[jillybean]

---

IMPS, what is your plan?

[smerriman]

Start with 1♣ and plan to rebid diamonds until partner gets the picture. If it comes back to me at 4M then I'll bid 4N.

[Winstonm]

jillybean, on 2021-September-17, 15:55, said:

---

IMPS, what is your plan?

I don’t know about you, but I’m opening the bidding.

[jillybean]

Winstonm, on 2021-September-17, 17:09, said:

I don’t know about you, but I’m opening the bidding.

haha, I'm glad you still have a pulse.

Ok,

1♣:1♠
2♦:2♠ (2♦ is a reverse, are you good enough?)
?

[smerriman]

This turned out much easier than expected Now we can rebid 3♦ to show exactly this type of hand.

[sfi]

jillybean, on 2021-September-17, 17:16, said:

2♦ is a reverse, are you good enough?

Four losers, good suits, defensive tricks, and an easy way to describe your hand. What are you worried about not having?

[Winstonm]

jillybean, on 2021-September-17, 17:16, said:

haha, I'm glad you still have a pulse.

Ok,

1♣:1♠
2♦:2♠ (2♦ is a reverse, are you good enough?)
?

More than good enough. Over 2S I bid 3D.

I assume this is where the problems start.

[mikeh]

I think it clear to bid 1C, then bid diamonds twice

Partner knows we are at least 5=6 (we could be 6=7, but those hands are exceedingly rare…we won’t be 5=7 unless we are very strong, so he will assume we are 5=6 with decent suits)

He is in an excellent position to value his hand. Minor suit honours are huge, major suit aces excellent…if he has only one, he should be worried we’re void there, but for now it’s a good card.

If he bids 3N, we should make it…one of my suits will set up and we’ve warned him about needing major stoppers, plural.

[jillybean]

Winstonm, on 2021-September-17, 18:53, said:

More than good enough. Over 2S I bid 3D.

I assume this is where the problems start.

Not exactly, my partner bid 4♣. I'd like to think this was the start of the problems
(fixed!)

---

I held;
♠AJ9765
♥A5
♦74
♣K83

[Winstonm]

Well, that is a clunker. Now it sounds like 7 card club suit and a false reverse. Still, if I can now ask for keycards I think it right to bid 7C.

[akwoo]

Is 4N RKC?

Oh - never mind - partner can't have 0 keys on the bidding, and if partner has 2 keys, I still can't find out if they have 2 kings. (In my mind, they're (21)46.) So 6♣ it is.

[mikeh]

jillybean, on 2021-September-17, 20:50, said:

Not exactly, my partner bid 4♣. I'd like to think this was the start of the problems
(fixed!)

---

I held;
♠AJ9765
♥A5
♦74
♣K83

Maybe refer your partner to the quote from me, in your signature block.

Maybe also ask why he/she felt that 4C was more descriptive than 3D.

There’s little point in discussing the merits or flaws in any action north can now take, since south has driven the auction completely off the rails.

4N ‘should’ be natural, but I’d bet any player who thought 4C was a good idea would take it as keycard.

Since I’d assume that partner has something like x x AKxx AKQxxxx for this bidding, I’m not worried about keycarding with no diamond control. While 4C is so bad that one has to wonder wtf is going on, even the player who bid 4C can’t have no diamond control.

Of course, it’s not as if I can count winners after keycard.

As it happens, partner presumably bids 5S, I bid 5N, partner bids 6D (hopefully we play specific kings) and I bid 7C.

Btw, just to be clear: I don’t think 4C exists. My guessing x x AKxx AKQxxxx doesn’t for a nanosecond imply that I think 4C is how to bid that hand…I’d bid 3C, having already reversed.

[smerriman]

Haven't you reminded us many times that at your club, 4♣ is always ace-asking?

[Cyberyeti]

Playing standardish methods as others have said this is a 3♦ bid not 4♣. For us this is 1♣-1♠-3♦ with bidding clubs then diamonds twice showing more HCP but less concentration in the suits.

It's a tricky hand, you want to be in 7 because partner has ♣8.

[DavidKok]

4♣ was Gerber, right?

I agree with everything mikeh said. I do sympathise a bit if opener holds, for example, 1=1=4=7 since 3♣ is NF over 2♠ and can be bid with only 5 (say, a 2=2=4=5 minimum reverse with soft hearts), and I suppose I would bid 3♥ (for me simple 4th suit GF) with a non-minimum or very good clubs.

On the actual auction I would expect opener to find 3♣ or 3♥ with all 4=6 and most 4=7 hands, so I'd expect a good 7 or any 8 clubs for the 4♣ bid. The king of clubs is staring right in our face, so opener cannot have solid clubs. So on balance I'd play partner for an 8-card suit now. Yikes.

[jillybean]

smerriman, on 2021-September-17, 23:13, said:

Haven't you reminded us many times that at your club, 4♣ is always ace-asking?

Not anymore, I'm back in Canada

[jillybean]

DavidKok, on 2021-September-18, 04:27, said:

4♣ was Gerber, right?

I agree with everything mikeh said. I do sympathise a bit if opener holds, for example, 1=1=4=7 since 3♣ is NF over 2♠ and can be bid with only 5 (say, a 2=2=4=5 minimum reverse with soft hearts), and I suppose I would bid 3♥ (for me simple 4th suit GF) with a non-minimum or very good clubs.

On the actual auction I would expect opener to find 3♣ or 3♥ with all 4=6 and most 4=7 hands, so I'd expect a good 7 or any 8 clubs for the 4♣ bid. The king of clubs is staring right in our face, so opener cannot have solid clubs. So on balance I'd play partner for an 8-card suit now. Yikes.

After partner opens 1♣ and then makes a reverse, 2♦ we are in a gf auction, 3♣ must be 6+ clubs, forward going, forcing!

[mikeh]

jillybean, on 2021-September-18, 09:56, said:

After partner opens 1♣ and then makes a reverse, 2♦ we are in a gf auction, 3♣ must be 6+ clubs, forward going, forcing!

Playing reverses as gf is very much a minority view.

It’s common to respond to 1C on such as KJxxx Jxx xxx xx…..in my partnerships we’d respond 1S (actually 1H as a transfer) with Kxxxx xxx xxx xx.

So to make 2D a gf requires either a truly enormous and rare hand or a desire for minus scores.

Indeed, the purpose of playing methods such as ingberman or lebensohl is to allow responder to announce weakness and thus avoid the gf.

Ingberman is very good here: use 2H as the negative bid…note that it allows opener an easy 2S on 3=1=4=5 or when she’s faked a reverse with 3=1=3=6, etc.

So, playing ingberman, 2S is game force. Playing lebensohl, 2S is ambiguous…it shows 5+ spades but with no strength definition.

Btw, while responder should be thinking of slam, at least, over 2D, I wouldn’t bid a forcing 3C, since we should be playing in spades opposite, say, KQx x Axxx AQxxx,which would (for me) be an absolute minimum reverse…warranted by the spade holding….x KQx AJxx AQxxx is a stronger hand but, imo, not worth a reverse….many would differ on that and, indeed, the hand is very difficult to bid if one doesn’t reverse.

Again, ingberman does better than does lebensohl, since 2S establishes the gf. Now opener has a trivial 3D, responder bids 4C, forcing, with at least some slam interest.

If opener now cuebid 4D, if 4N is keycard then we’ll reach grand unless feeling very pessimistic, since we can discover the diamond King…..of course grand is good only because opener holds the club Jack….but if he doesn’t, clubs could be 2=2 or the right opp has the short diamonds, or opener might hold AKQx AQxxxx in the minors, and so on.I think one would need to be quite pessimistic to avoid 7C.

If keycard is unavailable (personally I think 4N, in minor slamming auctions, should show ‘extras in context but not enough to cuebid beyond game’), I can see

1C. 1S
2D. 2S
3D. 4C
4D. 4H
5C. 5S
7C

Having shown a minimum via 5C, rather than bidding 4N, and seeing the grand slam try of 5S, opener has to bid the grand….she has a ‘good’ bad hand in context.

[Winstonm]

jillybean, on 2021-September-18, 09:56, said:

After partner opens 1♣ and then makes a reverse, 2♦ we are in a gf auction, 3♣ must be 6+ clubs, forward going, forcing!

You should consider this only a 1-round force auction.

However, with mistrust rampant is many medium-level partners, I can imagine partner thinking 3 clubs could be passed and therefore has a hand along these lines: void, Kx, AKQ, AQ10xxxxx

That's the only thing that makes any kind of sense to me.

[smerriman]

Winstonm, on 2021-September-18, 13:47, said:

However, with mistrust rampant is many medium-level partners, I can imagine partner thinking 3 clubs could be passed and therefore has a hand along these lines: void, Kx, AKQ, AQ10xxxxx

If you're playing lebensohl rather than ingberman, 3♣ *can* be passed, since 2♠ is only a one round force.