volcano

when I was playing precision with a diamond as short as one (so we didn't have the precision 2D bid based on solely short diamonds), it just made auctions relatively clumsy. A way around this that we decided upon was having 2D being miniroman, showing all hands, 11-15 with 4-4-0-5 if the 5 card suit is a minor and all 4-4-4-1 hands with any singleton. I'd never used this convention before, but it had the beautiful side effect of 1D, 1H, 1S, and 2C promising 5+ cards in the suit opened. I quickly started to adore the convention in this context due to being able to bid as if the suit opened was a major suit. Since this addition, I must agree the 2C opener seems to be the most difficult in the system to deal with. As such, I almost always just hope to not have to open 2C, opening 1NT if i'm 5-4-2-2, so only opening 2C if I have a 6th club or have a singleton.

I'm not sure if transfer positives are what my partner and I play or not. I've only read one precision book (Precision Bridge by Eric Jannersten) and we have made some significant modifications to what is suggested therein. Our positive responses to 1C are as follows: 1H= 8+ HCP, 5+ spades 1S= 8-10 HCP, balanced 1NT= 8+ HCP, 5+ clubs 2C= 8+ HCP, 5+ diamonds 2D= 8+ HCP, 5+ hearts 2NT=11-13 HCP balanced 3NT=14-16 HCP balanced If partner completes the transfer, it confirms the fit and asks responder's trump quality. This always saves space in the case where partner has support (except the 2D showing hearts bid), while sometimes forcing you a little higher when you do not have a fit with partner's suit. We only have beta come up when it goes 1C - p - 1H - p - 1NT. (1C - p - 1S - p - 1NT is asking responder to bid his cheapest 4 card suit up the line.) I think the other greek letter questions are more useful, so don't mind losing this usage of beta.