there, so the amount of high cards is (relatively) unimportant to the matter of deciding which contract is better. Instead, the short trump hand would be looking to see if there is possible ruffing value - which would favour the suit game and be a possible source of weakness in NT. Also what is the nature of the honours - a very quacky hand with intermediates tends to suggest NT - and so on.
At MP, with high cards significantly in excess of the minimum (upper 20s in total), the NT contract often scores the same number of tricks as the suit one does - which is 10 points more and worth grabbing if you can get it.
At both forms of scoring, when the contract is more marginal, safety becomes more important - you want to be in the one that makes the most often (no point in going down and getting a worse score than those who've stayed out of game for whatever reason). The safer game is generally the suit contract (other factors as above notwithstanding).
Nick
"Pass is your friend" - my brother in law - who likes to bid a lot.