[Stephen Tu]

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I think it's pretty standard for 3♥ to be played as forcing in this kind of situation. It's more important to be able to explore for best game then stop in a dime with 3♥ the last making contract.

Both E/W are rather light for their initial actions, I would have passed, but it's hard to argue with success. If East had just bid 3nt and respected what should have been forcing (West can be much stronger), he would have found a lucky making game instead of going down.

[1eyedjack]

I would expect West to have more than 4 card hearts for the bid, regardless of whether forcing

[lycier]

Jodnn had ever made several free lessons about preempt topic at BBO, of course, his teaching lessons were very good, so here I would expect Jodnn to make some expert comments on it.

[mcphee]

The new suit in that position is F. I would also pass 2S even though the decent 6 bagger tempts me. The problem with bidding H here is when partner raises with 3. I think the best you can do here is bid 3S and hope you supply enough to make 3N if partner can bid it.

[lycier]

Thank Mcphee for your excellent reply.

[Stephen Tu]

Note that 3♥ already properly described as 5+♥. West apparently thought had enough to deviate. Don't know why it chose 3♥ vs. 3♠, perhaps 3♠ promises diamond support even though it shouldn't in this position. I think I would have passed 3♦ but maybe simulation indicates bidding is better.

[jdonn]

The pass of the forcing bid is another deviation. In other words, GIB knows it is forcing but thinks pass rates to work best. I can't really blame him.

[Stephen Tu]

jdonn, on 2016-November-18, 20:51, said:

The pass of the forcing bid is another deviation. In other words, GIB knows it is forcing but thinks pass rates to work best. I can't really blame him.

Is this really a situation where we want to allow sim to kick in and pass forcing bid? I'd be pretty upset as West if I held something like same hand + HA, +DQ and partner didn't respect my force.

Is the sim maybe improperly excluding a lot of the much stronger hands thinking they bid something else so dealing more weaker hands to West than normal?

[jdonn]

The sim doesn't exclude any part of the range, although it is on the very small side compared to what a statistician would want. I wouldn't pass and in real life I would think it's weird. I'm just saying GIB is allowed to deviate, passing a forcing bid isn't inherently different than any other deviation, and given that I am not at all surprised GIB passed here with such a minimum hand. I mean if I was going to work on anything here it would be that east really isn't good enough for 3D. I like to start as early in the auction as possible because often that solves later problems, like if East won't overcall with a sub-minimum hand then he won't be tempted to pass a forcing bid later anyway.