[Phil]

ACOL SUCKS!!!

[gnasher]

Phil, on Oct 27 2009, 04:26 PM, said:

ACOL SUCKS!!!

You're not wrong.

[cherdanno]

gnasher, on Oct 27 2009, 10:20 AM, said:

Do you mean that "to play [2/1 game-forcing] is a mistake" was an insult? Or are you saying that it wasn't an insult per se, but it merited one by way of a reply?

I am saying that "LOL" in reply to "because I already know the answer - to play that way is a mistake" is not an insult.

Btw, "LOL" means "laughing out loud".

[jdonn]

gnasher, on Oct 27 2009, 10:20 AM, said:

As far as I'm concerned, Justin and David can throw around all of the insults they want to, as long as neither of them, nor Han, is thereby discouraged from sharing their views about bridge.

Perhaps starting a thread, getting replies from han that shared his views about bridge, and replying that it was a mistake to ask hanp a question, is a good way to discourage him from sharing his views about bridge.

You repeatedly question Justin's justification for LOL. What exactly is dburns justification for his comments other than to fuel his own massive ego?

[Jlall]

gnasher, on Oct 27 2009, 10:20 AM, said:

Do you mean that "to play [2/1 game-forcing] is a mistake" was an insult?  Or are you saying that it wasn't an insult per se, but it merited one by way of a reply?

Edit: I'm rather regretting getting involved in this.  As far as I'm concerned, Justin and David can throw around all of the insults they want to, as long as neither of them, nor Han, is thereby discouraged from sharing their views about bridge.

Yeah whatever I guess let's not get into it it doesn't matter. Even if you think "I started it" attacking hanp rather than me seems like a stretch. FWIW if dburn had insulted me after I said "LOL" I would not really have cared, but insulting hanp twice for doing nothing but giving his opinion on the questions asked seemed pretty amazing.

Also there are degrees of insults, I don't think quoting a statement like "I am sure that playing 2/1 GF" is a mistake and LOLing it is insulting to the person (I am talking about that statement only). I do think saying the stuff that dburn said to han is very insulting on a personal level, or at the very least to the level of their bridge (which is different than insulting a comment they make).

I also know that comments similar to dburn's do discourage hanp from posting. That's why he doesn't post much anymore. If hanp was a bad poster then whatever, but I think hanp is a good poster as I think most others thing, and he's also my friend, so it is sad to see.

[gnasher]

jdonn, on Oct 27 2009, 04:38 PM, said:

Perhaps starting a thread, getting replies from han that shared his views about bridge, and replying that it was a mistake to ask hanp a question, is a good way to discourage him from sharing his views about bridge.

Yes. That was what I meant, or part of what I meant anyway.

Quote

What exactly is dburns justification for his comments other than to fuel his own massive ego?

How would I know?

[pooltuna]

aguahombre, on Oct 27 2009, 10:25 AM, said:

interesting title for this thread.

Yep time to break out the slings for a better class of insults

[gnasher]

In case I've given the wrong impression, my fairly pointless discussion with Cherdano and others about the nature of an insult was no more than a fairly pointless discussion about the nature of an insult. It doesn't mean that I agree with what anyone said to anyone else, or that I think anyone started anything, or that I think anyone was more or less in the right than anyone else.

[cherdanno]

gnasher, on Oct 27 2009, 11:54 AM, said:

In case I've given the wrong impression, my fairly pointless discussion with Cherdano and others about the nature of an insult was no more than a fairly pointless discussion about the nature of an insult. It doesn't mean that I agree with what anyone said to anyone else, or that I think anyone started anything, or that I think anyone was more or less in the right than anyone else.

Further questions will be answered by your lawyer?

[Fluffy]

oh my god, I hope it is not kenrexford

[gnasher]

Does he charge by the word?

[manudude03]

gnasher, on Oct 28 2009, 10:05 AM, said:

Does he charge by the word?

By the letter.


Semi-on-topic: Systems are like guns. Useful for protection (auction). And like guns, systems don't kill, people do .

[Old York]

dburn, on Oct 26 2009, 04:38 AM, said:

West bid 6♦. Was that a mistake?

Was it a mistake? Maybe it depends on the circumstances.

If the slam had been bid by Zia, in a last ditch attempt to win the Lederer single-handed, then we would all applaud his audacity

If the slam was bid by a nameless novice in Bbo Relaxed at 3am after a bottle and a half of vodka, then why was it posted here in Adv/Expert Forum?

We will never know.... perhaps the hand is sheer invention to make a dubious political point?

Tony

[dburn]

Old York, on Oct 28 2009, 03:18 PM, said:

dburn, on Oct 26 2009, 04:38 AM, said:

West bid 6♦. Was that a mistake?

Was it a mistake? Maybe it depends on the circumstances.

If the slam had been bid by Zia, in a last ditch attempt to win the Lederer single-handed, then we would all applaud his audacity

If the slam was bid by a nameless novice in Bbo Relaxed at 3am after a bottle and a half of vodka, then why was it posted here in Adv/Expert Forum?

We will never know.... perhaps the hand is sheer invention to make a dubious political point?

Tony

All political points are by their very nature dubious, but this hand actually occurred a few days ago.

I seem to have offended JLOL (in his various guises) not a little, for which I apologise. I plead in mitigation that in response to hanp's observation that it was a mistake for East to be playing with West, I was under some provocation when I (West) asserted that it was a mistake to ask hanp a question - that was by way of a retaliatory, not an ab initio, insult. Still, "yes", "no" and "yes!" did not strike me as views from which one could gain very much.

I also confess to having misunderstood one of cherdanno's comments, which was foolish of me and for which I also apologise. Mind you, whatever kind of idiot it must have seemed to him that I thought he was, I was mildly perturbed to discover that he believed I (although certainly an Englishman) might regard 1♠-2♦-3♦-3NT-4♣-4♦ as not forcing.

I am still a little perturbed at this suggested sequence (I think it was mich-b who proposed it):

1♠-2♦-3♦-3NT-4♣-4♦-4♥-4NT

because if the West hand were:

♠J10xxx ♥AKx ♦AQxx ♣K

it would presumably bid the same way and the partnership would obtain a result no less undignified than the actual one (because West would bid 5♠ and East would bid a slam). It is axiomatic that one does not bid Blackwood with an uncontrolled suit, and although one tends to forget this axiom when the suit is the one in which partner has opened the bidding, one probably should not.

I fully understand the idea that bridge is a game of percentages, and "cherry-picking" hands to demonstrate that such-and-such an auction may not work well is in general an unproductive exercise. If I have been guilty of that to an unreasonable extent, I proffer a third apology. But it seems to me that whereas one may bid games, or take decisions under pressure in competitive auctions, on the basis of percentages or intuition or both, this approach should not be applied to slam bidding.

As to Ken Rexford's pertinent question about the meaning of 4♦, it did not mean anything very much other than that I did not want to pass 3NT (which, pace hanp, I still consider absurd), and I wanted to hear partner's next bid in the hope that if it was not 4♥ (which would simplify the auction for me greatly), it would be 5♣ only if he had a suitable hand for slam. Partner, on the other hand, thought he was obliged to cue-bid his club control despite not having a particularly suitable hand for slam at all, hinc illae lacrimae. Many auctions, but particularly 2/1 game-forcing auctions in the hands of unsophisticated people such as myself, suffer from this kind of flaw. But the truth may be, as Fred remarks, that the pair of you can end up in a daft contract without either of you having made a daft bid.

Thanks to him and to everyone else for their comments. Sorry, partner and everyone else.

[mike777]

1) with the OP again i start with 1nt and stay out of slam
2) with a bit more I start with 2d and:
1s=2d
3d=3nt
? it gets tough. tough to pass 3nt or try for minor suit slam with unbalanced 17 hcp.

[mich-b]

dburn, on Oct 28 2009, 11:04 PM, said:

I am still a little perturbed at this suggested sequence (I think it was mich-b who proposed it):

1♠-2♦-3♦-3NT-4♣-4♦-4♥-4NT

because if the West hand were:

♠J10xxx  ♥AKx  ♦AQxx  ♣K

it would presumably bid the same way and the partnership would obtain a result no less undignified than the actual one (because West would bid 5♠ and East would bid a slam).

One more try to explain myself better :

With the original hands I would suggest something like:
1♠-2♦-3♦-3NT-4♣-4♦-4♥-5♣-5♦

Opener bypasses 3NT to show some extras, both sides cue to show controls , and since neither has further extras they sign off in 5♦.

If East held : ♠xx ♥Qxx ♦AKxxx ♣Axx.
1♠-2♦-3♦-3NT-4♣-4♦-4♥-4NT
Because this hand is much better than the original, and it is very difficult to construct hands where opener will not have ♠ control.

[gnasher]

dburn, on Oct 29 2009, 05:04 AM, said:

I am still a little perturbed at this suggested sequence (I think it was mich-b who proposed it):

1♠-2♦-3♦-3NT-4♣-4♦-4♥-4NT

I suggested it first, though I also suggested a sequence where East continues to cue-bid and the partnership could expect to stop in 5♦. I agree that 4NT on the East hand is a bit careless.

Quote

But it seems to me that whereas one may bid games, or take decisions under pressure in competitive auctions, on the basis of percentages or intuition or both, this approach should not be applied to slam bidding.

Are slam decisions intrinsically different from other bidding problems? With any bidding problem, you want to know as much about partner's hand as possible, but if you don't have enough exact information, using judgment and probabilities instead is a reasonable alternative. With a slam decision, you may have more space in which to investigate, but you also have more to find out about.

[Old York]

How should the auction have progressed after 1♠-1NT(Forcing 6-12hcp)-2♦ ? (Genuine Question)

BBO-Advanced Fd seems to fizzle out at this point.

According to Fd, the 3♦ bid in the actual sequence already shows "extras", so advancing beyond 3NT may have been optimistic with only one keycard, but I can see how a GF 2♦ response would make West reluctant to pass.
Not a good hand for any system

Tony

[hanp]

Note to self: if dburn asks who made the mistake, don't pick west!

It seems all agree that west endplayed himself by bidding 4D instead of 4C. But what about 5C by east?

I think that east should cue. After giving a negative signal with 3NT, west still continued and bypassed the chance to cue clubs. Not only does east have a club control, he also has 2 keycards plus the spade queen which has to be useful.

To give a typically British argument: how else will you find 6D when east has AK10xx AJ AJxx xx or similarly AK10xx Ax AJxx Qx? (or should west jump to 4D with those hands?)

[hanp]

As east with xx Qxx AKxxx Axx I would bid:

1S - 2D
3D - 3NT
4C - 4D
4H - 5C

and respect partner's decision. I think that this describes the hand well.