[steve2005]

I was wondering weather anyone had any good ideas for 1NT-4♠ & 2NT-4♠ assuming your playing Texas?

Possibilities i found were:
1) Spade sign-off, either had tenances wanted to protect, didn't want to give chance for opponents to double a transfer.
2) a minor suited hand with equal minors and no slam ambition(this seems to me be hard to have no slam ambitions yet trying to make a five-level contract)
3) as a transfer to Clubs with 5♦ being a transfer to Diamonds with no slam ambition(again this seems to me be hard to have no slam ambitions yet trying to make a five-level contract)

[mgoetze]

I never really thought about it. A spontaneous idea would be a 4045 or 4054 hand.

[jjbrr]

quantitative with 4-4 or 4-5 minors but no shortness

[Phil]

What jjbbr said. In my favorite setup where Jacoby transfers are GF (and you don't need Texas) 4♥ and 4♠ can be the same as 1N - 3M.

[jjbrr]

 Phil, on 2012-February-04, 18:13, said:

What jjbbr said. In my favorite setup where Jacoby transfers are GF (and you don't need Texas) 4♥ and 4♠ can be the same as 1N - 3M.

jjbrr*

[dbsboy]

I thought of playing something like what jjbrr plays, 4♠=balanced, either 1) quantitative with bad controls, or 2) strong enough to force to slam, starting a baron-ask; and 4NT as balanced, quantitative with good controls, slightly weaker in terms of hcp (e.g. 10 hcp and 4+ controls in 2NT-4NT). I thought about this because I love to open 2NT with 6 card suits, and sometimes I missed minor slam contracts. Does anyone think its playable?

[mich-b]

We play 4♠ response to both 1NT and 2NT as "slam forcing" , trying to find a 4-4 fit, asking opener to bid 4 card suits "up the line", 4NT from opener suggesting 4333.
If you wish , you can agree that 5NT later by either side is passable saying "since we haven't found a fit , if you are really minimum, we might not make 6 after all".

[Zelandakh]

2 options here stand out. The first is to use 4♠ as Baron (often incorporating a range ask), that is to find 4-4 fits in a slam-oriented hand. This is probably best but is also superfluous if you play other methods that handle these hands (such as 1NT - 2♠ for the same thing). The second is for both minors and no slam interest. This is obviously not a common hand type but about the only other thing that makes alot of sense.

[WellSpyder]

 Zelandakh, on 2012-February-05, 10:13, said:

2 options here stand out. The first is to use 4♠ as Baron (often incorporating a range ask), that is to find 4-4 fits in a slam-oriented hand. This is probably best but is also superfluous if you play other methods that handle these hands (such as 1NT - 2♠ for the same thing). The second is for both minors and no slam interest. This is obviously not a common hand type but about the only other thing that makes alot of sense.

I agree with these suggestions. However, I must admit that since getting a set of system notes a few years ago from one partner saying under responses to 2N "4♠ = God knows!" I have never felt that it has actually cost anything that I have never bothered to try to get God to share this knowledge.

[ArtK78]

An idea I found in The Bridge World that I have been using for some time:

4♠ is a weaker quantitative invite to 6NT - partner needs a maximum to accept.
4NT is a stronger quantitative invite to 6NT - partner needs a non-minimum to accept.

[Wayne_LV]

 steve2005, on 2012-February-04, 17:21, said:

I was wondering weather anyone had any good ideas for 1NT-4♠ & 2NT-4♠ assuming your playing Texas?

Possibilities i found were:
1) Spade sign-off, either had tenances wanted to protect, didn't want to give chance for opponents to double a transfer.
2) a minor suited hand with equal minors and no slam ambition(this seems to me be hard to have no slam ambitions yet trying to make a five-level contract)
3) as a transfer to Clubs with 5♦ being a transfer to Diamonds with no slam ambition(again this seems to me be hard to have no slam ambitions yet trying to make a five-level contract)

My partner and I play 1NT-4♠ and 2NT-4♠ as GF in best minor, but in 2 years it has not come up once

[jdeegan]

4♠ uses up a lot of space, so it has to be a one-shot picture bid or some kind of specialized asking bid that comes up often enough to be useful. Any ideas? I got nothing right now.

[CSGibson]

We play 4♠ as a quantitative raise to be accepted with any non-minimum, and 4N as a quantitative raise to be accepted with a max.

Over both, hands that accept will bid suits up the line at the 5 level if they are: a 5 card suit without 2 of the top 4, or a 4 card suit with two of the top 4 honors. Hands will accept at the 6 level by showing: a 5 card suit with 2 of the top 4, or a 6 card suit.

[han]

I know this is not quite an answer to the original question but I play the following:

4C and 4D = transfers to hearts and spades respectively. After 1NT they do not show slam interest, after 2NT they do show slam interest and opener can bid 4M with slam interest, so that slam is rightsided.

2NT - 4H = clubs, opener bids 4S with a bad hand for clubs, the next four steps show RKC responses. After 4S 4NT asks for keycards.
2NT - 4S = diamonds, as above.

1NT - 4H = qunatitative slam try with 4-4 or 4-5 in the minors.
1NT - 4S = quantitative slam try with 5-4 in the minors.

You have to be willing to give up on Gerber in order to play this.

[JLOGIC]

If you like to upgrade a lot, then playing 4S as a strong quantitative and 4N as a light quantitative might be for you.

[mikeh]

 JLOGIC, on 2012-February-13, 14:19, said:

If you like to upgrade a lot, then playing 4S as a strong quantitative and 4N as a light quantitative might be for you.

That's what I play in my current partnership.

[FrancesHinden]

I really like playing 1NT-4♠ as natural. It comes up a fair amount (unlike some of the more esoteric suggestions in this thread) and is very useful as a (semi-)pre-empt.
If I've got some boring 7222/6331/6322 10-count or whatever opposite a strong NT, then I'll use my method to get partner to declarer spades (which might include a way to offer choice of games), but 4S is a very powerful bid on something like

QJxxxxx
-
Kxxx
xx

or

AQxxxx
x
Kxxxx
x

because there's a big advantage in keeping a very distributional hand concealed. It also stops LHO, with his own distributional hand, coming in very/slightly more cheaply.


I feel reasonably strongly that this is the best use for the bid (unlike a lot of other systemic things where it's all a bit swings & roundabouts)
As it happens I also play 1NT-4♥ as natural for much the same reason, though the advantages are slightly less.


2NT-4♠ is a very different auction. There we play much as Han suggests, usually called 'two-under slam tries' i.e. 4C/D/H/S are slam tries in H/S/C/D. There are various continuation schemes, I actually play something a bit different from Han, but this is all minor stuff in comparison (and I also don't massively like what I play so I don't want to advertise it... my partner is keen on it )