[AL78]

♠J8652
♥J43
♦K75
♣A6

MPs. After three passes partner opens 1♥ (5CM). Do you show support or show the spade suit first? If it influences your decision, the field is playing 4 card majors.

[DavidKok]

Unless I have at least slam interest, I always support immediately.

[AL78]

I'll put this one down to playing a different system to the field then:

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I would have liked to make a trial bid instead of bidding 3♥, but since such a situation hasn't come up for years, I couldn't remember if we were playing long suit trial bids or suits with 2-3 losers trial bids, or even short suit trial bids, so made a completely unambiguous invitational bid. A bottom, the room is in 4♠+2, we can only make 11 tricks in hearts because I cannot get both club losers away on the side suit winners. The 4 card major bidders are always responding 1♠ so they land in 4♠.

[DavidKok]

Funny, I don't think I'd invite with the North hand (I'd go to game), nor would I accept with the South hand. Also some sort of shape-showing or -asking game try would have worked wonders here, but sometimes bad results just happen.

[Stephen Tu]

DavidKok, on 2022-April-08, 07:31, said:

Unless I have at least slam interest, I always support immediately.

Requiring slam interest IMO is kind of nuts. The usual standard is raise immediately with < game invitational values. Bid other major with limit or better.
As for OP to me it's obvious to try 2S after the raise even if you don't remember what partner will think it is, it's a trial of some kind and gives you at least some chance to find 4S. If partner doesn't raise the spades oh well, but at least you gave yourself a chance, and can't turn out any worse than 3H IMO.

[mikeh]

I upticked Stephen’s post.

To expand on why it is standard, in the circles in which I play, to show one’s suit, rather than raise, without that showing slam interest, opener’s have been known to have very strong hands, such that THEY have slam interest opposite my invitational to game hand. For that and for the layout on this hand, it seems best practice to respond 1S here.

[mw64ahw]

I tend to raise directly too, but playing Kaplan Inversion 5 you also have the option to show the 5♠ which I will do when min. or max. or with weak support within the 6-10 range. This would then set you up well for a ♠ contract.

Raising to 4♥ after the invite is a must being at the top end of my range defined by the 2♥ response, but a help suit try to cover the ♣s would have been preferable if not going to 4♥ directly.

[apollo1201]

Having passed, 1S is NF. Actually the only forcing bid you can make is an invite like 2C Drury if you play that. But playing in 1S facing Axx AKxx xxx xxx might not be a bad deal after all😉

So you raise to 2H. If partner makes another move and naturally bids S, like they probably should with the given hand, you will get to 4S.

If you hadn’t passed, raising is almost always better with weak hands. If opps compete in minors, you’ll have to overbid with 3H or hidethe fit. Also, if partner rebids 2M, your 2H will look like a false preference with 2 cards. Partner then would not further invite not knowing of the fit. Basically, showing your suit implies you’ll be able to handle the rest of the auction and unequivocally show your fit at a level consistent with your strength. Unless extreme things happen eg opps bidding 5m.

[DavidKok]

Stephen Tu, on 2022-April-08, 09:27, said:

Requiring slam interest IMO is kind of nuts. The usual standard is raise immediately with < game invitational values. Bid other major with limit or better.
As for OP to me it's obvious to try 2S after the raise even if you don't remember what partner will think it is, it's a trial of some kind and gives you at least some chance to find 4S. If partner doesn't raise the spades oh well, but at least you gave yourself a chance, and can't turn out any worse than 3H IMO.

I understand that that is standard, and I am of the opinion that it is not an optimal treatment. Calling my approach nuts is pretty harsh.

Firstly the spades aren't lost if you raise hearts. Most structures can cater to double fits when looking for game, and I'm willing to accept missing a grandiose spade fit if opener is exactly GF (the times this loses are made up for by the times you make the defence more difficult due to lack of information leakage).
Secondly the chance that opener has slam interest opposite a simple raise but opened 1♥, not 2♣ (or some other artificial strong bid), is very small. It is not even clear to me that responding 1♠ will help get to a good slam, compared to establishing the fit first.
Thirdly opener will frequently have a shapely hand, and 3-card support will help them judge how much the hand is worth. To a certain extent this is a chicken-and-the-egg situation, in that I prefer my bidding system to show a fit as early as possible. This is vital in competition, and generally a good idea to help partner evaluate their hand. Standard seems not very suited for this, and in my opinion is inferior to the extent that it does not. That's why I have bids to show weak, mixed, preemptive, invitational and minimum GF hands with a fit. All that remains are the hands with at least mild slam interest - those have to establish a GF first, and then give delayed support. In my system introducing a new suit shows either no fit in partner's major, or sufficient strength that we can give a GF raise on the next round (implicitly showing SI, by failing to show a minimum GF raise).