[pooltuna]

Even Nat'l Champions are tempted to take insurance at these colors plus if they don't you might actually make it

[mtvesuvius]

I bid 5♠ at the table, which caught a raise from partner holding AKQJTx Qxx - AKxx, and made 6 when we did not suffer a heart ruff.

[aguahombre]

Ok, so now that we know North's hand, give South the heart ace instead of the heart jack. Help me understand how FP would work, what North would reopen with after a pass, and how pass and pull (pull what?) would come into play.

These things always confuse me.

[kayin801]

aguahombre, on 2011-March-31, 11:30, said:

Ok, so now give South the heart ace instead of the heart jack. Help me understand how FP would work, what North would reopen after a pass, and how pass and pull (pull what?) would come into play.

These things always confuse me.

Pass then 5♠ after partner Xs shows a stronger hand then 5♠ immediately. If partner bid 5♠ instead of X then we'd probably bid 6♥ as a GS try without a minor suit control, though the prisoner might say that 5♥ right away and 6♥ later shows this, but maybe with xxxx, Axxxx, xxx, x we'd do 5♥ instead and your described hand is P... -> 6♥.

(made edit to last paragraph)

[aguahombre]

The focus is on the heart strength and the club length. AK(any) and club dub=grand; Axxxx or kxxxx in hearts is probably down in slam; KJXXX is good if no heart ruff, but also needs club dub or 3-2 hearts.

[aibZ]

I think pass is forcing here. 4♠ isn't just some hand that's shooting out a game hoping for a random 8-count from pard to bring it home. A jump over a preempt shows a REAL HAND - and should turn on FP for our side.

[bluecalm]

Quote

I think pass is forcing here. 4♠ isn't just some hand that's shooting out a game hoping for a random 8-count from pard to bring it home. A jump over a preempt shows a REAL HAND - and should turn on FP for our side.

LOL.

Yeah, and it should show REAL 8 card suit with AT LEAST 3 aces AND two KINGS !! IT's not just some hand hoping for a random 8 count from pard blablabla.
And what if you have KQJTxxx AQJx x x ? You eat the cards ?

[mtvesuvius]

I think Z's point is that is isn't pre-emptive or weak-ish in nature.

I would consider KQJTxxx AQJx x x a minimum 4♠ bid, although just 3♠ is probably enough with that.

[gnasher]

aguahombre, on 2011-March-31, 11:30, said:

Ok, so now that we know North's hand, give South the heart ace instead of the heart jack. Help me understand how FP would work, what North would reopen with after a pass, and how pass and pull (pull what?) would come into play.

These things always confuse me.

The theory is that:
- South passes, initially saying "I don't know whether to bid on or to defend."
- South expects that North will make a penalty double. South plans to remove the double, showing a slam try.
- If North unexpectedly bids instead of making a penalty double, South bids slam. The problem with this is that bidding slam may not be right.

You can improve that, in theory at least, by inverting pass and double. Then:
- South passes, initially saying "I have a penalty double".
- South expects that North will double, saying "I would have passed your penalty double". South plans to remove the double, showing a slam try.
- If North unexpectedly bids instead of making a penalty double, he is saying "I would have pulled your penalty double." Now South can bid slam with more confidence.

This post has been edited by gnasher: 2011-March-31, 13:32

[aibZ]

mtvesuvius, on 2011-March-31, 13:13, said:

I think Z's point is that is isn't pre-emptive or weak-ish in nature.

I would consider KQJTxxx AQJx x x a minimum 4♠ bid, although just 3♠ is probably enough with that.

This is actually a reasonably good example of a double-and-bid hand over a preempt. It shows the same strength as a 4S bid, just more than one possible strain in which to play.

[aibZ]

gnasher, on 2011-March-31, 13:31, said:

The theory is that:
- South passes, initially saying "I don't know whether to bid on or to defend."
- South expects that North will make a penalty double. South plans to remove the double, showing a slam try.
- If North unexpectedly bids instead of making a penalty double, South bids slam. The problem with this is that bidding slam may not be right.

You can improve that, in theory at least, by inverting pass and double. Then:
- South passes, initially saying "I have a penalty double".
- South expects that North will double, saying "I would have passed your penalty double". South plans to remove the double, showing a slam try.
- If North unexpectedly bids instead of making a penalty double, he is saying "I would have pulled your penalty double." Now South can bid slam with more confidence.

This works really great if all your bids are made in tempo, all the time. When pard takes ninety seconds to double and you pull, this is basically forcing to committee.

[MrAce]

bluecalm, on 2011-March-31, 12:46, said:

LOL.

Yeah, and it should show REAL 8 card suit with AT LEAST 3 aces AND two KINGS !! IT's not just some hand hoping for a random 8 count from pard blablabla.
And what if you have KQJTxxx AQJx x x ? You eat the cards ?

He will bid 4♠ with that, but i am having hard time to understand what are u trying to say. We have xxxx KJxxx xx xx In your example our ♥ J seems gone to pd's hand, so make us xxxx Kxxxx xx xx. What can you possibly take in defense to defeat 5♦ ?

To me it is % 100 fp, but regardless, our hand bids 5♠ as some others already stated. If you dont play fp here, u will bid 5♠ with this, as well as with xxxx Kxxxx xx Kx or xxxx Kxxxx xx Ax. I just can not believe there are still people who questions the benefits of fp here. None of us claimed that fp gives a perfect picture of your hand to partner, it just gives a little more about your intention to partner and that little info can be vital in some hands, thats it.

[bluecalm]

Quote

He will bid 4♠ with that, but i am having hard time to understand what are u trying to say

I am just criticizing wishful thinking like:
"isn't just some hand that's shooting out a game hoping for a random 8-count from pard to bring it home."

or:

"it should be similar to 2♣ opener"

Playing forcing pass here is one thing. I don't like it but at least it makes some distant sense. Making argument for playing it in a kind that 4♠ promises things which it can't logically promise is another.

Quote

I just can not believe there are still people who questions the benefits of fp here.

I just can't believe they are still people who question that if we play fp here they have an easy life (6♦ if we bid 5♠, pass if we pass and partner removes to 5♠, 6♦ if we remove partner's double to 5♠) which will make ton of imps to them in exchange for slight increase of our slam bidding precision.
Why slam bidding and not game bidding ? Because in this kind of problem we need to be making our game about 30% of the time to make profitable and that is assuming they don't even take phantom save. If we add this possibility it will be probably around 20%-25%. Maybe forcing pass will help you just a bit to bid those 30% games and avoid those 20% ones but this is very narrow target which removes large part of your equity on the deal (by making saving decisions much easier to them).

[cloa513]

Your shape is very bad- doubletons are probably the worst to hold in such a situation given a singleton and a few spades then 5S would be reasonable. If partner was powerful enough to handle 5S direct then he would have bid 5 as an overcall- the likelihood of staying in 4S was not great. Its likely partner has a shortage in hearts and a doubleton diamond Ax so you have 3 losers. Your pass says don't bid any higher- double or pass is the choice and don't count your spades as tricks for your double. If you were short in spades, you'd double. So clearly pass.

[gwnn]

zasanya, on 2011-March-30, 23:14, said:

While I think I can can work out what sort of hand should double (Short ♠ with a ♦honor?) I cant figure out what sort of hand should bid 5 spades.( no A K; 3+ spades with short ♣ or ♥? )
Could you help?

Hands with long spades and not a lot of diamonds.

[gnasher]

bluecalm, on 2011-March-31, 22:26, said:

I just can't believe they are still people who question that if we play fp here they have an easy life (6♦ if we bid 5♠, pass if we pass and partner removes to 5♠, 6♦ if we remove partner's double to 5♠) which will make ton of imps to them in exchange for slight increase of our slam bidding precision.
Why slam bidding and not game bidding ? Because in this kind of problem we need to be making our game about 30% of the time to make profitable and that is assuming they don't even take phantom save. If we add this possibility it will be probably around 20%-25%. Maybe forcing pass will help you just a bit to bid those 30% games and avoid those 20% ones but this is very narrow target which removes large part of your equity on the deal (by making saving decisions much easier to them).

The reason for playing a forcing pass is to improve our game bidding. If pass is forcing, we have a choice of three messages about game:
- 5♠: I think we should play in 5♠
- Double: I think we should defend
- Pass: I don't know what to do.

The ability to use pass-and-pull to make a slam try is just a bonus.

[JLOGIC]

Yeah people don't seem to be understanding the point of forcing passes in this thread.

For instance:

Quote

Pass is forcing. So passing doesnt make sense to me, if u wanna defend 5♦ then DBL, if u wanna play 5♠ bid it

Huh? What about when we have a hand that is not sure if we want to defend or bid. Partners hand is not greatly defined. With the knowledge that we are not sure what to do (meaning we have some offensive potential/a fit), partner will be able to make a better decision than we would have been able to make by just guessing immediately.

No, this does not mean we will get all decisions right, but it does mean we will see a marked improvement over just guessing ourselves by passing it off to partner when we're not sure and letting him decide.

Really none of this has anything to do with slam bidding, I do not even know what the difference between bidding 5H is, passing and bidding 5H is, and passing and bidding 5S is. Who cares, the real point of the forcing pass is to enable us to have some communication in a really cramped and important spot so that we can guess right a higher %age of the time whether we are supposed to bid 5S or double them.

[gnasher]

JLOGIC, on 2011-April-01, 02:43, said:

I do not even know what the difference between bidding 5H is, passing and bidding 5H is, and passing and bidding 5S is. Who cares

I know you said you didn't care, but since you mention it, I think that a direct 5♥ isn't primarily a slam try - it's a hand that's bidding 5♠, with length and strength in hearts.

Regarding the difference between pass-then-5♥ and pass-then-5♠, maybe 5♥ implies a lack of a diamond control?

[whereagles]

straube, on 2011-March-31, 00:22, said:

For what it's worth, Robson/Segal in their book Partnership Bidding would recommend (pretty sure anyway) this to be a forcing pass situation because our side at unfavorable vul jumped to game.

Actually, I would say "no". Their forcing pass situations are something like

1. After a fit-bid/FNJ/new suit that force to the 4-level and at "red" (V vs NV)
2. After an inv+ support bid and opps are at the 5-level
3. After a cue that forces to game

Unless you want to broaden the scope of 2 into any inv+ bid (bidding game definitely is an inv+ bid), I'd say that, strictly speaking, pass is NOT forcing.

[MrAce]

JLOGIC, on 2011-April-01, 02:43, said:

Yeah people don't seem to be understanding the point of forcing passes in this thread.


Huh? What about when we have a hand that is not sure if we want to defend or bid. Partners hand is not greatly defined. With the knowledge that we are not sure what to do (meaning we have some offensive potential/a fit), partner will be able to make a better decision than we would have been able to make by just guessing immediately.

I meant "Passing doesnt make sense to me" for this hand. Perhaps i shd have made it clear. And if u read i am one of those who said FP doesnt give pd a picture hand, and that its just a tool to be able to express our intention better. Of course there will be hands where we need to pass first, but it is interesting that you understood what i said the other way arround (even with my lack of clarification) how can someone play forcing pass and think "passing doesn't make sense" regardless of hands.

In this hand i still stand with pass not making sense, forcing or not. What will you do when pd doubles ? How can u expect pd to judge well when he doesn't know you hold 4 of his 6 or 7 cards suit and a KJxxx side suit ? Unless you believe our hand worths to make a slam try, which i don't.