After (1
) - 1
- (No) -? I can imagine a hand where I would like to bid 2
as natural and passable. If it is a transfer to
, I can't. But we could use
) - 1
- (No) - 1NT as a transfer to
. Hover, after (1
) - 1
- (No) -? I can imagine a hand where I would like to bid 1 NT natural and passable.
It would take more expertise than I have to argue convincingly one way or the other on the merits, rather I take an overall view that if someone wants me to replace a natural sequence with an artificial sequence then I will, perhaps, keep an open mind but my leanings are toward natural. There are so many simple natural sequences that I have not discussed with a partner that I am cautious about introducing artificial sequences.
Here is something that came up yesterday in a competitive auction. The opponents were the overcallers not us, but still it might be relevant.
The auction begins with 1
by pard and 2
on your right. You hold:
: KT92
: AJT6
: A
: KT84
As it happens, you are playing in one of these Bot Daylongs, your pard and your opponents are bots. You can see what your bid will mean to your pard, by hovering over it with the mouse, before you make it if you so wish. I try to avoid that on general principle, I think we are supposed to know what our system is w/o peeking, but occasionally I give in. At a real game, the opposing bot would surely call the director if I said "I am thinking of bidding such and such but let me first look up what it means".
At any rate, this looked like a 3
bid to me and that's what I did. Checking the scores later, I found that some decided to "splinter" with 4
. The trouble with that is that the bots, in a competitive auction, play 4
as natural. Oops.
It's another of these "what means what?" situations. The bots are not the only ones who play this way. After the 2
call, it is sometimes played that 4
is a splinter, it's their suit, but 4
as well as 3
are natural calls. That's apparently what the bots do, at least they definitely play 4
s natural and passable, since that's what happened. I was in 4
making 6 (it's cold for exactly 5, no more, no less, except for extreme double dummy play) on bizarre mis-defence. It sometimes helps to be playing against bots.