[0deary]

Pairs imps N/S Vul E/W Not Vul, Declarer East. All play 5 Card Majors and Strong NT

♠KQ864
♥KJ2
♦65
♣K63

{comments}

---

East P-?

What is your bid, and wha factors do you take into account in your decision please?

Thank you

0deary

[wank]

it's entirely obvious to open 1s and i'm a relatively sound opener. you have 12 points. no unsupported minor honours or stiff honours to downgrade. yes, aces and 10s are nice but the honour structure is generally fine.

[Tramticket]

What else could you do? Nobody is passing this.

Change it to weak NT and four-card majors and I open 1NT.

[steve2005]

Unless you used a time machine and went to 1950 you are opening 1♠ .

[NickRW]

I've played a style where I would have passed - because of the lack of aces, tens, nines or any aggressive shape. But even then it is borderline and, I recognise, a minority decision.

[ggwhiz]

Opening 1♠ is about unanimous in todays game.

If you pass and your partner opens, how will you ever convince them your hand is this good? Vul games at imps show a profit if they make 40% of the time or so and in addition to missing those you will lose some partscore battles when partner plays you for more modest values unless you are playing with Attila the Hun.

[neilkaz]

I would not want to partner anyone who doesn't open 1♠ here.

[rhm]

neilkaz, on 2018-March-05, 09:44, said:

I would not want to partner anyone who doesn't open 1♠ here.

I would open but I do not think terrible things are likely to befall you if you pass this hand in second position (the one where you should be most conservative) and sometimes you get a great score by avoiding a no-play game or slam.
The hand is very borderline and the old advise to subtract a point if you have no ace is still sound advise.

I look for different qualities in a partnership

Rainer Herrmann

[nige1]

[

It seems that most of us would open 1♠. Some factors you might consider when deciding whether to open are

- Description -- High card strength: 12 HCP is adequate. -- Suit quality: ♠KQ864 is a better than average suit. -- Honour distribution and suit-texture: OK (as Wank points out, this is important in borderline cases).

- Preparation: You can pass a 1N reply, unless it's forcing, If a 1N reply is forcing, however, you will have to grit your teeth and rebid 2♣. Other replies present less of a problem.

- Construction: the best scoring and cheapest contracts -- especially games -- are in the majors and notrumps. You have 5 good ♠s and 3 good ♥s - a sound basis for exploring such contracts.

- Competition -- Pre-emption: 1♠ takes away an appreciable amount of opponent's bidding space. -- Lead-direction: 1♠ suggests a useful lead,

---

[PhilG007]

0deary, on 2018-March-05, 00:34, said:

Pairs imps N/S Vul E/W Not Vul, Declarer East. All play 5 Card Majors and Strong NT

♠KQ864
♥KJ2
♦65
♣K63

{comments}

---

East P-?

What is your bid, and wha factors do you take into account in your decision please?

Thank you

0deary

1♠ As novices you are taught to open your longest suit What alternatives are there(?!)
The response might pose a problem What if North responds 1NT and is left to play there? The diamond suit could be open to the winds .

[0deary]

Here is the whole hand and the bidding that prompted this posting:-

{comments}

---

P-1S-2H-X-P-3C-all pass for 3imps to E/W

If it went P-1S-P-2D-P-2N-all pass, N/S are still losing imps

Once you open 1S you will pretty much have to hand over 3+imps!

On this hand the points around the table look average so is it just an unlucky shape? But a slightly less extreme shape might face similar challenge for N/S. On other hands it could just be average shape but just unlucky points? When does “just unlucky” become “avoid.” Is it “just one of those things” and everyone else will be losing 3imps too, or could we beat the field by better Bridge here?

Maybe these factors are relevant, but if so I’m not sure how to weight them:

S owns the Spades- hoist the flag! Milton Works points (BBO Convention Cards Acol 11-19 or SAYC 13+); Whole hand shape- Rule 19 (UK Blue Book para 6-Level 2) or Rule 20; poor Hand suit intermediates- top card an 8; Position- when East has passed its slightly more likely that West has points (over South), moreover North has yet to bid in 4th- NS Vulnerable and EW not; 7 losers in S hand; You wouldn’t lead KS (missing the 9) so your rebid isn’t completely solid; S is Ace-less. Is 1S a sound basis for major or NT try. Opening 1S has pre-empt value. If they buy the contract North has a solid lead. (?Drury). The field

Any more advice would be very welcome

Thank you

0deary

[Tramticket]

0deary, on 2018-March-06, 02:59, said:

{comments}

---

This is an unlucky hand where partner happens to hold a void in your five-card spade suit. The opponents hold an eight-card fit in your longest suit.

The real lesson from this hand is that you want to defend on misfits. Unfortunately you can't afford to sit around being over-cautious thinking "it might be a terrible misfit" - you will miss out on to many making contracts your way. Imagine you pass and partner also has a twelve count and a five-card spade suit - you are missing out on a likely game. It's a bidders world (but very occasionally it isn't:)).

[lycier]

1♠, what else?

[nekthen]

pass is a very close second and I would not lose faith in a partner who chose to pass
make the Q♠ the Q♦ and the 5♦ the 5♠ and you will find a lot more passing

[Left2Right]

Rather than recreating the wheel here, I suggest taking the following write-up to heart.

Hand Evaluation

Richard Pavilec was one of those top professionals during the 80's and 90's.
See his WBF listing.

[RD350LC]

0deary, on 2018-March-05, 00:34, said:

Pairs imps N/S Vul E/W Not Vul, Declarer East. All play 5 Card Majors and Strong NT

♠KQ864
♥KJ2
♦65
♣K63

{comments}

---

East P-?

What is your bid, and wha factors do you take into account in your decision please?

Thank you

0deary

Using basic ideas, I count 12 high card points, -1 for no aces, and +1 for the doubleton. Then I consider that I have no singleton honours, and this makes it an opening bid. I would open it 1♠

[eagles123]

nekthen, on 2018-March-06, 07:31, said:

pass is a very close second and I would not lose faith in a partner who chose to pass
make the Q♠ the Q♦ and the 5♦ the 5♠ and you will find a lot more passing

it's not even remotely close to a pass lol

[miamijd]

nige1, on 2018-March-05, 20:39, said:

[

It seems that most of us would open 1♠. Some factors you might consider when deciding whether to open are
...

- Preparation: You can pass a 1N reply, unless it's forcing, If a 1N reply is forcing, however, you will have to grit your teeth and rebid 2♣. Other replies present less of a problem.

...

---

Good points, but under Preparation, you really CAN just pass a 1N forcing bid, especially at IMPs. If partner can't bid 2/1, you almost certainly don't have a game (yes, I can invent some hands where you might, but they aren't worth considering and you probably wouldn't get there, anyway).

The only time you might go wrong doing that is if partner has the three-card limit raise in spades, but even there, you're just as likely to go plus in 1NT as in 3S, maybe more so.

Cheers,
mike

[rmnka447]

No problem, it's definitely a 1 ♠ opener.

It's an unfortunate hand, but getting too focused on any individual hand isn't good. The bidding to 3 ♣ was fine. Bidding is an art not a complete science and the best you can hope to do is get to reasonable contracts. Given that has happened, you shouldn't get too concerned about any individual result. Otherwise, you'll start taking views and doing convoluted things with your bidding that will degrade your overall results in the end.

[marklaf]

I would always open-At pairs not opening when you have spades is dangerous.