Cthulhu D

My rule of thumb here (not sure if it's good mine, but yeah), is what's going to happen if P bids 3NT on Kx or even Jx. Here it looks very good, you'll take 7 diamond tricks pretty easily, so he only needs to come to two outside tricks. P's probably okay even with xx, (as long as KJx isn't over you or K offside with Jxx onside).

1) There are two types of duplicate scoring, IMPs and Matchpoints (typically called MPs). IMPs and rubber bridge have much in common - except for the carry forward of partscores. IMPs essentially a succession of rubber bridge games where you abandon the rubber after the first hand every time, and a similar strategy should be employed. MPs is a different animal to a degree. 2) It doesn't matter which you play. Matchpoints is likely to be more common in pairs events. IMPs dominates teams. 3) Yes. When playing 4 handed with friends, we use the below: http://www.compensationtable.com/score-calc.php This gives an 'IMP' feel to your game, and is easy to use. Plug in the contract you bid, the number of tricks you made, and your best trump fit + HCP total and it spits back an IMP result. It's flawed, but reasonable enough for a fun game. It's better than chicago imho. If you want instant matchpoint games: http://www.rpbridge.net/rpim.htm has several with analysis. You need 4 decks of cards to make this work with 4 friends.

http://www.jeff-goldsmith.org/bridge/study is an interesting discussion of handicapping too at the end, but only IMP relevant.

I'm not sure it needs the 'even vaguely interested in cars' disclaimer. I'm sure anyone who watches, say, the episode where they drive some toyata utes to the north pole will be impressed and entertained.

That's beautiful - I'd read the manual but hadn't put 2 and 2 together. All my 4x etc are at the tail end of sequences so I can definitely do this. Oh it's mostly to handle stuff like garbage stayman sequences so 1NT-2C-2H pass tells you stuff about responders hand. But sweet that works. Fantastic, will produce a new iteration this weekend.

It appears the general operating method is that unethical players are going to look at their own notes in another tab, so no point punishing ethical players and the system will let you share their advantages.

I am screwing around with the same system with a casual partner. It occurred to me that most 9 counts will be enough to force to game (except opposite a min hand with clubs, but yeah most of the time it's balanced hands, so you could try 1C - ?? 1D: 9+ GF any Everything else is limited to 8 1H: 4+ spades 1S: 4+ hearts 1NT: 5+ diamonds 2C: 5+ clubs 2D: Either major 6+ Not sure what the best use for 2H +2S is, probably both majors type hands. Not sure how hot that is. The flip flop transfers should solve your wrong siding issues.

I'm working with wordpad here, I probably need to use a more sophisticated editor. I haven't used emacs since I quit programming and I haven't used VI since university. Just tested it then, works fine. Excel is very good at this because - well, check out my notes. https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet/pub?hl=en_US&key=0ApdG9_UbtV3HdF9rYzBsZVNmb2o2QzQ1OFF2OUdIN3c&hl=en_US&gid=9 Turns out if you just select the entire system description for each opening, then paste it into wordpad and do a find replace for tabs and replace them with a single space, the entire system comes across. The only problem is bids where I have used shorthand like 4m 4M 4x Those obviously don't work. It would be great if the parser did understand them or something similar. I also hate that the parser doesn't understand that 1NT = 1N, but that's easy to find replace again as well. So I'm going to redevelop my notes to expand out the shorthand, but it works very nicely. Edit: Is P the bid for pass?

With an 11 card spade fit are they going to ever pass for penalties, so risk is nil. 4H. Is X support or negative? I think 4H either way is good though.

Yeah, we currently play it 5/4 (either way though), but have a understanding that in really juicy pre-empt opportunities you can be 4-4.

Got practically an entire system in and working - it's pretty good and quite fast if you doco your system in excel. I am going to change my documenting style to meet your parser haha.

I've got this going. Some thoughts A) It's really good, I like it B) Nothing you can do, but the BBO interface for uploading FD cards is 100% made of pure ass. C) Make the headers preceeded by a tag or something - it took me awhile to work out why the 1C bidding description was becoming the system name. D) Number 1 feature request PLEASE OH PLEASE let tabs work for indenting bidding trees!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Or make the converter replace a tab with 8 spaces. I care not. Otherwise it's pretty good, working a system up into it now. Edit: Also, can you validate if the output is a legit BSS file? I guess this is partly FD's fault - it never says 'OH NOES your file is buggered right up' it just fails silently. Which is awesome when you're trying to debug stuff. Not. Edit2: Also, what is the 'symbol' for Pass? Passes have meanings in my system, so I need to be able to define a meaning for that bid. Feature Requests: Allow me to define PASS or if you have tell me how Let it read tabs as white space Can it accept and expand the short hand 4m 4M 4x to 4C and 4D, 4H/S and 4C/D/H/S respectively? This is partly personal interest. If it can do that, I can paste my system notes directly from excel into the program. However, just the shorthand and pass is a massive leap forward, replacing tabs with whitespace can be done with find/replace.

He's asking how often you get a systematic swing in from playing an artificial system vs how often you forget it. As a relative beginner playing a system described as 'hugely complex' by oppo my 2 cents are that it's been a mixed experience, and artificiality is best used in non competitive situations and ideally that occur relatively frequently. The two things that have generated the biggest system swings in for me (transfer responses to 1C and 1M-2NT is a limit raise or better with 3C as any minimum), have been superb and are easy to remember. I love auctions that go 1C-1H-1S-4S and 1S-2NT-3C-4S. They are frequent and amazing. These are strongly net plus for us. Some other stuff such as transfer responses to 1H-1S playing Kaplan inversion and Bart are easy to forget and not that useful. These are net negative, mostly because they are infrequent so one of my two partners struggles with the memory burden. I'd agree that my time is best invested focusing on my cardplay. However, I find that I need to practice cardplay with actual cards so my time to do that is limited, whereas I can work on my system on the bus or in the car. Footnote: Thanks to all the guys (e.g. UK Phil) who suggested that 2NT limit raise treatment in the thread here. That was brilliant.

Sorry, I do not understand what you are asking. Three concerns: [sarcasm] You appear to be posing a question, but there are no question marks. Did you intend to ask me a question? If so, consider the use of punctuation. There are "......." everywhere. An ellipsis is used to indicate the omission of words, but as you are not quoting a source, I am not clear what you are omitting. Can you please try again with the question intact? I guess you could mean to use them as a full stop, but that doesn't make sense either? Is it a dramatic pause? If so... why? ;) Finally, you appear to have a non functional shift key. I recommend that you either use the Caps Lock key or get a new keyboard to capitalise your sentences. [/sarcasm] I think you are trying to say that because no one individual (in this case, me specifically) is smart enough to recognise the sum of all regulation required globally for all fields of human enterprise, we should not regulate at all. This is obviously absurd. I cannot get a bunch of kids to get rings of "outcome focused; shared responsibility; risk appropriate; responsive to change and cycles; impact sensitive; and clear and consistent" then don a lycra suit and shout "BY YOUR POWERS COMBINED, I AM CAPTAIN EFFECTIVE REGULATION." It's ridiculous that you even suggest that I might be suggesting that. I think it's indisputable we need oversight to ensure the efficient operation of markets. Once you accept that regulation is required for the proper functioning of the state for the benefits of all it's people, then all that's left is arguing about the correct regulations. Some stuff is completely obvious too, can you suggest even one reason why it would be a bad idea to prevent government officials from taking a huge sum of money from the private sector organisation they regulate? I have a name for that and it is 'Bribery' but maybe you disagree. I'm also pretty sure that bribery is so obviously dumb I cannot see even one single argument against it. Damn, and here I thought I was smart. Additionally, I think it is pretty clear that as the state is going to have to pay for people's old age if they themselves can not, it's just as clear that people's wages should be garnished and forcibly saved for their retirement to prevent them putting it all on black in the casino. Conversely the company they work for should not be able to control it either, and DEFINITELY not invest it in shares in themselves.

2D seems ludicrous. What would you open if two small diamonds were clubs? If the answer is 2D, how is partner even going to understand what you have?

I agree, the reality is that the Government is always going to have to backstop in places, unless we're okay with letting people die on the street. We're not, so it's a given that the government needs considerable oversight of whatever it is backing. This is why companies shouldn't be able to have pension funds tied to the success and/or control of the company (General Motors) or have employees buy their own shares (Enron) as their retirement fund. I think it's fine to take people from the sector being regulated - indeed would be difficult to operate otherwise. I do think it is improper to say to someone "Hey, I'll give you 800 grand if you take the job where you have oversight of me" - Goldman Sachs for example pays ex-partners large bonuses to take public sector regulatory jobs. Given than their salary is likely smaller than the bonus, who is really employing them? Goldman Sachs or the US Government? Conflict of interest anyone? It doesn't work anywhere. It's why auditing of publicly listed companies is busted as it stands and is just dumb practice. Yes, this is the root of the reason regulation exists. Markets are efficient if two things hold true: A) There is comprehensive availability of information and complete transparency to the purchaser B) the purchaser makes 100% rational judgements 100% of the time. Neither of these things are actually true. The entire existing of marketing as a discipline is predicated on that. Given that markets are not efficient we much regulate, and one of the things we should regulate against is people taking to much risk as we underpin them with the social security net.

I think the ABF is trying to say "If you want to use stop cards at your event, here is how you are going to do it, but the Tournament Organiser is operating at his own discretion when deciding if his tournament will use them or not"

ABF regulations are here: http://www.abf.com.au/events/tournregs/ABFwbbb10.pdf Relevant sections are below. Note that most conditions of contest do not mandate the use of the stop card. As sfi says, no-one ever actually uses it (and not all boxes actually have a stop card...). Bids at the 4 level are considered self alerting to.

Assuming clients are in it to win it (This may be a mistaken), aren't those with even an ounce of bridge sense going to realise that sitting the same way as the other teams client the best plan - assuming that their team is better? If there team is weaker I agree it makes sense to sit at the same table and stake everything on them having the cards.

Would it be different if you held the KQ of clubs?

Yeah that's the Bocchi Duboin and Mark's suggested style.

Playing a swiss pairs event, with an inexperinced partner but who's generally a smart guy and plays all his bridge with you or your usual partner so if you try something a bit off beat he will usually figure it out in the end (and you're still a beginner yourself, you're seeded 2nd last in the novices...). LHO deals and opens 3D. You're looking at a 17 count with both majors and decent spots (spots approximate, but it was about the below. I cannot use the hand editor from this browser): S: KQJ9 H: A9865 D: Q C: AJ8 The auction continues LHO - Partner - RHO - You (3D) - X - (4D) - ?? How do you make a slam try here? What does 5D mean vs double? I had no idea what to do and bid 5D just to hear something more from partner which resulted in us playing 6H, which made on a finesse. 6S is much nicer, but partner has equal length in the majors, and unsurprisingly better hearts texture. This was probably not a great slam, but pre-empts work etc. What should we do?

I currently play the Overcall Structure in competitive situations, a very aggressive natural overcalling system that sacrifices all weak jumps for two suited overcalls (so you can show all two suiters), and has a 1NT as a weak takeout. We really like this, but we miss being able to make pre-emptive jump overcalls. In an effort to fix it, Canape Overcalls sprung to mind as letting us get both, but potentially compromising lead directing inferences. So anyone got any experience with Canape overcalls? What's fun, what's good, what's bad and what's just ugly? How much damage does it do to lead direction? We were looking at Bocchi-Duboin and Mark Abraham's Catomult to make things extra festive. This is only for teams so it can be as brown sticker-y as we like. Edit: I have used the search feature, and there is some discussion of defence, but not much. I also found Bluejak's post on another forum. So something like (all credit to Mark Abraham, this is mostly stolen from him): (1C) Double 15+ 1D/1H/1S 7-15 Canape (can be good 10-14 6 carder) - Mark goes 1S-2S with a intermediate jump, but Bocchi always canape 1NT 8-14 3 Suited 2C 10-14 5 Diamonds & A 5 card Major - we will probably play this 5/4, but I guess you might be better of canape-ing? 2D 5-9 4+/4+ Majors 2H 4-9ish hearts or spades - we might swap this with 2D. 2S Good Preempt in any suit 2NT Good Intermediate Jump in D with a stop 3C 10-14 5+/5+ Both Majors 3D Good Intermediate Jump in D with no stop 3Maj Poor preempt and (1D) Double 15+ 1H/1S 7-15 Canape (can be good 10-14 6 carder) - Mark goes 1S-2S with a intermediate jump, but Bocchi always canape 1NT 8-14 3 Suited 2C 10-15 Canape (can be good intermediate jump without a stop) 2D 5-9 4+/4+ Majors 2H 2H Multi - We might swap this with 2D, partner thinks that this might be a bit to festive. 2S Good Preempt in any suit 2NT Good Intermediate Jump in C with a stop 3C Good Intermediate Jump in C with no stop 3D 10-14 5+/5+ Both Majors 3Suit Poor preempt These structures give us back weak jump overcalls (hurrah!), and lets us have all the two suiters as well, which is a major design objective. Any thoughts on the structure?

I appreciate there is probably no 'easy' defence here, but I realised I have never discussed a defence to my own methods - and these RCO style overcalls are hardly uncommon here so maybe I should. With all my partners we just play a generic defence (First Double = Values, 2nd = Takeout and 3rd = Penalties, bid shape naturally, sometimes they get you), but something more specific might be good. Any advice from the community?

Good point. Still weird though. How common is level 3?