Are transfers actually a good idea?

[EricK]

Let us suppose that like the majority of bridge players you use a 1NT opening to show a balanced hand with a restricted range.

 

After a 1NT opening, if that hand ends up as declarer, the defense will know from trick one pretty much all there is to know about the declaring side's assets. Yet if the 1NT hand is dummy, the defense are left much more in the dark. They won't know if they need to be active or passive. They will find it much harder to estimate their partner's lengths in various suits etc.

 

Are the advantages of transfers enough to counterbalance this massive downside?

[helene_t]

We had a discussion about this when I followed bridge teacher training a couple of years ago. Our instructor maintained that against good opps, transfers indeed tend to wrong-side the contract as you explain. Against lesser opponents who do not use the inference that can be made from declarerer's point count, this may not be true.

 

I've played natural responses to a strong 1NT in one partnership for a couple of years, and my experiences are not particularely good. Slam bidding becomes awkard since responder can't show a strong two-suiter economically. My feeling is that this is the best reason not to play natural responses to 1NT. There are a lot of other well-known pros and cons as well, but they seem largely to balance each other out.

[hotShot]

You have to balance the given information and the information that is worth knowing.

The very weak hand usually does not have information worth hiding.

A very strong responder might want to avoid the transfer.

Allthough the NT opening is very descriptive, there is still a little FUD (fear, uncertainty and doubt) left about openers hand.

[EricK]

We had a discussion about this when I followed bridge teacher training a couple of years ago. Our instructor maintained that against good opps, transfers indeed tend to wrong-side the contract as you explain. Against lesser opponents who do not use the inference that can be made from declarerer's point count, this may not be true.

 

I've played natural responses to a strong 1NT in one partnership for a couple of years, and my experiences are not particularely good. Slam bidding becomes awkard since responder can't show a strong two-suiter economically. My feeling is that this is the best reason not to play natural responses to 1NT. There are a lot of other well-known pros and cons as well, but they seem largely to balance each other out.

I don't necessarily think natural repsonses are better.

 

How about a system which tries to determine as much as possible about opener's hand while making sure that it becomes dummy as often as possible.

[EricK]

You have to balance the given information and the information that is worth knowing.

The very weak hand usually does not have information worth hiding.

A very strong responder might want to avoid the transfer.

Allthough the NT opening is very descriptive, there is still a little FUD (fear, uncertainty and doubt) left about openers hand.

Compare 1NT 4♥ natural with 1NT 4♦ (transfer to ♥).

 

Here the responding hand may be very weak or quite strong. May be very distibutional (singletons, voids, outside 5 card suit etc) or only slightly so. This is information which must be worth hiding.

[pclayton]

Transfers are valuable for concealing the strong hand. Fundamentally, it is better with the lead coming up to the strong hand.

 

But, yes, as soon as dummy comes down, the defense knows within 3 points what their combined assets are.

 

Transfers serve a more important purpose in constructive bidding, as the responder can pass the transfer, invite or force to game.

[EricK]

Transfers are valuable for concealing the strong hand. Fundamentally, it is better with the lead coming up to the strong hand.

 

But, yes, as soon as dummy comes down, the defense knows within 3 points what their combined assets are.

 

Transfers serve a more important purpose in constructive bidding, as the responder can pass the transfer, invite or force to game.

The lead only comes up to the strong hand at the very first trick,. Subsequent leads may come from either hand. Why is the opening lead (which after all is made with the least information available) considered so important?

 

I agree that transfers give more options than natural bids. But are they the only two options?

[whereagles]

Transfers allow you to show shape first, followed by strength. They also save bidding space by putting a lot of hands into the same bid. All this goes in line with the basic priorities of bidding theory, and therefore transfers are a step in the RIGHT direction.

[david_c]

I don't necessarily think natural repsonses are better.

 

How about a system which tries to determine as much as possible about opener's hand while making sure that it becomes dummy as often as possible.

I suppose Relay Stayman works a bit like that; it shouldn't be too difficult to play around with the responses so that opener is usually dummy in suit contracts.

 

But you can't get opener to be declarer in 3NT whatever you do. Revealing lots of information about opener's hand does not seem to be a very good idea if there is any possibility that you might end up in NT.

[Free]

There are many factors that may influence the usefulness: NT range, strength of responder, possibilities to get to the right game/partscore,...

 

1. Opposite a strong NT (15-17), you usually have an invite or better hand.

- When using transfers for a signoff, you usually rightside the contract because you get a trick tnx to the lead, so transfers may well be a good idea.

- When using transfers for invite hands, the opener will always give lots of information when not playing in the Major. The factor of 'leading to the strong hand' is less efficient.

- When having a GF hand, the NT bidder is still stronger.

Conclusion: transfers are a pretty good idea for rightsiding.

 

2. Opposite a weak NT (12-14), you usually have some signoff or invite hand.

- Using transfers with a weak hand, the lead will not give as many tricks away as with a strong NT. Also, the range of a hand not using transfers is bigger (0-10).

- With invite hands, it doesn't matter much.

- With GF hands it usually wrongsides the contract since responder has at least as many HCP as opener most of the time.

Conclusion: transfers may be a good idea for rightsiding, but they clearly are not supperior.

 

3. Opposite a mini NT (10-12), you usually have a signoff.

- With a signoff, you better hide your own strength, since you have a range of 0-12. Defense is hard on these.

- With invites, responder is stronger, so he might as well try to play.

- With GF you better let the stronger hand play, so transfers are not a good idea as well.

Conclusion: transfers are VERY poor for rightsiding.

 

So transfers are most useful with strong NT hands. The weaker the range, the less effective they become.

 

So why are so many people still playing them? I guess it's not as easy to show as many handtypes for invites when not using transfers. I mean, wrongsiding the contract all the time (maybe losing a trick) doesn't outweigh missing games regularly.

One of the most fascinating structures imo is HEEMAN: it lets responder show his handtype (never asks), but it needs transfers all over the place (showing 4M, 5+M,...). There are lots of invitational auctions possible (like 4M-5m), as well as slam try's. It probably wrongsides lots of contracts, but the main advantage is that it keeps opener pretty unknown and you seldom miss games!

[Gerben42]

I agree with what has been said so far. My view on this:

After a weak NT you should NOT play transfers, instead I prefer something else for example this:

 

http://www.geocities.com/gerben47/bridge/weaknt.html

[helene_t]

The lead only comes up to the strong hand at the very first trick,. Subsequent leads may come from either hand. Why is the opening lead (which after all is made with the least information available) considered so important?

Subsequent leads are subject to some control (avoidance play). Also, declarer might get rid of his loosers before opps regain the lead.

[cherdano]

Let us suppose that like the majority of bridge players you use a 1NT opening to show a balanced hand with a restricted range.

 

After a 1NT opening, if that hand ends up as declarer, the defense will know from trick one pretty much all there is to know about the declaring side's assets. Yet if the 1NT hand is dummy, the defense are left much more in the dark. They won't know if they need to be active or passive. They will find it much harder to estimate their partner's lengths in various suits etc.

 

Are the advantages of transfers enough to counterbalance this massive downside?

I think the biggest advantage of transfers over "natural" is that you can show many different hand types more easily.Right-siding is a secondary concern.

 

I agree that, say, 4M=natural, to play, can be very useful. Especially if responder is highly distributional, defense will be a lot tougher after trick one.

 

Arend

[luke warm]

i play something like gerben's (in fairness, the most similar aspects are that 2c and 2d are artificial while 2h/2s are natural), and i'm deliriously happy with it.. it allows me to find 5 card majors, show invitational hands, show gf hands.. and i can tweak the 2d gf to please fredrick (who seems mildly obsessive about wrong siding contracts B))

[Gerben42]

Usually opener's partner is the lesser defined hand so keeping that one hidden can have specific advantages. Also you might double 1NT 4x (transfer) for the lead.

 

With invite hands, it doesn't matter much.

 

With invite hands you would prefer NOT to play transfers. Opposite a 12 - 14 you have:

 

♠Kxxxx ♥x ♦Axx ♣QJxx

 

With transfers you have to guess if partner has a fit or not. With my system, 2-way Stayman, Keri and probably also Heeman you can find out.

 

Opposite a weak NT you also would prefer not to play transfers on weak hands since they give opps many ways into the auction.

 

Finally if you have a strong hand you might want to play transfers because of flexibility but many other systems have almost the same flexibility.

[Flame]

The fact that the 1NT hand remain close is an advance.

[sfbp]

One place we did away with them is where responder is known to be weak.

 

Specifically

1♣(unlimited) P 1D(0-7) P

2NT(19-21) P ?

 

Here there are more hands where you want to play in 3♦ than where you want to invite 4♥. The side effect of the big hand being dummy is just that..... it's true that having the big hand on the table still makes you guess about the small hand, so I have rarely seen losses because of which hand was exposed.

 

With a very bad hand opposite a 2NT opener in standard - haven't you often wished that partner was not allowed to superaccept? And we can actually play 3♦. Clubs is still lost but that's life, you can't win em all, Stayman is still necessary.

[Gerben42]

The fact that the 1NT hand remain close is an advance.

 

If both hands are about the same strength this is a disadvantage. When you open 1NT you are very limited in strength and distribution. This is why so many books on defense have examples where someone opens 1NT: Such hands are easier to defend because you know a lot.

[Flame]

The fact that the 1NT hand remain close is an advance.

 

If both hands are about the same strength this is a disadvantage. When you open 1NT you are very limited in strength and distribution. This is why so many books on defense have examples where someone opens 1NT: Such hands are easier to defend because you know a lot.

Yes im talking about the normal 15-17 hcp range.

[badderzboy]

Its funny I play acol with a weak 12-14 NT and transfers are my favourite bit of my system although I use 4 way with extended stayman to find a 5-3 if I need to.

 

Also as I play in the UK the bidding is with the field too so no real advantage playing a better more memory intensive system.

 

Beauty of transfers is it's dead easy to remember and can ferret out the best contract in most hands!

 

Steve

[Gerben42]

Transfers are turning up in many other places also, because they allow for many more sequences. For 15 - 17 NT transfers are great, also for for example 1M (Dbl). For mini NTs they are not so great. Where does the usefulness no longer compensate the clear advantages? I have no idea. But somewhere :)

[whereagles]

Hum.. I see many are thinking of transfers in the trend of hiding/disclosure of opener's hand. I don't think this is the most important thing. It's tertiary in comparision with shape/strength issues, but ok.. :)

[kenberg]

I have played without using transfers. Sometimes the results are good, sometimes bad. Probably on balance transfers earn their keep but I wouldn't rate them highly.

 

One thing I have often thought of as useful: Use 1N-3M as gf, with perhaps no more than five cards in the major. It offers the responder the option (when he wants to force to game) of choosing which hand is to be concealed. If the partnership does not consist of two hand hogs, this can be a useful option. It can also lead to slam development: If opener has two card in M, he bids 3NT. If opener has a fit he either bids 4M or cues, depending on strength and general suitability for slam. I have (but don't currently) played this and I think it has merit. You can still play transfer and drop, transfer and invite, or transfer and then 3NT with suitable hands. Of course it gives up other possibilites, such as 3M=5-5.

[mikeh]

In my view, transfers represent one of the most powerful advances in the theory of bridge.

 

When I was learning the basics, I was told (and read) that the main advantage of playing transfers in response to an opening 1N (strong) was to right-side the contract, and I suppose that this is still a valid argument...altho as others have noted, this breaks down somewhat as the strength of the opening bid declines.

 

However, in my opinion, the main advantages of transfers lie in the conservation of bidding space.

 

We can argue that sequences such as 1N 4Major might have tactical advantages over 1N transfer to 4Major, but this is both debatable and, in any event, a special case.

 

For the more common, low-level, transfer, the preservation of bidding space is key... playing transfers allows responder to show an important element of his hand (length in the indicated suit) while assuring him of another opportunity to bid, should he need it. Thus 1N 2♦ can be bid (as a transfer) on a wide range of hand types, from weak (intending to pass) to various invitational hands, to game-force one or two suiters or balanced'unbalanced to slam-invitational and so on.

 

Compare that to 'natural'. Is 2♥ weak? If it is, how does one invite? If not, then how does one get out in ♥? And so on. There are 'answers', but one need only read old bridge books and magazines to realize what a quagmire these simple hands became.

 

Furthermore, the use of transfer responses allows for the bundling of various hand types into one initial 'transfer' response. Walsh relays are an obvious example, well-know to many North American players: 2♦ is ostensibly a transfer to ♥ but may in fact be a single-suit minor hand with slam ambitions.

 

This technique of combining quite disparate hand types into one initial forcing bid (forcing in the sense that opener cannot pass the transfer) allows for sophisticated response structures that mesh well opposite a well-defined opening bid.

 

Even the 4 level transfer allows for the preservation of bidding space by allowing distinctions to be drawn between hands shown via a 2-level transfer and a 4 level transfer: based once again on the advantage accruing to responder being assured of another chance to bid.

 

Thus 1N 4♦ 4♥ 4N can be keycard while 1N 2♦ 2♥ 4N is quantitative.

 

Also, of course, one can now add toys to the texas transfer: 1N 4♦ 4♥ 4♠ exclusion keycard.

 

Compare 1N 4♥ to play: we now use the jump to the 4-level for only oine hand type: a hand that wants to play 4♥. Transfers allow us to use the 4-level not only for that hand-type but for other, stronger hands.

 

The power of the transfer concept is reflected in the many, many top pairs who use transfer principles throughout their methods. Several top pairs use transfer responses to a 1♣ opening. Many pairs use transfer advances of overcalls, and transfers after their opening bid gets doubled for takeout.

 

Thus 1♠ (x) 2♠ can be a garbage hand, with (say) 2♥ used for a 'real' raise to 2♠. This allows for maximal preemption by a weak responding hand with 3 trump, while preserving the chances of finding a game should opener be strong and responder have a real raise.

 

So are transfers actually a good idea?

 

My answer is a resounding YES.

[1eyedjack]

I think that transfers as a means to placing the declaration in one hand or another is pretty neutral, and was never the primary reason for their adoption. Transfers were designed to increase the range of expression, and when they were invented they were, in that regard, a huge improvement on the methods that they displaced. I just happen to think that there have since evolved methods that are superior again to transfers, although the margin of superiority declines with each iteration in the evolution, as the optimal method is approached.

 

Having said that, I am only talking in context of a 1NT opener. In other situations, such as in response to overcalls or jump responses to take-out doubles of 1-suit, they still have their net merits. At the moment anyway, until someone cooks up something yet again better.