[inquiry]

The First 12 hands in the Defensive Play Series have been posted (apologies to ralph23 who came up with the titles Defensive play #1, and defensive play #2 in the same forum less than a week before I started this series). I have many, many more I can post, and the two best were actually posted by BunnyGo.

Here is a recap of the 12 post to date. The question is are any of these too inappropriate for beginner/intermediate forum. Surely some are probably "too hard" but they provide possible thought process learning material for intermediates. Anyway, before I post more of these in THIS forum, I would appreciate opinions on the appropriateness of the content given so far. I have shared my views on each of the 12 problems below.

REMEMBER vote for problems that WERE NOT SUITABLE for this forum. A problem that was too easy, or to hard without educational merit for target audience, or too stupid can be voted as inappropriate.

Problem 1: Partner needs two red suit winners. The diamond can only be ACE, hearts can be A, K or AK. Have to return heart to avoid endplay if partner has heart king. Appropriate for intermediate or advanced.

Problem 2: avoid third hand high to defeat contract. Can't be sure ducking will defeat the contract, but it is clear playing high is wrong. Intermediate clearly.

Problem 3: Counting partners hcp and knowing that he close to broke now, so you need to go for potential ruff if it is not there, nothing you can do. Intermediate.

Problem 4: Very nice hand by BunnyGo, requires visualization of unseen hands to a point, and execution of a smother play. Hard for intermediate, but advanced should find it easily enough.

Problem 5: Possible trump promotion (intermediate), poker play (advanced + with advanced + partner)

Problem 6: Counting declarer's winners and hold up play in diamonds to prevent late entry to dummy. (intermediate)

Problem 7: Visualize late in play that establishing two club winners can not help declarer. Intermediate to advanced, so you can can realize your diamond ace can't go away, and go for down two

Problem 8: Extremely nice one by BunnyGo. Visualize partner's heart holding from the opening lead. This problem was made harder by partners signals. Still, the opening lead is clear. Probably an advanced hand, however, especially in light of partners signals or lack there of.

Problem 9: Give up a ruff and sluff to set the contract anytime partner has club Queen, Jack, or Ace. For some reason, giving up a ruff and sluff is hard for intermediates and advanced. I think it is good hand for both.

Play 10: Simple hand visualization to find the best chance for a trick from partner (ruff or red king). Intermediate

Play 11: Complete hand count - place every relevant card. Only because of all the questions asked, lets call this advanced, but really should be intermediate

Problem 12: No solution given yet, but there are two mutually exclusive lines consistent with bidding and play that need to be considered. I think this is advanced because there are two possible solutions and you need to pick between them logically. Perhaps this one should be in the advanced/expert forum because of that.

[Phil]

I thought these were all good defensive intermediate hands, although some bordered on advanced. None of them are really appropriate for beginners.

In this software can you make a folder and stick them in? I think it would be great for the community if they were pinned.

I judge a good intermediate problem if its not something you can figure out in 10 seconds but there is always a clear answer and the card play theme isn't exotic. All of these problems took a little time to solve, but I thought all could be solved at the table.

Yet, we see plays like these missed by good players all the time. I think this is because of lazy thinking, or because they do not approach every bridge as a 'problem'.

As a P.S., at first the formatting with the partial cards was annoying, but I've grown fond of it.

[wyman]

I really enjoyed these and would like to see more. I didn't think any were beginner level, but I think it's good to challenge B/I's to think about these problems and to give them a few days with A/E answers in spoilers. It's a really nice idea. Of course, on 12, the first 3 responders (all A/E, myself included, though maybe I'm more I/A) all made a different play at T4, so...

Thanks for doing this, Ben.

[BunnyGo]

wyman, on 2011-September-06, 09:28, said:

I really enjoyed these and would like to see more. I didn't think any were beginner level, but I think it's good to challenge B/I's to think about these problems and to give them a few days with A/E answers in spoilers. It's a really nice idea.

Thanks for doing this, Ben.

I agree completely, thanks Ben!

P.S. Thank you for the kind comments.

P.P.S. I thought 12 was hard, as could be inferred from my rambling thoughts.

[inquiry]

BunnyGo, on 2011-September-06, 10:05, said:

I agree completely, thanks Ben!

P.S. Thank you for the kind comments.

P.P.S. I thought 12 was hard, as could be inferred from my rambling thoughts.

Well on 12, I hope my solution is "correct", I still think there are (at least) two solutions, depending on what you think is happening... I will give it tonight sometime, along with some interesting new problems.

[inquiry]

Phil, on 2011-September-06, 08:53, said:

I thought these were all good defensive intermediate hands, although some bordered on advanced. None of them are really appropriate for beginners.

In this software can you make a folder and stick them in? I think it would be great for the community if they were pinned.

As a P.S., at first the formatting with the partial cards was annoying, but I've grown fond of it.

I was thinking along the lines of either a commented lin file or a PDF. I have the files (except for Bunnygo's) in lin format already, so easy to comment it up or convert to PDF using bridge composer, and post that for beginner's or intermediates. Of course, any crappy one should not be included. That would probably be best.

Glad you grown fond of the partial cards. I just didn't like retyping a list of what cards where played when you can step through the play. Seemed a reasonable compromise. I am getting the hang of formatting the things. I will probably write an excel macro or something that will make "declarer" south and fix all the other issues so I don't have to do it manually anymore. I use my forumlin.xls spreadsheet to format the hands already, so i shouldn't be too hard to fix the display issue. I screwed up the vul a couple of times.

What kind of defensive problems are appropriate for beginners?

[BunnyGo]

inquiry, on 2011-September-06, 15:26, said:

What kind of defensive problems are appropriate for beginners?

I was trying to think of some. The next couple hands I was thinking of posting were definitely Int/Adv.

I was actually starting to think that most defense problems are not "beginner". I think of beginner as not taking a practice finesse. Counting tricks, etc. But a lot of these problems are more difficult when your partner's hand is hidden.

Maybe a hand finessing against dummy is beginner? Maybe one that requires overtaking trick 1 for an "obvious" switch that needs to be done now? Is ducking trick 1 at NT to maintain communications beginner? In some sense, I think all of them are, but in another it's harder to visualize the other hands on defense.

Maybe executing a pumping defense? That's beginner. Not getting confused about ruffing while trying to pump. Just some thoughts.

[kgr]

wyman, on 2011-September-06, 09:28, said:

I really enjoyed these and would like to see more. I didn't think any were beginner level, but I think it's good to challenge B/I's to think about these problems and to give them a few days with A/E answers in spoilers. It's a really nice idea. Of course, on 12, the first 3 responders (all A/E, myself included, though maybe I'm more I/A) all made a different play at T4, so...

Thanks for doing this, Ben.

Agree, Makes them interesting for I/A ass well.
This were the posts I read first the last weeks.

[inquiry]

kgr, on 2011-September-08, 14:58, said:

wyman, on 2011-September-06, 09:28, said:

I really enjoyed these and would like to see more. I didn't think any were beginner level, but I think it's good to challenge B/I's to think about these problems and to give them a few days with A/E answers in spoilers. It's a really nice idea. Of course, on 12, the first 3 responders (all A/E, myself included, though maybe I'm more I/A) all made a different play at T4, so...

Thanks for doing this, Ben.

Agree, Makes them interesting for I/A ass well.
This were the posts I read first the last weeks.

Thank for the comment kgr. It makes it worth while to stick these hands in these forums when I find ones that are appropriate. It also helps my ego that was crushed when bunnygo posted better problems than I did,.. At least I have encouraged others to offer educational material in this forum for the intermediates!

I also happen to agree with you, that a few would be challenging to advanced players. Wait until I post the ones for I think will possibly trip up experts!! (I already posted one, that did cause a little problem in that forum). The real problem is we don't think hard about a bridge hand unless it is PRESENTED as a problem. That is many of miss plays at the table we would NEVER miss if presented in the forum as a problem. This is a phenomena that Phil mentioned above, and which is why I tend not to show links to the hands and cut the names out of even the results tables if I show them, to keep people from finding people who blew the defense but shouldn't have based upon their experience and skill levels.

I will try to post at least a four or five a week for the next couple of weeks.

[diana_eva]

Thank you Ben, Bunny and everyone for this initiative. We're glad to see it caught on and more players post problem hands for beginners.

We are linking these problems in the BBO News for the wider community. After all most beginners are not on the BBF, but on BBO. We will also archive them and think of a suitable place for the Archive. So they will definitely not be lost.

Please keep them coming