[1175]

Obviously, an endless amount of material exists for this topic, but I will restrict posts to actions that left me wondering what caused the Robot to make a particular subsequent bid or play.

I have my first hand for this category:

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The other fifteen tables saw a normal auction:

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At those tables, declarer made either 10 tricks (ten times) or 12 tricks (five times), mostly depending on whether previous play revealed the club split (which allowed a marked finesse).

I can't count the number of times I see South throw in a completely random double (as in the auction accompanying the hand diagram) which causes the Robot to abandon a completely normal (and cold) 3NT contract for some suit contract that goes down (in other words, the double usually "works" - but it didn't this time), or makes fewer tricks than NT. I enjoyed seeing the double punished on this hand.

The 5NT bid seems a bit useless. East can't have any kings below clubs, and if East can't act over the quantitative 4NT, zero chance exists that East will suddenly find a grand slam bid. Obviously, I want to know what caused East to run from 3NT (again, I see that fairly frequently by players who have apparently determined that such doubles against the Robot win more often than they lose). Bidding a slam after the opponents make a penalty double of your game seems odd, especially after West passed the double (a penalty redouble by West might have caused South some discomfort), but West always had a slam invite. I don't know why the double would cause the Robot to drive to slam, though (any other response to Blackwood still forces a club slam).

[smerriman]

1175, on 2024-July-06, 20:09, said:

The 5NT bid seems a bit useless. East can't have any kings below clubs, and if East can't act over the quantitative 4NT, zero chance exists that East will suddenly find a grand slam bid.

5NT is forced after Blackwood when holding all key cards. This is fine and what you'd want from a robot, even if the free robots are forced to bid 6♣ over the top with any hand.

1175, on 2024-July-06, 20:09, said:

Obviously, I want to know what caused East to run from 3NT (again, I see that fairly frequently by players who have apparently determined that such doubles against the Robot win more often than they lose).

Free robots are forced to run from 3NT if they hold an 8 card fit. As usual, this isn't a "mistake", but a side effect of half of the algorithm being disabled.

1175, on 2024-July-06, 20:09, said:

Bidding a slam after the opponents make a penalty double of your game seems odd, especially after West passed the double (a penalty redouble by West might have caused South some discomfort), but West always had a slam invite. I don't know why the double would cause the Robot to drive to slam, though (any other response to Blackwood still forces a club slam).

A penalty redouble doesn't exist; a free robot just passes because its only slam invite is 4NT, and it's not allowed to bid that after a penalty double of 3N.