Bid and play in a teaching Acol auction. At startup choose whether to control both North/South hands or South only with partner on automatic play.
Designed for EBU Blue Book Level 2 teaching
1. Board→2. Bid→3. Play→4. Review
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Board 1
Only your South hand is exposed before bidding.
The Auction
Hands for bidding
Choose your call when a hand you control is on turn.
North
East
South
West
Play the Hand
Contract
Declarer · Trump— · —
TricksN/S 0 · E/W 0
North
South — You
West
East
Play will begin after the auction.
Teaching Points
These points are specific to the current hand and update as you bid and play. For permanent Acol guidance, use Rules.
Conventions
Choose the North/South partnership system. Automatic bids and Teaching hints use only the conventions enabled here.
A. Core System
B. Responses to 1NT
C. Competitive Bidding
D. Slam Bidding
With an agreed suit, RKCB is preferred when enabled; ordinary Blackwood is used if RKCB is off. Gerber is used primarily in no-trump slam auctions.
Teaching Rules
Hand evaluation
Count high-card points: A=4, K=3, Q=2, J=1.
Balanced shapes are 4-3-3-3, 4-4-3-2 and 5-3-3-2.
Uses the same balanced-hand evaluation, Goodies & Baddies and LTC treatment as the Leads trainer. LTC is fit-adjusted only after a trump fit is known; with 9+ known partnership trumps one loser is deducted.
Opening bids
Open one of a suit with about 12+ points and an unbalanced hand.
Prefer a four-card major where appropriate; with two four-card suits bid the higher-ranking suit first.
Use the Rule of 20 on borderline first- and second-seat unbalanced hands: HCP + the lengths of the two longest suits. A total of 20 or more supports an opening in bridge judgement, but this trainer also checks the EBU Level 2 one-level minimum (11+ HCP, or 8+ HCP satisfying the Rule of 19).
Position-sensitive openings include weak twos/pre-empts, third-seat ‘borrow a king’ judgement and fourth-seat Rule of 15, subject to EBU Level 2 minima.
Responses
Support partner's major with four-card support when the strength is suitable.
With no fit, show a four-card suit at the one level when possible.
Includes Stayman, transfers, Puppet Stayman, CRO, Pender–Flint, negative/take-out/penalty doubles, Law of Total Trumps, fourth-suit forcing, Gerber and quantitative 4NT as in Leads.
After a 12–14 1NT opening, do not leave an 11-HCP response as 11: use hand evaluation to treat it as either 10 or 12. A 10-equivalent hand does not invite; a 12-equivalent hand bids game (using Stayman/transfers first when appropriate).
Minor-suit transfers over a 12–14 1NT require a weak hand and at least a six-card minor: 2♠ transfers to 3♣; 2NT transfers to 3♦. Opener completes the transfer and responder normally passes.
Card play
Follow suit whenever you can.
Second hand generally plays low; third hand generally plays high.
With a sequence, lead the top; in No Trumps a low card can be fourth highest from an honour.
Count winners, identify losers and plan before playing from dummy.
Bid & Play
This trainer joins the bidding and card-play stages in one exercise.
You sit South. First choose how much of the North/South partnership you want to control:
The teaching engine gives recommendations and explanations whichever mode you choose.
Set your conventions
Choose the North/South system the automatic bidding and teaching hints should follow. You can change these later from the Conventions tab.
Core system
Responses to 1NT
Competitive bidding
Slam bidding
RKCB is the preferred agreed-suit ace/key-card ask. Blackwood is available as the simpler alternative; Gerber is retained for no-trump slam auctions.