[cristianm3]

Please, how would you bid this? N, E and W were robots. I started with 3♠. All robots passed. But look what N has in ♣.Was N right to pass?

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[mw64ahw]

You're way to strong for a 3-level preempt especially with an outside Ace.

Traditionally at that vulnerability South has 7 playing tricks so North would need 3 to go to 4♠ which may be difficult with that length in Clubs

[Huibertus]

cristianm3, on 2025-November-04, 04:54, said:

Please, how would you bid this? N, E and W were robots. I started with 3♠. All robots passed. But look what N has in ♣.Was N right to pass?

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Surely this is NOT a ♠ preempt, North is a LOT stronger than the average 12-13 HCP 1 ♠ opening. This of course is also NOT a 4!♠ opening, even though you are not going to pass below 4♠.

And yes I'd bid 4♣ as south. As a SIGN-OFF, not as a step on it's way to 4♠ assuming partner really had a strong 1♠ opening one suiter.

[Cyberyeti]

3N-P-4♠-P-P-P

If N passed, I would open 4♠

[P_Marlowe]

Hi,

#1 The pass is due to the way a first seat club preempt is defined for the robot.
It is always a ongoing debate, if the club suit is solid, it would be for me,
but other disagree. If it is seen as solid, 3NT would be an option (gambling),
the bots play gambling, but maybe the suit is not good enough for the bid.

If the bot does not have a bid to discribe the hand, it passes, something peoble
can take notice and try to follow as well.

#2 3S is wrong, either open 1S or 4S, ... I would go with 4S, but see above, someone
disagrees heavily with 4S, and it may not be the right forum to suggest 4S.
The reason 4S is an option, at least for me, is the fact that you are in 3rd seat,
chances of bidding slam are remote, you dont need much that 4S is making (maybe a lead
helps), so cutting the auction short has a lot of going for it, but again, see above.

With kind regards
Marlowe

[Cyberyeti]

Note also that 5♥ only goes off because of the diamond ruff and 5♦ because of the club overruff, this may not be your hand at all, bidding 4♠ may buy the contract or make it difficult for opps to bid their making slam.

[mikeh]

Huibertus, on 2025-November-04, 05:56, said:

Surely this is NOT a ♠ preempt, North is a LOT stronger than the average 12-13 HCP 1 ♠ opening. This of course is also NOT a 4!♠ opening, even though you are not going to pass below 4♠.

And yes I'd bid 4♣ as south. As a SIGN-OFF, not as a step on it's way to 4♠ assuming partner really had a strong 1♠ opening one suiter.

This is absolutely a 4S opening bid. Partner is a passed hand and the odds of him having what you need for slam are exceedingly low. Plus, when he does, you almost certainly can’t find out.

Meanwhile you want to make life difficult for the opps. Now, this being robot ‘bridge ‘ that factor is somewhat different than in real bridge but it’s still there. Bidding anything less than 4S is losing bridge imo.

[Huibertus]

mikeh, on 2025-November-04, 15:23, said:

This is absolutely a 4S opening bid.

Well no. You're to strong for it.

Which doesn't mean it won't work. It might be the tactic that does work. I'd find it reasonable in 4th seat, and a gamble (i don't like gambles in bridge) in other seats.

[P_Marlowe]

Playing MP you could argue, that if p cant respond / or has only a minimal response to
a 1S opening, 4S will be quite often have less than 50% for going plus / making, hence the
plan to open 1S, followed by 3S will be ok.

If you plan to 1S / 4S, bidding directly 4S is better, ..., it also strengthens the hand that
do go 1S / 4S. And this may enable p with a max. passing hand and lots of controls to move
over 4S.
Playing IMPs, and MP the way I play it, i.e. IMP like, I bid game and worry about making / going
plus, when the dummy hits the floor.

The argument "way too strong" / misleading, begs the question: who are you misleading?
P has nothing. And obv. p will tell the opponents, that 4S in the given seat is wide ranging.

As it is: 2nd instead of 3rd / 4th, red vs. green, this would be a 4S opening for us, even submin,
but this is non standard.

[jillybean]

Huibertus, on 2025-November-05, 03:00, said:

Well no. You're to strong for it.

Which doesn't mean it won't work. It might be the tactic that does work. I'd find it reasonable in 4th seat, and a gamble (i don't like gambles in bridge) in other seats.

Does your partner need 12 to open?

[akwoo]

Huibertus, on 2025-November-05, 03:00, said:

Well no. You're to strong for it.

Which doesn't mean it won't work. It might be the tactic that does work. I'd find it reasonable in 4th seat, and a gamble (i don't like gambles in bridge) in other seats.

I think this depends a lot on the opposition you're playing.

Against bad opposition, 1♠ will work perfectly well.

Against good opposition, what happens on this particular layout (or many similar, quite likely given your holding, layouts)?

It goes 1♠-(2♠)-3♣-(5♥) and now you are getting a bad board whether for 5♥X or for 5♠ (which goes down).

If you don't like gambles, don't play bridge, because there are lots of gambles you are forced to take. Hopefully you take the ones that are 60-40 in your favor and decline the ones that are 60-40 against you.

[DavidKok]

Threads like these always have me a little worried. People are horsing around so much that readers might confuse it for genuine advice.

Whether or not this is within the range of a 4♠ opening for you depends on partnership agreements. I think it should be, and I can make the hand a bunch stronger and still open 4♠. Some partnerships might pull out ye olde 'it is third seat, which changes everything', which is a great excuse if you do not want to look to closely at whether opening this hand 4♠ is also a good action in first or second. But here it doesn't matter, we are third seat, so take the easy out to avoid complications. Just don't then walk into the trap of discussing opening styles and strength requirements and perfect slams.

The 'gambling' remarks tend to make me laugh, or make me cry. I haven't decided yet in this case. I think there's an implicit reference to some platonically pure version of bridge where we resolve all our problems in the bidding? Any call, including pass, will gain on certain distributions and lose on others. No bidding system can resolve all your problems, and certainly yours can't (this goes to anybody reading this). When you have shape, prepare for a competitive auction. And, despite the fact that we're over 25 years into this century, some (meaning 'most') bridge players still don't have good ways to resolve their problems on competitive auctions.

'Those tricks might work at your level, but once you get to whatever level I judge you to not be at, the good players will punish this'. I have run into this a lot, especially from club players who were upset that I was growing past their ranks. The most profitable strategy indeed does depend on your opponents, or on the field, but in my experience not by nearly as much as people like to claim. It's also usually not necessary to dust off this rhetoric - plenty of bad actions lose in more than one way, so you don't need to invent some specific counter by skilled opponents.