[hanp]

Ah ok, I misread. My other comments are still valid.

[gurgistan]

gurgistan, on Sep 13 2010, 03:52 PM, said:

PetteriLem, on Sep 13 2010, 12:25 PM, said:

The heart slam depends on trumps. If they are good, then we have 6-7♥. I would rule out splinter and rkcb. Splinter will not give you any information u need or partner needs and worse, one day the opponents believe that you really dont have spades and lead clubs, which u really dont want to happen. Rkcb may strike gold, but often u just have to guess, which u should avoid. If u have agreed that 5♥ asks trump quality that should be used. I think it is not ideal here, but u find correct place more often than never.With 3 honours or equivalent partner should explore 7, with 2 bid 6 and with less it depends on agreements.

I am very interested in the idea of 5♥ asking for trump quality.

Presumably, if partner is good he bids 6♥ and passes if poor.

Is this a recognized convention or a good commonsense solution to bidding a hand I am having difficulty with?

Does anyone know the answer to this question?

What does the leap to the five level in an agreed suit mean?

It seem to work akin to a grand slam force but GSF is 5N.

Many thanks.

[2Macchiato]

gurgistan, on Sep 13 2010, 08:29 AM, said:

Scoring: IMP

I open in 3rd seat with 1♦. Regular partner bids 1♥. I bid 4N RKB1430. Partner responds 5♦. I place in 6♥. Opponents are silent throughout.

How bad/good was my placing of contract in heart slam?

---

1. Can you guarantee 5 ♥? Probably not if partner has the worst kind of hand (points in Spades for example)

2. Should you use RKCB (or any Blackwood (except Voidwood) with a void? undoubtedly NO

So, start with 3 ♠ - clearly a splinter (control - potentially a void) and see what partner says - clearly you are hoping for 4 ♣ since a club lead might result in establishing a club winner for the defence to go with the putative trump winner.

Partner may - on the other hand - have excellent spades to pitch your club losers (we will assume some early entry to his hand via trump or diamond ruff.

Your priority must be however to get some co-operation from partner. It's possible partner may have nothing to add at all - or even at this stage (good trumps nothing else) - so you should probably consider a 2nd effort - 3 ♠ 4♥ 5 ♥ will force him to address the quality of his trumps for slam.

[2Macchiato]

ONEferBRID, on Sep 13 2010, 10:24 AM, said:

Instead of the Sp splinter, what about using the convention-with-no-name?

p   - 1D
1H - 4D! = strong 4h/6d

Excellent point

And for those who play Exclusion how about the switch back from partner:

3S ♠ Splinter
3N - Asking bid - 4 ♣ singleton (or King) - all other bids RKCB with a VOID guaranteed.

[bucky]

gurgistan, on Sep 29 2010, 01:16 PM, said:

gurgistan, on Sep 13 2010, 03:52 PM, said:

I am very interested in the idea of 5♥ asking for trump quality.

Presumably, if partner is good he bids 6♥ and passes if poor.

Is this a recognized convention or a good commonsense solution to bidding a hand I am having difficulty with?

Does anyone know the answer to this question?

What does the leap to the five level in an agreed suit mean?

It seem to work akin to a grand slam force but GSF is 5N.

Many thanks.

I don't think this is a "convention". Rather, it is based on logic. When you leap to 5M in a constructive auction, it has to be a slam try, and it shows that you are concerned about *something* for the slam. The trick is figure out what this *something* is. In an uncontested sequence it is often about trump quality, since if you are worried about a specific side suit, you can find out by control cuebid. It can also be asking for control in an only unbid suit. In competitive auction, such as 1♥ (3♠) 5♥, it should be asking partner to bid slam with control in enemy (spade) suit (it follows that 1♥ (3[DP]) 4♠ is a slam try WITH spade control).

That being said, I don't think it is right to bid 5♥ on this hand. You have more than one concern: club control, and trump quality. 5♥ might let you find out one but not both. Also, how good is "good"? ♥KQ certainly qualifies (but if partner has KQxxx you can easily miss a grand), what about QJxx? How about ♥J9xx and ♣K? To find out all the information you need, it is best to open an interactive dialog by bidding 3♠ or 4♦.

[2Macchiato]

A lot of these problems regarding the appropriateness of cue bidding and splinters evaporate if you agree that - in principle - you should splinter (and co-operate) with good controls and decent trumps. In other words don't over commit to the 5 level and beyond without the (semblance) of controls in your hand. I'm advocating that, if you have a great 17 count but only one ace you shouldn't be acting too quickly to proceed to the 5 level and, by the same measure, if you have a poor trump holding you end up at the 5 level (or heaven help you, beyond that) with the opponents holding (at least) 2 of the 3 big trump cards.

I would never splinter without at least some (if not most) of these features and would expect a good partner to readily cooperate if he or she also held like for like features - rapidly signing off when this does not apply (unless they are forced into cooperation by a second effort). Similarly I would advocate never bidding 1M-4M on side suit controls - it should be reserved for control poor hands of moderate - even poor - counts (in the manner of the TNT raise). Obviously there are no golden rules but the presence of side suit controls is vital to give partner the opportunity to go beyond game. With this in mind partner will only rarely proceed over 1 M - 4 M and only then on an exceptional control rich hand - or one with a significant source of tricks (6-5 shape for example).