Concealed Splinters And 4-card Raises

Splinter bids are bids that (by agreement) show partner a trump fit, a raise to game, and shortness in a side suit. This is terrifically useful information for assessing how well the two hands fit together, and splinters should be used at almost every opportunity.

There are a couple of tweaks that can be made, though. One observation is that usually, a splinter could be either a singleton or a void. Singletons are much more common, of course, but if you do happen to get a void, it would be nice to be able to distinguish it. Another thought is that the “traditional” splinter uses three responses to distinguish shortages in three suits. This is easy to use, but a tad inefficient. If you use one response to indicate that there is a shortage somewhere, a relay can be used to identify exactly where, if partner wants to know. And if he doesn't ask, you can bid game without revealing where the shortage is.

Another leaf on the tree of Niggle is the matter of jump-shift responses to major-suit openings, and using them for different flavors of raise. I don't like Bergen Raises, but the 4-card raises in Shep's 2/1 make sense to me. In addition, it's fair to say that if you don't need or want to use jump-shift responses as natural and strong, you need to find a good use for them, and that's not quite as easy as it sounds. Clearly distinguishing an assortment of 4-card raises seems like a very useful idea.

Putting all this together, you find that everything fits quite neatly. We include 2NT in the pantheon of jump-raises, and we include 3NT in the range of double-jump raises. Now, the cheapest jump raise is a concealed splinter. So 1H-2S and 1S-2NT are raises to game that include 4 trumps and a singleton somewhere. If Opener wants to find out where (ie usually), he bids the next step as a relay, and Responder bids the suit of the shortage, or bids the trump suit for the one suit he can't mention below 3. That is:
1H-2S; 2NT (relay) - 3C/3D/3H with a singleton C/D/S respectively. 1S-2NT; 3C (relay) - 3D/3H/3S with a singleton D/H/C respectively. This all leaves plenty of room for Opener to start q-bidding if slam is starting to look attractive. Note that if Responder q-bids the splinter suit subsequently, he is indicating the singleton ace.

We have only used one response so far, the cheapest jump-shift. There are 4 other single-jump responses, and these are used in reverse order of strength to indicate a 4+card raise (this idea being lifted from Shep's 2/1).
1H-2S 1S-2N Splinter (above)
1H-2N 1S-3C game-forcing raise without shortage (equivalent to Jacoby 2NT)
1H-3C 1S-3D 4-card limit raise
1H-3D 1S-3H 4-card mixed raise (weak but includes a defensive trick, an A or K outside trumps)
1H-3H 1S-3S pre-emptive, no defensive trick

Next we move up to the double-jump raises. The cheapest one is a concealed void splinter, showing a raise to game with 4 trumps and a void somewhere. As with the singleton splinters a level lower, a relay is used to locate the actual void. So,
1H-3S; 3N (relay) -4C/4D/4H shows a void C/D/S respectively.
1S-3N; 4C (relay) -4D/4H/4S shows a void D/H/C respectively.

At this point, we can look back and see that we have an array of raises with 4-card support, and can distinguish singleton and void splinters, which is a lot more than most people have in their bag of tricks. [infomercial voice]But wait, there's more.[/infomercial]

We actually have a few bids spare now. The double-jump raises, that most people use for splinters, are available for some different meaning. There is a type of splinter used by Opener called an Auto-splinter. For example, the sequence 1C – 1S; 4C! would indicate 4-card support for spades and a raise to game that includes 6 solid clubs (and a shortage somewhere else, therefore). This is off the main track of splinters, as the most important part of the message isn't actually the shortage but rather the honking great source of tricks. But it's still a good idea, and I think it makes sense to make that type of raise available to Responder also. So, for example, the sequence 1S – 4C! would show a hand like KJxx/xx/x/AKQT9x. It's true that you could start to bid this hand by bidding clubs, or by showing a diamond splinter. But I don't think either of those routes is really going to convey the combination of a very good suit with 4-card trump support.

Now we're talking. All I have to do is sell Agent 99 and Elwood on the idea.