[MinorKid]

Edited : 2016-02-09 22:07

Till now all agreed South should double first round, showing merely points in three suits other than ♠.

As suggested by Ahydra and eagles123 , 4NT here would be some sort of another take out in nature.

I guess the bidding goes something like this:

---

For others with 4NT as something else, north might try 6♣ responding the double.

Is there no way to get 7?

Funny thing is, the GIB says 4NT is Blackwood (!?) and the Q-plus says 4NT here is to play (!?) so they both end up defending! We all should be collecting big swings playing teams against robots on this board!

[ahydra]

Double.

ahydra

[MinorKid]

We were playing 5-card major, SAYC , Negative Double up to 3♠ only.

[Jinksy]

I'd double no matter what it showed. 5-level bids are all obscene, and even if I'm confident partner will take 4N as showing minors is too likely to lead to the wrong denomination (even if there's a right one). Take the money.

[eagles123]

I would play 4n here as keycard so I see no alternative to X unless we take some wild position

[ggwhiz]

MinorKid, on 2016-February-07, 06:10, said:

We were playing 5-card major, SAYC , Negative Double up to 3♠ only.

Your partner can still pull the double if they opened on something like a 6-5 hand.

Sure double is penalty oriented but it doesn't show a lot of trump tricks in an auction like this or strong heart support so it tends to look like a negative double with teeth anyway.

[rmnka447]

Double, don't see an alternative as I think 4 NT would be RKCB.

Bidding beyond the 4 level is unilateral and not very attractive holding a doubleton ♠. There's no way to know if you have 2 ♠ losers or not. If you do, then you have to take all the remaining tricks to make a 5 level contract. And there's no way to know if you can do that either.

If partner is short in ♠ and want's to bid on, you have pretty decent cards for partner.

Occasionally, I think you may eat the double, but preempts work sometime.

[neilkaz]

I thought this was double WTP? Then I read the nice explanations of others and it still is double, WTP!

[akwoo]

What if your partner thinks double shows a hand like

♠AQT
♥64
♦J98642
♣87

and hence won't take it out even with a 6-5 hand (which will have 2 quick tricks, since they opened).

Before you find another partner, would you still double?

[ggwhiz]

akwoo, on 2016-February-07, 14:22, said:

What if your partner thinks double shows a hand like

♠AQT
♥64
♦J98642
♣87

and hence won't take it out even with a 6-5 hand (which will have 2 quick tricks, since they opened).

Before you find another partner, would you still double?

That's just playing east as the worlds biggest moron for their 4♠ bid. If east is that crazy you will beat him like a drum but everyone else will steal from/hammer you.

[Phil]

You just.....don't.....double high level preempts with trump stacks.

Today, we picked up a surprise swing because our opponent didn't understand this principle I had AqjTX akjx x kqx...Partner had xxx xx AJx xxxxx. Lho had xx x kqtxxxxxx x. Our table was 1s 3n p p; x 4D x +300. The other table was 1s 5D x (!) P; 5H p 5s. Down 3.

[wank]

obviously you shouldn't play double as penalties, but if that's how you play it you have to double anyway.

[MinorKid]

Pardner had:

---

[akwoo]

ggwhiz, on 2016-February-07, 14:28, said:

That's just playing east as the worlds biggest moron for their 4♠ bid. If east is that crazy you will beat him like a drum but everyone else will steal from/hammer you.

Look - I know it's not the right way of playing it. However, I'm guessing you've never moved to a small remote town where there are only 4 other decent(*) bridge players, and they're all already playing with each other. At least I've found someone who occasionally recognizes defensive signals, and right now there are just more important things for me to fix with our agreements. Especially since, as both rarely happen, I doubt he'll be able to remember or figure out that 1H-(4S)-X is takeout but 1H - ( P ) - 4H - (4S) - X is penalty. (Actually, taking it rationally, I should consider myself lucky that there is any live bridge here at all.)

I lean towards doubling even if it's purely for penalties, but I am genuinely worried partner won't pull when they should, leaving us with a bottom for +500.

(*) For the purposes of this post, I define "decent" as being at a level to average over 50% (on average) with an equal partner at open side games at an NABC. I barely qualify.

[eagles123]

MinorKid, on 2016-February-08, 00:20, said:

Pardner had:

---

well if double is penalties then I guess we pass but in the real world, 4n

[helene_t]

"Negative double until 3♠" hopefully doesn't mean that partner passes your double without first looking at his hand. I hope it just means that pass is the default choice which he takes with an unexiting hand. He will pass with most hands that contain a doubleton spades. But with a void I expect him to take it out.

[SteveMoe]

Double, values with no clear direction. Aka Negative.

[MinorKid]

eagles123, on 2016-February-08, 04:20, said:

well if double is penalties then I guess we pass but in the real world, 4n

What does 4N mean to be? Like the nature of negative take-out?

[ahydra]

4N = 2 places to play (or even three!)

ahydra

[MinorKid]

ahydra, on 2016-February-09, 02:45, said:

4N = 2 places to play (or even three!)

ahydra

Is it a choice between ♣/♦ ?