bjacobs

It's arrived, hallelujah!

Newbie question here. I want to run simultaneous (or at least heavily overlapping in time) tournaments, in order to stratify my field. I assume this is possible. Are there any traps or gotchas I should watch out for? Thanks in advance … Bill

Thank-you

Hand details for tournaments are not being displayed. Might be related to the server upgrade? It's possible that they are being displayed after an hour or so.

The title says it all. Can we please please put some audio prompt on director calls to save us having to continually stare at a screen.

Yes, my idea was that 1S-2C-3H was a middling hand, with 5-5 shape. It's consistent with the principles of Gazzilli, in which jump rebids show distribution in a narrow range of strength. 1H-2C-3S would be a rare 5-6 shape. This is entirely optional, no particular reason to play it.

I don't have data for when Fantoni-Nunes passed in 1st/2nd seat, but I do have some data for my own partnership. The differential on 1st/2nd seat passes is when Fantunes passes with a weak-2 opening. We lost imps on average, but there weren't a lot of data points. Fantunes also loses a small number of imps due to passes in 3rd seat. You can't make light 3rd seat openings at the 1-level (i.e. about 8-11 points), although you can at the 2-level. I would warn against trying to infer too much low-level detail from the statistics. The board count is not high enough. I had to smile when I read the posts about results when Fantoni opened compared to when Nunes opened. Thinking through it logically, the outcome is surely meaningless, and simply proves that you can always find some weird conclusions to make from a limited data set if you look hard enough. Statisticians have a name for this fallacy: it's called the "Look Elsewhere Effect". Cheers ... Bill

I'm not really saying anything except that the extract from the book reproduced in this thread is being quoted inaccurately and out of context. There are a couple of tables of data in the book about imp results that Fantoni and Nunes have achieved. But the main objective of the book is to describe the system in detail and discuss why it works so well. Virtually all that discussion is of a qualitative nature. To suggest that I am claiming that Fantunes is a good system becuase of the two tables of data presented is completely wrong. Cheers ... Bill Jacobs

Yes, the statistical tables occupy 2 pages out of a 170 page book. To get a real sense of the argument, it might be best to read and digest the other 168. To describe the inclusion of the data as the equivalent of a cheap gimmick is quite a stretch. It's not as though I am using it in the marketing of the book or system. Cheers ... Bill Jacobs.

That's not a verbatim quote from the book. I really only did one "interesting" thing with the collected data. I totalled imps swung and won/lost on boards where the final contract was the same, in order to make an approximate calibration of card-play aspects. (Clearly approximate, as there would be some deals where the auction affects the card play, particularly the opening lead.) It still seems to me to be a valid device. Cheers ... Bill

No, I hadn't missed the discussion, it's just that I can't think of much to contribute. I did some calculations that are accurate if BBO Archives and Excel are to be believed, and drew a couple of conclusions from the results. Nothing in this thread makes me want to back off from those conclusions, although I will admit that there are some points made here that I simply don't understand. The analysis that I did is fairly important to me, because there are probably people in the world who are thinking: "Fantoni and Nunes are such great bridge players: think of what they could achieve if they played a normal system!" I am totally convinced that their system is one of the reasons for their greatness, rather than something that holds them back. Most of that belief stems from my own experiences with the system, for which I kept substantial statistical records that I chose not to publish in the book, although they can be found elsewhere on the internet if you are a REALLY good searcher :) Cheers ... Bill

Hi, The GCC restriction on transfer responses to 1C is a big problem for Fantunes. Without them, the whole system is thrown out of kilter. Given the growing popularity of transfers after 1C, one would hope this restriction will not last forever. I had some experience with this in the Akuba Cup, the Pairs event that is part of the NEC Cup. We were told not to use the transfer responses, and as it happened it cost us the event. We had one board where the auction started 1C-1H (natural, perforce), and the resulting 4H contract was played from the wrong hand. This cost many matchpoints, and we came second by about an eighth of a top. The prohibition on the Fantunes 1major - 2C response is probably also a killer. The restrictions on the 4441 shape would be less of a concern (you improvise). Cheers ... Bill Jacobs