MickyB

Under AV, the post that comes 2nd or 3rd may win!

If you played 1N:2N as natural, invitational, then there would be no need for 1N:2C, 2H:2N to deny four spades. That is why four-suit transfers are considered relevant.

Thanks. Match 5 was Levin+Jodizc in the open room, result was 53-62.

Disappointed that the title has been changed, I thought 1335 described this hand well. Still, there's no alternative to 2D. People reverse on three-card suits, sometimes even doubletons, so how can there be an issue with xxxx?

If partner has the ♠K, is a spade switch required?

That wasn't what I intended to suggest, I still meant qualifier Saturday, final Sunday

Round-robin or swiss with longer matches [4 matches per day] imo.

Your 1C opening should show either clubs or a 15-19 NT; 1C (2S) 3C should be to play opposite a minimum with clubs, but for conversion to NT opposite most balanced hands. As such, 4-4-4-1 11-14 should definitely not open 1C. The advantages of transfers over 1C are smaller playing weak NT. This is because 5D4M (8)9-11 can respond 1D to 1C without missing a 4-4 major fit when playing weak NT.

No.

This is definitely too weak for 1H:2H in my book. I'd bid 1NT forcing if possible, or 1S if playing a semi-forcing NT. The disadvantage to 1S is that partner will raise on 35(14) minima.

Thanks, I had understood this as referring only to non-jumps but 5G2c4a makes it clear that's not the case.

I found a reg that referred to non-jumps, but nothing about jumps in this situation.

I play something similar; 1, 0, 2 w/o Q, 2 with Q. I call it, "RKCB 10".

On the topic of NFBs - they are indeed alertable, but I believe that opening bid-(X)-bid is not alertable whether forcing or not. Given that, IME, 95% of players here play 1S-X-2C as nat F1, I've always thought this odd.

I am keen to know what you'll vote for in this poll, Adam.

Double

This is pretty much "Half-Astro", invention of former BBFer dcrc2. We played double by a passed hand [and probably of a strong NT too, I forget] as hearts+minor, with 2C a NF ask for the five-card suit and 2D asking partner to pass on any hand with diamonds and describe further with hearts+clubs. I modified it a couple of years back, making the 2C overcall show 3+S,4+H - sort of a compromise between 2C majors and 2C hearts+another. The method is possibly my favourite bit of kit [and I have a *lot* of kit, as Gnasher will probably mention at some point during this thread]. Unfortunately the name "Three-quarters Aspro" never really caught on in the same way, not sure why.

Indeed. Acol strong NT is common in Manchester btw, I don't know if there are any other pockets of resistance in the UK. I guess you could argue that "modern Acol with a weak NT" bears more resemblance to the original system than "modern Acol with a strong NT". Light 2/1s meant that 1S:2C, 2D and 1S:2C, 2N [showing 15-16 when NV I think] were non-forcing, but at least you didn't have to prepare your rebid unlike when playing strong NT - I understand that 4342 would bid 1S:2C, 2D or 1S:2H, 3H while 4243 would open 1D because it couldn't cope with a 2H response to 1S. Likewise 4-4 majors would open 1S and rebid 2H, while 4333 would open 1C because raising 2m on three in a 4333 wasn't acceptable. "Modern Acol strong NT" should use 11+ 2/1s which makes it hard for 1S:2D, 2S to be non-forcing.

No need to apologise, people are allowed to be wro...sorry, disagree with me :P I think this gadget will lead to worse auctions when opener is unbalanced, much better for opener to show their suits and responder to use fourth/third suit-forcing for basically the reason that Free gave - unbalanced hands should describe to balanced hands, not the other way around. I am also not convinced that you'll give less information away, while playing xfers over 1C already gives you a fair bit of flexibility with regard to who declares. It's a fair bit of work and I'm not sure it'll actually be an overall gain. That's not even taking into the account the cost of not being able to use 2D for something else, eg responder's reverse flannery.

In that case, 4-card majors with a Weak NT and weak twos must have crossed the line too, surely?

I don't think this idea is very good, sorry. This 2D bid is useful in Precision because there isn't a great way to bid these hands otherwise, there's just nothing wrong with bidding 1C:1M, 1N:3N in standard.

:lol: I'd partly agree if the OP was playing 5533, but I don't think most of those who play short club with xfer responses think it's an intrinsically worse system than, say, Precision. I certainly don't consider the opening bid structure to be "where it matters", quite the opposite.

On occasion I've seen it referred to as Wagner

Cheers Zel. One question - why are so many hands bidding 1S:1N, 2C? I'd have been inclined to start with something like 2D = 5S4D 11-18 2H = 5S4C 11-13 2S = 5S4C 14-17 Or similar

I want responder to get the NT in first, and I want 1S:2C free to show a suit. When I set out I thought that suit would be diamonds, but I guess I'll have to make do with it being clubs B-)