[kenrexford]

gnasher, on Feb 27 2008, 06:44 PM, said:

If responder shows a second suit, opener will think that what matters is how well his high cards fit responder's side suit, whereas the important question is how well responder's high cards fit opener's side suits. This sort of hand is a lot easier if responder can say early on that he's 5332, so that opener knows to treat his side-suit cards equally, and knows that it's OK to cuebid kings freely.

I sometimes play 1NT-2D-2H-2S as a relay, asking how may hearts opener has. A 3D reply would show three; after that any new suit is a cue bid in a 5332 or 6322 hand. That's rather better than having to bid 1NT-2D-2H-5NT.

After this start, the grand slam is fairly straightforward:
1NT 2D
2H 2S
3D 3S (cue bids from here onwards)
4C 4D
4S 5C
5D

At this stage, responder can count 12 tricks as long as there's no trump loser. A 13th trick might come from a club ruff, CQ, a long diamond, or SQ, so responder might just bid 7H (via GSF).

If that doesn't seem like good enough odds, he can instead cuebid his queen of diamonds with 6D. Opener can now count 13 tricks and will bid 7NT.

[inquiry]

I like some of glen ashton's stuff over NT (his ETM bidding systems, see www.bridgematters.com), and this hand is one example of why.

Scoring: IMP

1N - 2D
2H - 3H
4C - 4D
4H - 4N
5H - 5S
6C - 7NT/7H
Pass

---

2D = jacoby transfer, lots of different hands, including some without hearts
2N = less than 4 hearts
3H = GF, 5+ hearts, offering choice of 3NT/4H but can include slam tries
4C = cue-bid, gonna play in hearts, choose hearts. 3S would NOT BE cue bid, but offer choice back to responder for NT or hearts
4D = cue-bid or last train to clarksville, up to partnership agreement
4H = the conservative bid, if he cue-bids 4S instead grand is easy.
4N = rkcb
5H = 2 no queen
5S = specific suit ask
6D = Kx of spades

Opener knows about Club king (cue-bid), DA HK (response to blackwood), three hearts (2H bid), Kx of spades (response to 5S). This counts to 13 hcp. Playing 15-17 he has at least two more, and will probably not have 4 more (since only bid 4H over 4D will not be max). Opener will also likely be 2-3-4-4, 2-3-5-3, or 2-3-3-5 (a six card minor is still possible). At worse grand is likley on a club hook (assuming hearts behave if partner doesn't have the jack), and if partner has jack of diamonds or club queen, it will be easy. Even if partner is missing the jack of diamonds, you can try for 3-3 split before falling back on club hook if necessary.

I sort of like 7Nt, because you might be able to get 13 tricks even if hearts don't behave (we don't know about heart jack), via 4C, 4D, 3H, and 2S.. if partner has, for instance, Kx Kxx Axxx KQxx, or a heart-diamond squeeze if both hearts and diamonds are foul...

[kenrexford]

inquiry, on Feb 27 2008, 07:42 PM, said:

I like some of glen ashton's stuff over NT (his ETM bidding systems, see www.bridgematters.com), and this hand is one example of why.

Scoring: IMP

1N - 2D
2H - 3H
4C - 4D
4H - 4N
5H - 5S
6C - 7NT/7H
Pass

---

2D = jacoby transfer, lots of different hands, including some without hearts
2N = less than 4 hearts
3H = GF, 5+ hearts, offering choice of 3NT/4H but can include slam tries
4C = cue-bid, gonna play in hearts, choose hearts. 3S would NOT BE cue bid, but offer choice back to responder for NT or hearts
4D = cue-bid or last train to clarksville, up to partnership agreement
4H = the conservative bid, if he cue-bids 4S instead grand is easy.
4N = rkcb
5H = 2 no queen
5S = specific suit ask
6D = Kx of spades

Opener knows about Club king (cue-bid), DA HK (response to blackwood), three hearts (2H bid), Kx of spades (response to 5S). This counts to 13 hcp. Playing 15-17 he has at least two more, and will probably not have 4 more (since only bid 4H over 4D will not be max). Opener will also likely be 2-3-4-4, 2-3-5-3, or 2-3-3-5 (a six card minor is still possible). At worse grand is likley on a club hook (assuming hearts behave if partner doesn't have the jack), and if partner has jack of diamonds or club queen, it will be easy. Even if partner is missing the jack of diamonds, you can try for 3-3 split before falling back on club hook if necessary.

I sort of like 7Nt, because you might be able to get 13 tricks even if hearts don't behave (we don't know about heart jack), via 4C, 4D, 3H, and 2S.. if partner has, for instance, Kx Kxx Axxx KQxx, or a heart-diamond squeeze if both hearts and diamonds are foul...

I don't get it at all.

We dedicate a number of bids to asking questions about strain. 3♥ asks about strain, 3♠ asks back. Someone needs to make a decision.

We do all of this with the cost of anything resembling preparatory cuebidding of substance, cuebidding that on this hand helps. However ideal that pick-the-strain technique may be, it is not favorable for this auction, and yet you cite this as a good argument. The negatives are touted as the positives. Strange.

Then, we have one cue below game of any substance (I have a club control), followed by another pass-the-buck call of 4♦. This is starting to sound a bit weird so far.

So, we end up simply using RKCB, having gained nothing so far over any other auction possible, and again this is great stuff.

So, partner answers, and we for some reason ask about the spade situation, finding out about the Kx, and thereby decide that we will bid a grand with no knowledge of any source for trick 13 other than a finesse guess?

I just don't get how this deal is an example of anything powerful about ETM. This is a grand slam decision hand, and you end up making the ultimate decision with everything except that which matters.

[matmat]

sathyab, on Feb 27 2008, 04:21 PM, said:

matmat, on Feb 27 2008, 04:16 PM, said:

what was 5H on the original auction?

Good ol' RKC with only hearts as trumps; two keys w/o the Q.

i need to learn to read right side up.

[sathyab]

gnasher, on Feb 27 2008, 06:12 PM, said:

sathyab, on Feb 27 2008, 10:10 PM, said:

For instance if you had caught partner with Kxxx Kx Axx KQxx, all 7c needs is a 4-2 break in clubs.

You'd have to bid it quite well.

Yes, it does indeed need some good bidding to get there. But most of the methods are well-understood and extremely well-illustrated by Kantar in his book "Roman Keycard Blackwood", Slam Bidding for the 21st century, 4th Edition. You don't need any of the esoteric stuff either, simple stuff like two-suit RKC, Specific King Ask (SKA) which most people play anyway and SSA (Specific Suit Asking). There's one additional treatment that helps on this hand, it's similar to the auction 1m-1M-2nt-3d (checkback). Now opener can bid 4m or 4om to tell his pd that he has 3M, 4OM and a good hand. When it goes 1n-xfer-to-M-2M-3x, pd now bids 3M whenever he has 3-card support for Major, 3nt with no interest in partner's suits, 3y to experss interest in pd's second suit alone and 4x on a hand where he has both 3-card Major and 4+ minor.

With Kxxx Kx Axx KQxx it'd go

1nt-2d
2h-3c
3d-3s
4c-4d(RKC)
4s(1430, 3 keys), 4nt(Q-ask)
5d(low Q, 5c would show 0, 5d low Q, 5h high Q and 5s 2 Q; since Q-ask has so many steps now it can not be extended to show Kings when holding a Q)

Now responder bids 5s (Specific Suit Ask in spades)

Cheapest return to one of the two-suits denies third round control and isn't counted as a step. That apart the steps are:

1st step: xx or Q
2nd step: Kxx(x)
3rd step: Kx
Raising SSA shows KQx. With a singleton and "lots of trumps" (this needs a lot more discussion), jump to 6 of cheapest suit.

On this hand pd bids 6d. 5nt is 1st step, 6c doesn't count, so 6d is 2nd step showing Kxx(x).

So there you have it: pd has Kxx or Kxxx of spades, Kx of hearts, AofD and at least 4 clubs to KQ. 7c is clear.

In the auction I posted first, 3c was a temporizing bid to find out if pd had 3 hearts. But I think recognizing clubs as a possible key suit, in that you can extract key card info about both K and Q leads to a really good slam. If you had chosen Diamonds instead, things don't work out as easily.

[kenrexford]

sathyab, on Feb 27 2008, 10:26 PM, said:

In the auction I posted first, 3c was a temporizing bid to find out if pd had 3 hearts. But I think recognizing clubs as a possible key suit, in that you can extract key card info about both K and Q leads to a really good slam. If you had chosen Diamonds instead, things don't work out as easily.

Picking diamonds helps partner a lot more, especially if he has diamonds (as he does) with only two hearts.

The question is not logically which minor to bid in case partner wants to bid seven of this minor. If that was the case, I like diamonds better. But, that's a silly reason to make up a bid. You make up a bid to facilitate the likely auction. Either minor might possibly be right if that will be the end contract.

[gnasher]

kenrexford, on Feb 27 2008, 06:59 PM, said:

I like the idea of manufacturing a minor suit for practical reasons, but I think it works better if Responder sets the auction up to tell rather than to ask.

1NT-P-2♦(transfer)-P-
2♥-P-3♦(manufactured)-P-
3♥(heart fit)-P-3♠(spade control)-P-
4♣(club control)-P-4♦(two top diamonds)-P-
4NT?-P-(three)-P-
Qask-P-yes

At this point, Opener knows that Responder has the spade Ace, AQxxx in hearts, the diamond King and Queen, and the club Ace. He can count, therefore, five hearts, four diamonds, two spades, and two clubs, for 13 rippers. He bids 7NT.

Unless I've misunderstood, opener thinks he is facing something like Ax AQxxx KQxx Ax. So wouldn't he also bid 7NT with Kxxx KJx AJx Kxx ?

[gnasher]

Impact, on Feb 28 2008, 12:44 AM, said:

1NT  12-15    2C  Stayman
2D                2S  Relay
3H 2-3-4-4

I like this start.

Quote

    3S  R
4D  5 cont      now you know  Kx  Kxx  Axxx Kxxx  but need DJ & HJ max for a really good grand but you can find out  about CQ albeit you know that if he has the CQ he cannot have the HJ....
regards

What if he'd shown only four controls? Would you be able to distinguish between these hands:
Jx KJx AJxx KQxx (cold grand slam)
KQ KJx AJxx Qxxx (grand slam on a finesse)
KQ Jxx AJxx KQxx (poor grand slam)
KQ xxx AJxx KQxx (hopeless grand slam)

[kenrexford]

gnasher, on Feb 28 2008, 04:39 AM, said:

kenrexford, on Feb 27 2008, 06:59 PM, said:

I like the idea of manufacturing a minor suit for practical reasons, but I think it works better if Responder sets the auction up to tell rather than to ask.

1NT-P-2♦(transfer)-P-
2♥-P-3♦(manufactured)-P-
3♥(heart fit)-P-3♠(spade control)-P-
4♣(club control)-P-4♦(two top diamonds)-P-
4NT?-P-(three)-P-
Qask-P-yes

At this point, Opener knows that Responder has the spade Ace, AQxxx in hearts, the diamond King and Queen, and the club Ace.  He can count, therefore, five hearts, four diamonds, two spades, and two clubs, for 13 rippers.  He bids 7NT.

Unless I've misunderstood, opener thinks he is facing something like Ax AQxxx KQxx Ax. So wouldn't he also bid 7NT with Kxxx KJx AJx Kxx ?

Yes, he probably would. However, that is the worst-case scenario, placing reliance on partner to pick up the club suit correctly. Hence why the J10 in clubs as a buried value is key to this sequence.

If partner had held a side doubleton, either clubs or spades, he might reconsider 7NT, though. When he visualizes our complete hand, he should recognize that, with this amount of firepower, we might be fudging the minor call, as that would be what he would do. If that doubleton is spades, we have that same guess in clubs. If in clubs, we probably can get a ruff in.

BTW -- if Responder shows hearts and diamonds, and people squeak in spades a few times, won't you get a club lead a lot? If you bid hearts and clubs, you will be less likely to get that one lead that may be very favorable.

[mike777]

sathyab, on Feb 27 2008, 11:40 AM, said:

<!-- NORTHSOUTH begin --><table border=1> <tr> <td> <table> <tr> <td>Dealer:</td> <td> North </td> </tr> <tr> <td>Vul:</td> <td> Both </td> </tr> <tr> <td>Scoring:</td> <td> IMP </td> </tr> </table> </td> <td> <table border='1'> <tr> <th> <table> <tr> <th class='spades'>♠</th> <td> Kx </td> </tr> <tr> <th class='hearts'>♥</th> <td> KJx </td> </tr> <tr> <th class='diamonds'>♦</th> <td> AJxx </td> </tr> <tr> <th class='clubs'>♣</th> <td> Kxxx </td> </tr> </table> </th> </tr> <tr> <th> <table> <tr> <th class='spades'>♠</th> <td> Ax </td> </tr> <tr> <th class='hearts'>♥</th> <td> AQxxx </td> </tr> <tr> <th class='diamonds'>♦</th> <td> KQ9 </td> </tr> <tr> <th class='clubs'>♣</th> <td> AJT </td> </tr> </table> </th> </tr> </table> </td> <td>  </td> </tr> </table><!-- NORTHSOUTH end -->

I watched the bidding on this hand in a recent GNT Open game. North opened 1nt and at one table it went 1nt-2d-2h-3c-3h-4nt-5h-7h ! The other table stopped in 6nt, auction unknown.

After I saw this hand, I immediately wrote to my partner reminding him of the need to play six-key RKC whenever a two-suiter faces a strong balanced opening such as 1nt/2nt. With that agreement, the bidding could go

1nt-2d
2h-3c
3h-3s

4c-4d (RKC, as responder is interested in a major-minor two suiter in which case  the immediate suit after the minor is the kickback suit, when  unambiguous),
4s(1430 structure, 3 keys out of 6), 4nt (Q-ask)

5c (no Q), 5nt(Specific King Ask, 5s can be Specific Suit Ask by agreement)
6s(Spade king)

So now, you have extracted as much information as you possibly can (if you had used SSA in spades you could have found out if pd had Kx of the suit or longer which could have been critical had you been interested in 7c, which could have been the case had partner shown the QofC and you suspected he had four of 'em; 7c would then be safer than 7h without the Jack of hearts, but that's academic now). You know pd has Kxx of hearts, AofD, KofC, but no Q and KofS. He must either have the Queen of Spades or two jacks for a minimum opener. Do you have enough info to try 7nt now ?

If you had discovered that partner was missing either the King of clubs or hearts, it appears to be poor grand, which would be the case if pd had something like KJx KJx AJX Qxxx or some unappetizing variant thereof, so it looks as though introducing clubs would have helped to some extent.

Great post and great thread. Ty for posting it.

I learned alot from this thread.
I did not post my questions, since I thought they may be too silly.

As a nonexpert my concerns were:
1) rebidding 3d over 2h
2) rebidding 3h over 3d not 4d
3) getting opener to bid rkc not me.

I learned how to handle these issues.

Again ty to all the posters and people who emailed to help me out in this thread.

[Impact]

gnasher, on Feb 28 2008, 04:50 AM, said:

Impact, on Feb 28 2008, 12:44 AM, said:

1NT  12-15    2C  Stayman
2D                2S  Relay
3H 2-3-4-4

I like this start.

Quote

    3S  R
4D  5 cont      now you know  Kx  Kxx  Axxx Kxxx  but need DJ & HJ max for a really good grand but you can find out  about CQ albeit you know that if he has the CQ he cannot have the HJ....
regards

What if he'd shown only four controls? Would you be able to distinguish between these hands:
Jx KJx AJxx KQxx (cold grand slam)
KQ KJx AJxx Qxxx (grand slam on a finesse)
KQ Jxx AJxx KQxx (poor grand slam)
KQ xxx AJxx KQxx (hopeless grand slam)

Yes, pretty easily in most cases based on spiral denial cues (by length) :-

4C= 4 controls 4D= relay

a) 5C top D, C, H no top Sincl Q 5D=R
5H no DQ 5S= R
6D CQ, no HQ so xx Kxx Axxx KQxx have to punt on working J


4S top D< no CA/K ie 11 controls Kx Kxx Axxx ??
know that grand cannot be better than finesse eg CQ or much worse than 2 C hooks for 6 - but here might as well bid 6NT

c) 4NT top D & C no HK effectively just jump to slam and hope either HJ or good pips or favourable lie as you know you will have a H loser (unless KJ underneath AQ and pips... or J falls singleton and pips allow pick up etc ), but lacking the perfect pips cash HA and then lead towards HQ..

d) same auction as above simply jump to 6H once missing HK and not bother to find out just how good slam is...

regards

[inquiry]

kenrexford, on Feb 27 2008, 09:45 PM, said:

inquiry, on Feb 27 2008, 07:42 PM, said:

I like some of glen ashton's stuff over NT (his ETM bidding systems, see www.bridgematters.com), and this hand is one example of why.

Scoring: IMP

1N - 2D
2H - 3H
4C - 4D
4H - 4N
5H - 5S
6C - 7NT/7H
Pass 

---

2D = jacoby transfer, lots of different hands, including some without hearts
2N = less than 4 hearts
3H = GF, 5+ hearts, offering choice of 3NT/4H but can include slam tries
4C = cue-bid, gonna play in hearts, choose hearts. 3S would NOT BE cue bid, but offer choice back to responder for NT or hearts
4D = cue-bid or last train to clarksville, up to partnership agreement
4H = the conservative bid, if he cue-bids 4S instead grand is easy.
4N = rkcb
5H = 2 no queen
5S = specific suit ask
6D = Kx of spades

Opener knows about Club king (cue-bid), DA HK (response to blackwood), three hearts (2H bid), Kx of spades (response to 5S). This counts to 13 hcp. Playing 15-17 he has at least two more, and will probably not have 4 more (since only bid 4H over 4D will not be max). Opener will also likely be 2-3-4-4, 2-3-5-3, or 2-3-3-5 (a six card minor is still possible). At worse grand is likley on a club hook (assuming hearts behave if partner doesn't have the jack), and if partner has jack of diamonds or club queen, it will be easy. Even if partner is missing the jack of diamonds, you can try for 3-3 split before falling back on club hook if necessary.

I sort of like 7Nt, because you might be able to get 13 tricks even if hearts don't behave (we don't know about heart jack), via 4C, 4D, 3H, and 2S.. if partner has, for instance, Kx Kxx Axxx KQxx, or a heart-diamond squeeze if both hearts and diamonds are foul...

I don't get it at all.

We dedicate a number of bids to asking questions about strain. 3♥ asks about strain, 3♠ asks back. Someone needs to make a decision.

We do all of this with the cost of anything resembling preparatory cuebidding of substance, cuebidding that on this hand helps. However ideal that pick-the-strain technique may be, it is not favorable for this auction, and yet you cite this as a good argument. The negatives are touted as the positives. Strange.

Then, we have one cue below game of any substance (I have a club control), followed by another pass-the-buck call of 4♦. This is starting to sound a bit weird so far.

So, we end up simply using RKCB, having gained nothing so far over any other auction possible, and again this is great stuff.

So, partner answers, and we for some reason ask about the spade situation, finding out about the Kx, and thereby decide that we will bid a grand with no knowledge of any source for trick 13 other than a finesse guess?

I just don't get how this deal is an example of anything powerful about ETM. This is a grand slam decision hand, and you end up making the ultimate decision with everything except that which matters.

Well you picked on an auction that didn't occur, and the 3♠ ask back is a wonderful bid as it turns out. It has been very good to me at least (a bid that didn't occur).

Also, i find it hard to believe you can find any bid "sounding weird" given these two recent auctions by you....

Where you had 1NT bidder respond 2H on 3 card suit to stayman

or this one Where you open 1♣ on KQ doubleton with six strong diamonds

Not to mention in this very thread where you have responder invent a diamond suit he doesn't hold. Also, no one says glen aston would support my characterization of his method, but anyone can read it for themselves. The use of a GF balanced 3♥ then force to slam with grand slam aspirations describes the hand wonderfully so that opener can evaluate his hand opposite. In your auction on this hand, isn't it wonderful you decided to create a bid in DIAMONDS where partner held good stuff rather than clubs where he is not quite as good.

[kenrexford]

I guess "sounding weird" is not necessarily a bad thing. LOL