WARNING! The following post talks about BLACKWOOD. Blackwood is a bid used by more experienced players. If you are a new player do NOT bother reading this post. When you have played a bit more and know a bit more you can learn Blackwood. For now, do not bother.

Blackwood -- A Summary

For an introduction on Blackwood please read the following posts first:
Blackwood -- An Introduction
Blackwood -- To Bid or Not to Bid
Blackwood or Quantitative?
Blackwood -- Asking for Kings

Blackwood is a convention bridge players use to ask their Partner how many Aces they hold after the partnership has agreed upon a suit or, if no suit has been agreed upon, the last bid was not any number of natural NTs. In these auctions, a bid of 4NT asks their Partner how many Aces they hold. Bridge players call this 4NT bid Blackwood.

• Blackwood can be bid after an opening bid of any suit
• Blackwood can be bid after Partner supports your Opening suit
• Blackwood can be bid after Partner opens and supports your suit
• Blackwood can be bid after Partner opens and rebids a suit
• Blackwood can be bid after Partner made an Overcall of a suit
• Blackwood can be bid after Partner supports your Overcall of a suit

The key here is a SUIT has been bid. Not NT.

What are the responses to Blackwood?

5♣	Partner I have either zero or all four Aces
5♦	Partner I have one Ace
5♥	Partner I have two Aces
5♠	Partner I have three Aces

Since you do not know which Aces Partner has you should NOT bid Blackwood if you have a void in a suit OR a useless doubleton.

Many players think you MUST ask for Aces in order to bid a slam. This is not true. You only ask for Aces if you need to know how many Aces Partner has in their hand. If you do NOT need to know that information then don't ask for it.

If you KNOW you want to be at the 6 level and not at the 7 level then do NOT ask for Aces. Just bid at the 6 level. Asking for Aces only assures the Partnership they are not off 2 Aces so can safely bid to the 6 level OR is looking for the 7 level if the Partnership holds all the right cards.

Once the Partnership has gone through Blackwood to ask their Partner for the number of Aces they hold, they can continue bidding Blackwood if they want to know the number of Kings. In order to do this the Partnership MUST hold ALL the Aces. You do not ask Partner for the number of Kings they hold if the partnership is missing an Ace. If you cannot bid a small slam after going through Blackwood and finding out the Partnership is off one Ace then you shouldn't have bid Blackwood in the first place.

In order to ask for Kings you need to go through asking for Aces first. A leap to 5NT without bidding 4NT first is NOT asking for Kings. So even if you hold all 4 Aces in your hand and want to go straight to asking Partner for the number of Kings they hold you cannot. You must go through 4NT Blackwood and ask for the number of Aces before you then ask for the number of Kings.

In order to ask for Kings you should be interested in a GRAND. Partner is allowed to ignore your question and leap to the 7 level if they have a hand that can take all the tricks knowing the partnership has all the Aces.

After getting a response from bidding 4NT, a bid of 5NT is now asking for the number of KINGS Partner holds. The responses are:

6♣	Partner I have zero Kings
6♦	Partner I have one King
6♥	Partner I have two Kings
6♠	Partner I have three Kings
6NT	Partner I have all four Kings