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My experience playing against 'fert' bids is that increases the need to judgement and decreases the reliance on my own favourite conventions. In a strange sort of way I think it makes the game more natural. I have always enjoyed the challenge. =What judgement?= How do you compete against an opening that at one extreme is best defended against using penalty X's and at the other extreme best defended against using T/O X's? ...and T/O pf what? and what can you use as cue bids? ...and of course the fundamental problem of how can you possibly evaluate your own hand if you have no idea what your ODR is? After all, if you have length and/or values =in= Their suits you want to defend most of the time, if you have length and/or values =outside= Their suits, you want to declare most of the time. But you literally have no way of judging that after this opening. It goes on and on. The opening essentially turns the board into a giant random number. ...and THAT is what the regulators, and many players, object to.

You are probably not playing against decent defenders then. There are numerous studies on this backing up the number I gave. Name one. Marshall Miles and Danny Kleinman both at one point had stuff you could look at. Before that John Lowenthal, the author of BOREL, had done studies both for himself and the Dallas Aces. For more contemporary sources, find Tom Andrews web site or Robin Hilliyard's (sp?) web sites. I was told about those a few years back. There are others I've tripped across over the years. Do a Google search.

If I open 1N 1st or 2nd seat with 0-9 hcp and any shape, I think you will find that if you calculate all of the averages that we make it just about half the time. As for opening it one spade, well, that just lets your partner bid the 1NT, which increases our odds further. At any rate, I certainly wouldn't take your word for it that this bid isn't trying to get us to a constructive contract. ...and the initial criteria I mentioned was ~75%. So this, and any other opening that is basically designed to be the equivalent of a coin flip just to chew up space and hurt the opponents ability to use their bridge skills, would definitely get punished under the regulation I'm proposing. Any opening that is essentially a coin flip is not Constructive as I understand the term.

If my RHO opens a monster 2♣ bid and I overcall, I'm not doing it because I think I'm capable of reaching a reasonable contract. I'm doing it to interfere, or to direct the lead. In fact, the bids that you mention are, in my humble opinion, ESSENTIAL to bridge. If you play S.J. Simon style four card majors, solid openings, Acol 2s, 16-19 1NT, etc., you are pretty much freakin' immune to destructive overcalls. You are a freakin' rock, and anybody who thinks they can break you down is going to find themselves smashed to pieces. People playing Simon's method will slap the Futile Willy's out of the way unless they want to slow down on occassion to pick up an 800. The cuter you try to get, the more vulnerable to destructive methods you become. 2♠ on a 4 card suit shuts down a 1 diamond opening with 3+ a lot better than it does a 4+, and it shuts down a Polish club far better than 4+ In particular, the version of the 1 diamond opener in Precision which shows 11-15 hcp and can have as few as 1 diamond is ridiculously vulnerable to random, stupid, destructive bids. I won't go so far as to say that a 2nd hand 1 diamond opening like that should be forcing for the next opponent, but I'll just think it really, really hard. 'Destructive' bids are the great equalizer. If your bids are solid and natural, destruction is pointless. If your opening shows a good hand and 13 cards, then my overcall can show a bad hand and 13 cards. You want to use relays to show your hand? Then we can use doubles to show ours without ever being danger. Non-constructive calls are the pushback on artificial systems. If they were made illegal, the only people who would still play SAYC or 2/1 would be kids just learning the game. Once more, I AM NOT TALKING ABOUT TACTICAL BIDDING. (sorry for shouting, but this point keeps getting missed.) Tactical bidding is =all= about using your judgement and your cards to decide how far you can push things to get a good score. That's a very important and valuable part of Bridge. The objection the regulators have is to bids =systemically designed= to make your bridge skills irrelevant and at the same time do everything they can to make the opponents bridge skills irrelevant as well. Wow, I must be a darned good player. I only need 18 points, on the average, to make 1N. You are probably not playing against decent defenders then. There are numerous studies on this backing up the number I gave.

I'd rather go for the argument "this idea won't work." Next. I mean, here you are in third seat at W/R and it has gone P - (P) - ? and you hold: a) xxx xx xxxx AKJx Under the Foo system, don't open 1♣. It's illegal by all measures you mentioned. B) AKT9x xx xxxx xx Under the Foo system, don't open any number of spades. It's illegal by all measures. No, those are examples of tactical bidding. That is based on you using your judgement with regards to your own cards. Perfectly reasonable. OTOH, opening 1♠ when you may or may not have any ♠'s and have 0-8 HCP is obviously designed to simply make it impossible for the opponents to use Bridge skills. opening 2D when you could hold any 2 suits, each any length from 4-7 cards long, and 0-8 HCP is equally obviously designed to obtain good scores only by messing with the opponents. Not by any constructive merit. Tactical bidding good. Systemic design to scr*w the opponents bad. See the distinction?

No. I'm drawing a explicit and significant distinction between a= tactical bidding with "ordinary methods" VS b= bids that =systemically= and =by design= have little or no chance of scoring well based on the side using them's cards but rather rely on their ability to make it impossible for the opponents to use bridge skills in order to obtain good results. The 1st is based on using your own bridge skills. The 2nd is based on, as one member of the ACBL C&C was quoted as saying in a thread I was pointed to, "f*cking the opponents". Bids =systemically designed= solely or primarily for the 2nd goal are Destructive.

Actually, I would !not! ban Strong Pass systems or WOS or HUMs. I'd apply the regulation I'm describing to the =openings= or =responses= that qualified on a case by case basis. So in your example using a SP system, the only opening that would routinely get "nailed" is the Fert. (my 1st chosen example of a Destructive convention with a "limited chance of reaching a reasonable contract" in your words.) Everything else has at least a chance of being mathematically proven to be Constructive. ...and those that want to play FP systems would be able to far more than they can now. (In short, I'm trying to =help= you bidding innovators out there.) I suspect that there will always be a class of player that must be protected from everything beyond a certain complexity level. That's a separate issue. We can always keep a "wading pool" or "bunny hill" available for those not up to real swimming or real skiing yet.

Why must the contract be makable? I did not say it had to be makable. I did not even say it had to be makable in the specific circumstances that an instance of the opening was used. I said the method had to have a reasonable chance of finding a contract that has play according to basic bridge logic. We all know the rules of thumb here. Examples a= it takes ~21 playing points to make 1N w/o a fit. b= the LoTT (modified by the excellent work on shortness In _I Fought The Law_) c= The modern Losing Trick count etc If you are knowingly using a method that =systemically= (not in a spcific case, overall systemically) has too poor a chance of reaching any reasonable contract, then you are essentially trying to get a good score by making it impossible for your opponents to use bridge skills, not by using your own. That appears to be the core of the definition of "Destructive".

awm, I think the problem with changing the scoring table for all methods is that there =is= a substantial and quantifiable difference in the approach to the game in the two different classes of bids. Methods designed to make the most of your bridge skills to obtain a good score are inherently different from methods designed to obtain a good score by making it impossible for the opponents to use bridge skills. I don't think a scoring system that overly punishes those that use perfectly reasonable methods but simply get unlucky on a board; or a scoring system that does not recognize the fundamental differences in the approach to the game epitimized by the two different classes of methods, has any chance of being fair. IMHO any fair regulations should take this difference in approach into account.

>1= It has been argued that those playing systemic methods that are basically >designed to gain all or the vast majority of their good results from making it >impossible for the opponents to use Bridge skills are not playing Bridge. > >That's why the technical terms "Destructive" and "Dominant" have come into being. The expressions "Destructive" and "Dominant" were introduced for much the same reason that the "Estate Tax" was rebranded as the "Death Tax". This is a cynical attempt to cause people engage with the debate on an emotional level. That's your POV. You are welcome to it. It is not supported by =any= TD or regulating official I've had discourse with. What =has= been agreed is that there is evidence that the current process is too inexplicable, too undisclosed, and that there have been actions taken that could be construed as being based on personal bias rather than objective judgement. Therefore I am trying to make suggestions that fix the problems that seem to be substantiated.

I have not suggested anything resembling a "destructive:constructive ratio". I'm not even sure what that term means. The metric I presented was based on the chance that your opening bid has a "foo" % chance of resulting in a makable contract: 8+ trumps and appropriate values for the degree of trump fit and level to which one has bid. My initial 75% number came from the mathematical calculations of a traditional 6 card long single suited Weak Two having a fit of at least 8 cards. Clearly, that is not all there is to calculating the odds of a traditional Weak Two resulting in a reasonable contract. That's why I suggest those more mathematically adept than I should do the calculation that goes into the actual proposed regulation. The protection this gives bidding innovators is that, regardless of whatever a regulator's personal prejudices are, if a bid is as "sound" as other accepted methods by this metric, this regulation guarantees that whatever the new method is it will be accepted as equally valid Bridge. On the "other side of the aisle", players are protected from methods that are too "outrageous" by the simple fact that if a pair plays unsound methods the scoring table will mete out appropriate justice regardless of the players involved.

I also agree with whoever stated that those who are actually particpating members of Organized Bridge should get more of a voice and vote than players who are not. Micheal's comments were specifically about hidden defensive carding agreements from my read of that section of the book. ...and he's right. Many pairs do things with regards to carding that if they were bids and similarly unexplained, the pair in quesiton would be in "hot water" fast.

HCP is a ridiculous guide for pre-emptive openings. So why would you ever use it in regulations to define if an opening is destructive or not??? :D Poor idea! Ridiculous or not, all of the present regulations regarding acceptable bids are based on HCP. It could be reasonably argued that said regulations should be based on tricks or some other more accurate methods of hand evaluation. However, that is not the way things are done. Frankly, I'm improving things by =weakening= the regulations cuurent tie to HCP considerably. The focus is on the percentage odds of constructive results in my suggestion. This, of course, is what constructive bidding is =really= about. Not HCP. I'm basing my suggestions on established precedent.

So in short you would like to not play bridge but some other game. How sad. In that case my range is 0 - 11. This way you force people to give an explanation that is not really full disclosure, it's like having to declare your 15-17 NT as 13 - 18 because there might exist one 13 HCP hand worth a 15-17 NT. 1= It has been argued that those playing systemic methods that are basically designed to gain all or the vast majority of their good results from making it impossible for the opponents to use Bridge skills are not playing Bridge. That's why the technical terms "Destructive" and "Dominant" have come into being. This is the dominant meme within the Bridge community. It is never going away. Unfortunately, the current way these situations is handled involves enough personal judgement, usually unexplained and undocumented personal judgement, on the part of regulating officials that many players attempting to be innovative with regards to bidding are crying "foul!" There =will= always be regulations where some methods are deemed unacceptable at some levels of play. Therefore the best thing to do to protect those who want to innovate is to make rules that are as objective and as understandable as possible. By using an objective mathematical basis based on what is now consider acceptable bidding, we get a objective "dial" that innovators can guarantee will not be set too stringently nor can be used to "single out" or prejudice against any specific method. It's a heck of a lot better than the current situation. 2= Please note that the regulation I proposed explicitly states that it is only valid for bids that do not pass the mathematical test for being adequately Constructive. Clearly =all= of the present 1N opening ranges, the Kamikaze included, pass that test. Therefore example based on a Strong NT is a red herring designed more to incite flames than to objectively evaluate the suggestion.

As the player who advocated (3C)-pa-(3D)-5H with - KQJT9xxxx xx xx, Allow me to make some comments in its defense to counter those claiming it to be "insane". 1= The auction reveals it is the opponent's hand. Time to Jam Them if we can. 2= Even in the unlikely occurance that They have every other value in the deck, 5♥ is at most -3. If 5♥ is -3, They are cold for a grand. If 5♥ is -2, They are likely cold for a small slam. 3= 3♥ and 4♥ might be construed as constructive by pd. Not so 5♥ 4= the "book preempt" holding a 9 card suit is... So while I can understand the action is not everyone's cup of tea, it is far from insane or random and actually is based on some defensible Bridge thinking.

After reading all these recent threads on this and similar topics, I'm beginning to think that any set of regulations based on allowing or disallowing any methods using HCP or suit length or having "n" cards in a suit is likely going to either a= end up being "gamed" or b= being perceived as arbitrary by some group. Cascade has in effect suggested what IMHO is a whole new approach, and possibly a better one, to the issue. What makes a method Constructive or Destructive is how much it helps you get to the right spot rather than how much it is based on scoring well by making it difficult or impossible for the opponents to evaluate their own cards. That means the best way to regulate such methods is to see to it that there is a scoring disincentive for using methods that randomize board results by too much rather than playing whatever is defined as Bridge. This IMHO, is much better than the current regulatory morass: a= it's objective. No accusations or worries about politics leading to certain decisions. b= it puts the focus of the primary goal of the game: getting good scores. c= any hierto unknown method can be tested by a TD on the spot at a tourney just by asking someone with the correct math background to do the calculation. d= it's "fair" in the sense that it can be tuned to represent the majority views of the playing membership being regulated. e= it's a "meta-rule" that simplifies the approval process for new methods enormously.

Some methods at some levels are deemed too disruptive. So... It may be a more in the spirit of the above as well as more effective disincentive to change "b" in my suggestion to "Every time a pair uses such an opening and does not make their contract, the board is scored as if they played XX'd."

IMPs means Make your contract Do not risk your contract for overtricks. Do not even try for overtricks unless or until your contract is secure.

So, an idea based on a suggestion of Cascade as a modification of the regulations on allowed methods at the ACBL GCC or other "general playing member" level: "If the opening is systemically 'light' enough that it has less than a 75% chance of resulting in a makable contract (example: Frelling Two's with a low enough HCP range), then the pair using it a= must play the opening strictly within it's stated shape and value range (IOW, they may pass hands they consider poor in the stated range, but they may not use this opening with hands that have more or less HCP than the stated range; nor with hands that are off-shape for the stated description.) AND b= every time a pair uses such an opening and fails to make the resulting contract, the hand is scored as if it was XX." EDIT: replaced clause "b" with improved version Thus there will be a built-in dis-incentive against being more "random" than Usual Practice. 75% may not be the correct value. The mathematicians can figure out where the cut-off should exist such that people playing too Destructive a method end up having a large negative overall expectation on the scoring table. Certainly any methods having a 55% or less expectation of leading to a making contract should end up being long term losers if this idea is adopted, but I'm not mathematically adept enough to figure out what the optimal exact percentage should be in the proposed regulation above.

So, an idea based on a suggestion of Cascade: "If the opening is systemically 'light' enough that it has less than a 75% chance of resulting in a makable contract (example: Frelling Two's with a low enough HCP range), then the pair using it a= must play the opening strictly within it's stated shape and value range (IOW, they may pass hands they consider poor in the stated range, but they may not use this opening with hands that have more or less HCP than the stated range; nor with hands that are off-shape for the stated description.) AND b= every time a pair uses such an opening the hand is declared XX." Thus there will be a built-in dis-incentive against being more "random" than Usual Practice. 75% may not be the correct value. The mathematicians can figure out where the cut-off should exist such that people playing too Destructive a method end up having a large negative overall expectation on the scoring table. Certainly any methods having a 55% or less expectation of leading to a making contract should end up being long term losers if this idea is adopted, but I'm not mathematically adept enough to figure out what the optimal exact percentage should be in the proposed regulation above. EDIT: it may be a more effective disincentive to change "b" above to "Every time a pair uses such an opening and does not make their contract, the board is scored as if they played XX'd."

This is a beautiful balancing T/O X of (4♥) in my world. Admittedly a min or very close to a min for the action, but still automatic ♠QJTx ♥xx ♦AKxx ♣A98 has 15 points in support of either pointed suit; and rates to have 15 support points for ♣'s as well. pd's expectation is a little better than 10 points here. ♠ Ax ♥ ♦ Qxx ♣ QTxxxxxx has 13 playing points. IOW, it's ~ a full trick stronger than it's expectation. More than that given the 10+ card ♣ fit a balancing T/O X here will tell us We have. Given a balancing T/O X, I'd probably bid 6♣ as an Advance with the OP hand due to my considerable extras. Bottom line: pd should have balanced and did not. Give pd awm's 2nd example of KQxx Qxx Kxx Kxx, and this would've been a much more problematic discussion. But ♠QJTx ♥xx ♦AKxx ♣A98 (or Kxxx xxxx AKx Ax for that matter) should be an automatic balance given what 2nd chair is expected to hold for playing strength.

2x post

A good bridge player I know once made the mistake of trying to teach his wife to love Bridge as much as he did by teaching her to play. It quickly became apparent that she had a rather unique approach to bidding: she hated to open and would go out of her way to find a flaw in her hand that would allow her to pass. Sometimes her hand was too good to justify passing even to her. Then she would mutter "d@mn". This rapidly lead to some new alerts on the couples' card: "d@mn." "Alert!" *confused opponents* "Yes?" "My wife has a hand Al Roth would consider an mandatory opening bid" "god d@mn!" (or "d@mn it all!") "Alert!" *now curious opponents* "what now?" "my wife has a hand that is at least strong enough to reverse." "X!" "Alert!" *shocked opponents* "What's she up to now?" "my wife previously passed with enough values that you are going for -800 on this auction."

This actually happened! It was an ACBL Nationals in the late 1970's or early 1980's and it really was directed at 2 Catholic priests who had been playing slowly all session. Then they bid to a thin 7N and their play =really= slowed down. ACBL National Director the late Maury Bronstein went to their table and made the quip that has since become famous: "Our Fathers, who art in 7, Hurried be thy game."

I think you bring up some good points, but the most important one is the one we've all, including you and me, only been talking about implicitly rather than explicitly up until now: What's your partnership's agreements and style about who competes when vs preempts? Most I know require that Direct Action be on better or bigger hands than balancing action... ...and define their balancing style based on their definitions of "better" and "bigger" for the Direct seat. So in most of my partnerships, the OP posted hand is a bit weak in terms of Quick Tricks for Direct action. The corollary of this is that hands like your first example: Kxxx xxxx AKx Ax =must= balance in order to protect against direct seat hands like the OP ♠ Ax ♥ ♦ Qxx ♣ QTxxxxxx That were too weak under this style to take immediate action. 6 control hands with 4 cards in the unbid majors are not common enough to pass IMHO. OTOH, KQxx Qxx Kxx Kxx is likely a problem hand no matter what your balancing style is. C'est La Vie. Preempts work. That's why people continue to preempt. The problem is if we take direct action to protect against pd having this hand, what hands are we risking pd having that would be disasters if we take direct action with the OP hand? As wonderful as your examples are, they don't answer the fundamental questions: what does the percentage Direct overcall or T/O X look like? what does the percentage Balancing overcall or T/O X look like? No specific example(s) chosen to support a specific POV are going to answer these questions. Using specific examples to argue general bidding strategy is a form of Resulting.