david_c

Results are on the EBU website (www.ebu.co.uk). There's a couple of teams of BBOers still in contention at the moment.

A lot has been written about this in various places ... you should certainly have a look at Chris Ryall's methods (www.cavendish.demon.co.uk/bridge/two/clubs.htm), which a lot of people around here are playing. I used to play the traditional Acol responses, except with 2H and 2NT interchanged (so 2H shows a positive hand without a good suit) - that seemed to solve a few problems and was nice and simple. Usually it's played as about 6-10HCP or so. In my opinion, yes, I prefer using 2NT to show a strong hand because it's not very effective as a pre-empt (compared to bids in a suit, which are much harder for the opponents to deal with). A maximum for rebidding yorur suit at the 3-level would normally be about 17HCP with a 6-card suit. But depending on your system, it may be possible to have a stronger hand which is still not good enough for a 2-level opening. It's more risky. Normal Muiderberg fits in very well already, so I can't see any reason to change it. Yes, these hands are difficult to bid if you have to start at the 1-level, so putting some of them into the multi is a good idea. You can have fun playing around with the various possible combinations. The alternative is to play a multi which has no strong options at all - this makes it a more effective pre-empt. But if you have already decided to include some strong balanced hands, there's no harm in packing more strong options in.

I chose to double with this hand. Of course I knew it could go wrong if partner bid diamonds, but I wasn't expecting anything quite as bad as this: [hv=d=e&v=n&n=sj6hj3dkqt76432c9&w=sq52h9864daj98ck6&e=sat9743hkt2d5c532&s=sk8haq75dcaqjt874]399|300|Scoring: IMP[/hv] At our table the bidding went ... ... 2♠ X 3♠ 5♦ p 6♣ p 6♦ p p X all pass At the other table: ... ... 2♠ 3♣ 3♠ 4♦ P 5♣ p 5♦ p p X all pass

I'd be surprised if the best structure was the same for 1♥ and 1♠. Here's what I like at the moment: 1♥: ... 1♠ = denies 5+ spades ... 1NT = 5+ spades ... 2♣ = GF relay ... 2♦ = various hands with heart support 1♠: ... 1NT = semi-forcing ... 2♣ = GF [semi-]balanced or inv+ with clubs or invitational 3-card raise ... 2♦ = inv+ with 5+ hearts ... 2♥ = 5+ diamonds, GF unless suit rebid The reason for the differences is that after a 1♠ opening it's difficult to show invitational hands starting with 1NT, whereas after a 1♥ opening you can use a 2♠ rebid to help sort these out. Also, after 1♥ it's important to show support immediately, whereas after 1♠ you are slightly less worried about interference.

OK. But which one are you going to choose? :) By the way, at one table in this match a natural 4♣ bid was available, but at the other table they were playing Leaping Michaels. It would be interesting to have an answer in both cases.

[hv=d=e&v=n&s=sk7haq75dcaqjt874]133|100|Scoring: IMP[/hv] RHO opens 2♠ (a standard weak two). What do you do? [Your side is vul]

Assuming that responses to the double are pass/correct, isn't it marginally easier to find your best fit when double promises spades? If double shows hearts and another, then you might miss a spade fit when partner has 5=3=3=2 say. But I doubt this is a serious problem.

I don't see why 1H:1NT has to be strictly less than GF. It's often useful to be able to describe your hand instead of relaying. Particularly if you have a distributional hand short in partner's suit, you would rather not have to relay (in my opinion). My methods over 1M include a 2C relay; but I don't use the relay with a 5-card major unless the hand is balanced (we play 1S:2D as inv+ with 5+ hearts). With a 5-card minor we will certainly start with 2C, but if we have shortage in partner's major we will often break relays on the next round.

I wonder what you mean by "full relay" here. Presumably it means that it should be possible to find out the complete shape, and then have further relays available afterwards. This is what I currently do in 1M:2C auctions, and to be honest it suffers from a lack of space. If the relay was 1NT then this problem would be solved, but I'm very reluctant to give up the normal meaning for 1NT (particularly over a 1S opening). Personally I prefer not-quite-full relays, as in Ambra etc. That involves not always being able to find out the complete shape, though you get very close. It gives up some of the accuracy in slam bidding. But it's still an improvement compared to natural bidding because it gives the relayer a sensible way to bid his hand - in natural methods you are often in a situation where there is no particular suit you want to show, so you have to make the most meaningless bid available hoping to get more information. These relays do the same thing but in a more systematic and space-saving way.

To Chamaco: I don't think Free's method is a big club - it's a short forcing club, and I suspect 1♣:1M,1NT is non-forcing. To Mike: I don't see why it's so useful to have 1♣:1♥,1♠ free. Playing a strong no-trump then it would be useful for sorting out the balanced ranges, but playing a weak no-trump I'd be worried about wrongsiding 1NT after this sequence.

Do they allow opener to bypass a major to rebid 1NT ? This is very important to me. Yes. I'm sure I've posted this before, but what we play after 1♦:1♥,1NT is 2♣ = puppet to 2♦ (either weak with ♦ or invitational) 2♦ = transfer (either weak or GF) 2♥ = weak, 5♥4♠

I didn't find any. With good methods after 2♣ or 2♠ you will probably be able to get back some form of forcing diamond raise. But it's not as good as having a natural inverted raise, so you need to consider whether your new meaning of 2♦ is really necessary. And I don't think it is - see previous threads on how to solve the problem of 5♥4♠ hands after 1♦:1♥,1NT.

Trying to answer the original question - one advantage of playing reverses which do not promise extras is that opener can show which major suits he has immediately. For example after 1♥:2m you'd like to be able to show a spade suit if you have it. So how do you know whether you have values for slam or not? Well, it's difficult :) but if you know how to do it after 1♠:2♦,2♥ you ought to be able to do it after 1♥:2♦,2♠ as well! For reverses at the 3-level, you're always showing a minor suit, and you're taking up more space; you're also fairly likely to be able to show your suit cheaply later if you start by rebidding your first suit, so here there is much more reason to require extra strength for the bid. Part of the problem is trying to play natural 2/1 methods. In a game-forcing auction there's no particular reason to use natural bidding (the advantage of natural bids in general is that you can pass them) except for memory problems. For example: if you're happy playing that 1♠:2♦,2♥ is natural and 1♠:2♦,2♠ is catchall, then why not play 1♥:2♦,2♥ as showing spades, and 1♥:2♦,2♠ as catchall? Similarly if you do use 2M as a catchall bid, it's worth playing 2NT as showing a single-suiter (as suggested in "the other place" recently). And as for auctions beginning 1M:2♣, don't get me started ...

Whenever a chat message is displayed, the name of the person who sent it is shown at the front. Usually it's possible to click on the name in order to reply, or right click to do other things. There are a few things which seem a bit odd about this process at the moment: Sometimes (when a person is in a tournament) it isn't possible to click on their name in the chat. That makes sense because you're not allowed to reply to them, but sometimes we might want to use one of the right-click features. So it would be nice if these names were clickable too, except that the message displayed when you hovered over them would be "private chat disallowed" (like it is if you hover over their name in the lobby list). Interestingly, it seems that even when a person's ordinary chat messages are not clickable, if they send a message to kibitzers (or similar) then this copy of their name is clickable. It would be nice if this inconsistency was cleared up. Finally, it seems that when you're in a tournament, you can click on the chat messages of people at other tables in the tournament. The software allows you to type in a message to them, but then says that you can't send it. It would be better if we were prevented from typing in a message in the first place. (I think this happens in other situations as well, but I can't remember. Though obviously if someone changes their status while you're typing, there isn't anything that can be done about it.)

Thanks. Version 4.2.0 coming soon and it contains a fix to this bug. The same thing just happened to me, running version 4.2.1.

"10-11" is a very poor attempt at an explanation. I would probably decide this was misinformation - I doubt that East would ever be able to persuade me that they really had agreed a maximum of 11 for the 1♣ bid. Most likely, the explanation was intended to mean "a minimum of 10-11", but that's not what was said. So even if I decided not to adjust on this hand, I would warn West that his explanation was unclear. I think there are two things that might have happened: 1. South thinks, "10-11? That doesn't sound right. I bet he's messed up his explanation, but I won't ask him to clarify it because I have a cunning plan. I'm going to double. If they really do have at most 11, opposite a passed hand, then this contract is unlikely to make. If they have more than 11 I'm going to call the TD." 2. South thinks, "10-11? That's unusual, I never did understand these Polish systems. Oh well, if he's got at most eleven, and his partner didn't open, that's not enough for game, so I'll double." Very difficult to decide which of these actually happened. If it's 2, then I see no reason not to adjust (to 3NT undoubled). Most likely I'll be unable to find out what was really going on, so I will adjust anyway, because 2 is reasonable. E/W can have no complaints because West's explanation was clearly deficient. The main thing which would cause me not to adjust is if it becomes obvious that South is a good player. In that case, I will tell him he should realise that "10-11" was unlikely to be an accurate explanation, and he should have protected himself by asking for clarification before making a double.

I like the word "really" here. When you're asking about the frequency of an opening bid, trying to consider all four seats in the same calculation is an odd thing to do. The first question to try to answer is whether transfer pre-empts are a good method in first seat. The answer to this does not depend at all on how often you expect it to come up in other seats. Once you've answered this question you can go on to ask whether the method is a good one in second seat - which is harder because it depends on the opponents' system. And so on. At no point is it useful to combine statistics for more than one seat.

Another note about transfer pre-empts in general: Here in England, as of last week we are allowed to play a 2♦ transfer pre-empt in most competitions. I wouldn't be surprised if this becomes quite popular, because most other multi-meaning pre-empts are heavily restricted. So perhaps we will quickly become expert at defending against it! You may be wondering, why aren't we allowed any other transfer pre-empts? It appears that the answer is partly that no-one asked to be allowed to play them. So if there are any English players who want to play this sort of thing, then go ahead and apply to the EBU - it ought to stand a decent chance of getting through, now that 2♦ has been accepted.

A general question about transfer pre-empts - how should playing transfers affect your style of pre-empting? Should your pre-empts be more constructive, or more random than normal? I can see an argument either way: Because you're giving them a penalty double, maybe your pre-empts need to be sounder than normal. On the other hand, transfer pre-empts make it harder for partner to bounce, so maybe it makes sense to play a style where partner will not want to bounce very often (ie. a very random style of pre-empts).

I like Richard's defense. Against a 3♥ transfer opening, you might be able to convince me that double should show hearts. But against a 3♣ or 3♦ opening I think Richard had it absolutely right. I really don't like the idea of playing the "cue-bid" as natural. You're hoping they have the strong hand, but your bid isn't at all pre-emptive, so all you can hope for is that partner has a fit and can bounce. Meanwhile you've given LHO a free double. So, on those occasions where opener has a strong hand, your bid is a bit like doubling a strong club opening. Whereas, if opener has the weak type, you've handicapped yourself by not having a different meaning for the cue-bid.

Ah, that makes a difference. One reason that the Nightmare 1♦ can be bad is that responder has to stretch to respond with short diamonds. If you're playing 1♦ as forcing anyway then this is a non-problem. I do not understand why, could you explain further ? Playing a short club, you might want to double on relatively weak hands if they have the right shape. You also might want to double on hands at the upper end of the 15-17HCP range, in order to try and show your strength. If you include 18-20HCP balanced as well, you'll often have to double on that too. So double covers a lot of hands, which isn't great. Playing a 15+ club, the weakish hands are ruled out, and there's no real need to double with a balanced 15-17HCP, because partner already "knows" you have this much. So the double is used almost exclusively for the 18+ HCP balanced hand. This is why I don't think the 18-20HCP hand is a problem in competition, if your 1♣ promises 15+.

My philosophy is that balanced hands of 15-16HCP aren't worth another bid in competition. So I would pass in these auctions with up to 16HCP. That's not to say that I would be happy with the way the auction had gone. Everyone knows this is one of the main weaknesses of weak-NT systems. I'm not sure it's so much better even if you do exclude 18-20HCP balanced from 1♣ - are you really happy doubling on a flat 15 in the first auction? And what do you do if you have a weaker hand, but with the right shape for a take-out double? Is the double two-way? I believe the reason that they include 18-20HCP balanced in 1♦ is to solve a rebid problem. Their 1♣ opening is forcing and they don't play a negative, so after 1♣:1♠ (for example) they would not want to have to bid at the 2-level to show 18-19HCP balanced, when responder could be completely broke. But playing Nightmare the situation is different because 1♣ promises 15HCP. So if the auction goes as in the two examples above and you have a balanced 15-17HCP, you can pass and feel happy about it. So in fact if you're only thinking about competitive auctions, taking 18-20HCP out of 1♣ makes less sense in Nightmare than in the short club we're talking about. (Millennium Club rules OK - have I said that already? :D )

Actually, if you look a bit closer, the main idea here is putting all the balanced 15-17HCP hands into 1♣. It doesn't really matter what you do with the 18-20HCP hands - you can agree to open them 1♦ if you like, but a reasonable alternative is to put those into 1♣ as well. I prefer this method because it keeps the 1♦ opening pure and frees up 1♦:1M,1NT completely. The extra possibilities in 1♣ don't really cause any problems, because there's plenty of space available, particularly playing transfer responses.

4NT sounds natural to me. But certainly 4♠ as RKCB for diamonds makes better sense than playing it as RKCB for hearts. Nice to see someone else taking up this style of 2♣ response; I've been playing it for a little while now and I'm convinced that it's the best thing you can do for your bidding system. There's no real problem with the 2♦ relay: you're always going to have to use 2♦ as some sort of catchall bid here - though calling it a relay is probably a bad idea, if only because it sounds wrong to the captaincy freaks. What is a problem is forcing responder to rebid in no-trumps with a balanced hand - why not 2♥, the cheapest bid for the most frequent hand type? Actually, I do think the system forces opener to bid 2♦ a little too often: you could do with taking one more hand type out, something like 2♦ - denies 4 cards in the other major 2♥ - 4 cards in the other major 2♠ - clubs

If things were that clear, then big club systems would be dead (responder to 1club HAS to bid regardless, he is after all "giving up the pass" ;) ). Having one forcing opening bid is inevitable; having four on the other hand ... :P Still, I'm not putting too much faith in my own theoretical arguments :) I will reluctantly have to admit that F-N can play bridge.