[Mbodell]

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East thought 3♣ set clubs as the focused trump and that 4♣ was minorwood.
West thought that 3♦ set diamonds as the focused trump suit and that the other bids were cues (1st or 2nd).

The general system is 2/1 with strong nt, inverted minors, etc. The form of scoring is MP in a good field.

Also how would you suggest bidding it in this context?

[manudude03]

It's hard to place blame on what it a misunderstanding. My views are that if you play inverted minors, then 4C should be RKC for clubs. Do you have a quantitative 4N available over 3♠? 100% blame for West if anything for bidding 4C having been warned that partner likely has weak spades.

[chasetb]

I prefer 2♦ by East, though I don't mind 2♣ at all. Once 3♣ shows the fit, you have Clubs as trump, so I side with East. Of course, I prefer that 4♣ in this context be invitational, and 4♦ as RKC for Clubs, since in theory you have denied a Diamond fit.

I do use one gadget, over 1♦-2m (inverted), that 2♥ is either a minimum balanced NT, or 15+ HCP with 4 hearts. 2♠ is a transfer to 2NT, partner breaking it with extras. Here, I use 2NT by responder to show a slam try, usually balanced, but definitely wanting to play it. The other bids I came up with, they might not be optimized so if anyone has better suggestions, please let me know. I think maybe after 2NT, it should be forcing to 4NT, or that partner can bid on over a 3NT sign-off with a max and 5-6 controls.

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On a side note, I really need some way to do 6-card RKC (when we have 8+ card fits in both minors), especially in a Precision context.

[Lord Molyb]

I think west should have raised diamonds directly or bid a quantitative 4NT at some point.

[neilkaz]

I suspect the blame rests with the player who 1) Bid RKC without a ♠ control and 2) failed to give his partner then chance to show a ♠ control and 3) failed to give his partner the chance to show a min. opener.

[HighLow21]

How is it that East thought 4♣ was a cuebid while his response was 4♠ (I assume either intended as a cuebid or a response to minorwood)? Without more information, my assumption would be that East was either (1) cueing spades to try to avoid a spade lead, or (2) responding to minorwood, in which case he's being dishonest that he thought it was a cuebid.

[Mbodell]

HighLow21, on 2014-January-22, 19:30, said:

How is it that East thought 4♣ was a cuebid while his response was 4♠ (I assume either intended as a cuebid or a response to minorwood)? Without more information, my assumption would be that East was either (1) cueing spades to try to avoid a spade lead, or (2) responding to minorwood, in which case he's being dishonest that he thought it was a cuebid.

East thought 3♦ and 3♥ were cues (1st or 2nd round) and that 4♣ was minorwood and 4♠ was two without.

West thought 4♥ and 4♣ and 4♠ were all cues.

If it matters the pair agreed exclusion, gerber, and minorwood only when obvious. So the disagreement was primarily about if this is an obvious minorwood for clubs situation or if this could be cue bidding for diamonds.

[HighLow21]

Mbodell, on 2014-January-23, 02:26, said:

East thought 3♦ and 3♥ were cues (1st or 2nd round) and that 4♣ was minorwood and 4♠ was two without.

West thought 4♥ and 4♣ and 4♠ were all cues.

If it matters the pair agreed exclusion, gerber, and minorwood only when obvious. So the disagreement was primarily about if this is an obvious minorwood for clubs situation or if this could be cue bidding for diamonds.

OK. then I fault East for not understanding 3♦ as a cue.

Either that, or I fault their system for being ambiguous.

[the_clown]

1♦-2♦
2♥-2N
3N-4N
all pass.

At least 50% of the blame should go for agreeing to play minorwood.

[fromageGB]

If you start with 1♦ then you must reply 2♦. It all goes wrong from there. There seems nothing wrong with the agreements, but West must know that 3♣ on their bidding to date sets the club suit as trumps, so there is no problem with minorwood - it is obvious when trumps are agreed. I have a similar situation (using kickback) in that you cannot change the trump suit after agreement. All you can do is live with your first mistake. The more meanings you assign to bids, the less freedom you have in correcting an error. You can't even continue through ace asking and convert the eventual 5♣ to diamonds, because that is now (possibly, I don't know the methods) the K ask. Tough.

I can't suggest a good sequence given the stated methods because I don't know how you (ie East) revert to a minor when you don't have the spade stop to bid 3♠ or 3NT. If 4m is minorwood, what do you do? At least playing kickback you can deny spades and sign off in 4m, and let partner bid 5m or 4NT to play if he wants to, or 4m+1 to ace ask.

. . . 1♦
2♦ 2♥
3♣ 3♦
3♥ ... ???

[Zelandakh]

Within your agreements, 1♦ - 2♣; 3♣ - 3♦; 3♥ - 4♦; 5♣ seems perfectly reasonable.

[gszes]

the minority report returns to try and defend my opinion (only 1 so far sigh) why east

should shoulder 100% of the blame due to their umm err 4s bid.

I am not a fan of the bidding in general because I do not even agree with the partnership

approach to show controls at this point (they seem to have abandoned the search for 3n

so who know how they might bid weaker hands) BUT since both partnerships were sort of

using the same principles we need to see who failed to follow those principles.

1d normal

2c is a very useful start keeping the bidding as low as possible with visions of a grand in mind

3c 4 card support hard to suppress especially with a minimum hand and still room to explore for 3n

3d cue bid or suit setting should not really make any difference to this partnership at this point

3h necessary evil no matter if 3d was a suit or cue

4c certainly nothing wrong with this call and the interpretation as minor wood was not their fault.

4s thinking 4c was minorwood means the bidding makes no sense. What possible holding can

p have to take the time to bid 3d then suddenly go for a slam search merely because we showed

the A or the K or hearts???? Partner did not splinter so we know they are not short in hearts so learning

we have the A or K adds little value to our hand yet p is slamming----hmmm makes no sense. Go over the

bidding again and you will realize the cue bidding sequence that is happening and you will bid 5c (emphasizing

4+ clubs) with no spade control and get lucky not to lose too many imps to 3n. Bidding is not just about what

is actually bid but what was NOT bid is also of tremendous importance when deciphering what p means.

[HighLow21]

gszes, on 2014-January-27, 12:51, said:

... east should shoulder 100% of the blame due to their umm err 4s bid.

...

4s thinking 4c was minorwood means the bidding makes no sense. ...

I believe I was the one vote.

East is almost completely to blame here.

EDIT/CORRECTION: I gave East 90% not 100%.