If you’re not planning on setting up a suit, then ruffing out that suit ONLY accomplishes one thing: reducing your trump tricks. You’re giving up control and giving the opponents a gift. Stop being so fucking stupid.
“Nice try partner.”
Blackwood is like a loaded gun. Learn which way that nozzle is pointing before you go firing it off at any opportunity. Woooo you’ve got a 17 point hand. Holy crap in the manger, it’s a miracle! We barely have enough for game and you’re off trying for slam because I showed interest in your suit.
“interesting gamble there partner.”
And while we’re on Blackwood, you cannot use it when you have a void. You CANNOT use it when we haven’t even agreed on a suit yet. YOU CANNOT USE IT WHEN WE’RE PLAYING NO TRUMP! Is Gerber the redheaded stepchild of conventions? Use it!
“oooh, one too high. We’ll get them next time partner.”
If you bid 1NT, I know your hand. If you bid 2NT I know your hand. Once you’ve described your hand, you’re done. See me, with my hands at 10 and 2? That’s right, I’m in the fucking driver’s seat, so sit back and enjoy the ride. I will bid this hand to the contract it needs to be and if I get us too high, that’s my fault. But it’s only my fault if I’m the one bidding it. You’ve shown me your hand, now STOP BIDDING.
“guess it’s just not our night, partner.”
If I don’t show interest in the suit you lead, please believe me. I’m not trying to lie to you partner. I’m not trying to trick you into giving the opponents more tricks. That would be sneaky, three against one, but the world isn’t full of that conspiracy you must surely believe exists. Keep your Ace and let me lead up to you. There, we worked as a partnership. Doesn’t that feel nice?
Yeah, but blackjack isn’t a partnership. Well, ok, it can be, but casinos sometimes frown upon it.
Bridge is a partnership. You play with a partner and you trust them to help you guide each other to the right contract and right play of the cards.
It’s like if you go through basic training and you’re climbing that wall and almost make it to the top, you have to trust your buddies aren’t going to, you know, stab you in the heart with a bayonet and toss you down, bleeding and battered, 30 feet to the cold hard ground below. It’s a trust issue.
Ender, I have to admit that when I saw your thread title, my first thought was, “Isn’t he in his second year? He should be done with Contracts by now!”
I don’t have a set partner. I play online and at clubs and often time have a different partner every single time. So there are things I give leeway to. Do you go high low or low high when discarding? Do you show suit preference or attitude? Do you know splinter bids or cue bids? Hey, we should probably work some of those out, but there’s only so much time in the day, you know?
But damnit, there’s only so many times you can give “constructive criticism” to very basic mistakes before it looks like you’re just yelling at them over everything…which you are, really.
I mean, when I open with a bid and responder hasn’t bid yet, his bid is FORCING. You do not need to bid 4NT and give up four levels of bidding space because you have a hard-on for slam. Bid normally and I’ll rebid…as it should be.
ENugent, you’re never done with contracts. It follows you to your grave. Nevertheless, if I had written about contracts the title probably would have been “motherfucking contracts! I’ll give you your damn consideration when I shove this peppercorn up your butthole!”
friedo, I’m not old, I’m 37! OK, I’m actually 25 but how often do you get to use that line? I play Hold’em, 7 card stud, Omaha, and about a bajillion other card games.
Heh. Me too. I thought he was saying that playing bridge trumped studying for contracts. I guess the thread title was a bid for our attention.
Anyhoo, Ender buddy, here’s a bridge quiz for you, just like in the newspapers. (Answer correctly, and maybe we can ditch our parters and see if we’re suited for each other.)
Nothing on, no one vulnerable, you deal. After counting all of your distributional points, you have 12 total points. Do you open?
Vulnerability is a big factor, I know, but three other things matter to me:
a) The number of aces I have in my hand
b) Whether I have a convenient rebid.
c) Is my first bid spades?
I’d put B ahead of all the others in terms of importance. As I said, responder’s bid is forcing and if I’m starting off the bidding I do NOT want to get into a position where I’m scrambling to find a bid saying “why did I ever open? Now my partner thinks I have something!”
So to answer your question specifically, yes, I will open on 12 distributionally. To answer it generally: it depends.
“How would you have played that hand?”
“Under an assumed name.”
–George S Kaufman
OK, I admit to being nothing more than a talented amateur at bridge (I have 0.52 master points) but
I thought that in Blackwood a void counted as an ace. Why can it not be used with a void? I looked here and it says that attempting to bid slam is not a good idea if a partner has a void but doesn’t explain why beyond “experience has shown.” My limited experience has shown that a void, with its automatic first round (and every round as long as trumps hold out) suit control can be very conducive to making slams, especially if the void is in a suit where partner has, say, A-K and the void serves as a way to jettison some potential losers. Regardless it doesn’t say “don’t use Blackwood with a void” except by inference since Blackwood is a slam inquiry.
Bzzzt. If you can’t get to 13 counting distributional points (nothing on, no one vulnerable, first seat), do not open opposite me.
Bzzzt. For God’s sake stop thinking and just play! Otherwise, I shall be forced to eat the entire container of onion dip. It’s either that or I chew my arm off.
Looks like we just don’t match up well. Too bad. You were showing some finesse there too.
Otto, sorry, I guess I didn’t explain it clearly. If your partner starts Blackwood, you have no choice but to respond, void and all. That’s no problem and there’s even a response to show you have a void: bid your aces but at a level higher! So if you have one ace and a void, your response to 4NT is 6d.
But if you’re initiator of Blackwood, you cannot have a void. The reason why is because, when partner responds with the number of aces, what does that mean? Does he have an ace in your void or in a good suit?
Imagine this situation: AKxxx Kxx AKxxx
If you bid blackwood and your partner shows you one ace, what do you do? Is it the ace in your void? That won’t do any good, will it? You need an ace to plug up that king or they can run right through it.
Humble Servant if you don’t stop with those god awful puns, I shall slam you with such grand force you’ll be transfered back to last Tuesday.
And then I open it and it’s like listening to my mother complain about my father - so first, early twenties trauma followed by childhood trauma. Thanks a lot.
As a philosophical matter, I’m generally very lenient about counting distribution and taking situation into account. You got a 5-card suit and 12 high-card points? Well, then you at least have a doubleton and that gets you to 13. They have a part on or they’re vulnerable? Opening with 12 is at worst a noble sacrifice. You got 12 high-card with 4/3/3/3 distribution and no situation to address, then you don’t have openers. (Your Dad must love that thrill of victory/agony of defeat thing; me, I’d have to kill you.)
amarinth: I (like Otto) play with my parents. We honor them by this; after all the sacrifices they have made for us, after all the bad breaks they’re helped us through, it’s a way to let them know they’re not dummies. It may seem very conventional, but our hearts are in it.
