[nigel_k]

Vampyr, on 2011-February-06, 22:04, said:

Seems a little pessimistic. How good can partner's 2♠ be?

I do this too playing Acol but it's a slight hole in the method. On the plus side, when you have a flat 16 sometimes they balance.

[gnasher]

nigel_k, on 2011-February-06, 22:42, said:

I do this too playing Acol but it's a slight hole in the method. On the plus side, when you have a flat 16 sometimes they balance.

Yes, that's normal when playing Acol with a weak notrump. I can't see what else you can do with these hands. If you open them 1♣, you lose most of the benefits of 4-card majors.

[mikestar13]

On the first hand, better opening lead methods would tell if partner has the queen at trick one. Playing Journalist, you lead the T from QT9+ but the 9 from T9x+; playing zero or two, you lead the T from T9x+ and the 9 from QT9+. In either case, you know whether the Q is held at trick 1: if partner has the Q, you can lead hearts whether or not the J
drops at trick 2 and whether or not you trust partner to drop the Q under your K when it does.

[Cyberyeti]

mikestar13, on 2011-February-07, 03:28, said:

On the first hand, better opening lead methods would tell if partner has the queen at trick one. Playing Journalist, you lead the T from QT9+ but the 9 from T9x+; playing zero or two, you lead the T from T9x+ and the 9 from QT9+. In either case, you know whether the Q is held at trick 1: if partner has the Q, you can lead hearts whether or not the J
drops at trick 2 and whether or not you trust partner to drop the Q under your K when it does.

While I understand this, I tend to play with lots of different people, so keeping to the same leads/signals/discards with all of them saves a lot of brainpower.

[Cyberyeti]

Vampyr, on 2011-February-06, 22:04, said:

Seems a little pessimistic. How good can partner's 2♠ be?

Not very good, we have 3♠ (distributional bad 3♠ bid) and 2N (good 3♠ upwards) for the 4 card raises, and are not afraid to bid 1N with some flat 3 card raises. 2♠ will almost never be better than an 8 count or bad/4333 9.

[phil_20686]

When I played this system we reckoned that if you wanted to be in game opposite a 15-16 nt and you have 3s you are too good to bid 2s, and should make a 2/1. If partner bids 2N you can show your spades, if he rebids 2s or 2x then you can just bid 2s and have shown 9-10 and 3 spades. More difficult is after 1S-1N as 1N can be a bit better as making a 2/1 is more dangerous when you dont have a fit.