[1eyedjack]

Scoring: IMP

Uncontested auction.
You open 1S in first seat with this hand.
Partner responds 4D (splinter).

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[whereagles]

Tell me what exactly the splinter shows and I'll give you the bid

[Stephen Tu]

You need partner to have AQ of spade, A of hearts, KQ of clubs for a virtually cold slam. In my view, one should play a tiered splinter system, a hand that strong should go through a different sequence, so that it doesn't have to guess what to do after an opening hand like this signs off. Since the splinter could easily be something like Axxx AQx x Qxxxx, where 5 is in serious jeopardy, and even 4 goes down on a bad day, it's a very clear signoff in my view.

If your K of diamonds was the K of clubs, then bidding 4H would be fine IMO. Without extra values, one should only cooperate with no high cards in the splinter suit, (with a bare min, even Axx is dubious, the A would be more useful elsewhere.)

[P_Marlowe]

Hi,

yes. Take away the king of diamond and
you have less than a opening bid.

With kind regards
Marlowe

[joker_gib]

Stephen Tu, on Apr 4 2006, 09:17 PM, said:

You need partner to have AQ of spade, A of hearts, KQ of clubs for a virtually cold slam. In my view, one should play a tiered splinter system, a hand that strong should go through a different sequence, so that it doesn't have to guess what to do after an opening hand like this signs off. Since the splinter could easily be something like Axxx AQx x Qxxxx, where 5 is in serious jeopardy, and even 4 goes down on a bad day, it's a very clear signoff in my view.

I agree and 4♠ is enough

Alain

[Gerben42]

A splinter is a slam try. Since my hand just went to subminimum I will decline the slam try and bid 4♠.

[1eyedjack]

Thanks for the replies. I was the plonker who bid 4H at the table, and accept the majority verdict. I should like to add a few specific replies to the comments made.

First, I was under no illusions about the value of the Diamond King. I could however construct worse opening hands in light of the splinter, such as

Scoring: IMP

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Incidentally I did not say so at the outset for which I apologise but 1S opener only promised a 4 card suit, so the 5th trump perhaps adds a little extra to the total evaluation, but perhaps not because it would contain a strong-notrump if only 4.

I agree with Stephen, that a tiered splinter system is preferable and normally I like to play "mini-splinter" single-jump shifts by a non-passed-hand as a mixture of game tries and slam tries. Unfortunately this was a pickup partnership with minimal discussion and certainly only one splinter available.

I disagree with Stephen that his example hand argues against 4H on the grounds that 5S is at risk. Over opener's 4H, responder, having splintered, has said enough and would bid a non-forcing 4S bid which opener would gratefully pass.

And this is I think the point that no-one else has picked up on. A 4H cue bid by opener is always going to be a welcome noise, from responder's perspective, whatever he has for his Diamond splinter, so he should not feel compelled to re-state his slam try by committing beyond 4S every time he hears 4H - such a strategy effectively wastes the 4S bid. So effectively we were playing a 2-tiered system, if you allow for responder to bid 4S over 4H with one tier.

I bid 4H expecting to hear 4S with a minimum splinter and expecting 5S to be safe if responder has extras over and above the minimum requirements for a game raise with Diamond shortage.

In fact partner had

Scoring: IMP

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and effectively slam-forced after my 4H cue, by bidding RKCB then slam.

5S has a small risk. A specific 4-0 trump break beats it as would a 4-1 Club break combined with D:Ace being offside (so I guess the King had some value, even if it would have been more valuable elsewhere). In practice 5S is virtually risk-free (and would in the event have made), despite that responder has (in my expectation) perhaps a little in reserve for the splinter but not what I would regard as a rock-crusher.

Had responder bid (say) 5C over 4H (or 5H over 4H if you don't like to cue Kings at the 5 level) and then respected opener's 5S sign-off there would have been no story to tell.

[Fluffy]

Sorry, but I don't see how would you end playing in 5♠.

[cherdano]

There is no point in discussing the bidding after 4H if you haven't agreed what 4D shows. For me, responder is absolute max for a splinter (single, 4-card support, 10-12(13) hcp), so I would always drive to slam if you cooperate with a 4H cue.

Unless you are playing unusually strong or wide-ranging splinters, your 4H bid is (in my opinion) a clear overbid.

Arend

[mikestar]

In most systems ♠KTxxx ♥Kx ♦xx ♣Axxx (the equivalent of what your hand is worth opposite the splinter) is subminimum, so 4♠ would seem to be in order. Also, you have some distributional waste opposite a stiff diamond: ♠KTxxx ♥Kx ♦xxx ♣Axx is actually more promising.

I think that a cue below game after a splinter is in order if you have a minimum with no waste or significant extras. A cue above game should show no waste and significant extras.

So in this sequence, 4♠ is minimum with diamond waste or no heart control. In either case, partner will pass even with his tip top max splinter (in most methods).

[Stephen Tu]

Quote

A 4H cue bid by opener is always going to be a welcome noise, from responder's perspective, whatever he has for his Diamond splinter, so he should not feel compelled to re-state his slam try by committing beyond 4S every time he hears 4H - such a strategy effectively wastes the 4S bid. So effectively we were playing a 2-tiered system, if you allow for responder to bid 4S over 4H with one tier

I disagree with this. In my view there are essentially 3 ranges for responder. One is the minimum worth a game force. The highest is worth going on even after opener's 4M signoff. Then there is the tricky range in the middle. If you don't have tiered splinters available, one should do something else, e.g. 2nt forcing raise, with hands in the middle range, and try to get the information one needs that way.

Once opener cooperates, I think responder should only have to sign off with a minimum within his minimum range, e.g. 10-11 hcp, rather than all of his minimum range. I don't think it's feasible to play the splinter as 10-17 hcp, with responder signing off after cooperation with all 10-13hcp.

[luke warm]

something i've found that works fairly well on splinters is the 'rule of 26'... add your hcp outside the splinter suit to that shown by responder... if the total is 26, slam is a good bet... for this reason i prefer the over and under jumpshifts, which show different ranges... one further 'rule' is that i try not to splinter with a stiff king (to help partner know where my values are)

[civill]

♦K is wasted,and splinter doesn't show a very strong hand,4♠ is a good contract.