[aguahombre]

Focus. West did not bid a natural 2NT, and must assume East knows it is not a natural 2NT.

Nothing based on a natural 2NT response to the balancing double is part of what West is allowed to consider.

If you think 3S has to show a spade control rather than LT or general acceptance of hearts and extras, then your 5H bid is pretty much all you have left. 4D would be a long diamond suit.

[WellSpyder]

aguahombre, on 2013-May-15, 07:24, said:

Focus. West did not bid a natural 2NT, and must assume East knows it is not a natural 2NT.

This is true, of course. But the UI suggests that East might not know it is not a natural 2NT, and West must carefully avoid choosing an action that could be suggested by this UI. How can he do this without giving some thought to what the auction would mean if the UI were valid?

[campboy]

Yes, I was talking about what the auction means with and without UI in order to determine what is suggested by the UI. I came to the conclusion that 4♦ is the only call which is suggested.

I then attempted to determine LAs based on the AI. I think that 4♦, 4♥ and 5♥ are the only LAs for me.

[aguahombre]

WellSpyder, on 2013-May-15, 08:12, said:

This is true, of course. But the UI suggests that East might not know it is not a natural 2NT, and West must carefully avoid choosing an action that could be suggested by this UI. How can he do this without giving some thought to what the auction would mean if the UI were valid?

We are beyond that. Any call which does not show slam interest in support of hearts, within the confines of our Leben 2NT advance, could demonstrably be suggested by the failure to alert.

There are other situations where the type of slam try might be a hedge against disaster, but this is not such case.

[barmar]

blackshoe, on 2013-May-15, 00:29, said:

<sigh> Have it your way, Andy.

What I think he's saying is that if the UI suggests that A and B are likely to be more successful than C, that is equivalent to saying that C is the one most likely to get you into trouble. Regardles of how you phrase it, the implication is that C is the one that you have to choose when you have this UI.

[VixTD]

I was North on problem 1, and after some thought I didn't call the director. 4♥ failed by a trick, and I think the most could expect was an adjustment to 5♥-2, as they would probably have discovered they had two spade losers. I did think that 4♦ would be a cue-bid agreeing hearts, as West is unlikely to want to overrule East on the choice of the trump suit, but I see I'm probably wrong about this.

EW really did seem to think that 3♥ was an impossible response to Lebensohl.

On problem 2 I was North, and I would normally have bid 3NT without much thought, but I did have a nasty suspicion that pass could be the winning action here, if neither 3♠ nor 3NT are making. Partner's question suggested to me that we were more likely to be making a contract our way.

Partner tends to ask a lot, but not every time the opponents bid. She was aware they were playing some sort of two-suited major suit bids and a multi, as she had asked questions at the start of the round.

I bid 3NT and made ten tricks. I considered calling the director at the end, but the opponents seemed happy, so I didn't.

I'll post problems separately in future.

[campboy]

aguahombre, on 2013-May-15, 08:42, said:

We are beyond that. Any call which does not show slam interest in support of hearts, within the confines of our Leben 2NT advance, could demonstrably be suggested by the failure to alert.

If it's demonstrable, would you care to demonstrate it? I have explained why I do not think 4♥ is suggested.

[aguahombre]

campboy, on 2013-May-15, 12:13, said:

If it's demonstrable, would you care to demonstrate it? I have explained why I do not think 4♥ is suggested.

4H is suggested by partner's 3H bid, which if he understood 2NT as artificial and less than a certain strength, would not have been his bid with minimum strength in his own hand. He would have cooperated with 3C, or have balanced 3H instead of doubling.

[campboy]

aguahombre, on 2013-May-15, 15:21, said:

4H is suggested by partner's 3H bid, which if he understood 2NT as artificial and less than a certain strength, would not have been his bid with minimum strength in his own hand. He would have cooperated with 3C, or have balanced 3H instead of doubling.

But he won't have minimum strength even if he has not understood 2NT, since in that case he would have passed 2NT (or bid 3♥ instead of doubling).

[aguahombre]

campboy, on 2013-May-15, 15:37, said:

But he won't have minimum strength even if he has not understood 2NT, since in that case he would have passed 2NT (or bid 3♥ instead of doubling).

So you are arguing that you should make a bad bid, but it is legal, and you have both AI and UI to tell you it is a bad bid. O.K., but IMO the extremely low-road bid of 4H could only be influenced by doubt from the failure to alert whether partner knew what 2NT meant and the belief that partner thinks we have already shown tenish values with a spade stopper.