[Jan_L]

Hello!

Im swedish and in Sweden 99,9% of the players play Upside Down Count and Attitude.
But how do players out there who play standard signals, normally signal in trumps?

a) They play low-high from three cards and high-low from two trumps (unless the high trump might be valuable when they play low from two) ie same carding in trumps as in other suits.
b) High low only when they want to ruff something and have three trumps? Else from the bottom no matter how many cards in trumps.
c) High-low from three (often middle + lowest) and low-high from two?

[helene_t]

A standard trump ecco is hi-lo but different authors have slightly different ideas about what it shows. To most it shows an ability to ruff while to some it shows three trumps. But naturally you don't ecco for the benefit of declarer so the difference won't be that big in practice.
Some prefer to give suit preference.

[Zelandakh]

Traditional is your b, although just playing from the bottom is lazy and you should randomise the spots to avoid declarer taking advantage on occasion. More common in modern bridge is to use the spots in the trump suit to give a suit preference signal and this was recently described here on BBF as "the most important signal in bridge". A side benefit is that this does some of the randomising for you and therefore makes you less exploitable (in comparison with the lazy bottom-up approach).

[kuhchung]

I've never played SP signals in trumps. Is the idea that declarer is going to draw more than one round of trumps, and if you play lo-hi vs hi-lo it shows preference in whatever the side suits are?

[dustinst22]

kuhchung, on 2014-February-25, 15:36, said:

I've never played SP signals in trumps. Is the idea that declarer is going to draw more than one round of trumps, and if you play lo-hi vs hi-lo it shows preference in whatever the side suits are?

Yes and for some reason very few intermediate level players have this agreement, but almost all adv+ players do. Very useful agreement to have.

Keep in mind only the high low signal is a strong signal, as with 2 you will just play up the line. With 3, obv the middle is used for no pref.

[Stephen Tu]

dustinst22, on 2014-February-25, 16:03, said:

Keep in mind only the high low signal is a strong signal, as with 2 you will just play up the line. With 3, obv the middle is used for no pref.

High low is a strong signal for a particular side suit (usually higher of logical options), low high is just neutral, partner just has to figure out what's best knowing you aren't wild about the high suit. You still play low high with 3 (in non ruffing situations) not having a pref for the high suit. With 2 trumps one still plays high-low with strong pref for the high side suit, if the high card isn't big enough to need preservation for trick taking purposes. Obviously one doesn't waste crucial spots or high trumps to signal if it can cost a trick.

Trying to play middle from 3 as no pref, with low asking for the low suit, is just really impractical. Partner will often not know how many cards you have in the suit, which spots are missing, won't know if you are doing middle from 3 or if your middle card is your highest & looking for the high pref.

Generally trying to play a 3 way SP signal (high suit, no pref, low suit) is impractical, unreadable unless you are known to have say 5+ cards in the suit you are signalling in. With only 2 or 3 cds in trumps, need to stick with just high suit, or not the high suit.

[CamHenry]

Or, of course, you can play Prism Signals:
http://prismsignals.com/PDFonline.pdf

(I used to play these for a while; they're fun but ultimately of occasional benefit only. I remember playing them against an England international in a Swiss event, who promptly went into the tank for longer than usual, emerging with a complete read of our hand shapes).