Posted 2015-October-23, 07:20
Interesting end position, in a potentially strange way. A likely start might be club Ace and club back. If so, after a flurry of red cards and club pitches, the end position is three spades on each side and a decision to hook or drop.
At IMP scoring, percentages.
At MP scoring, this gets trickier. The right decision wins, obviously. But, suppose you play one high honor and then lead small toward the other high honor and hook option, all following at all times. Suppose, then, that you guess wrong. The wrong guess of a hook means that you are set two tricks. The wrong guess of the drop means that you are set one trick.
Now, back up. For those who do not get the club Ace and back a club attack, either wrong guess means a one-trick set.
So, it seems that a pessimist should hedge his bets by guessing wrongly to play for the drop.
That happens to be the normal play, perhaps, but it is a different way to look at the situation. If the spades had been only a combined 8 cards, and some little worthless club on the side, then maybe this changes. Playing for the drop guarantees -1 when God hates you. Playing for the hook is 50-50 for -2. So, the pessimist might go anti-percentage on his "when it is wrong" move as a MP hedge to solve his problem of also getting the damnable club lead.
"Gibberish in, gibberish out. A trial judge, three sets of lawyers, and now three appellate judges cannot agree on what this law means. And we ask police officers, prosecutors, defense lawyers, and citizens to enforce or abide by it? The legislature continues to write unreadable statutes. Gibberish should not be enforced as law."
-P.J. Painter.