You and partner have spent countless hours developing complex bidding methods. Your convention card is filled to the margins and you’ve memorized every word of your hundreds of pages of system notes. Still, science will take you only so far at the bridge table. No matter how detailed your agreements, you’re bound to encounter situations where you have to rely on judgment rather than system to find the winning action.
Experienced pairs make these decisions easier by following broad principles that apply to a range of auctions. Some of these ideas are so widely accepted that they don’t even require discussion. One is that bidding decisions should be based on the principle of "game before slam".
This advice suggests that when deciding how to structure your system or interpret a bid, finding the best game should take priority over searching for slam. This means that when in doubt, you should treat an ambiguous bid as a natural suggestion of a trump suit or as a search for game, rather than as a cuebid for a possible slam.
The wisdom of this approach is based partly on the idea that games deserve more emphasis because they come up more frequently. More important, though, is that since you have only three or four bidding levels to investigate game – and five or six to search for slam -- it’s best to devote that limited space to bids that will help you make game-level decisions.
The game-before-slam theory often comes into play when partner makes a new-suit bid at the three-level. Suppose you hold ♠52 ♥AJ1063 ♦AQ ♣K974 and the auction goes:
You Partner
1H
2C
3C 3S
If partner intended his 3S as a control cuebid for a club slam, you’d want to encourage with a return cuebid of 4D. But if he has a minimum and is just looking for a notrump game, this is your last chance to show your diamond stopper.
At this point in the auction, those who rely on the game-before-slam guideline treat 3S as a search for 3NT. With two unbid suits in question, partner will bid the one where he has a stopper, so this auction suggests that he needs diamond cards in your hand. Partner might hold ♠KQJ ♥52 ♦1043 ♣AQ1063 .
If he has a more powerful hand, there’s still plenty of room to investigate. He can show slam intentions -- and confirm that his 3S was a control cuebid -- by bidding on over 3NT.
Here are some other three-level auctions where the game-before-slam principle should apply:
You LHO Partner RHO
1D 1S 2S Pass
3D Pass 3S
Even though partner has cuebid their suit twice, there’s no reason to assume he has anything more than a minimum game-force. His first cuebid showed a limit-raise or better in diamonds. His second cuebid confirms the “or better” hand and asks for a spade stopper, so your first priority is to bid 3NT if you have the stopper.
Partner You
1S
2C
2S
3D
3H
It’s unlikely that partner, who has already limited his hand, is making an advance cuebid for a club or diamond slam. The game-before-slam interpretation of his 3H bid is that he’s interested in a notrump game, but doesn’t have a heart stopper (if he did, he would have bid 3NT himself). He may hold ♠KJ7643 ♥1042 ♦AK6 ♣J .
You Partner
1S 2H
3H 3S
Partner's 3S may sound like a cuebid, since the other major has been bid and raised, but it’s more useful to treat this bid as natural. This is how partner would bid if he had five weakish hearts and three-card spade support – a hand such as ♠Q62 ♥K9763 ♦AKJ ♣62 .
Partner is asking you to choose between 4H and 4S, so your next bid should be four of your stronger major. If you bid anything else, partner will have to make the decision himself.
This principle can also apply at higher levels. A simple use is in this auction:
RHO You LHO
Partner
3C DBL Pass 4C
Partner isn’t promising slam-try strength. His 4C cuebid is merely a search for the best trump suit for game, and he may be stretching. Unless you hold a monster, you should settle for bidding four of your longer major.
With some cuebids, partner already knows what the right game is, but he's giving you extra information on the way:
You LHO
Partner
1S 3H 4H
Partner’s cuebid shows a high-card raise to 4S as opposed to a weaker, distributional raise. For the time being, his 4H is a “game-only” bid -- it doesn’t guarantee a heart control and it doesn’t ask you for a return cuebid. If the opponents bid on, your knowledge of partner’s strength will clarify which side is sacrificing and may help you make a five-level decision.
The game-before-slam guideline can be useful even at the five-level:
You
LHO Partner RHO
1D Pass 1H 3S
Pass 4S 5C Pass
A new suit by responder is usually forcing, but when you’ve been preempted, it’s important to avoid being stampeded into a contract you wouldn’t have chosen without the interference. If eleven tricks is the limit of the hand, you need a way to stop there, so treat partner's 5C as natural and non-forcing, showing at least 5-5 in his suits. Mutter to yourself "Game before slam" -- along with that other old adage, "Sometimes, preempts work" -- and make your choice by passing 5C or bidding 5H.
© Karen Walker