[mikeh]

J532
K432
KQ
KQJ4

I'd downgrade this 15 count

Spots matter. KQ or QJ tight matters, but downgrades are rare, especially into 1N as opposed to dropping out of that range..

I suspect one reason is that when one holds 18 hcp, one will almost always hold some Aces and Kings....and both Aces and, to a lesser degree, Kings seem to be undervalued by the 4321 count. Thus calling most such 18 counts an 18 count is already undervaluing them compared to, say, an average 10 count.

And when one lacks one's expected Aces and Kings, yet has 18 hcp, then one is likely to have combining values.....a QJxx is more than one point better than a Qxxx holding because of the combining effect of touching honours.

These are subtle points and may be unconscious in the thinking of most players, but present nevertheless in players with lots of experience.

[chasetb]

To add to Mike's comment, bridge at the top is really aggressive, so you apply maximum pressure by almost never downgrading. While someone said they might downgrade #1, there is NO WAY I would. Though it is 4333 and had KQJ, AQ9 is worth 7, and the hand has 9 honors. Hand #2, you could drop a Jack or even a Queen and I'll still open it 1♣ in Standard because I have the Majors.

[FrancesHinden]

It's definitely true that most experts who claim to play "15-17" don't, they play something more like "good 14- bad 17" i.e. a lot of hands are upgraded and very few downgraded.

Mind you, in one session I played on Vugraph earlier this year, I opened 1D on a 15-count and 1NT on a 14-count, and one of the commentators decided our convention card must be wrong, we were actually playing weak NT.... shows how rare the idea of a downgrade is

(We gained imps on the hand I downgraded by playing in partial against a hopeless game going off; the other board was a boring flat 3NT)

[mikl_plkcc]

Isn't a 4333 hand completely suitable for NT? Why deduct one point from it? A balanced hand is exactly for NT!

[han]

mikeh, on 2012-April-17, 12:40, said:

I suspect one reason is that when one holds 18 hcp, one will almost always hold some Aces and Kings....and both Aces and, to a lesser degree, Kings seem to be undervalued by the 4321 count. Thus calling most such 18 counts an 18 count is already undervaluing them compared to, say, an average 10 count.

This sounds really good but what does it mean?

I know that most 18-counts are very strong compared to average 10-counts, but that's probably not what you meant to say.

Are you saying that the average 18-count is better than an average 18-count because it will probably have some aces? Won't it have some queens and jacks as well?

[han]

Frances, you can expect to get your invitation for membership of the UnderBiddersClub in the mail soon. Everybody can underbid, but not everybody can have success while doing so. You are a great ambassador for our club!

[helene_t]

mikl_plkcc, on 2012-April-18, 07:25, said:

Isn't a 4333 hand completely suitable for NT? Why deduct one point from it? A balanced hand is exactly for NT!

Yes but even if you are going to play NT, a 4333 18-count produces (on average) fewer tricks than a 4432 18-count.

Besides, part will sometimes put you in a suit contract, and then the weakness of the 4333-shape is even more pronounced.

[han]

helene_t, on 2012-April-18, 08:20, said:

Yes but even if you are going to play NT, a 4333 18-count produces (on average) fewer tricks than a 4432 18-count.

But more than a 4432 17-count. The official UBC-policy is that downgrading just because you have a 4333 goes way to far.

[mikeh]

han, on 2012-April-18, 08:06, said:

This sounds really good but what does it mean?

I know that most 18-counts are very strong compared to average 10-counts, but that's probably not what you meant to say.

Are you saying that the average 18-count is better than an average 18-count because it will probably have some aces? Won't it have some queens and jacks as well?

Well, isn't it enough that it sounds really good? I mean, isn't that the key to marketing or politics?

More seriously, yes, the 18 count will usually hold 'more' Q's and J's as well as more A's and Kings, but while Q's and J's are as overvalued in the point count as A's and K's are undervalued....Q's and J's (as with all high cards) gain when they exist in conjunction with other honours, so maybe the answer is that in an 18 count, the Q's and J's are not as weak as they would be in a 10 count, because they are far more likely to be held in conjunction with other honours. A simplistic example would be AJxx or Jxxx. The firsr J holds more power than the second in most layouts. Of course, the same argument suggests that the A's and K's gain as well...so maybe the real principle is that the more high card we hold, the more likely it is that the hand deserves an upgrade?

I hope that that also sounds really good

[han]

So what you are saying is that an 18-count is unlikely to have many of the features that would call for a downgrade, such as unsupported minor honors? I agree with that, and it does sound good.

I think of it more in a Helenesque (how about that for a sound!) way though, that there is a spectrum of 18-counts and that the poorest of those will still be more like 17-counts. And also, I like opening 1NT, and I wouldn't want to downgrade more out of 1NT than into 1NT. I guess there are too many goodlooking 14-counts for that to happen anyway.

[Statto]

han, on 2012-April-18, 09:56, said:

... And also, I like opening 1NT ...

If you like opening 1NT, you might consider a weak NT, or perhaps 14-16

[jillybean]

FrancesHinden, on 2012-April-17, 14:12, said:

Mind you, in one session I played on Vugraph earlier this year, I opened 1D on a 15-count and 1NT on a 14-count, and one of the commentators decided our convention card must be wrong, we were actually playing weak NT.... shows how rare the idea of a downgrade is

LOL

[mikl_plkcc]

helene_t, on 2012-April-18, 08:20, said:

Yes but even if you are going to play NT, a 4333 18-count produces (on average) fewer tricks than a 4432 18-count.

Besides, part will sometimes put you in a suit contract, and then the weakness of the 4333-shape is even more pronounced.

Given a 18 4333 hand, I would open 1 of a suit, then jump in NT, specifying an 18-19 balanced hand.

[fuburules3]

mikl_plkcc, on 2012-April-19, 23:59, said:

Given a 18 4333 hand, I would open 1 of a suit, then jump in NT, specifying an 18-19 balanced hand.

So would a lot/most people. The point is some players would downgrade some/all 4333 18 counts and open 1NT (deciding that their hand is only worth 17 points).

[FrancesHinden]

han, on 2012-April-18, 08:06, said:

This sounds really good but what does it mean?

I know that most 18-counts are very strong compared to average 10-counts, but that's probably not what you meant to say.

Are you saying that the average 18-count is better than an average 18-count because it will probably have some aces? Won't it have some queens and jacks as well?

I thought he was trying to say the following (you may not agree with all the statements of fact but I think the argument stacks up logically):

The 4-3-2-1 point count devalues aces and kings and overvalues queens and jacks. A lot of players have a sort of mental filter that automatically downgrades queens & jacks and upgrades aces and kings when they look at their hand.

An average 10-count in the 4-3-2-1 scale is also an average 10-count after this mental readjustment
However an average 4321 18-count in the 4321 scale is more than 18/10 as good as an average 10 after this adjustment, because it will tend to have more aces & kings than queens & jacks. So 18 counts tend to look better than they actually are.

You see this more blatantly in other auctions. 2C-2D-2NT-slam try, opener looks at their hand and thinks 'I've got all 4 aces I've got an obvious accept' while in fact having all 4 aces is nice, but not unexpected in a 23+ balanced hand.

I've also spotted this habit in my partner. We play a direct splinter in response to a major as showing about 8-11 HCP, but he keeps upgrading 10s and 11s into the stronger raise, because as he puts it, 'I had 4-card trump support and a singleton, it's a really powerful hand'

[Vampyr]

FrancesHinden, on 2012-April-20, 02:19, said:

I've also spotted this habit in my partner. We play a direct splinter in response to a major as showing about 8-11 HCP, but he keeps upgrading 10s and 11s into the stronger raise, because as he puts it, 'I had 4-card trump support and a singleton, it's a really powerful hand'

If your partner does this but you don't, how should it be disclosed on the CC?

[gnasher]

Vampyr, on 2012-April-20, 02:54, said:

If your partner does this but you don't, how should it be disclosed on the CC?

"8-11 if female; 7-9 if male".

[helene_t]

gnasher, on 2012-April-20, 04:05, said:

"8-11 if female; 7-9 if male".

There was a Dutch pair who had on their CC about (1NT)-p-(3NT)-x: "asks for a heart lead if declarer wears glasses, otherwise asks for a spade lead".

[mgoetze]

helene_t, on 2012-April-20, 04:29, said:

There was a Dutch pair who had on their CC about (1NT)-p-(3NT)-x: "asks for a heart lead if declarer wears glasses, otherwise asks for a spade lead".

I know a pair whose convention card states: "PSYCHICS: North/East occasionally, South/West never."

[Bbradley62]

broze, on 2012-April-15, 05:11, said:

Some hands are worth much less than their HCP count would suggest, but in today's game you seldom see the pros downgrading their NT openers. Is there anything to be gained by doing this in either form of scoring or is it just passive bridge?

They're clearly not pros, but everyone downgrades 18-counts to open 1NT in the Express Automated Fun games, so they can be declarer instead of their unknown partner