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The term cue-bid has two completely unrelated meaning for constructive bidding and defensive/competitive bidding respectively.
Bid of opponents' suit[]
A cue-bid is a bid in a suit known to be held by an opponent. Because such a bid could only rarely be natural, it is typically reassigned an artificial meaning. Examples of cue-bids include
- Stayman after interference over 1NT
- Michaels cue-bid
- Invitational cue-bid
If the opponents' overcall is artificial (such as Michaels cue-bid or Unusual 2NT), it may show a suit other than what was bid. In that case, a bid of a shown suit is called an invisible cue-bid, and may be artificial.
Common use of cuebids[]
- A direct cuebid on a suit opening is historically played as a very strong bid, like a hand which would be opened with a forcing opening if there is no interference. However, as these kinds of hands can now be bid with a takeout double first and make the cuebid, the most common convention now is Michaels cue-bid, which shows a 2-suited hand with the unbid major(s).
- A cuebid on an overcall is commonly played as a limit raise or better, freeing all the direct raises to be competitive.
- A cuebid on the suit opened as a response to a takeout double shows a game-forcing hand.
- A cuebid on the suit opened as a response to an overcall shows is commonly a catch-all forcing bid, showing near game-forcing values without an appropriate bid available. This strongly suggests a missing stopper in the opened suit in order to play in NT.
- A cuebid after 1NT is overcalled is most commonly played as game-forcing Stayman.
Control showing bids[]
They are a very different kind of bids which is completely unrelated to the above. See Control-showing cue-bid for details.