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Messages - brian_m

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1
Interesting Play Hands / Re: You say “bad split”, I say “endplay”
« on: February 08, 2022, 12:27:00 AM »
Yes, I agree that I'm making those assumptions, for the reasons I gave in my earlier post. I just don't buy the idea of West penalty doubling under your club bid with less than 5 clubs, even if he has all the missing strength except for  !HQ. I agree my logic for playing for 4=1=3=5 rather than 4=0=4=5 might be a little less certain.

Anyway, I certainly wouldn't be capable of working out the probabilities at the table. It gives me headaches just trying to think through them now!  ::) One thing is certain, though, and that's if the hearts are split 5-1, the chances of a stiff  !H Q or  !H 10 in the West hand are not negligible.


2
Interesting Play Hands / Re: You say “bad split”, I say “endplay”
« on: February 07, 2022, 01:01:20 PM »
I understand your logic, Aravind, but I'm still not 100% convinced. The problem I have is that the deep !H finesse risks losing to a singleton 10 or Queen in West's hand. Let's try something a little different.

We know West has the 13th  !S from the 2 !S bid. I think it's also highly unlikely, unless West has taken leave of his senses, for him to have less than five  !C, possibly even six, to make what we know (following your logic) is a penalty double sitting underneath your !C suit. So, we've placed at least nine cards in the West hand, leaving only four red cards. Since West doubled the opening 1 !H, rather than overcall, I think it's fair to place him with 4-1-3-5 or maybe even 4-0-4-5, although the fact that he ran to 2 !S rather than 2 !D after your redouble is at least circumstantial evidence for for 4=1=3=5, or possibly 4=0=3=6. We have to assume that the  !D are 4-3, I think, if West has made an off-shape takeout double with only two  !D, and East is 3=5=5=0, I don't think you can make that contract without risking everything on the read and cashing the  !C A before you end up in dummy.

I think it all depends on your reading of the opponents' hands. The line of play I come up with is :-

We take, by force, the 3rd round of  !S, thinking ourselves lucky that West didn't duck the first round of  !S - I think that kills the contract.

Play a  !H, putting up the A or K from dummy. This protects against West's singleton  !H being the 10 or Queen.

Come back to the Ace of  !D, and now you can cash the Ace of  !C, removing East's (presumed) only remaining black card. Now it's time for your deep  !H finesse, then set up your fifth  !D in dummy, and East has to give you another  !H finesse.

It's quite honestly giving me headaches trying to work out which of these lines is superior. The one thing of which I'm certain is that your line is off if West's stiff  !H is the Q or 10 - you're going to lose 3 !S, 1 !H and 1 !D. My line is still alive, because I crash that high  !H. It all depends on how you read the E-W hands, I guess. 

3
Interesting Play Hands / Re: An Instructive Hand for Assumptions & Counting
« on: January 09, 2022, 01:42:37 PM »
Quote from: OliverC on January 09, 2022, 10:27:07 AM
Counting is the key, though, Brian:
  • East opened the bidding so they have at have at least 11-12 HCP
  • That in turn means that West is unlikely to have more than 3 HCP, probably less.
  • Since you cannot stop East from taking their !S Ace at some point there is no way you can make this contract if the Diamonds are 5-3.
  • Thus you have to base your play on the assumption that the Diamonds are 4-4.
  • Note that you don't really lose anything if it turns out that the Diamonds are 5-3 after all.
  • Once East shows up with a singleton Club, then if the !D are 4-4 (your assumption) East must be 4441 or they would have a 5-card Major and would have opened that instead of 1 !D.
  • Now you can count the hand and plan to get them down to !S Ax, !H Kx, !D Q, !C - when you play the 5th round of Clubs.
  • Whether they discard the small Spade or blank their !H King you can now endplay them with a !S or drop the singleton King of Hearts.
If instead they discard the !D Queen then you just have to credit their expert play  -  you gave it your best shot. Now they can exit to the Spade Q in West's hand and West can either cash a long Diamond or lead a !H through. Not many defenders will think of chucking a sure-fire winner in order to keep an exit card, however.

Please note, guys, this is not a "Hail Mary" play. Playing for West to have the !H King  and East to have !H 10x would fall into that category, for sure. Giving East the !S Ace, !H King and !D KQ is entirely consistent with the bidding and West's opening lead of the !D Jack.


On this hand, I agree. I was just trying to emphasise your last sentence in the original post. IMO, it's a very important point, that many weaker players seem to miss.

4
Interesting Play Hands / Re: An Instructive Hand for Assumptions & Counting
« on: January 05, 2022, 06:11:55 AM »
To anybody reading this who might feel a little overawed by Oliver's hand reading and card play - in my opinion, the most important point is in Oliver's last sentence.

No matter what level you play at, if you find yourself in a contract where you can see no legitimate way to make it, the final chance is always to see whether you can find a mistake that an opponent could make to give you the contract, and then you play to try to give that opponent the best chance to make that mistake.

5
Correct (?) Answers to Bidding Problems / MOVED: is motor on ? can north bid transfer to spades after the dbl? thanks Mark
« on: December 03, 2021, 08:10:06 PM »
This topic has been moved to the Simple system forum.


6
Interesting Play Hands / Re: Double dummy play problem.
« on: October 12, 2021, 06:44:04 PM »
You're right, six is easy. It was the need to immediately ruff a heart that I missed.

7
Dealer Scripts / Re: Vul NT vs nv NT opener script
« on: June 24, 2021, 08:08:41 AM »
A bug rather than deliberate non-implementation, then. Well done for the detective work.

8
Dealer Scripts / Re: Vul NT vs nv NT opener script
« on: June 21, 2021, 07:42:11 AM »
Quote from: abby cj on June 21, 2021, 12:57:25 AM
yes..I tried that but it doesn't work..The best I can get is every other deal being vulnerable.

As above, it's possible they don't let the 'vulnerable' command override the usual rotation of vulnerabilities. The easy answer is to skip the deals you don't want, of course. If you want to pursue this I'd suggest writing to BBO support in the first case and asking then whether the "vulnerable" command has been implemented. They could hopefully ask one of their programmers. It's impossible to know for certain without seeing BBO's source code.

9
Dealer Scripts / Re: Vul NT vs nv NT opener script
« on: June 20, 2021, 05:54:10 PM »
Quote from: abby cj on June 20, 2021, 05:04:43 PM
I am trying to set the vulnerability script for the dealer when at a practice table in BBO.  So far I have been able to 1) set the dealer 2) set the NT range..but I am unable to add in the vulnerability.  I am not a computer person at all...any advice/suggestion as to how to accomplish this is appreciated.

I don't know how fully BBO have implemented Hans van Staveren's dealer program in their dealer scripts, so I can't guarantee this will work - but if you want to set the vulnerability in the stand-alone dealer program, the command to put in the script file is

vulnerable ??

Where ?? is one of

none
all
NS
EW


If you can't get this to work, let me know and I'll have a play with it, but it may take me a few days to find the time to do so.


10
Interesting Play Hands / Double dummy play problem.
« on: June 28, 2020, 08:40:39 PM »
https://www.bridgebase.com/tools/handviewer.html?bbo=y&lin=pn|brian_m,kasey,IBracem,brucek|st||md|3S24QAH36AD5C689JK%2CS356H4789JDJC457T%2CS89JHTD36TQKAC3QA%2C|rh||ah|Board 25|sv|e|mb|1C|mb|p|mb|2C!|an|!c positive%2C GF|mb|p|mb|2D|mb|p|mb|3C!|an|5 controls|mb|p|mb|6C|mb|p|mb|p|mb|p|pc|HK|pc|HA|pc|H4|pc|HT|pc|CK|pc|C4|pc|C3|pc|C2|pc|C6|pc|C5|pc|CQ|pc|H2|pc|CA|pc|H5|pc|C8|pc|C7|pc|DA|pc|D2|pc|D5|pc|DJ|pc|DK|pc|D4|pc|H3|pc|CT|pc|H7|pc|S8|pc|HQ|pc|H6|pc|S7|pc|SQ|pc|S3|pc|S9|pc|SA|pc|S5|pc|SJ|pc|ST|pc|CJ|pc|H8|pc|D3|pc|D7|pc|S4|pc|S6|pc|D6|pc|SK|pc|D9|pc|C9|pc|H9|pc|DT|pc|S2|pc|HJ|pc|DQ|pc|D8|

I'm not really endorsing Mark's precipitous jump to 6 !C, in fact I thought we might have missed 7 !C when I saw the two hands, but once I saw all four hands I'm having great difficulty in finding a line which makes 12 tricks on the K !H lead. If East did not have the 10 !S then I could possibly do it by leading away from AQ !S and getting another entry to dummy by finessing  !S 9, but unfortunately East's  !S are K10x not Kxx, which puts paid to that idea.

If you let West ruff a  !D then she will continue  !H.

Can anybody see a line which makes the slam?


11
Bidding Challenges / Re: Positive responder with 55+
« on: June 29, 2019, 05:50:05 AM »
Quote from: lute57 on June 28, 2019, 10:43:54 PM
Hi Dick,

Good to see you playing OCP and discussing tweaks with partner.

IMO, you perfectly bid the sequence according to OCP doctrine. In regards to partner showing  !D first, I think everyone would do the same. With 8+ HCP and 5-card  !H & 6-card  !D, the only time I would show the 5-card Major first is when the Minor is significantly weaker. I believe that is Oliver's doctrine, too.

Anyway, Brian created a nice gadget for showing two-suited Responder hands with 8+ HCP. 1 !C-2 !H [alert] showing 8+HCP and promising two-suits. Of course, to incorporate this in your system, you need to modify your 4441 8-11 HCP Responder responses. I believe Brian suggested making 1 !C-2 !S showing 4441 8-11 HCP and showing a singleton in one of the Major-suits. Similar to 1 !C-2NT [generic singleton in the Minors]. You would also have to adjust your subsequent Eta responses to allow the additional first step "oops! you Eta Asked in my singleton suit."

Brian can elaborate better (and correct me as needed). I think Oliver has no problem with OCP partnerships playing in this matter; but I seriously doubt if it will ever become part of OCP standard. Although it is a tweak I use, and I believe Brian continues to endorse it, adding it as standard OCP just adds another level of complexity to a standard system that is already quite complex [and we are talking the Simple System  :D].

John

Maybe the information in the alternative treatments forum is not up to date. I'll go take a look...

One quick check later...

The information in the alternative treatments forum is correct, provided you notice the amendment in red to my original posting, and read down to the bottom of the thread to see what we ended up with.

The two and three suited positives which Georgi and I devised, and Michael and I now play, are as follows

1 !C - 2 !H = 8+ HCP with any 5+/5+ two-suited hand except for both minors. In other words, the 2 !H bid must promise at least one 5+ card major.

1 !C - 2 !S = ANY 4441 shape with either 8-11 or (rarely, obviously!) 16+ HCP.

1 !C - 2NT = 8+ HCP with 5+/5+ in the minors. We found that we had to take this out of the 2 !H bid to get the responses to work properly.

1 !C - 3 of a suit = the standard suit below the singleton 4441 of OCP, but these bids are limited to 12-15 HCP. It's obviously very rare for responder to have 16+ 4441 shape opposite a 1 !C opener, but we found we could handle that very easily within the 2 !S response, so we moved those hands into that. After 1 !C-2 !S Opener just assumes that Responder has the 8-11 hand initially, as will be the case on the overwhelming majority of occasions. For those very rare occasions when responder does have 16+, they just continue on after opener (presumably!) signs off in game.

If anyone wants the Adobe PDF of this scheme, with all the continuation bids, send me an e-mail (or PM me your e-mail address on here) and I'll send it to you.



12
Interesting Play Hands / Re: A Nice Burns Law Violation
« on: June 27, 2019, 11:49:18 AM »
The hand was in a duplicate at Stratford-on-Avon BC, when I still lived in the UK. Not surprisingly, we got a visit from the TD on the following round because the next table just couldn't believe the contract. We'd been waiting for the TD call.  ::)

When I told him what had happened, the (playing) TD probably violated Law on providing UI (can a TD's announcement provide UI? Interesting theoretical question...) by telling the room there was a very unusual contract on board number whatever it was, the entry on the traveller was correct, and please don't call him to query it! 

I can't honestly say I blamed him...  ;D



13
Interesting Play Hands / Re: A Nice Burns Law Violation
« on: June 26, 2019, 12:57:23 PM »
It's a shame there's not a way to fit the old Blue Club style 1NT opener into Precision, where 1NT was either the genuine 1NT or the 'other' range with a 5 card  !C suit (in the case of Blue Club, that was always 12-14, as the genuine NT was 15-17 bal).

The problem is that it would totally bugger the system of transfers (and the 2-way 2 !D) so there's no possible case to be made for it.

The occasional Burn's Law violation , sometimes spectacular violations against opponents who know what they're doing, are the price to be paid for playing Precision or similar systems.

I still claim at least a joint share of the ultimate, unbeatable record for a Burn's Law violation for playing 2 !D, undoubled (because opps knew I would likely escape) and at adverse, with not one diamond in either hand, and getting a good score for ending up with zero tricks in 2 !D-8 (-800) when opponents had 6 !D cold their way for +920. The culprit was an Amsbury sequence

(1 !C)-2 !D-all pass

1 !C Precision (including, as it turned out, a six card  !D suit)

2 !D showed a weak jump in  !D OR a 3-suiter short  !D OR a major 2-suiter.

My LHO had the other seven  !D, and passed, hoping for a takeout double from her partner.

My partner looked at her  !D void and decided I had to have the WJO in  !D, so she passed

Opener looked at his 6-card  !D suit, assumed that his partner had a weak hand rather than a trap pass, and at the vulnerability decided to play for 100s, as his double would have been for takeout and would also have let me escape if I didn't hold the WJO in  !D.

 ;D




14
Bidding Challenges / Re: MOTOR and Lebensohl Nuances
« on: May 17, 2019, 01:18:40 AM »
Quote from: OliverC on May 16, 2019, 11:59:43 PM
I wouldn't say it's a "requirement", even now. The idea behind the suggested holding for a redouble is that a 6-1 or 7-0 opposing trump split might cause opener some problems in 1MXX even if we definitely hold the balance of the HCP and the opposing long trumps are under Declarer. Obviously Responder won't be better then Hx in Opener's Major, but we also want to be sure that 1MXX is going to make. :)

I take your point, but there's still the question of how to handle one of those inconvenient decent hands where responder has one or even none of opener's major. 1 !S-(dbl)- and you're looking at  something like   !S void   !H Axxx   !D KJxx   !C KJxxx  Not a common holding, I grant you, but if  !S Hx or even  !S xx is only a suggestion rather than a requirement, then this one could go seriously wrong.


15
Bidding Challenges / Re: MOTOR and Lebensohl Nuances
« on: May 15, 2019, 12:07:32 PM »
Quote from: OliverC on May 15, 2019, 07:37:58 AM
(3) and (4) are easy in the sense that they are "normal" Leb sequences. 2NT is Leb and 3NT is "fast", and therefore lacking a Heart Stop and presumably with good long Diamonds.


It's (1) and (2), particularly (1), that are a bit more interesting to me. I know what I've written on the MOTOR sections, but...


I wonder if there really is much point in either of them being natural in any way at green vs red, especially (2), because Responder would have a fairly obvious Redouble over 1 !S - (X) - ??. I can't see much sense in (1) being Leb either, because MOTOR already gives us so many different ways of expressing different hand-types. Even if Responder has a Spade shortage here, a Redouble seems very attractive once Responder is 11-12 (let alone 13+) and if the Spade split is bad, the opposing Spade length will be underneath Opener, which is probably good for us.


At red vs green, natural and invitational, or natural and GF makes perfect sense but I do now wonder whether it's worth reconsidering their meaning at favourable vulnerability.


I'd be interested to hear other people's view on this.

There seems to be one hand type which it's a little awkward to bid after opponents double - particularly if we're at favourable, as you say. The redouble is supposed to have secondary support for opener's major (the notes say Hx) but the problem would arise with 4441 shape short in opener's major. In John's sequences 1) and 2), we have already taken the decision not to try to extract a penalty from opponents by using MOTOR. I would wonder whether we could remove the 'secondary support' requirement from the redouble and make it penalty-hunting with no guarantee of anything in partner's suit, and use the MOTOR-then-NT sequence to show some support but trumps not good enough for one of the limit raise sequences.

This isn't to say that a redouble denies support for opener's major, just that responder thinks we will be better off looking for that penalty.




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