Count

My favorite partner and I decided to support our local clubs with the ACBL "Black Point" game on BBO. Entry is $5 each (many clubs in the US only charge $5 per pair, although in the Boston area it's usually $10-12). It takes 2 full hours to play 18 boards so it's excruciatingly slow.

But a couple of things came up that were perhaps worth the entry fee.

While, I've known the mechanism (and name) of "Last train" for a long time, it had never actually come up before in the heat of battle--at least not knowingly. Here it was in the flesh. We got to a decent 6S contract (made even more decent by getting a club lead).

The second thing that came up is that it turns out that we don't play the same count signals (and haven't done for several years, it seems).  We play UDCA, as I do with almost all of my partners, but once a suit has been broken, we play present count, right? But do we play present count upside down or right-way-up? Turns out that all the "good" players play it right-side-up. What about you?

Signaling - suit or whole hand?

Signaling is easy when there's only one message to be sent and the same message to be received. In communications, we would say that the protocol is established. Here's a simple example: in a suit contract, partner leads the king of a side suit (king from AK). Dummy comes down with three to the queen. The queen is on view so that the protocol (assuming standard carding) established is that follower's carding will be: high-low if he has a doubleton and wants to ruff; otherwise low-high. High-low here is not count. It's attitude but of a specific type -- it doesn't say you like the suit (you don't) -- it says you can give partner a ruff in the suit. If you had J873 in the suit you would like the suit well enough. If partner continues with the suit, your jack will eventually become the high card. That might be nice in a notrump contract but is completely counter-productive in a suit contract! So, that's why the protocol doesn't cater to that situation. High-low says you can ruff the third round and that's all it says.

Unfortunately, there are also many situations where the protocol isn't so well established. Here's a case in point which arose in a club game against unknown opponents. Partner led a small heart and down came the dummy (click "Next").

I won the first trick with the ten and paused for thought. Partner was leading "my" suit and it looked like she had one or three as I could see all the low spots. If it's a singleton, she can get a ruff, but I need to cash some winners first in case it's declarer who has the singleton. So, I cashed the club king to which I received a discouraging signal. According to my interpretation of the protocol, that means that partner is looking for a heart ruff. But according to partner's interpretation, she just doesn't have anything good in clubs. I continued with the ace and then cashed the heart ace. It was declarer who ruffed but we had two more tricks coming: the trump king and the spade ace, for +500.

On this hand, it made no difference. The heart king that I mistakenly promoted in the dummy could never be used for a discard so all was well. But it got me thinking about the protocol in this situation. With no real clues from the auction, I really felt I needed to know about the heart situation. Why would I care about clubs? -- nothing in the dummy could go away on declarer's good clubs. In other words, I needed a signal that helped with the whole hand, not the suit (clubs) in question.

It turns out that we lost the hand in the auction which perhaps is my fault for not bidding hearts directly at some point. Because of partner's three small hearts, we can actually make four hearts, although several players did not. We scored a decent 8 out of 12, eight pairs having bid game our way with four of them making.

I've written before about signals that simply inform and signals that try to direct the defense: Show and tell -- more on defensive strategy. My thesis was that it is the degree of urgency, typically as evidenced by a strong side suit in dummy, which determines which message should be sent.

Here's another situation from the same session (also against unknown opponents):

You can click on the GIB button to see what's right. But I didn't have that luxury. Both of us could see that dummy had a threatening heart suit. So, to me that triggers the notion of urgency. Can we cash sufficient spade tricks before they can get their heart tricks? Or should we try to knock out the diamond ace early on so that it cannot be used later as an entry to the established hearts?

Partner encouraged spades and I had no reason to believe that she wouldn't be able to cash another three spades after getting in with her presumed entry. So, I continued spades at trick two. Unfortunately, the right defense was to give up on spades for now and knock that diamond out. This resulted in us suffering our only bottom board. Defeating the contract would have been a top.

Again, I probably should have known that a diamond was the most urgent. But, I suspect that opportunities for signaling about the whole hand (that's to say helping to direct the defense) arise quite frequently. We definitely need to be on the same page in these circumstances.

A couple of difficult hands from Auburn

In an otherwise decent effort Kim and I had a couple of tricky hands at the CMBA sectional in Auburn, MA.  First, a defensive problem.  Your hand is ♠– ♥JT864 ♦KQ ♣Q87654.  None vulnerable and partner deals and opens 1♠.  You bid a forcing 1NT.  LHO, a player who has never met a hand on which she could not find an overcall, bids 2♦.  Partner passes and it comes back around to you.  Double is primarily for take-out (but with the expectation after the pass that it might well be converted to penalty).  Bidding 2♥ and 3♣ both seem somewhat flawed.  So, let's say you do double and partner leaves it in.  Game for us seems unlikely, so 300 would be a top and even 100 might get most of the matchpoints.  In any case, you have to defend assuming that we are in the right contract.

Partner leads the ♠A (Ace from AK) and dummy comes down with an undeserved trick for declarer: ♠T8642 ♥9752 ♦3 ♣AT2.  Dummy follows low and you are at the cross-roads.  Partner won't be expecting your hand, that's for sure.  Maybe something like ♠93 ♥AT84 ♦72 ♣KJ765 or maybe ♠9 ♥AT864 ♦Q2 ♣K8765.  If you had one or two small trumps, you'd like to ruff a spade early so somehow you'd like to persuade partner to play a small one, if any, before your trumps get drawn.  You might do this by playing a low club then a low heart.  On the other hand, with your actual hand, you don't particularly want to waste any trumps on ruffing partner's losers.  Rather, you want partner to get dummy's entry off the table before the high spade could become good.  So, although this might typically suggest you have the king, I think the right card at trick one is the ♣8.

Unfortunately, neither of us defended optimally and on this occasion, declarer's hand was just good enough to take advantage and score 8 tricks for 180.  This wasn't an absolute bottom for us, but it was a low score.  Actually, it turns out that the normal contract was 3♣ by our side making exactly, so even +100 would not have been a good matchpoint score.

Here's a poor result that was entirely my fault, but is interesting theoretically, nonetheless.  I picked up ♠AK7 ♥98 ♦Q542 ♣KT85 in fourth seat at favorable vulnerability. Partner opened 1♥ and I responded a forcing 1 notrump.  Partner now rebid 2♥ which, in our system practically guarantees six pieces and tends to show a minimum hand strength-wise.  Obviously, I was going to bid game, but which game?  I felt that it might be advantageous to have the lead come up to my hand, especially on a minor suit lead, and bid 3NT – but I neglected three important factors.

First of all, partner's hand might be short on entries given the auction (or alternatively have a poor heart suit).  Both of these factors argue in favor of playing in a major suit game.  Secondly, the choice of notrump versus a major suit tends to work better with a 5-3 fit rather than a 6-2 fit.  Finally, choosing notrump over any 8-card major suit fit should generally only be considered with a plethora of high-card points, something like in the range 27-30.

So, to my contract of 3NT, a fourth-best deuce of spades was led.  Dummy came down much as expected with
♠J6 ♥AKJ764 ♦K8 ♣J97.  Obviously, I was going to try the J.  If it held, my judgment would be vindicated and I would likely make the same number of tricks as the heart declarers.  Unfortunately, the J was covered by the Q and I won with the Ace.  Now, I was definitely behind the heart declarers.  Any lead from the other defender would have likely given away a trick.  Not only that but I now had to be quite careful.  If the ♦K proved not to be an entry, it would be highly embarrassing to leave several hearts stranded in the dummy.

So, I turned to a couple of guidelines.  One was that if hearts were 3-2 I was destined to score badly.  The heart declarers would always score 20 points better than me.  If hearts were 4-1 offside, I'd be just as badly off, probably even worse.  That didn't bear thinking about.  But what if hearts were 4-1 on-side?  The heart declarers would all likely finesse the J and then try to drop the Q or T.  A first-round finesse was obviously called for, but which finesse?

That's when I turned to my Principle of Least Commitment for guidance.  This is the lazy man's way of avoiding having to learn all 656 suit combinations from the Bridge Encyclopedia.  In this case, least commitment suggests running the 9.  The advantage of running the 9 is that if RHO wins with the Q, you know where the T is (unless RHO is very devious indeed).  If you run the 9 and it loses to the T of course, you know nothing about the Q and if you finesse the J and it loses to the Q, you know nothing of the T. 

If entries to dummy were not a problem (or if hearts were trumps), then the best play is to cash a high heart, cross over and finesse the J.  You'll make 6 tricks 37% of the time and 5 tricks 88% of the time.  But if we assume no outside entry to dummy, then we essentially want to duck a trick to maintain our link.  Again, this suggests running the 9, which is what I did.  It lost to the T.

Another way of looking at it is this: if indeed there is no further entry to dummy, running the 9 first will result in either 2 or 5 tricks in the suit, assuming that the hearts are distributed unfavorably: Q532–T or T532–Q.  Finessing the J first will result in either 3 or 2 tricks.

A spade came back and now I had another decision to make.   So far, my strategy was not panning out.  The heart declarers would finesse the J and see the T come up on their left.  Then they'd bang down the top hearts and hope to drop the Q.  If that happened, I'd lose.  Was there a way to win?  Yes: take another finesse in hearts.  But wait!  If that lost to the Q, I might be in the ignominious position of not taking any heart tricks at all and going down quite a few.

Here's where I goofed.  I got scared.  I didn't "stay with the program."  I couldn't bear the thought of looking so silly so I played off the A and K.  The Q failed to appear.  She was exactly where I needed her for a good board.  What an idiot!  I ended up with -50 while my competition were all +420.  I might still have ended up with 400 which would have been good for slightly over average.

When third hand couldn't show attitude

Here's a thorny problem that I've been thinking about recently since it actually came up a couple of months ago.  I'm only going to give you one suit and no auction.  Yes, I know many of you are going to complain!

You are on lead to 1NT (let's assume for the sake of argument that it went 1NT all pass).  Here's your holding in the suit in question:  QJ52.  You decide to lead the 2 and dummy's holding in the suit is T7.  Declarer calls for the T and partner produces the K which is headed by declarer's A.  Notice that partner hasn't been able to show attitude -- he simply was trying to win the trick.  

A couple of tricks later in the hand you are on lead again (partner hasn't had the lead yet) and you decide to cash the Q of this suit.  Dummy plays the 7 perforce, partner's card is the 6, and declarer plays the 8.  How do you continue?  Yes I know you want to know the rest of the hand but please bear with me.

There are three unseen cards: 9, 4 and 3.  Here are partner's seven possible holdings:

1. K9643
2. K964
3. K963
4. K643
5. K96
6. K64
7. K63

If partner is showing (present) count from #6 or #7, then declarer started with A984 or A983 in which case if you continue with the J, you will actually give a trick to declarer. 

We can probably rule out #4 because playing the 6 would be confusing to partner (and this doesn't look like a situation where it would be helpful to confuse declarer).


What about #1, #2 and #3?  Could partner be showing attitude?  Wouldn't he play the 9 then?  Well, yes, he would with #2 or #3 because he can afford to play the 9 to show attitude.  But where partner has all three of the missing cards (#1), he cannot play the 9 because the suit will then block!  Partner may have no outside entry.

There's one more possibility: #5 -- partner is simply playing his lowest card.


The bottom line is this: with #1 (attitude) we want to continue with our J and then the 5.  With #5 (attitude, kind of), we should continue with our 5 to partner's 9.  With #6 or #7 (count) we must not continue at all.  #2, #3 and #4 are impossible (according to our logic above).


Can we actually tell what to do?  Is partner showing attitude or count?  The books are silent on this issue.  Kantar and Bird don't cover it.  Neither does anyone else that I've found.  But according to the logic that, in following suit, partner shows attitude first, then count, then suit preference, it seems to me that partner should be showing attitude because he didn't get a chance when we led the suit before.  It would be different if partner got the lead and returned this suit: by convention, he shows present count by returning his original fourth best card (or high from an original holding of Kxx).  


So what happened in practice?  Partner started with holding #1 (K9643) and opening leader never played the J.  So, from a suit where we should have taken four tricks, we actually took one!  Not a good result :)

More thoughts on defensive signaling

I was a little disappointed to get no response, comments, whatever on my earlier contribution to defensive signaling: Show and Tell – More on Defensive Strategy.  Indeed the only reaction I got was from my own favorite partner who thought my idea was all wrong.

Yet, we had just suffered a bad result where, if we had both been following my ideas, we might have averted disaster.  The scene was a pickup game against the GIBs: this was the hand.  The opponents were in 2C doubled after my rather pushy negative double was left in.  It turns out that they can always make 2C but there was just a chance that maybe we could get a heart ruff provided the HJ was led at trick 3.  I led my trump to the 9, T and Q.  At trick 2 declarer played a small club to partner's J on which my discard was the S9.  According to my "show and tell" ideas, this card was purely informative (show in this case because there was no apparent defensive urgency).  After all, I had to pitch something and I certainly had plenty spades to spare.  Partner thought it was a more active signal (a "command") to switch to spades.  Nothing really bad happened: according to GIB, we were never setting this contract.  But partner was convinced that a H switch would have got us a ruff (and the setting trick). 

So, what is it really that distinguishes between show and tell.  In my previous blog I suggested it was all about distribution and level.  The more distribution and/or higher level, the more urgency exists (and therefore telling is most effective). 

But now, I'm thinking perhaps it has more to do with the dummy.  Assuming that dummy is where the ruffs, if any, are going to occur (not always the case after a transfer or in the case of a dummy reversal), the dummy pretty much dictates the type of hand.  If dummy has a good long suit with entries, or will be able to do some ruffing (bearing in mind that declarer may be able to throw dummy's losers on his own good suit and then ruff in the now short suit) then "tell" signals should prevail.  The level of urgency has been increased by an "active" dummy.

Either way, in the hand in question, dummy was pretty much rubbish and would have required a few thousand volts to make it in any way active.  So, signaling should be to show assets rather than directing the defense.

Now, does anyone have any comments?  If I'm oversimplifying something, then let me hear it!

Show and Tell – More on Defensive Strategy

The bridge defender's dilemma: when you make a discard (or other signal) do you:

• show partner where you have something; or
• direct the defense by telling him what to do?

Often these come to the same thing in which case there's no problem.  But not always.  Note that I'm not talking about deceptive carding here, that's a separate subject.  The assumption is that we want to give partner good information and we're not too concerned about declarer seeing it too.

At first glance, it seems like we might be able to make an agreement with our partner: I'll always show you where I have high cards; or I'll always help you find the right defense.  But that idea of course would be nonsense.  You want to do different things at different times.  The trick is knowing what partner is telling you on any given hand.  How can you figure it out?

First, I think we have to assume that partner is an intelligent, sentient bridge player who was also listening to the auction and can clearly see the dummy!  He already knows which tricks might be going away and where declarer's weakness might be.  In particular, he can see if dummy has a dangerous suit or whether declarer is going to have to make his tricks the hard way.

So, my suggestion for the key to which defensive strategy should be (or is being) employed is this: urgency.  It stands to reason that the degree of urgency is greatest when the opponents are in a distributional suit slam and least when they're in a balanced 1NT contract.

Thus the following seems like a reasonable rule:

• if the situation is urgent, direct the defense by telling partner what to do;
• otherwise, show partner where you have a useful card or two.

Let's take a couple of examples, all assuming standard bidding and carding.  You are dealt the following hand at teams: ♠976 ♥K953 ♦7 ♣A9876.  Partner deals and opens 1♥, RHO bids 1♠ and you contribute 2♥.  LHO bids 3♥, partner passes and RHO closes the auction with 3♠.  You decide to lead your singleton ♦7 and the following dummy comes down: ♠AT4 ♥J74 ♦AT8 ♣QT53.  The first trick is made up of the 8, 9 and declarer's J after which the ♠Q is passed around to partner's K (not declarer's best play).  Partner leads the ♣4 which you win, returning the ♣6 for partner to ruff.  At this point, we have three tricks, but partner isn't sure what you want returned (declarer followed to the two club tricks with the K and J so that the location of the ♣2 is still unknown).  In order to figure out whether you want a diamond ruff or whether we can cash two heart tricks, partner plays the ♥A.  You know that a second ♥ trick won't stand up (partner can't be sure) and your trumps will be drawn if you don't get a diamond ruff immediately.  Urgency suggests direction (telling) over information.  Therefore, even though you actually have the ♥K, you play a discouraging 3.  You get your diamond ruff for a set, instead of letting them make.

Here's another hand: all are vulnerable at matchpoints and you deal yourself ♠A54 ♥62 ♦KQ82 ♣J863.  Your LHO opens 1♥ and RHO bids 1NT which is passed out.  You choose the ♠4 as your lead, eschewing the good diamond suit (this actually works out rather well).  Dummy is ♠982 ♥KQ874 ♦AJ ♣Q95 and partner's J is won by declarer's K.  Declarer now sets about enjoying the hearts, having started with A9 in his own hand.  On dummy's Q, you have to discard and you know that partner will be winning the next trick.  What should you discard?  You'd like partner to continue with spades of course, but he'll likely be doing that anyway.  Is there anything that you think partner needs to know about your assets (he knows you have between 10 and 14 hcp but he doesn't know where they are exactly).  He's also expecting you to have 4234 shape (he can only see four clubs so if you don't have four, declarer has six).  I think he needs to know that you have a stopper in diamonds (if he happens to have the ♦T, we may even be able to get 3S, 1H, 3D and 1C).  I believe that you should show your diamond values by discarding the ♦8.  There's no great urgency here, so our signal should be seen as informative (showing) rather than directing.

When I played this board recently, my partner holding the hand given, discarded the ♦2 (because he wanted spades continued, i.e. he was telling, rather than showing).  But I assumed he was showing.  Figuring then that partner must have the ♣K and only one of the ♦ honors, I wanted us to be able to cash out our clubs when the spades were finished.  Since I held the singleton ♣A, I felt that it was essential to cash it before running the spades (I held QJ63 originally).  Declarer now took 1S, 4H, 1D and 2C for an overtrick.  Although Deep Finesse says that declarer should always make the overtrick, our declarer wasn't going to without our help.

So, if potential tricks could go away quickly unless you metaphorically kick partner in the pants, tell him/her what to do.  If an active defense is likely to give away tricks, use your signals to show partner where you have useful values.

When attitude is known

It's customary when signaling to show attitude when we lead a suit.  If they lead a suit, our attitude is assumed to be bad and we skip to showing count.  If both attitude and count are known, or if bridge logic says that neither of these is important (e.g. a singleton in dummy), we skip to suit preference.

So much is reasonably standard.  Some people like to show count even on the opening lead, others on the opening lead if dummy presents a certain number of cards in the suit, etc.

In this blog entry, I would like to propose a variation: when attitude is already known from the auction, we give count on the first trick.  It's a method I've been playing for a while with one of my partners.

How does it operate?  When is attitude already known?  The premise is that when we get to show a good suit during the auction, our attitude is considered known (and good).  What constitutes showing a good suit?

• an overcall;
• a rebid of a suit;
• a "free" bid in a suit (when pass would be a valid alternative) [according to my principle of "stuff"];
• a lead-directing double of an opponent's artificial bid;

Thus, if we are not obliged to try to win the trick, for instance when partner leads a high card, or we cannot beat the dummy, our carding shows count, not attitude (when attitude is known from the auction).

Here's why it works: in all of the cases given, we have suggested length and strength in the suit.  Because of the length, the suit will not be standing up for very many tricks.  But how many tricks?  That's why count is so important.  Fie, I hear you say, sometimes I make bad overcalls.  Well, that may be true, but assuming partner is going to lead your suit anyway, the damage, if any, will already be done.  Much of the time the play to the first trick will clarify the position.  Yes, it's possible that a tempo or even a trick may be lost when partner gets in and, assuming good attitude (because you weren't able to discourage at trick one because of the obligation to show count), leads the suit a second time.  But for that to cost, four conditions must be met:

1. you have to have made a questionable bid during the auction;
2. you must have been in a position to signal at trick one (i.e. you were not trying to win the trick);
3. declarer/dummy must have sufficient cards in the suit for it to make a difference;
4. it must not be obvious from dummy's holding what's going on in the suit.

The chance of all these happening at the same time is actually quite small.

The same idea applies when the bidder is the one leading the suit.  On opening lead, it is normal to show count in any case so there's really no difference there.  But during the hand, it's common to make attitude leads of new suits.  Again, it's better to show count when we are leading our own "good" suit.

Note that this scheme may also apply (according to partnership agreement) when partner is leading his own known-to-be-good suit: our carding should show count if we can't win the trick.

As always, comments welcome.

Signaling

This is another topic that I've been thinking about for some time.  Len and I are trying a slightly different scheme for signaling which works as follows:


if either leader or leader's partner has strongly bid a suit, then follower skips attitude and goes directly to count; otherwise, follower starts with attitude and then goes to count. In all cases, after count, suit preference would come next.

A little explanation of "strongly bid" is called for. A "strongly bid" suit is one which either:

• overcalled;
• was bid twice;
• made a preempt.

It's possible of course that your suit quality isn't all that good, especially if you made a weak jump overcall.  But it's too late to worry about that now that partner is leading your suit!  He's expecting you to have good attitude so your carding, if it means anything at all, is count.

Leader of course makes the normal lead from an honor sequence or 3rd/lowest or whatever your lead conventions are.

The point of this convention is that when one player has strongly bid a suit, there won't be many tricks standing up in the suit.  But knowing exactly how many will stand up is often crucially important.