The robots make weird opening leads

To start today, look only at the West hand. What would you lead against one no-trump doubled?

Isaac Asimov’s first law of robotics is: “A robot may not injure a human being or, through inaction, allow a human being to come to harm.”

Those of you who play regularly at Bridge Base Online with the robots will have noticed that in particular their opening leads are unusual. A minor- suit singleton against a notrump contract is not uncommon. They would do so much better to lead fourth-highest from the longest and strongest, or top of touching honors. Perhaps they don’t because they may injure a human bridge player!

South upgraded his hand for the aces and kings. (The Kaplan-Rubens hand evaluation method rates this hand as worth 15.15 points.) I like West’s double in preference to a bid showing a spade-minor two-suiter.

You would expect West to lead the club king. Declarer can win that and play a heart, but the defenders take one spade, two hearts and four clubs for down one. Plus 200 would have been a top for East-West in an online duplicate.

However, at the table, West led the heart ace. No problem; surely the robot shifted to the club king. No — it led the diamond eight: nine, 10, ace.

Declarer played a heart, and finally West turned to clubs, but South won, played a heart to the jack and ran the diamond jack when East played low. Now South had seven tricks: two hearts, four diamonds and one club. Plus 180 was a top for North-South.