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Tough play problem?

#1 Guest_Jlall_*

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Posted 2008-June-25, 21:12



What contract do you want to be in? At the table the auction was:

P P P 1H
P 2D p 2S
P 2N p 3D
p 3H p 3S
p 4D p 5D

Agree with the auction (yay no 2 way drury)?

The lead is a club to the ace and a club back. Plan your play. If it matters to you your RHO is a weak player and your LHO is a strong player.
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#2 User is offline   gnasher 

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Posted 2008-June-26, 02:25

I think the auction was good, and 5♦ seems the best spot.

I ruff and play a heart towards the queen. If RHO has ♥K and wins it, I'm well placed to ruff my other club, draw trumps, and throw my spades on hearts.

If a strong RHO plays low on the heart, I'll probably play the queen anyway, because I have a naive belief that good players usually defend well. If LHO wins this and plays back a spade, I'll be forced to finesse. If LHO wins ♥K and plays back a club, I'll have to use a heart ruff to get back to hand to draw trumps. So, this line is a little bit worse than trumps breaking and one of two finesses.

Edit: I hadn't noticed that RHO was a weak player. If he plays low on the heart, I should play the nine.
... that would still not be conclusive proof, before someone wants to explain that to me as well as if I was a 5 year-old. - gwnn
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#3 User is offline   nige1 

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Posted 2008-June-26, 04:09

Jlall, on Jun 25 2008, 10:12 PM, said:

What contract do you want to be in? At the table the auction was:

P P P 1H
P 2D p 2S
P 2N p 3D
p 3H p 3S
p 4D p 5D

Agree with the auction (yay no 2 way drury)?

The lead is a club to the ace and a club back. Plan your play. If it matters to you your RHO is a weak player and your LHO is a strong player.
Auction and contract seem fine.
Guessing: ruff 2nd ♣. Advance ♥J.
  • If LHO wins and leads ♠, then finesse.
  • If RHO wins and leads a ♦ (or a ♣) then (ruff) draw trumps. hoping to make 6♦ 4♥ and 1♠ (unless the play indicates something else)
  • If ♥J wins, then try your luck with ♠J ;)

Guthrie.tech
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#4 User is offline   Halo 

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Posted 2008-June-26, 06:45

I think 4H is reasonable since I tend to make with hearts 33 even if diamonds are 41.

Meanwhile I don't seem to make five diamonds against 41 trumps, so ignore 41 and:

Ruff and play Queen of spades. If RHO wins, and forces me again I'm pretty much home. If RHO wins and plays a diamond, or LHO wins looks like I need the heart finesse.
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#5 User is offline   mikeh 

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Posted 2008-June-26, 08:23

ruff the club, low heart, relying upon rho's weakness.

rho won't duck the King.

If he wins the King, I am virtually home, so long as trump behave. If he plays low, I insert the 9...lho presumably wins and returns a spade... I have to finesse due to entry problems.

I think this line is effectively one of two finesses, on the assumption that rho can't duck the k♥ smoothly (if he twitches at trick 3, I pop the Q). I am assuming 3-2 trumps, of course. It isn't quite that good, but I have a plane to catch so won't go into all the details

The spade play at trick 3 (the Q or the J) is not quite as good, since rho can win and return a trump or a spade, and now I need the heart hook as well
'one of the great markers of the advance of human kindness is the howls you will hear from the Men of God' Johann Hari
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#6 User is offline   Halo 

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Posted 2008-June-26, 08:33

Although after hitch, 9♥ won by the King, a spade comes back and you have choices to make.
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#7 User is offline   gnasher 

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Posted 2008-June-26, 09:30

Halo, on Jun 26 2008, 03:33 PM, said:

Although after hitch, 9♥ won by the King, a spade comes back and you have choices to make.

Not many. Finesse the spade, draw trumps (overtaking, because you know that they're 3-2) and cash major-suit tricks.

If ♥K is on the left, you need ♠K onside. The reason for playing ♥9 is to provide an entry back to hand in the event that LHO wins ♥K and forces dummy again.
... that would still not be conclusive proof, before someone wants to explain that to me as well as if I was a 5 year-old. - gwnn
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#8 User is offline   Halo 

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Posted 2008-June-26, 10:31

gnasher, on Jun 26 2008, 10:30 AM, said:

Halo, on Jun 26 2008, 03:33 PM, said:

Although after hitch, 9♥ won by the King, a spade comes back and you have choices to make.

Not many. Finesse the spade, draw trumps (overtaking, because you know that they're 3-2) and cash major-suit tricks.

If ♥K is on the left, you need ♠K onside. The reason for playing ♥9 is to provide an entry back to hand in the event that LHO wins ♥K and forces dummy again.

Yes Gnasher,

But it doesn't equate to one of two finesses - since after the nine takes the King (successful finesse) you still need a second finesse to make. We are told LHO is strong, so he is not forcing you a second time when the spade finesse is failing.

For the moment (until I understand the argument better) I'll stick to my defensive error or King of Hearts on the left line of play.
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#9 User is offline   gnasher 

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Posted 2008-June-26, 11:42

Halo, on Jun 26 2008, 05:31 PM, said:

Yes Gnasher,

But it doesn't equate to one of two finesses - since after the nine takes the King (successful finesse) you still need a second finesse to make.  We are told LHO is strong, so he is not forcing you a second time when the spade finesse is failing. 

For the moment (until I understand the argument better) I'll stick to my defensive error or King of Hearts on the left line of play.

The first finesse is against RHO's ♥K.

If LHO has ♥K, one finesse has lost.

The second finesse is against LHO's ♠K.

If LHO has ♥K and RHO has ♠K, two finesses have lost.

If LHO has ♥K, ♠K, a doubleton heart, and ♦9x(x), we also need RHO to have ♥10, to enable us to avoid a trump promotion. Most of the time, we don't care whether ♥9 loses to ♥K or ♥10.

Thus it needs trumps breaking, one of two finesses against the major suit kings, and a bit more.

The above analysis assumes that if RHO has ♥K he'll either play it or make it obvious that he has it.
... that would still not be conclusive proof, before someone wants to explain that to me as well as if I was a 5 year-old. - gwnn
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#10 User is offline   Trumpace 

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Posted 2008-June-26, 11:56

<deleted stupid question>
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#11 Guest_Jlall_*

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Posted 2008-June-26, 13:50

Does it matter that you took about 3 minutes to play at trick 2 and were like "hmm..I have no idea what to do... (ok RHO was a client and likes that you talk etc lol)"? I felt like that may have sominex couped RHO or something, or made her do something wierd when I led a heart off dummy so I just put in the Q. I am not really familiar with the ramifications of playing slow since it is rare for me but it seems like it might make people do weird things.

Anyways, RHO ducked with KTx so it was all good haha (but I chose to put in the Q).
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#12 User is offline   gnasher 

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Posted 2008-June-26, 13:52

If I were in any doubt at all what RHO would do holding ♥K, I'd put the queen up. The potential gain from finessing the nine is quite small.
... that would still not be conclusive proof, before someone wants to explain that to me as well as if I was a 5 year-old. - gwnn
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#13 Guest_Jlall_*

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Posted 2008-June-26, 13:54

gnasher, on Jun 26 2008, 02:52 PM, said:

If I were in any doubt at all what RHO would do holding ♥K, I'd put the queen up. The potential gain from finessing the nine is quite small.

Yep that was what I decided. I created that doubt in my mind anyways from playing slow and talking... I think if I was able to play in tempo I would have played the 9 since there would be no doubt (and I think she would have popped king).
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#14 User is offline   Halo 

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Posted 2008-June-26, 14:48

I usually just give in on these posts.

But what I see here is complete gibberish.

We have MikeH reading RHO (reasonable on OP), and Gnasher (I believe) mistaking which was the weak player, and JLall (hoho) too busy talking to notice whether RHO hesitated or not.

And the conclusion is 'chortle, chortle...'

Could take it to the 'interesting' forum, at risk of rejection.
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#15 Guest_Jlall_*

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Posted 2008-June-26, 15:03

Halo, on Jun 26 2008, 03:48 PM, said:

I usually just give in on these posts.

But what I see here is complete gibberish.

We have MikeH reading RHO (reasonable on OP), and Gnasher (I believe) mistaking which was the weak player, and JLall (hoho) too busy talking to notice whether RHO hesitated or not.

And the conclusion is 'chortle, chortle...'

Could take it to the 'interesting' forum, at risk of rejection.

I'm not sure what this post means lol.

What do you mean I am too busy to take note of whether RHO hesitated or not? I played very slowly which gave RHO a lot of time to think, so RHO was likely never going to hesitate after I played slowly. Unforuntately I thought this was a hard hand and wanted to make sure I chose the best option (SQ off the dummy, heart to queen, or something else). Unfortunately if you play slowly you give RHO time to think and weird things can happen. You can no longer expect RHO to hesitate with the king, though you might expect them to pop king. So in an ideal world you play a heart off the dummy in tempo and play RHO to give away the king (I agree), but what actually happened at the table was I thought forever and played a heart so when RHO ducked I felt that playing the queen was now the best play.

Can you please clarify the meaning of your post? If you really think a thread where mikeh, gnasher, and I post about how to play a hand is "gibberish" perhaps it is over your head.
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#16 User is offline   Halo 

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Posted 2008-June-26, 15:11

Jlall, on Jun 26 2008, 04:03 PM, said:

Halo, on Jun 26 2008, 03:48 PM, said:

I usually just give in on these posts.

But what I see here is complete gibberish.

We have MikeH reading RHO (reasonable on OP), and Gnasher (I believe) mistaking which was the weak player, and JLall (hoho) too busy talking to notice whether RHO hesitated or not.

And the conclusion is 'chortle, chortle...'

Could take it to the 'interesting' forum, at risk of rejection.

I'm not sure what this post means lol.

What do you mean I am too busy to take note of whether RHO hesitated or not? I played very slowly which gave RHO a lot of time to think, so RHO was likely never going to hesitate after I played slowly. Unforuntately I thought this was a hard hand and wanted to make sure I chose the best option (SQ off the dummy, heart to queen, or something else). Unfortunately if you play slowly you give RHO time to think and weird things can happen. You can no longer expect RHO to hesitate with the king, though you might expect them to pop king. So in an ideal world you play a heart off the dummy in tempo and play RHO to give away the king (I agree), but what actually happened at the table was I thought forever and played a heart so when RHO ducked I felt that playing the queen was now the best play.

Can you please clarify the meaning of your post? If you really think a thread where mikeh, gnasher, and I post about how to play a hand is "gibberish" perhaps it is over your head.

If you bother to read the thread you will see my suggestion of Q♠ after the ruff.

I thought I was taking part in a discussion of the best play.

What on this Earth is the rest of your statement about.

What do you believe is objectively the best play.

This is the Advanced Forum.
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#17 Guest_Jlall_*

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Posted 2008-June-26, 15:20

The problem with the SQ off of dummy is that they can ALWAYS reduce you to the heart finesse + 3-2 trumps no matter who wins the trick by coming back a spade. They can also reduce you to the heart finesse by coming back a trump. LHO can also reduce you to the heart finesse by coming back a heart. So while you're right if RHO wins and plays a club you are home if trumps are 3-2, RHO might not do that, and LHO certainly won't do that. RHO could make a mistake though, obviously, but you are still sacrificing too much imo.

Also regarding 4-1 diamonds, a heart off the board still gives you play on 4-1 diamonds if RHO has 4 diamonds (you will be able to trump coup them if you can guess their major suit lengths and the spade hook is on), so your statement that you cannot make with 4-1 diamonds is wrong.

FWIW I don't see why you expect everyone to tell you why you are or might be wrong. Sure it would be nice, but no one is obligated to do so. Maybe you should read other peoples posts (mikeh) and figure out why his line might be better than yours. If you still have some reasoning why you think the SQ is better than a heart off you can post it. But you should not say everyone else's posts are "gibberish" because they aren't answering yours.
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#18 Guest_Jlall_*

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Posted 2008-June-26, 15:27

Also, wtf gnasher even clarified his "1 of 2 finesses" comment to you, and you seem to know your line is "1 finesse or a misdefense"... what else do you want to know?
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#19 User is offline   Halo 

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Posted 2008-June-26, 15:31

At least some Bridge maybe. But still too much emotion and name dropping.

Are you categorically saying that small to the Queen of hearts is better than Queen of Spades?

We can leave mikeh to account for himself, as he or anyone else chooses so honestly to do.
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#20 Guest_Jlall_*

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Posted 2008-June-26, 15:37

Halo, on Jun 26 2008, 04:31 PM, said:

At least some Bridge maybe. But still too much emotion and name dropping.

Are you categorically saying that small to the Queen of hearts is better than Queen of Spades?

We can leave mikeh to account for himself, as he or anyone else chooses so honestly to do.

There is a reason I ignore your posts. You are just one of those people for me. I am not sure why I altered my policy here but the merits of small heart to the queen have been posted several times now, and I explained the merits or lack thereof of playing the spade queen, so I'm not really sure what else you want. Would you like me to hold your hand? All you have added so far is to insult people and speak in a cryptic form of english. Back to ignoring you, but don't say I didn't try to help!

And FWIW you are the only one who has been at all emotional in this thread. And I won't even ask about "name dropping." lol.
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