[DavidKok]

A fun hand from last night.

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I'll explain the bidding before handing it over to you for the play. The title is in jest - there's several misbids on this auction. I am playing Dutch Doubleton in a new partnership, but we haven't set up our system agreements in full detail yet so we're flying by the seats of our pants while also writing a system book that we can agree on. We're currently at only 50 pages, but likely this will double in the next two weeks.

As South I was cheerfully imagining how I might show this huge hand when to my surprise partner opened and RHO, after asking about my alert, passed. The next round I got an even bigger surprise when partner revealed shortage in my short suit and a massive fit.

1♣ was Dutch Doubleton, showing 2+ clubs and containing balanced hands up to 4 diamonds (our 1♦ opening is 5+ or 4=4=4=1 or 1=4=4=4). Our NT range is 14-16, in case that matters.
1♥ is Dutch Doubleton as well, showing 4+ hearts and approximately 8+ hcp, and may contain a longer diamond suit in a weak hand.
3♠ is a spade splinter for hearts. Since the 1♥ promises values we can bid this a little bit lighter than most systems, as long as it's a good description of the hand. On this hand we discussed whether 3♥ would be more appropriate (showing 14-16 with 5(+)♣, 4♥ or 4=4=1=4), and we both agreed that it would have been a better description of the hand due to two factors: 1) The singleton spade is the ace; 2) The large upgrade needed to get to the splinter.
4♣ is a club control. I prefer to have the agreement that showing a control in partner's known long suit (and the clubs are real, by now) shows the ace or the king, and never a singleton or a void. This helps resolve exactly the confusion partner might have now - if I have the king the clubs are precious, if I have a singleton or a void they are much less valuable. However, we did not have this agreement (yet). Besides, at this point I was going to take charge anyway, with all suits controlled and plenty of playing strength. Do keep in mind that 4NT here would have been undiscussed - I don't play jump bids as ace-asking. We have not discussed Nonserious 3NT yet.
4♥ is a signoff. We had not discussed Last Train, but even if it did apply partner's hand is at the very bottom end of the bucket shown by the splinter.
4NT is RKC 1430.
5♥ shows two key cards, which surprised me a little as it revealed the singleton ♠A. Over this I normally have the agreement that 6♦ asks for a third round control in diamonds, so the ♦Q or a doubleton. This avoids the poor grand in case partner has ♠A, ♥Jxxx, ♦xxx, ♣AKJxx where even ruffing out the clubs isn't enough and I see nothing better than a finesse - though this also shouldn't be a 3♠ bid. However, again, we did not discuss this and I wasn't about to introduce this nuance in a live auction.
So it seems like partner must have something - either better clubs, or the ♦Q, as there's no room for anything better in spades or hearts - for the 3♠ bid. Time for 7♥.

With my explanations, can you tolerate the auction?

West leads the ♥2. I took around 5 minutes before playing to trick one - can you figure out what the problems are, and the options are, and the winning line(s)?

[mw64ahw]

On first sight I'd look to squeeze in ♣ or ♦ having established the trump split and looking to hold back opener's low ♥s for additional entries

[Cyberyeti]

Did both follow to the first heart ? Winning with the A, clearly diamonds must not split or there's no issue, if clubs are 4-2 and hearts 3-1 there's no issue either, I think I simply:

Win ♥A and if all follow
♣A
♣ruff high if all follow, this is over, if not
diamond to Q
Club ruff high
Spade to A
Club ruff with 10
Draw trumps and pitch the remaining 2 clubs on the diamonds

[mikeh]

Thank partner for his heart spots.

If both follow to the first trump:

Win high in hand, club, club ruff high, trump to dummy.

Second club ruff high, spade to dummy, third club ruff high, spade ruff, pull trump and claim

4 trump in dummy, 3 club ruffs, 4 diamonds, 2 black aces.

I assume you’d have mentioned it had RHO shown out at trick one so have assumed trump are 3-1 or 2-2. Note that this line succeeds even on 6-0 diamonds. If trump are 4-0, we have to use a diamond to dummy rather than the spade Ace, lest the hand with four trump pitch diamonds on the clubs as we ruff high. Then we can use the spade ace to dummy in order to pull trump.

[mike777]

Wonderful post, ty for sharing.
Non play question, actually I have bunch of questions but will not take up your time.

What is your plan for teaching each other your bidding system, 50 pages over the next 2 weeks sounds like a lot. Are your 100 pages of notes, full pages or are many simply one or two sentences?

[DavidKok]

My old Dutch Doubleton system notes from 2019 are 71 pages. I went through those the past week, updating them where appropriate but mostly slashing them since there's a lot of stuff in there we aren't going to play (yet). What remained is 50 pages.
In fairness there is a table of contents, and the 17 chapters start on a new page each so sometimes there's a half-empty page before it (though mostly there isn't, looking through it). I'd say there are around 46-47 filled A4 pages at the moment - none of which contain only one or two sentences.
The split isn't the best, though it's healthier than most bidding systems:

• 3 pages TOC
  
• 3 pages on philosophy of the system
  
• 18 pages on our constructive system
  
• 2 pages on our preempts
  
• 3 pages on slam gadgets
  
• 9 pages on defending against intervention
  
• 8 pages on interfering with the opponents
  
• 2 pages on specific defences against opponents' gadgets
  
• 2 pages on leads and signals

We're off to an amazing start. Over the next weeks we intend to focus on the competitive bidding. In particular, hand evaluation, preempting and gadgets on competitive auctions are currently underemphasised. On this deal I pointed out our lack of detailed slam bidding agreements - the far other extreme, and probably we'll ignore those gadgets I discussed above for now. There's a list titled 'Options for the future' near the start of the document, currently it contains 17 items. In addition, we have some file management ready to separate 'stuff we agreed on' from 'stuff we propose' from 'stuff we just want to store for now but only discuss in a distant future'.

It is simply a lot of work. Some of it is sufficiently standard, but (in my opinion) more thoroughly explained, that picking this up shouldn't be too hard. Other aspects most definitely are hard. We're going to keep focusing on the low-hanging fruit, emphasising style over gadgets and only adding stuff if we think it's necessary.

[DavidKok]

East follows to the first trick. I did not mention this because I wanted to plan the play before playing to trick one - those ♥J97 are valuable entries and need to be managed carefully, especially if the hearts are indeed 4-0. Once you choose a card East will produce the ♥3.

Mikeh is completely correct on the best way to play this hand. At the table I did not spot the spade ruff for a re-entry, and thought I had to enter the dummy with the ♦Q to get to three ruffs for the dummy reversal. That line wins when the diamonds are no worse than 5-1, but cannot handle 6-0. This is still better than playing for the diamonds to drop (which also fails on 6-0 diamonds, as well as 5-1 diamonds) or a minor suit squeeze (which requires long clubs and diamonds on the same hand, which is improbable and further counterindicated by the lack of bidding). Making 7♥ was a clean 100% as the rest of the field did not bid past a small slam.

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[mikeh]

One great way to practice bidding is to use cuebids.com. Great website

We have about 130 pages of notes, with no blanks (lol) and (since we’ve played off and on for almost 30 years) a number of agreements that aren’t in writing, to do primarily with style and defence.

[DavidKok]

We use the Cuebids app on our phones. So far we've bid 288 practice deals (12x24). It's a nice app, but it also has a number of flaws. It's important to identify when a poor score was due to a mistake, due to a system gap or due to Cuebids just being Cuebids. Lately I've noticed people rely on it for practice too much, and that can overshoot the mark and harm the partnership. In particular, the bias it puts on the deals has a major impact on bidding strategy.

[mike777]

Thanks for taking the time to go into organizational details regarding your notes and how you are putting together your partnership.
I am doing that now, but clearly on a slower pace. Adding a new piece each week.
For example versions of, splinters or game tries or Jacoby 2nT are separate modules.

Have not even started on defensive bidding.

I am still learning puppet stayman and a new no trump response style after 3 weeks..smile

I am day three of cuebid app, I like it so far.

The posts by everyone in this thread, very helpful. Ty.

[mikeh]

DavidKok, on 2025-August-15, 13:55, said:

We use the Cuebids app on our phones. So far we've bid 288 practice deals (12x24). It's a nice app, but it also has a number of flaws. It's important to identify when a poor score was due to a mistake, due to a system gap or due to Cuebids just being Cuebids. Lately I've noticed people rely on it for practice too much, and that can overshoot the mark and harm the partnership. In particular, the bias it puts on the deals has a major impact on bidding strategy.

We ignore the ‘scores’. It rates contracts on, we think, a double dummy analysis. Plus once in a while you get a result in which the top score goes to defending a doubled contract….and the opps did not bid against us, lol.

You need discipline, looking at the combined hands on a single dummy basis.

It also helps to have an upgraded membership that allows you to input constraints that let you practice particular sequences. For example, my wife is learning Bart and my partner sent her a bunch of hands such that bart came up on many of them.

[thepossum]

haven't read the thread but with the top 8 trumps looks simple
I can count 11 top tricks.
now to read the thread and what I missed
I am sure I am underthinking
A couple of voids in the black suits I guess 10-0 in spades, 6-0 in clubs. No not that worried
You culd be unlucky with diamonds too I guess5-1 perhaps
I imagine a pro would worry about it
Back to NB for me
EDIT back here looking for the trick
EDIT 2, not as stupid as I seem but the only hands that don't make (double dummy I add) have voids
EDIT 3, I assume since this is IA there is a catch. Still looking for it. Maybe the hand belongs in NB

[Slamhound]

The hand can easily be bid using a jump shift in hearts. Opener can bid 4N, slam found. I stopped playing many conventions because while fun to play, don't always translate to good scores when partner or you forget the continuations, or use different ones with different partners, and so on: KISS.

On heart lead: play HJ, SA (unblock), come into hand with a trump, ruff a spade, draw trumps if not fallen, play the top diamonds, throw club losers. Should make 13 tricks.

[pescetom]

 Slamhound, on 2025-August-17, 02:03, said:

On heart lead: play HJ, SA (unblock), come into hand with a trump, ruff a spade, draw trumps if not fallen, play the top diamonds, throw club losers. Should make 13 tricks.

Why not pitch the 5 on the first trick? It's the only trump that can possibly lose.
At first sight your line also looks inferior to the dummy reversal with clubs. What happens if diamonds do not behave ?