[gnasher]

FrancesHinden, on 2012-May-16, 13:59, said:

(If you think 4NT is 'pick a minor', what do you do with a natural 4NT bid? I play 4H as any two suits, by the way, so if I was not passing that is what I would bid)

You could ask the same question about any 4NT bid in competition. Some 4NT bids are more useful as natural, and some 4NT bids are more useful as two places to play. I agree that this is a fairly close decision.

By playing 4NT as natural you gain a balanced slam try, but you lose

3♥ dbl pass 4♥
pass 4♠ pass 5♣

as a natural slam try, and/or

3♥ dbl pass 4♥
pass 4♠ pass 4NT

as Keycard for spades

[han]

mikeh, on 2012-May-16, 16:56, said:

Well, you might just be collecting 500 or 800 against a cold slam

If that's the worst case scenario, how bad can this be? On a bad day we'll score 500 or 800 versus 990. On a good day we'll collect 1100 versus making a game or going down in slam.

Looking at what the actual player had makes me think that a vulnerable against not preempt may not always be what you and I would expect from our partners.

[bluecalm]

You post very difficult hands. It's another post I open and have no idea what to do
My instinct is that 3NT is better than passing but I am not sure at all about it.

Btw, I think 4NT should be natural but our hand is not nearly strong enough for the bid.

[karlson]

mikeh, on 2012-May-16, 16:56, said:

Well, you might just be collecting 500 or 800 against a cold slam, when opener has a real vulnerable 3♥, you have short top hearts, and partner extras with a long suit. You hold AQ tight in hearts and partner a stiff....not a holding I am personally yearning for on defence, especially if dummy has a ruffing value.

The former is likely enough, at this heat, while the latter (partner having the values to drive to slam over a natural 4N) may not be. But I think it a mistake to assume that there is no need for a natural 4N at these colours....and I see Frances' solution as being an excellent compromise.

Besides, few partnerships will be detailed enough to agree that the meaning of 4N varies according to vulnerability...and if you play 4N as natural, say red v white, how do you show the minors, and why not do that all the time anyway?

It seems hard to imagine that we have a hand with only 2 (or even 3) hearts, partner made a takeout double of hearts, and there's no suit that we would like to seriously suggest as trumps. We should be able to make a slam try after starting with 4h.

I thought this 4N was obviously minors until reading the discussion, and remain unconvinced.

[MrAce]

karlson, on 2012-May-17, 16:36, said:

I thought this 4N was obviously minors until reading the discussion, and remain unconvinced.

It depends who you are asking to.

4♥ for most people is 2 places to play, 2 suiter, or whatever you want to call it. Minors are pretty much covered here.

This leaves 4 NT

-Asking aces
-Natural
-Some sort of 5 minor bid with the intention of telling pd that we want to play 5 minor (1 suited hand) and we have no desire to play slam ( means we already stretched our hand to make this bid), while direct 5 minor shows real values to play game and slam availibility if pd believes we have what it takes. Or you can vice versa the meaning of 4NT and 5m bids, i personally like this way because i want my pd to know which minor i have when i suggest him it is OK to bid slam.

But whatever you decide to play, it will still be better than using this as minors, because you can easily have minors covered in 4♥ bid as i said.

[han]

MrAce, on 2012-May-17, 18:59, said:

It depends who you are asking to.

4♥ for most people is 2 places to play, 2 suiter, or whatever you want to call it. Minors are pretty much covered here.

I was just reading in the Dutch Bermuda Bowl book about the following auction:

1S - (Dbl) - 2S - (Dbl)
p - (3S) - p - (4H)
p - (4NT) - p - (5D)
all pass

Sementa thought that 4NT was keycards for hearts, Duboin intended it as minors. 5D in the 5-2 fit had no chance while 5C in the 5-4 fit was cold.

Who was right?

Duboin had something like xx AK AKJxx QJxx. Perhaps 2D is an alternative to doubling, depending on style, but once you double I think that 3S is the only option for the second call. After partner bids 4H you can't pass, and I think that 5C would just show diamonds, why can't he have a strong single suited hand that wanted to play clubs if partner had those?

Sementa had xx xxxx xx AKxxx. Not a typical hand for a responsive double, but using 2NT as scrambling it seems like you will usually get to a good spot on partscore deals. After 3S I think that Sementa should have bid 4C, but I understand that he wanted to bid his hearts after having suggested fewer than 4. It created this mess though.

The real problem came with the misunderstanding of 4NT of course. I don't know what is right, although looking at Duboin's hand I don't see any other way to bid it so I think it has to be minors, and the slam try hands will have to bid 4S over 4H. What do you think?

[MickyB]

Sim and I had a similar auction recently.

2S-X-3S-X
P-4H-P-?

4NT as both minors, either longer, seems inadequate in case doubler is 2533. You could use 4S to show the minors with 4NT asking for the longer, or you could play both 4N and 5C as the minors. No idea whether this is worth the inevitable losses elsewhere.

[MrAce]

han, on 2012-May-18, 03:27, said:

I was just reading in the Dutch Bermuda Bowl book about the following auction:

1S - (Dbl) - 2S - (Dbl)
p - (3S) - p - (4H)
p - (4NT) - p - (5D)
all pass

Sementa thought that 4NT was keycards for hearts, Duboin intended it as minors. 5D in the 5-2 fit had no chance while 5C in the 5-4 fit was cold.

Who was right?

Duboin had something like xx AK AKJxx QJxx. Perhaps 2D is an alternative to doubling, depending on style, but once you double I think that 3S is the only option for the second call. After partner bids 4H you can't pass, and I think that 5C would just show diamonds, why can't he have a strong single suited hand that wanted to play clubs if partner had those?

Sementa had xx xxxx xx AKxxx. Not a typical hand for a responsive double, but using 2NT as scrambling it seems like you will usually get to a good spot on partscore deals. After 3S I think that Sementa should have bid 4C, but I understand that he wanted to bid his hearts after having suggested fewer than 4. It created this mess though.

The real problem came with the misunderstanding of 4NT of course. I don't know what is right, although looking at Duboin's hand I don't see any other way to bid it so I think it has to be minors, and the slam try hands will have to bid 4S over 4H. What do you think?

I think Sementa should have bid 4 ♣, not 4♥, this is a very problematic auction, no wonder one of world's best pair got it wrong. I am not sure if i would understand 4 NT as minors. Its probably correct but i am trying to be honest if you and i was having this auction, there is a good chance i would take it as RKCB on ♥ too, unless we have discussed it in detail previously.

[Fluffy]

han, on 2012-May-18, 03:27, said:

I was just reading in the Dutch Bermuda Bowl book about the following auction:

1S - (Dbl) - 2S - (Dbl)
p - (3S) - p - (4H)
p - (4NT) - p - (5D)
all pass

Sementa thought that 4NT was keycards for hearts, Duboin intended it as minors. 5D in the 5-2 fit had no chance while 5C in the 5-4 fit was cold.

Who was right?

Duboin had something like xx AK AKJxx QJxx. Perhaps 2D is an alternative to doubling, depending on style, but once you double I think that 3S is the only option for the second call. After partner bids 4H you can't pass, and I think that 5C would just show diamonds, why can't he have a strong single suited hand that wanted to play clubs if partner had those?

Sementa had xx xxxx xx AKxxx. Not a typical hand for a responsive double, but using 2NT as scrambling it seems like you will usually get to a good spot on partscore deals. After 3S I think that Sementa should have bid 4C, but I understand that he wanted to bid his hearts after having suggested fewer than 4. It created this mess though.

The real problem came with the misunderstanding of 4NT of course. I don't know what is right, although looking at Duboin's hand I don't see any other way to bid it so I think it has to be minors, and the slam try hands will have to bid 4S over 4H. What do you think?

Goes to show that 14-30 is clearly superior

[FrancesHinden]

I know some very good players who use 3H x P 4NT as asking for aces. It's certainly a sensible use of the bid, I'm not sure what is actually best.

[JLOGIC]

I highly doubt it's sensible. There are too many other priorities in that auction.