[uva72uva72]

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IMPs, ACBL robot individual

Does it bother anyone beside me that the 4 most-successful participants on this hand were those who completely shut North out by leaping to 3NT in response to 1♦ - at IMPs, holding a solid 7-card suit and a singleton and a doubleton in the other two suits? This despite the fact that if North holds ♠Axx ♥Ax ♦KQxxx ♣xxx 7♣ would be a better than 96% contract; and there are any number of hands where 6♣ will make while 3NT fails by multiple tricks. They succeeded not because they deceived their opponents but because they deceived their partners.

It's not that I lost anything by their bids - I bid 3♣ immediately and never had a chance of avoiding the nullo slam. But 9 Souths who tried to bid the hand in a sensible fashion by starting with 2♣ also ended up in slam when they chose to jump rebid in their solid 7-card suit instead of bidding an ambiguous (forcing or no?) 4♣. Unluckily for them, North looked at its 12 count (with which it had already opened the bidding and made a free rebid) and presumably decided that ♣J10x merited a raise to 6.

I think that if 4♣ is forcing and South can count on North to bid again, the system notes should say so. And if it is not forcing, the requirements for a 5♣ bid (having failed to jump shift at the first opportunity) should be more forgiving so as to discourage North from raising to slam with a (very) minimal hand. Being in thin games (but only high-percentage slams) is what it's all about at IMPs, after all.

[Bbradley62]

There have been many posted hands very much like this one where GIB will raise partner from 4m to 5m or from 5m to 6m. Most of us who have been around a while just know not to jump to 5m. This will never find its way into the documentation. Bidding 4♣ over 3♥, while not specifically coded as forcing, does show more strength than 2♣ did.

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I am, however, curious as to how (if at all) GIB sees the second-round jump to 5♣ as being different from an original Soloway JS. I would want both of the sequences to be limited to hands that could not make an initial 3♣ bid, which is explained as rebiddable ♣; 17+ total points.

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[cloa513]

uva72uva72, on 2014-September-12, 20:09, said:

My link

IMPs, ACBL robot individual

Does it bother anyone beside me that the 4 most-successful participants on this hand were those who completely shut North out by leaping to 3NT in response to 1♦ - at IMPs, holding a solid 7-card suit and a singleton and a doubleton in the other two suits? This despite the fact that if North holds ♠Axx ♥Ax ♦KQxxx ♣xxx 7♣ would be a better than 96% contract; and there are any number of hands where 6♣ will make while 3NT fails by multiple tricks. They succeeded not because they deceived their opponents but because they deceived their partners.

It's not that I lost anything by their bids - I bid 3♣ immediately and never had a chance of avoiding the nullo slam. But 9 Souths who tried to bid the hand in a sensible fashion by starting with 2♣ also ended up in slam when they chose to jump rebid in their solid 7-card suit instead of bidding an ambiguous (forcing or no?) 4♣. Unluckily for them, North looked at its 12 count (with which it had already opened the bidding and made a free rebid) and presumably decided that ♣J10x merited a raise to 6.

I think that if 4♣ is forcing and South can count on North to bid again, the system notes should say so. And if it is not forcing, the requirements for a 5♣ bid (having failed to jump shift at the first opportunity) should be more forgiving so as to discourage North from raising to slam with a (very) minimal hand. Being in thin games (but only high-percentage slams) is what it's all about at IMPs, after all.

Though 6♣ only goes down if GIB gives you a ruff/sluff so there is the near inevitable diamond loser and it only takes a J♦ in South for 6C to be good proposition. Why they can't define 2S better say to at least exclude flat 12-14HCP hands.

[uva72uva72]

I'm curious as to why the word "forcing" will never find its way into the documentation for a bid of 4♣ by South in this sequence. Having been passed out in bids for which my hand matched the documentation exactly and which intuitively could not be passed, I am myself leery of making high-level bids not called out as forcing. The fact that some people just know not to make certain bids seems a bit like a private understanding and something we should try to avoid whenever possible.

The point about only a ruff-sluff beating 6♣ is an astute one, since declarer should always make the correct play to bring home 6♣ whoever wins the ♥ lead after elimination and leads a ♦. Playing 6♣ myself, I went through the motions of the elimination and throw-in, but without much hope because it's been my experience that the robots always find the ruff-sluff to defeat a contract. I've even received a devastating ruff-sluff at trick 3 after a not-particularly-revealing auction that I think only a world-class human defender would have found. It's that kind of high-level play that makes it so hard to accept when, conversely, a robot locks itself in its hand as declarer or deliberately throws away winners on defense.

[steve2005]

on rather obvious K♥ lead you don't have the entries to make the elimination play. (I think?!)

[uva72uva72]

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Actually, there are enough entries if you start immediately upon winning the ♥A.