[wank]

2s p 3c to you, unfavourable vul, imps
2s is spades and a minor weak 5/4+
3c is pass/correct

Your hand:-

Aqtx
Aqx
Axx
10xx

[Hanoi5]

Double sounds good but the hand's distribution is ugly. We may pass and double 3♦ later but that could be showing some clubs or not understood as strong. 3NT right away also sounds plausible, though the lack of a club stopper seems bad; we could try passing and bidding 3NT later. Is thois MP's or Imp's? Maybe double is better for Imp's and NT for MP's.

[1eyedjack]

Pass

[fromageGB]

Pass, rapidly. If partner does not protect, we have nothing. If he doubled, I pass again.

[billw55]

Unfavorable and LHO opened weak? To pass now would feel like giving the ops a license to steal from me.

On the other hand, no bid seems good.

[ahydra]

billw55, on 2016-February-22, 07:42, said:

Unfavorable and LHO opened weak? To pass now would feel like giving the ops a license to steal from me.

On the other hand, no bid seems good.

These are my thoughts too. I really want to X here but it feels too risky, particularly with only 3 hearts. Being able to pass in tempo here (not something I'd do, most likely) is perhaps a sign you've graduated from advanced to expert

One way of looking at this might be to construct possible hands for partner where we have a game, which would almost certainly be 3NT. If we give partner a 2443 given RHO's preference for clubs over spades, he'd have to have the HK, DQ or DK, and two stoppers (AJx) in clubs, for example. And then he's pretty close to a double of 2S. Even if partner has 5 hearts and we get to 3H or 4H instead, our hand isn't great for him as it has no ruffing power and no long suit tricks. I'd say odds favour the pass.

ahydra

[gszes]

IMPS = pass MP = x

I expect to get a positive score around 70% of the time with the opps playing 3m. x At MP makes a ton of sense since increasing a penalty by a mere 50 translates into more MP. The same cannot be said at IMPS. The x brings only a tiny amount of imps and the times the opps make turns a quiet board into a disaster.

3n sounds like a fun bid but partner rates to hold 3/4 spades leaving them with much less room to have a long suit. With the spade honors poorly located, we will be hard pressed to come up with 9+ tricks and if p pulls to 4h the opening spade salvo is going to put us in a bad situation immediately. 3N is bound to work sometimes but will it make up for the many times it fails or fails disastrously? I am unsure and it feels wrong to put so much on the line when I like our odds of a plus anyway.

Sometimes the opps make preempts that find you with a difficult hand to bid they WORK.

[broze]

Pass for me at any form of scoring. I don't really consider it close but IANAE.

[PhantomSac]

I hate getting stolen from as much as anyone, especially red/white vs some shenanigan preempt but I think you just have to pass here. All the warning signs are there. That being said if partner has like 6 hearts and short clubs our hand can be good (esp if he has a spade honor, eg even Jxx Kxxxxx xxx x will probably make game on a stiff spade lead and he can have more than that obv). But the spades are offside/not splitting, if he has 5 hearts trumps are more likely than usual to be 4/1, we only have 3 hearts, 3 clubs to the ten is terrible, we have good defense against 3C after our trump lead etc.

[rmnka447]

I'm passing.

[wank]

Partner has kx 109xxx kqjxx x. double will presumably get you, one way or the other, to 4h making. 3nt was bid at the table which was a swift -1.

If you pass partner will double. It was suggested that this hand should float the double with such good spades. I think that's a rather poor idea. 6 of a red suit could be on if p has spade values which he often will for the delayed double, even with the 33 red shape and the penalty would only have been 100 from 3cx.

[ahydra]

wank, on 2016-February-29, 01:26, said:

If you pass partner will double. It was suggested that this hand should float the double with such good spades. I think that's a rather poor idea. 6 of a red suit could be on if p has spade values which he often will for the delayed double, even with the 33 red shape and the penalty would only have been 100 from 3cx.

Over (2S)-p-(3C)-p; (p)-X-(p), I agree with not passing the X (especially at this vul), but what should this hand bid? 3NT is probably out of the question given the lack of club stop, so... 3D? 4C? At the table I'd be so stuck the opps would be able to guess my entire hand just from the hesitation

ahydra

[PhantomSac]

ahydra, on 2016-March-01, 13:09, said:

Over (2S)-p-(3C)-p; (p)-X-(p), I agree with not passing the X (especially at this vul), but what should this hand bid? 3NT is probably out of the question given the lack of club stop, so... 3D? 4C? At the table I'd be so stuck the opps would be able to guess my entire hand just from the hesitation

ahydra

3S