[skjaeran]

ralph23, on Oct 22 2007, 07:23 PM, said:

jdonn, on Oct 22 2007, 12:59 PM, said:

Wow, that will teach me to claim there is no chance of a misunderstanding if I let rho go back and bid 5♥ on my right. And to think we were told we have an agreement for that very situation.

You do have an agreement, but its terms aren't clear. Do you think they are clear?

What would you bid over 5♥ if you held 3 keycards for instance??

I'd double, showing 0 or 3 KC of course.
Btw, I play 1430, but not here.

[Halo]

I'd make them correct the bid. Otherwise, I'm going to have an agreement about this, no thanks.

[brianshark]

Since partner really wants to know about your keycards, in my opinion your bids should definitely show your keycards in some shape or other. I think intending 4♠ as to play or reject and double 5♥ as penalty is anti-partnership. Partner asked you a question, so answer.

The confusion is whether, for example, 5♣ is the 5th step in D0P1 or whether it's 1 or 4 keycards as without interference.

But pass must surely show 1 keycard.

And if you force a correction and say you hear 5♥, I also expect pass (and other bids) there to be D0P1. (Sans other agreements obviously.)

[barmar]

ralph23, on Oct 22 2007, 01:40 PM, said:

I guess you think it's so clear that even a question as to what the calls mean is an insult. So be it. It's not so clear.

The way the original question was posed, and the subject of the thread, imply that there wouldn't have been a problem over a 5-level overcall. The question was clearly "does the insufficient bid make any difference?" Confusion over how to use DOPI when you play RKC is certainly a common problem, but it's not the issue that Richard was looking for help with.

[Tomi2]

There are many problems in many responses:

some say "accept 4♥ and double is for penalty" - this can not be logical since you have the chance to let them bid 5♥ and double for 300 points more, so if I would be you partner, I would never believe 4HX should be to play

some say "just bid 5♣ or 5♦, whatever your normal answer to 4NT had been" they forget, that partner may take this NOT for the normal answer, they add two steps for pass and double and to for 4♠ and 4NT. So if you have special agreement, what your 5th and 6th step after 4NT would mean, and it is still possible you hold a hand like this in the given context, partner maybe will understand your answer like the 5/6th step and not like the 1st or 2nd like intented.

so I would understand my partners bids, given the agreements, like this:
accept 4♥ and double = 0 or 3 Keycards (for me the word dopi means double = 0)
accept 4♥ and pass = 1 / 4 Keycards
accept and bid 4♠ = 2KC (or 5) without ♠Q
accept and bid 4NT = 2 with ♠q
accept and bid 5m or 5♥ = the number oe keycards agreed and void in this suit

let them correct to 5♥ and double = my hand does not look like we have a slam on but I can defend 5♥ very well (some boring 4333 with few controls)
correct to 5♥ and pass = my hand is good for defending and playing a slam aswell, maybe good troumps, outside shortage but QJTx in ♥ or something like this

[hrothgar]

Steve Willner pointed me to the following thread on rec.games.bridge

http://groups.google.com/group/rec.games.b...deaa1bfc7c73e42

which has a practical example of some of the issues involved

[Echognome]

Who says that they have to correct to 5♥?

Doesn't seem that anyone has considered the other possibilities... one being a correction to pass.

[jdonn]

For the life of me I still wonder why anyone would accept the 5♥ bid. How could anything go wrong if we just have him take it back, and he will either pass or 5♥ in which case we know our agreements easily? Is someone really worried 5 will be too high when partner bids blackwood and we have such a nice hand for slam and nothing wasted in hearts?

[cherdano]

jdonn, on Oct 24 2007, 09:52 AM, said:

For the life of me I still wonder why anyone would accept the 5♥ bid. How could anything go wrong if we just have him take it back, and he will either pass or 5♥ in which case we know our agreements easily? Is someone really worried 5 will be too high when partner bids blackwood and we have such a nice hand for slam and nothing wasted in hearts?

My only worry is that we are missing one keycard and partner is not willing to risk slam when he can't find out about our ♥Q.

[jdonn]

That seems like a fair point, but it won't really matter. Partner will assume the queen if there is no room to ask because
- we might have it
- we might have 5 spades
- they might break 2-2 or he has the jack or we have it etc etc
- partner very likely has 6 spades anyway in which case it won't matter

[skjaeran]

I'd only accept 4♥ if I had a hand where I'd expect to beat 4♥ enough to score better than our game and not make slam. Then I'd accept 4♥ and double. That's to me the logical reason to accept an unsufficient bid here - I don't think the extra space will be important. Thus accept followed by double is business. In practice I can't see that happen..... Btw, you can't be sure to be able to double 5♥ for penalty, since 4♥ can be replaced with a pass.

[Impact]

I cannot imagine accepting 4H and doubling for penalties when I could either force them to bid 5H (sufficient bid) or something else with the resulting penalty (both bidding and lead potentially) given partner has indicated a slam suitable hand for S (in fact by his action virtually said Slam is on if we have enough KC). This is NOT a co-operative dialogue but rather having shown the limit (slightly understated IMHO for S) of the hand partner has asked a single slam-determinative question : to which we should supply a straight answer.

The HUGE disadvantage of 1430 with the particular method is that holding one KC it gives partner room to go wrong if you double (he shouldn't but it does whereas if you passed over 4H it must be encouraging - but that is second step!! on your agreement - so for safety I bet you wish you were playing the inferior 0314 on this particular hand).

THe other important point is that by accepting you save room in a slam -suitable situation where the SQ may be important to show.
Hence I bid double (first step of the insufficient bid) and hope to survive.

Note unfortunately the logic in the particular auction where Keycards are being requested does not directly apply to other auctions where cue-bidding or non-suit agreement is pertinent.

regards,