[Creeksider]

I'm more than a little vague on the subject of game tries: when to use them, how to respond, and how to interpret partner's response. This comes up fairly often playing with GIB, where some bids are labeled "LSGT" and others appear to be game tries without that label, with GIB saying they show 2-11 8421 HCP.

The basic auction might be

1S - 2S
3D

We've agreed on a suit and need to agree on a level. I believe the general concept is that opener has diamond losers but also an intermediate honor that could be valuable if responder also has intermediate value. One hand might have Qxx and the other KJx, each one separately looking like possibly three losers, but working together to produce only one. So the 3♦ bid is trying to find that kind of fit, if I understand correctly. But what exactly is responder supposed to do?

a. Bid 4♠ with helpful diamonds, regardless of point count, otherwise bid 3♠
b. Bid 4♠ only with helpful diamonds AND top of range, otherwise bid 3♠
c. Something else?

I'm even more confused when they come up in slam tries. Any hints on how to think about this, with bots or human partners?

[Quantumcat]

Long suit game tries say, "I have a bunch of losers in this suit. Can you help me to cover them?" They should NOT mean, "This is my secondary source of tricks, do you have an honour?" some people bid those sorts of suits but they shouldn't.

You can accept whatever your holding if you are absolute max on HCP, but if not you should look at your holding in the suit.

Holdings that are BAD:

- Hxx(x)

Holdings that are VERY BAD:

- xxx(xx)

Holdings that are GOOD:

- Hx

- Ax

Holdings that are VERY GOOD:

- HHx

- x

H refers to a king, queen or jack.

If you play short-suit game tries, they say "I am not worried about losers in this suit. Can you help me outside this suit?" in which case, xxx(xx) is very good, and random honours and singletons outside are good, random honours in the suit and xxx(xx) outside the suit are bad.

If long-suit tries come up in slam tries (do you have an example of the auction you mean?) they will normally mean "This is my secondary source of tricks, but it's not solid. A king or queen from you would be really helpful."

If the auction you mean is something like,

1♠ - 2♠
3♦ - 3♠
4♥ - ??

3♦ was actually a cue, looking for slam.

[cherdano]

The correct answer is c. There are some hands that bid 2♠ that are so good that you will bid 4♠ over any game try. Say you have Qxx Axx xxx Axxx. Partner's game try in diamonds didn't excactly improve your hand, but it's still worth accepting the game try with such a prime maximum. On the other hand, if you have Qxx xxx Qxx Qxxx, then your ♦Q got upgraded, but it's still such a terrible hand that I would reject the game try.
So it's mostly about your range, but you should upgrade or downgrade strongly depending on your diamond holding.)

(P.S.: I never quite understood the point of these fine distinctions between "long-suit" or "help-suit" game tries. For me, opener's 3♦ just shows length in that suit, so intermediate honors (QJ) in diamonds are very good, top honors in diamonds (AK) still better than originally advertised, and intermediate honors in hearts and clubs = bad. Also, if opener bid's on again after responder rejects with 3♠, 3♦ was still a long suit (definitely 4+ in this case), I wouldn't call it a cuebid.)

[Fluffy]

what arend said, 3♦ helps you reevaluate your hand, upgrading/downgrading not only diamond holdings, but everythign else as well.

[1eyedjack]

I would suggest a couple of additional points to what has been mentioned:

1) If you have a choice of long suit and short suit game tries available, then it would normally be more help to partner if you make the short suit trial in preference to the long. By inference, if partner makes a long suit trial there is a high likelihood that he holds no shortage.

2) When accepting the game try, you might wish to have half an eye on the possibility that the trial bidder has enough in his own hand to be confident of game and is making a move in preparation for a slam try (although of course you can forget this if he is a passed hand). To protect against that possibility it *might* be worthwhile making a cue bid below game as a more descriptive method of accepting the game try.

There is a trade-off between making as informative a game try (and response) as possible on the one hand, and on the other hand a desire to conceal from the opposing side information that might aid in their opening lead, defensive play or sacrificial bidding. If you build into your methods a scheme that maximises the relevance of the information imparted then it would constrain the types of game tries that are available to made, contrasted with an alternative scheme that maximises the number of game tries but at a cost of surplus information leakage. Opinions differ on where the optimal balance lies, but in my experience most experts nowadays go for maximum relevance at a cost of accuracy. I have no doubt others will pile in and disagree now.

[Creeksider]

Relevant to jack's point on the trade-off in making a bid that may help opponents, when playing with robots I always seem to get a defensive lead in the game-try suit. This could be coincidence (small sample), but it could suggest a strategy of making a game try bid in a suit you'd like to encourage LHO to lead.

Suppose you know you have enough for game, but instead of going straight from 2♠ to 4♠ you bid 3♦, holding AQ doubleton in that suit, when your card says your 3♦ bid is a LSGT. You're hoping to get a free finesse on a diamond lead. I assume that's fair enough in a robot tourney (assuming GIB can be expected to lead against the LSGT bid), but I don't know if it's proper in regular competition. Seems like it should be okay if not a matter of undisclosed partnership agreement.

Then again, suppose your CC discloses this strategy: it indicates that this bid is normally LSGT but sometimes used deceptively. Just by putting that on your card, you make it harder for opponents to take advantage of the information you reveal when making the LSGT bid.

[ggwhiz]

I agree with the discussion so far and am adding another small wrinkle.

1♠ - 2♠
3♦ - 3♥ ???


We play that 3♥ shows interest but (for the moment) denies diamond help. A source of tricks in hearts, maybe KQJx with a max raise.

If opener has the ♥Ace in a 5-3-3-2 shape, 3 diamond tricks may be the only losers.

Similar to opener making a slam try by bidding on over a 3♠ sign off, responder can carry on over a sign off here to show a heart source of tricks AND diamond help. That one has only happened to me once every 10 years.