pbleighton

Your partner was correct that 3H wasn't forcing. Your hand is a bit too strong for 3H for this reason. I would bid 3D and hold my breath - the requirement is 19+, you have 18 hcp plus 2 for length, and a great suit. You should normally have 4 to jump shift, but sometimes you have to tell a lie ;D

"Many of the systems that use relativly light artifical club opening bids are migrating to response structures that are designed to immediately clarify responder's semi-positives" What does semi-positive mean? Is it a couple of points under game forcing, with no upper limit? If so, are you then dealing with somthing like an invitational 2/1 response in Standard American, or are there mechanisms for the responder to clarify strength level on the next bid?

I would like people's popinions on the merits of systems which are based on the systematic use of light or very light opening bids in all seats and vulnerabilities. For the purposes of this discussion I will use the term light to mean the Rule of 19, or any equivalent algorithm which results in most 11 point hands (and a significant minority of 10 point hands) being opened, and very light to be a point or two points down from that. 1) How well do these bids work in "natural" systems? Specifically, do you find yourself missing games because partner passes you out with a 6 or 7 point hand when you have a 19+ hand? Or if partner responds with these hands, do you get in trouble often? 2) With forcing club systems, I have seen descriptions of Moscito and various other systems (it seems mostly Swedish) which use light or very light opening bids. They usually have a 15 point strong club, or else they are weak/strong (i.e. 1C is 11-13 balanced, or 17+ any shape). Using 15 points, you get significanly more negative responses than with a 16 or 17 point club. Can this deficiency be handled without relays? How well is it handled with relays? Same questions for the weak/strong systems - how/how well is the club opening handles. 3) For both "natural" and forcing club systems: a) Do you go down much, and hwo often do you get a very bad result? Do you ever play at the one level doubled? B) It seems to me that if the objective of light openening systems is to interfere with the opponent's bidding, as well as to bid constructively, then 4 card majors seem to be natural for these systems. Most of these systems I have seen are 4 card majors. Do you agree that 4 card majors and LOBs go together? c) Does very light opening bids sometimes interfere with slam bidding, when partner has a big hand? d) If you don't use transfers, do very light opening bids result in sometimes wrong-siding the contract? 4) When I read that a club system such as Precision is 11-15 HCP, does this generally mean the Rule of 20 (it seems to) 5) Of the top 100 pairs in the world, how many would you estimate use "sound" (rule of 20 or more conservative), how many use light, and how many use very light? 6) Any other specific or general comments on these systems

In the beginning there was "open with 13, pass (almost always) with 12)". Now the Rule of 20 seems to be prevalent, at least in the U.S. (though I've read that in Great Britain and elsewhere the Rule of 19 is used - true?). Questions: 1) In the most common terminology, does the term "Light Opening Bids" refer to the Rule of 20, the Rule of 19, etc? Is the Rule of 20 now considered "sound"? 2) If a partnership playing SAYC or 2/1 decides to use the Rule of 19, should they revise the definition of weak, invitational, and game forcing responses up one point? 3) If the answer to 2) is yes, does this mean that 2/1 is less practical using the Rule of 19, because responder will hold significantly fewer game forcing hands in proportion to 1NT forcing? 4) If the answer to 2) is yes, if a partnership wants to use the Rule of 19 (or eighteen), is it more practical to use it with a strong club system, so that strong hands won't be passed out by a responder with 6 or 7 points? 5) What experience have people had using the Rule of 19 and/or the Rule of 18?

"Count for responding I use nothing special here, generally following the very old fashion Goren count when supporting partner's suit.... 5 point for a void, 3 points for a singleton, and 1 point for doubleton. Once again subtractions come into play. Things that are not good are 3 card support, 4-3-3-3 distrubution (no point additions anyway), poor honor placement and the like. But for me, support these days has more to do with the law of total tricks than exact point count anyway. " If not supporting partner's suit, do you count for length and/or subtract for singleton or void in partner's 5 card major?

Is this true of all versions of Moscito?

Undertaking risk of getting slapped down hard for adding a branch to a thread :o Hrothgar writes "I think that the undisciplined 2 bids lead to a significant net loss. " In your notes and postings on Moscito, you are quite clear that you regard those undisciplined openings as good. Is the difference that the Moscito weak twos have a more limited strength range (because of the very light opening 1 bids), and thus convey more information to your partner, whereas a traditional undiscliplined 2 bid has much less definition?

1)In another thread, posters referred to variable NT, where the range depended on seat and/or vulnerability. Would all/most tournament directors see this as GCC legal? To extend this question (perhaps past the point of practicality), what about: 2)Using 2D as weak in 1st seat NV, 3rd seat all vuls, and as Flannery in other seats/vulnerabilities? 3)Playing Moscito in 1st seat NV, 3rd seat all vuls, and playing Precision in other seats/vulnerabilities?

What dealer program(s) do you recommend? 1) A reply to a previous post recommnded that I create my own forcing club system, and I am attempting to do so. The simulation idea sounds good. I'm a programmer, but I want to avoid spending my weekends writing code. 2) Will these programs practice bidding with you? Do they mainly give you randomly generated hands which fit specified criteria?

Does anyone know of a website which has tables which reflect the odds of a hands having a given number of hcp, given that your hand has x hcp, with a table for each value of x. For example, the odds of having exactly 10 hcp without any information about the other hands is 9.4%, but the odds of your partner having exactly 10 hcp is higher if you pick up your hand and see 5 hcp, and lower if you see 15 hcp. By the way, there are tables of hcp and distribution probabilities at http://www.bridgeguys.com/MGlossary/MathTables.html

Partner opens 1NT (15-17). You have spades, but don't have enough for Stayman. Which of these hands bailing into spades: 6241: 1) xxxxxx-Ax-Qxxx-x 2) Qxxxxx-xx-Axxx-x 5341: 3) xxxxx-Axx-Qxxx-x 4) xxxxx-xxx-Qxxx-x 5) Qxxxx-xxx-xxxx-x 6) Axxxx-xxx-Qxxx-x 7) AQxxx-xxx-xxxx-x 6232: 8) xxxxxx-Ax-Qxx-xx 9) xxxxxx-xx-Qxx-xx 10) Qxxxxx-xx-xxx-xx 11) Axxxxx-xx-xx-xx 5332: 12) AQxxx-xxx-xxx-xx 13) Axxxx-Qxx-xxx-xx

Another thought - could 4C after 3NT be construed as Gerber?

1) Hand 2 - yes his hand was balanced. Doubleton C, no 5 card suit. 2) I had 7 clubs to the jack (next highest 8 or 9, I think), and a queen in a tripleton. Give that, would you go to 4 or 5, or be chicken like me and pass? 3) I didn't know that someone with such a weak hand (and suit) was allowed to second guess such a strong and decisive bid.

You have been so helpful - 1 more question - transfers except after NT. NT seems covered by "ALL CALLS AFTER A NATURAL NOTRUMP opening bid or direct overcall". Are transfer positives in Precision OK?

Thanks again for the link. 1) I see "Relay (tell me more) systems" are disallowed under the General chart. Does this mean that, for example, a Precision system which uses symmetric relays (for example) can't be played at events using this chart? 2) Do most club games use this chart?

Hand 1 - opponents silent. Partner (level Private) opened 1D, I responded 2C (11pts - invitational), he rebid 2D, I had a 3325 shape and bid 2NT. He then bid 4NT. I thought for a while - Blackwood or invitational to 6NT? From what I have read, 4NT is invitational to 6 after openings of 1NT and 2NT, and after 1 of a suit - 2NT/3NT, but I hadn't seen it described that way elsewhere, so I guesed Blackwood (he could have had a monster diamond suit). He meant it as a try for 6NT (he had 15 hcp, balanced, awfully weak for that). How would you interpret 4NT in this sequence (or would you scratch your head and guess), and if you thought it was invitational, how many hcp would you do expect partner to have? There were no hard feelings on this, but it was a pretty bad miscommunication, and I'm wondering what people think. BTW - 3NT down 1 was the par result, and we were at 6NT down 3 (opps took their quick tricks), so we didn't get burned too badly :D Hand 2 (different p - Expert). Opp opened 1H (both opps silent after that), partner doubled, I had 3 pts and 7C to the jack, and bid 2C. He jumped to 3NT. He had the AK doubleton in clubs, and though clubs were established he couldn't get to dummy, and went down 2 or 3. This partner seemed to be a good player based other things I could see, but he bid 3NT with 18 hcp. How many hcp would it take for you to bid 3NT in this situation?

Thanks Hrothgar! What about changing the bid from 2NT to the cheapest jump shift, as Fred did. Did that require approval?

I understand that conventions must be approved before they are used. To what extent may they be modified without being considered to be a new convention. Using Jacoby 2NT as an example, would any/all of the following require registration/approval in the U.S.: 1) using it with the cheapest jump shift but keeping the responses the same 2) keeping 2NT as the bid, but changing the responses (such as Fred Gitelman's) 3) combining 1) and 2), as Fred does 4) moving the point count requirement upward by a few points 5) moving the point count requirement downward, and making the bid invitational, not forcing 6) would different tournament directors give different answers to the above I realizze that there may not be a straightforward rules on this general topic, but I'd like to get a feel for this subject.

So if I am at a table, and wsh to respond to a private message from someone outside the table I can hit control/R. Other than that, how would I send a message to this person?

Playing a hand, I got a message in light blue from someone in the lobby, regarding a post I had made in this forum. I typed a reply into the chat area. I got another response. I typed another reply, then nothing. Questions: 1) How do you commuicate with someone playing at a table? 2) Is the blue I saw visible to to others some or all of the time? 3) During this communication, if the recipient at the table types something back, is it visible (is this a kibitzer?).

More basic questions: 1) For The Hog - sinnce you open 6322 with 6m, do you open 5422 with 5m? Either/both cases, do you do this only with a weak long suit? 2) When you overcall 1 of a suit, does this also mean 12-14? 3) From what I've read, Cappeletti (and Hamilton) use a penalty double after 1NT. How effective is this? Do you use it with partners who are willing? 4) Do you use transfers with a 12-14 NT, or do you prefer to keep 2D as a bailout in diamonds? 5) When you play this in a field where a strong NT is more common (i.e. BBO), do you alert? 6) Playing a strong NT, and using the rule of 20 for openings, I will almost always pass a 4333 shape with 12 pts, and sometimes pass 4332s and (less often)5332s. Do you open all/almost all 12-14 balanced hands? Do you open doggy looking 15 pointers as 1NT?

One poster said he thought 12-14 NT was illegal in SAYC or 2/1. SAYC that's right (it seems to specify everything), but is there any reason a Standard or 2/1 bidder can't/shouldn't use it, as long as both partners agree? Do those of you who like it play it vulnerable? If yes, do you open 1 of a suit sometimes vul rather than 1NT? If you were to play it with 5 card majors, would you open some/all of NT hands with 5 of a major in the major?

Very basic questions for those who've played 12-14 NT> I've never played 12-14 NT. What I've read (perhaps all by Americans) is that you get a lot of bad results because the responder frequently is too weak to use stayman to find a 44 fit in the majors. What is your experience with this? Does the preemptive value outweigh the bad results? Is it more of a problem at IMPs or matchpoints? Do you play 12-14 when playing SAYC or 2/1?

I'm just learning Precision. My book (Precision Today - Berkowitz/Stanley) recommends transfer positives. Questions for those who've played them: 1) In general, are they a good idea? Does the right-siding more than compensate for the loss of bidding space? 2) The book recommends playing Beta acceptance after the responder's transfer, asking for controls (A=2, K=1). A post in another thread said this was an outdated method. a) Do you agree that Beta shouldn't be played? :) Do transfer positives work well without them?

I have noticed that BBO Forum threads don't appear to show up on Google searches, whereas Bridgetalk.com threads do (I found out about BBO from a Bridgetalk online poll about favorite online bridge sites - BBO won by a mile). I think it would be a great way for people to find out about BBO if the threads could find their way into Google and other search engine results. I'm a programmer who has done just enough web stuff to be dangerous :D, and I am wondering if the reason for nonappearance is that the threads are kept in a database, and displayed dynamically when requested by a user, whereas perhaps Bridgetalk's threads are kept in files accesible to the search engines (pardon the tech talk). In any case, is it possible that the threads could be made available to search engines?