[jillybean]

---

We are playing kickback so 4♥ should be kb for ♦ and 4♠ kb for ♥. We havent dicuussed 4N.

Comments, other than we need to drop KB or sort out our agreements. It wasn't all bad, 4N made +1

[mike777]

Prefer 3nt over 3h.


Prefer 4d to be a cuebid agreeing hearts.

If you agree that 4d is a cuebid agreeing h then 4h now becomes natural signoff over 4d and 4s over 4d is KB with h as trumps.


Yes that means you cannot bid a natural 4d after 3h.

[Siegmund]

Well, you already know you need to sort out your agreements so we won't repeat that.

I can think of two other comments to make, though they really are sub-comments to sorting out your agreements:

Do you really believe that "we are playing kickback" means "4♥ should be kb for ♦ and 4♠ kb for ♥"? I suppose it's a possible agreement. It's not what I would assume if I had agreed kickback without any extra bells and whistles (do you have a meta-agreement to have two ace-asking bids in a variety of other auctions where trumps are not yet clearly set?) and I am not sure you'll find very many people willing to give up a natural 4M bid here.
Even if I had agreed Kickback with someone, and I knew 4D was natural, I would assume 4M natural and 4N asking for diamonds in this particular auction (and been sure enough of it to answer 1 keycard as South.)
Re 4NT, agreeing to play it natural in this type of auction does have merit at matchpoints, but in most kickback auctions (with one trump suit) I'd assume 4NT is a cuebid of the trump+1 suit, swapping it with the kickback call.

With my regular p, incidentally, 4D would be a cuebid for hearts, not natural - but absent discussion I would indeed expect 4D to show a hand like the one you held.

[jillybean]

Well ok, how do you play kickback if ♥ isn't kb for ♦'s and ♠ kb for ♥'s (and ♦/♣ and 4N/♠) ?

And no, we have no meta agreements to have an alternative ace asking bid. I'd suggest if we need this we should not be playing kickback at all right now. This is a new partnership, we both play kickback in other partnerships. I don't have a mata agreement in that partnership either.

[nigel_k]

My thoughts about this:

1. In the given auction, I would expect 4♦ to be a cue agreeing hearts and would have bid 3♠ on the actual responding hand.

2. Let's assume 4♦ is agreed or understood as natural. That means if 4♥ is kickback for diamonds then 4NT is a heart cue bid. If 4♠ is kickback for hearts then 4NT is a spade cue bid. Otherwise 4NT is key card for spades. You can agree it is a signoff, but then it is a signoff regardless of your ace asking agreements.

3. There should be only one ace ask and it should be based on the trump suit that 4NT would have referred to. Normally it would be responder's last naturally bid suit. But you can't have two ace asks that refer to different suits because you are going to want to cue bid, not ace ask, on most hands with slam interest.

4. Finding the best game should take priority over slam investigation, and it is very easy for 4♥ to be the best game here.

5. You do need some rules about kickback. I actually favour a presumption in favour of bids being kickback in most doubtful situations but it would never occur to me here.

[wank]

you shouldn't be using blackwood, be it a sane or insane form, without it being clear what trumps are.

in this case the 2 majors bids are too useful to give up for a pointless ace ask when you've no reason to assume you'v e got anything approximating 12 tricks.

ok, i might be a little biased as i would always refuse to play any form of kickback, but trying to play 2 lots of kickback at the same time is just absurd.

[jillybean]

I’m beginning to realize that again, I’m biting off more than I can chew here.
I am taking a bunch of what are for me, fairly complex and not well understood conventions from my regular partnership with an experienced partner and trying to transplant these into a new partnership with another relatively inexperienced player.

I know I would be better off keeping things simple and concentrating on hand evaluation and play of the hand but I keep getting drawn back into gadgets and discussions on systems.

Perhaps my New Year resolution will be to remove a few things from my CC

[the hog]

4D is a cue bid agreeing H. I think a 3NT bid here is obvious.

[wank]

as a general point, i don't know the rest of your methods so i may be wrong, but i suspect you're overusing blackwood. it seems to be the focus of your system. it's not meant to be used as a slam try. it's meant to be a specific check that you have the requisite aceage once you've already decided you've got enough tricks to bid slam. by taking up all your bids with ace asks, you're leaving yourself with no general slam tries. 5 aces is only 5 tricks - you need more than that.

[han]

jillybean, on 2010-December-28, 22:20, said:

Perhaps my New Year resolution will be to remove a few things from my CC

Nice resolution, I'll help you remember next time you start another kickback thread.

[JLOGIC]

I really dislike 3N over 3H, I think 3S is an easy bid with KJT9x and no club stopper. Partner can bid 3N over this.