David Stevenson
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I do wonder whether confirming helps in the long run. Like so many safety items in our life today they tend to stop people thinking about safety and act automatically – and then you will find yourself confirming automatically even when you made the wrong call or play. Try it if you like, but in the long run I think just accepting the odd accident with a misclick where an Undo is not permitted or is too late might be better.
It is normal bridge for preemptive bids to be more varied in third hand. They might have better or worse suits than normal, they might have more points or fewer. Weak twos are mini preempts so this applies to them. Of course if the opponents had asked for the range then an answer should include the variation.
Dealer takes the cards from his left and puts them on his right for his RHO to lift the top portion off and put it down towards dealer. Dealer then completes the cut and deals.
Dealer takes the cards from his left and puts them on his right for his RHO to lift the top portion off and put it down towards dealer. Dealer then completes the cut and deals.
The word standard means different things to different people and the EBU has said for a long time that the term should not be used. My advice is the same. A lot of people assume that what they play is standard so if you ask this and get the answer yes you might easily find they do something different.
I agree that what is printed on standard cards is probably standard in England and Wales. Nevertheless it is a dangerous way to ask and may lead to misunderstandings. Safer is to ask people what their leads are.
It is perfectly legitimate to ask both opponents their carding. The safest way on BBO is to use ‘Chat to Opponents’ which send each of them a private message. People tend to answer the way they are asked, so if asked by private message they tend to answer that way. In practice most people just ask questions by Table Chat and hope at least one of the opponents answer!
You can ask specific questions, certainly, but you must be careful with the wording and I do not like your wording. “Does your partnership play fourth highest from long suits” is permissible, but I do not think you can ask whether they lead from their longest suit, which is a judgement matter. The danger in even that question is that some players lead top of nothing or second highest from suits not headed by an honour and might answer “Yes” to that question even when the correct answer is, “Yes, so long as it is headed by an honour”.
Probably your first question should be “What are your agreements over leads?” which is a more neutral question but some less experienced players get flustered and you may get some strange answers! Then you will probably have to ask more specific questions. Of course if they have not discussed it then it is correct to say so. You are only entitled to know their agreements.
Two things I think can help to speed you up:
1 When you as declarer decide to play a spade decide what to do from both hands. For example you hold xx opposite KQTx in dummy. Having thought for a bit and decided to play this suit some players eventually lead this suit, LHO (left hand opponent) plays small, and then they stop to decide whether to play the ten, or one of the king/queen. If after thinking you decide to play this suit deciding what to do when LHO plays small should be part of your decision.
2 When defending there are certain things you should decide when you first see the dummy. For example, if dummy holds AJ9x and you hold KTxx on dummy’s right you should decide now what to do if declarer leads the queen, not dither once he has led it!
Despite what you were told I do not believe you need to include the possibility of 15 on your system card unless you regularly include 15 counts. However I agree that if you play 11 to 14 in fourth position then that should appear.
On a different (and irrelevant) note your description of McKendrick is flawed. The reason for the responses to 2S is that it might be 12 points, so you should say ‘a six card minor or balanced 12 points’. I would not have put the detail that you did but if you are going to give details it should be correct.
Hand valuation differs from person to person and from pair to pair. If you play 12 to 14 and you judge a 15 count is only worth 14 then you have a perfect right to open 1NT. You have not misled your opponents because in your mind it is within the partnership agreement. Similarly if you judge an 11 count as worth a 1NT opening because of a good five card suit and/or containing several tens then that is also fine.
The difficulty comes from the fact that other people may treat the point count as sacred and feel they may have been misled. This is unfortunate although in my experience it is usually complaints after the hand because they think you are out of range, not because they have actually been counting points and gone wrong. More experienced players who tend to count points also accept that people might be slightly out of range because their valuation differs.
I find a more common problem is that people expect you to give a range for weak two openings when in fact a lot of players do not really play a range. So they say “5 to 9“ then get complaints when they have opened what they consider a suitable weak two with 4 or 10 points.
The EBU has different rules for alerting of doubles. Over 1NT doubles are alertable unless they are for penalties. I appreciate you were playing under a jurisdiction with different rules for alerting but I think the EBU regulations are relevant because they say that if 1NT is doubled on less values than would normally be expected for a penalty double then that makes it alertable. So I would expect similar rules to apply to your jurisdiction and I would expect that if it is normal to double on a poor 14 count then it should be alerted. The fact that the partner did take it out with a 7 count suggests that he was expecting a less than normal strength double.
I do know some players who play the double is weaker in the protective position, including one partner with whom I play from time to time. But I insist he does not play that way with me. If we did play that way I would expect to alert it.
While Sean has answered most of your questions let me go through it again because i shall put it differently.
The most important thing to realise is that when playing live bridge (I like the term F2F!) and you alert your partner is absolutely forbidden to take advantage of the alert. So there is no effective advantage in F2F alerting unless a player acts unethically.
Why do you alert? Because the regulations of the various national bodies require it. I played before alerting and it is a far better game now because of alerting. It makes no difference whether online or F2F, you are required to alert. As for other methods, profile or system card (also known as a convention card) they help but do not replace alerting. Take a simple sequence such as (partnership) 1C 1D 1H 1S. If 1S is natural, it needs no alert, and if it is fourth suit forcing it needs an alert and an explanation. People do play this sequence both ways! Few people have this on their system card, no-one has this sequence on their profile.
If you alert or explain by table chat instead of via the alert button this is illegal because you are required to alert properly, and it is unethical if done so partner can see it. If he takes advantage then he has acted unethically as well. Of course you could use the facility in table chat so only your opponents can see it but why not do it the proper way?
I am afraid that it seems possible that when playing F2F you and your partner have used information from partner’s alerts. Now you know that is illegal you must decide not to do so when we go back to playing F2F.
Bernard is certainly correct and despite the people in your club I suggest you continue to plan the play (and say that you have been taught to!). There are time limits but generally they are merely for the amount of time for a round and allow for some thinking by players.
I understand StepBridge also uses self alerting. Anyway, I shall continue to post assuming self alerting where queries are about online alerting unless someone asks me otherwise. But it seems that if BCL uses partner alerts it is really just the same as live bridge (or F2F as I call it!).
Playing any particular agreement because it gives you an advantage over weaker players is acceptable In fact most weaker players tend not to notice discards or deduce from them so I think your advantage is very small.
It is certainly legal to open the weaker minor but it must be disclosed. It rarely matters to opponents so it is only if they ask what your choice is that it is important to disclose it. In the last year I have had opponents ask me on about six occasions (and I play a lot of bridge) “What do oyu open with two 4 card suits?”. If asked, playing your methods, I would say if the suits were both minors, I would open the weaker. But I do not think there is any ethical problem if disclosed properly. It is not alertable.
