[shyams]

This hand came up yesterday in the 3-day Robot Survivor tournament.

MP scoring. Partner and Opp are Robots.

---

* The 5NT by North confirms the missing key cards (♠A & ♥Q) with North.
* I have played enough with bots to know that (in my experience) their 3H raise is rarely done on poor hands.
* When North launched into 4NT, to me it seemed like North has something in spare to explore a grand. So I jumped to 7NT instead of replying with Kings or jumping to 7♥.

Today I discovered that mine was the only table in 7NT. Was my 7NT an anti-percentage action?

The full hand: https://tinyurl.com/2758lr2x. As an aside, playing in 7♥ scores a healthy 78% on this board which made me wonder if 7NT was too much.

Edited: full hand with the BBO Handviewer link (this will hopefully work)

Handviewer link

This post has been edited by shyams: 2022-November-09, 05:33

[Cyberyeti]

The tinyurl is not found for me, can you post the hand please.

I presume partner had ♦Q, it doesn't look so good if he has black suit honours and ♦x/xx

Is bidding 7♦ over 5N plausible ? partner should think about bidding 7N with the Q♦ although maybe it's more suggestive of AKxxx/AKJ10x where 7♦ can survive 4-1 hearts but 7♥ can't if partner has Q♦

[DavidKok]

There are multiple bad calls on the auction, some of them mandated by the system, some of them flawed actions by the bot, and some of them might be good exactly because the alternative is leaving it up to the bot. I'm not sure whether it is worth it to compare the auction to one that an experienced partnership would have on the same hands.

[shyams]

Cyberyeti, on 2022-November-09, 03:52, said:

The tinyurl is not found for me, can you post the hand please.

I presume partner had ♦Q, it doesn't look so good if he has black suit honours and ♦x/xx

Is bidding 7♦ over 5N plausible ? partner should think about bidding 7N with the Q♦ although maybe it's more suggestive of AKxxx/AKJ10x where 7♦ can survive 4-1 hearts but 7♥ can't if partner has Q♦

I have added the link again --- hopefully the revised link works.

Yes, partner had the ♦Q.

With bots as partner, I would not risk 7♦. I suppose it could backfire.

[DavidKok]

The issue with the tinyurl is that the period at the end of the link is mistakenly included in the url. Remove it and it works.

[smerriman]

shyams, on 2022-November-09, 03:05, said:

* I have played enough with bots to know that (in my experience) their 3H raise is rarely done on poor hands.
* When North launched into 4NT, to me it seemed like North has something in spare to explore a grand.

This should probably be in the robot forum, but GIB will virtually always use Blackwood if you start cuebidding - even if missing controls you denied - because it doesn't know how to cuebid properly and treats it as an extremely strong hand instead (25+ points).

In particular, after the 5NT bid all it has promised is the ♠A, ♥Q, and a single extra 'total point' anywhere in its hand. It will bid like above with Axxx-Qxx-xx-xxxx.

So any inferences that it may have 'extras' are unfounded.

(It would have also bid 3♥ and 4N with Jxxx-Qxx-Qx-Qxxx, or even Jxxx-Qxx-x-Qxxxx, though not 5N of course).

[pescetom]

I dislike the fact that this system does not allow South to control-bid an indifferentiated spades control rather than 1st level clubs control.
Our auction would probably go:
2♣ - 2♦
2♥ - 3♥
3♠ - 3NT (I control spades too)
4♣ - 4♥
4NT (even kc) - 5♦ (all KC and 3rd level control)
7♥ - p.

Maybe thinking harder we could infer that 7NT is there, but at the table I would settle for that even at MP.

[johnu]

shyams, on 2022-November-09, 03:05, said:

Today I discovered that mine was the only table in 7NT. Was my 7NT an anti-percentage action?

Yes, 7NT was definitely against the odds. You specifically need ♦Q to see 13 tricks. There is no guarantee that partner has even one extra queen, and if so, it may be ♠Q or ♣Q which while nice, don't help you manufacture 5 diamond tricks. Of course, you are somewhat restricted playing with GIB so getting to the best contract can often be a complete guess.

[thepossum]

I'm curious. Does 5NT really always promise the Queen of hearts, can it not also be 4+ hearts. Also its after a waiting bid so I wouldn't expect much

Just looked at the hand

I put the hand through other major Bridge software and indeed it was the 2D that threw me

[pescetom]

thepossum, on 2022-November-09, 18:42, said:

I'm curious. Does 5NT really always promise the Queen of hearts, can it not also be 4+ hearts.

Partner promised 3+ hearts so far, not sure what 4 would have to do with the discussion. And as you well know, 5 hearts is equivalent to holding the Queen

But it's an interesting question, given the SNAFU nature of RKCB when NT is used to ask with hearts: after a 5♦ reply there is no room below 5♥ to ask for the Queen. So I guess that it is down to partnership agreement whether 5NT promises the Queen and if so whether 5♠ asks for Queen (which would seem logical).

[bluenikki]

smerriman, on 2022-November-09, 13:53, said:

This should probably be in the robot forum, but GIB will virtually always use Blackwood if you start cuebidding - even if missing controls you denied - because it doesn't know how to cuebid properly and treats it as an extremely strong hand instead (25+ points).

I

Yes.

I'm being dragged kicking and screaming into Blackwooding unsoundly, to prevent the bot from taking over.

Similarly, the bot has lebesohled me so often into Jxxxx that I'm going to start passing 2NT.

[bluenikki]

smerriman, on 2022-November-09, 13:53, said:

This should probably be in the robot forum, but GIB will virtually always use Blackwood if you start cuebidding - even if missing controls you denied - because it doesn't know how to cuebid properly and treats it as an extremely strong hand instead (25+ points).

I

Yes.

I'm being dragged kicking and screaming into Blackwooding unsoundly, to prevent the bot from taking over.

Similarly, the bot has lebesohled me so often into Jxxxx that I'm going to start passing 2NT.