[kfay]

AKQxx xxx Qxxx K

r/w

(1NT)-P-(3♣)-?

1NT= 11-14
3♣= to play

[Phil]

Unimaginative 3♠.

[mikeh]

3♠ scares the bejesus out of me.

I'm not even sure that I want partner to raise if I bid it....and that makes me decide to pass.

As someone who plays the same methods (in this auction) as RHO, I can attest to the fact that rho could easily hold 8 or 9 hcp, and I'm probably getting tapped at trick one.

Colour me yellow....I'm passing....they got me here (maybe) but I'm not handing them a number nor am I having partner live in dread of what I hold on other hands. The number I fear is more when RHO doubles game (which partner will feel pressure to bid), not when we drift off 2 or 3 in 3♠ when he passes on his 2=4=3=4 6 count.

[bluecalm]

I double. I think that pass is "normal" (by this I mean the one chosen by most good players) action but my short bridge experience tells me passing leads to too many disasters (like us missing 10trumps game/partscore).
To contribute something useful here are 10 first generated partner's hands (assuming we play t/o double and don't have natural 2♣/2♦ overcall) :

J6 J65 AJTxxx Ax
J73 KJ862 AJ J85
J94 KQ 9765 J742
JT63 KQ J87 9732
942 854 AKJ65 Q9
JT976 KQ854 T8 7
T732 K854 AK8 62
74 KJ9654 75 Q76
J74 K85 J96 J854 (well, here I wish I passed)
J743 K842 AT8 J3

I reviewed some more. I don't believe passing is reasonable choice anymore unless partner is willing to reopen wildly which I think he shouldn't be.

I think 3♠/dbl are close.

[mikeh]

bluecalm, on May 14 2010, 12:32 PM, said:

I double. I think that pass is "normal" (by this I mean the one chosen by most good players) action but my short bridge experience tells me passing leads to too many disasters (like us missing 10trumps game/partscore).
To contribute something useful here are 10 first generated partner's hands (assuming we play t/o double and don't have natural 2♣/2♦ overcall) :

J6 J65 AJTxxx Ax
J73 KJ862 AJ J85
J94 KQ 9765 J742
JT63 KQ J87 9732
942 854 AKJ65 Q9
JT976 KQ854 T8 7
T732 K854 AK8 62
74 KJ9654 75 Q76
J74 K85 J96 J854 (well, here I wish I passed)
J743 K842 AT8 J3

I reviewed some more. I don't believe passing is reasonable choice anymore unless partner is willing to reopen wildly which I think he shouldn't be.

I think 3♠/dbl are close.

when posting simulations, please post your constraints, otherwise we can't assess how reliable your results are

[bluecalm]

Yeah, right.
Here it was 11-14balanced without 5card major for opener.
less than 13hcp for partner or less than 10hcp if 6card major;
0-9hcp with 6-7clubs without 5card major.

I don't mean to say that 10 hands prove anything. In such problems I usually make loose constraints and then manually review hands skipping those which would bid otherwise (so here if partner is 5-5 with 5M and say 11hcp I would just skip this manually as he would've overcalled). Sometimes things are not clear but here hands where pass is right are quite rare.
I consider this very good way to gain experience as I would need to play for 10 years to be in similar situation say 20 times.

Btw, if you agree with me that reviewing hands in such a way is good way to improve intuition in given situations I can generate output file for you with given constraints. I am interested if other people would reach similar conclusion here.

[gnasher]

Double seems a reasonable compromise between the scary 3♠ and the feeble pass.

[gszeszycki]

i would X if club K was small I am even happier to X WITH club K in case p wants to convert. Both opps have limited their hands and opps pretty much have a known club fit so we probably have one also. Also note that the vast majority of my power is not subject to bad lie of the cards this enhances my offensive potential and has a tendency to mitigate disaster. This PRE balance is safe because both opps have limited their hand and we do not want to force P to decide between pass and bid with say 4243 hand and scattered values.

[mikeh]

bluecalm, on May 14 2010, 01:23 PM, said:

Yeah, right.
Here it was 11-14balanced without 5card major for opener.
less than 13hcp for partner or less than 10hcp if 6card major;
0-9hcp with 6-7clubs without 5card major.

I don't mean to say that 10 hands prove anything. In such problems I usually make loose constraints and then manually review hands skipping those which would bid otherwise (so here if partner is 5-5 with 5M and say 11hcp I would just skip this manually as he would've overcalled). Sometimes things are not clear but here hands where pass is right are quite rare.
I consider this very good way to gain experience as I would need to play for 10 years to be in similar situation say 20 times.

Btw, if you agree with me that reviewing hands in such a way is good way to improve intuition in given situations I can generate output file for you with given constraints. I am interested if other people would reach similar conclusion here.

I do agree, and I thank you for the offer, but I am comfortable making my own simulations and can choose to use your constraints, my own, or both if I look into this one deeper.

I can tell you that I wouldn't use the constraint that prohibits a 5 card major for opener: while in my weak NT partnerships, a 5 card major is not common, it does happen. We use, in one, an agreement that it cannot be as good as K10xxx, and in another, it cannot be in a hand where we would prefer to open 1Major (which is usually but not always based on such things as where our values are, whether we are min or max (max tends to open 1M) and so on. In simulations, I use your approach: loose constraints then lose those I feel wouldn't apply.

I also wouldn't use your constraint of partner being less than 13 if balanced. As a weak notrumper, I love hearing double followed by an announcement that it could be weaker than my top limit. I'd give partner all kinds of hands with 13-14 as well as weaker ones. He needs shape, in my view, to enter with 13 or less, and 14 is borderline.

I'd also give rho up to 10 hcp, especially if (as he usually will be) he is short in one or both majors....I hate bidding 2♣ or passing with say x Qxx Qxx AQxxxx, and I won't invite in notrump with that. One of the costs of 11-14 is that you sometimes miss game opposite 14 when you hold 10, but it's not safe to investigate since he will hold 11 or 12 far more often than 13-14.

So you can see that our constraints are sufficiently different that we may well generate many different hands.

[bluecalm]

Thanks for the comments, some useful points about weak 1NT (I don't face it too often)
I am very interested if you (or any other exp++/wc) player would come to different conclusion if he/she "looks into it deeper" with whatever constraints he/she chooses.

I am interested in this situation because I feel in similar situations people (even very good players) are in general too cautious and they lose a lot of mp's/imps.
While I am not easily convinced by "it intuitively wrong to dbl here" even by wc player (especially if I put some effort in forming my opinion) it would be much more persuasive to me if it was : "I looked into it and still passing seems right".

[karlson]

I would bid 3s with such disparity in the majors.

[mikeh]

I ran a simulation, with the following constraints: 1N = 11-14, no 6 card suit, no strong major; rho 6-7 clubs, 0-10 hcp. I discarded a few hands because partner would probably have overcalled. I discarded a few hands because it seemed to me impossible to predict the results: for example: bidding 3♠ works better than passing so long as partner doesn't raise, and he has a borderline (to me, at least) decision.

So I looked at about 30 hands and eliminated about 5, leaving 25 hands to analyze. This is a very small sample size and my subjective choices might not be made by everyone or even most.

The first thing is that my earlier fear that partner could raise and we go for a number was not borne out so far. On one hand it seemed to me to be clear to raise, and the opps were able to get a couple of ruffs in the reds and beat us 3, but doubling would have been strange. Opener had Aces, giving the communication to get the ruffs.

But having said that, pass was a fairly clear winner.

It was definitely best on 13 of the 25.

I couldn't distinguish between x and 3♠ on 2....they led on one hand to a good spade contract and on the other to a heart contract that was as good as the spade...and on both bidding was better than passing

Only one hand showed that double was best

On 2 hands, I couldn't tell whether passing was better or worse than bidding 3♠: it depended on the defence to 3♣ or 3♠. 3♣ was down on both, but 3♠ might be beaten.

On 7 hands, bidding 3♠ seemed clearly best.

All this seems to suggest that passing is better than bidding, and that 3♠ is way better than doubling.

[dburn]

What defence do we play to a weak no trump, and how aggressive is partner when it comes to using whatever that defence is?

Whatever the answers to the above questions, I would bid 3♠. I don't understand pass (we could be cold for game, or for 3♠ when they can make 3♣), and I don't understand double because I really don't want to see partner's face when I put this dummy down in 3♥ opposite four low in both majors.

[MarkDean]

3♠, double, and pass all have their risks, and I think it close between the three.

I would pass with the actual hand, but would double with AKQxx Kxx Qxxx x and bid 3♠ with AKQxx xxx KQxx x.

[OleBerg]

Phil, on May 14 2010, 05:53 PM, said:

Unimaginative 3♠.

Unimaginative indeed, but probably right.

If my agreements for double over 1NT were slightly more conservative, I would bid 4♠. (I might even bid it vs some opponents.)

[bluecalm]

Quote

So I looked at about 30 hands and eliminated about 5, leaving 25 hands to analyze. This is a very small sample size and my subjective choices might not be made by everyone or even most.

Quote

All this seems to suggest that passing is better than bidding, and that 3♠ is way better than doubling.

Thanks for that. Now I have motivation to look into it much deeper. I will try to evaluate this more carefully with the assumption I am probably wrong wanting to bid

[Jlall]

i am passing and feel amazing about it

[Jlall]

ive seriously never pased here but thinking about it its so right

[jdonn]

mikeh, on May 14 2010, 03:26 PM, said:

So I looked at about 30 hands and eliminated about 5, leaving 25 hands to analyze. This is a very small sample size and my subjective choices might not be made by everyone or even most.

Oh no not this again!!!

Whatever, I feel pass >>> dbl >> 3♠.