[y66]

Pard and I are working on suit-preference signals. We have a bet to see who can come up with the most types of situations in which they can be profitably employed.

Have found excellent discussions of suit-preference signals in Partnership Defense (book/CD) by Kit Woolsey (thanks for the tip Arc), Judgment by Mike Lawrence and Better Signalling Now by Mark Horton.

Poor pard, I think she's losing this one. And no, she doesn't visit this forum (yet)!

Most serious intermediates are prolly familiar with these books. But did you know that there are 16 "deals of the week" that discuss this topic? What a great resource.

Here's one, for example, http://www.bridgebas...otw/dotw168.lin

Will post others on this thread, and possibly an index of sorts, if there is interest.

[kfay]

I don't know if this thread is geared towards getting responses for where people employ SP methods or not but here's the main instance in which I use them.

When opps are leading their suit (either trumps or a runnable suit in NT) I like to use suit preference. I know this treatment is quite common.

This hits a bit of a snag against NT contracts because often declarer will run their suit immediately following the opening lead to induce some discards and in my regular partnership we use a smith echo. But I guess you could call that suit preference anyways. Really this hasn't caused much trouble with getting the right info for me, though.

[lexlogan]

I'm curious how the various authorities treat the case where the opening lead hits a singleton in dummy (against a trump contract.) Most players familiar with suit preference consider it mandatory for thrid hand to give suit preference; Kantar firmly rejects this as do I. If third hand has a touching honor, it will far more often be correct to continue the suit and force dummy to ruff than to switch; if a switch is called for, there will more often than not be an obvious suit to switch to. The Bridge Encyclopedia, in its discussion, makes it clear that suit preference applies only when attitude would be umistakably pointless, e.g., dummy has a powerful source of tricks and sufficient entries so that continuing the suit cannot possibly be correct -- and in such a case, how likely is it that switching to dummy's long suit will help? But I'm curious what Woolsey, Lawrence and Horton have to say.

Generally, I avoid methods such as Lavinthal or excessive suit preference because they seem to begin with the assumption that I have a clear preference as to what partner should lead next. In fact, what I have an overwhelming preference is for partner to use what he knows about the auction, dummy, and defense in general to find the right approach. And when I spend time trying to decide what to signal, I fail to concentrate on playing good defense. Of course expert players can concentrate on both overall defense and signalling, but I suspect the average player would do far better playing limited, simple, consistent signals and spending more time learning how to defend against various dummy types and auctions.

[kenrexford]

Signaling agreements can be quite complicated and quite diverse, especially in the area of suit-preference signals. As an example of a more obscure suit-preference signal, I have had a basic understanding with partners that in some situations a pip discard from a long suit tells partner where the saving will occur in a squeeze scenario. More common situations exist, of course. The key is partnership agreement, which can only competently result from discussion and practice.

[y66]

In this deal of the week, http://www.bridgebas...otw/dotw185.lin, which really is a defensive gem by the way, the author says

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Fred Gitelman and Brad Moss are not one of those pairs that almost always signal suit preference. Their defensive carding philosophy is more along the lines of "tell partner what you think he needs to know". Fred knew that Brad needed to know which suit to switch to. He said "Clubs!" with his D4. Brad trusted Fred to be giving him the information that he needed and defended accordingly. Partnership trust is a wonderful thing!

When dummy is short, does 3rd hand signal attitude or suit preference at trick one?

According to Matthew and Pamela Granovetter

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Many people play that when dummy has a singleton in the suit lead, third hand's card is suit-preference. But what do you do if you simply want the suit led to be continued, even though dummy will ruff? We play that a high card means, "please continue, partner."

In Washington Standard, Steve Robinson suggests:

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If pard leads an ace or king and there’s a singleton in dummy, then, assuming we have a choice of cards to play and pard knows we have a choice: 

* A high card says lead the highest off-suit.
* A low card says lead the lowest off-suit.
* Middle, if pard can read it, says continue.

However, in all other situations, the highest card you can afford says continue and all other cards are suit-preference signals.

[barmar]

I'm not a big fan of any signaling agreement that depends on recognizing middle cards.
"If pard can read it" is the crux of the problem. I find many times when partner can't even read whether a card is high or low (my lowest card in the suit may be a 7 or 8).

About the only time when I think partner may be able to tell that a card is in the middle is when it has become obvious (either from the bidding or play so far) that you have a really long suit. And even then, it can be hard to tell the difference between a middle card and the highest affordable card.

[y66]

Sorry Lex. Missed the part of your message asking what Woolsey, Lawrence and Horton have to say.

Kit Woolsey in Partnership Defense

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The suit-preference signal is an extremely important tool in the hands of competent defenders. There are a surprising number of situations which give a defender the opportunity to convey information to his partner by the play of a seemingly innocuous spot card. A good defensive pair will carefully select every card they play, and they will observe each other’s carding very closely, looking for some additional clue about the hand that may be revealed via a suit-preference signal.

One danger of the suit-preference signal is the ease with which it can be overused. The beginning player, after learning about suit-preference, uses it in many situations where its meaning will be misinterpreted. Keep in mind that if a signal can logically be interpreted as either attitude or count, that meaning takes priority. Suit preference applies only when the attitude and count are already known or are clearly of no importance.

Mike Lawrence in Topics on Bridge -- Suit Preferences

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Suit preference signals are very effective when used correctly. Unfortunately, they are so badly misused that some partnerships would be better off if they didn’t exist.

… If you are defending and your partner plays a card that looks like it might be a signal, ask yourself these questions [in order given!]:

1. Is it sensible to think that partner’s card is encouraging you in the suit? If so, then that is what partner’s signal should mean.

2. Is it sensible to think that partner’s card is giving you count in this suit? If so, then that is what partner’s signal should be.

3. If partner’s card can not possibly be interpreted as attitude or count, then and only then do you think about suit preference.

Commit these guidelines to memory and you will get the good results you are entitled to.

... I suggest that you play bridge until you are comfortable with attitude and count signals. When you are ready to add suit preference signals, you will know it.

Mark Horton in Better Signalling Now

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Of all the standard types of signal, the ones that show suit preference are perhaps the most exciting. The basic idea is that by choosing to play either a high card or a low card you can indicate which specific suit you would like your partner to play.

However, before getting too involved in the mechanics of suit-preference signals, it is important to remember that if a signal you either give or receive can be interpreted as count or attitude then that interpretation should normally take precedence. A suit-preference signal can only be made when the count or attitude position is known, or when the partnership have a special agreement, for instance, when there is a singleton in dummy.

BTW, the Official Encyclopedia of Bridge discussion of suit-preference signals is as clear and thorough as anything in these other books, imo. Did not think to look there before reading your post. Noticed the excellent, adjacent discussion on suit combinations. Maybe I can get another bet with pard.

Think you may be right about prioritizing the time budget. Suit preference situations do come up a lot though. And trying to sort them out is really helping the light come on on defense for me, if only dimly.

[barmar]

The case where suit preference comes up most, and is almost universally agreed to be in force, is when you're giving partner a ruff. If you have a choice of cards to lead for the ruff, your choice should be interpreted as suit preference for the way to get back to your hand to repeat the ruff.

But that if is important. Sometimes you can only afford one card, or sometimes you have to lead a specific card to ensure that partner will do the right thing. For instance, if dummy has the A, and you have KQxx, you usually have to lead the K so that partner will know not to ruff unless it's covered; if you lead Q, partner doesn't know where the K is, so he has to ruff in case declarer has it. (There are occasionally times when you want partner to ruff your winner, and then you intentionally lead something other than the K -- now it's suit preference again.)