Illegal Psyches

[inquiry]

The various bridge authorities do not allow the psyche of a strong forcing opening bid. So it clear, for instance, you can not psyche 2C in sayc or 2/1, nor can you psyche a 1C opening bid in precision.

 

This raises the question, are you allowed to psyche a 1C opening bid in polish club, since 1C while forcing is often not strong at all. Further, should you adopt Nunes-Fantoni bidding system where the opening bid of 1C, 1D, 1H and 1S all show 14+ (unlimited) and are forcing, are you allowed to psyche a one of a suit bid? Inquiring minds want to know.

[david_c]

Not sure what "the various bridge authorities" means ...

 

The WBF's regulations don't seem to include anything of this sort, though I may have missed it.

 

The EBU currently bans psyches of game-forcing or nearly-game-forcing opening bids. So psyching a strong club is actually allowed. The same goes for Polish Club or Fantunes. And in two weeks' time the regulation is being dropped completely.

 

I don't know much about the regulations elsewhere, but from a quick look at the ACBL charts I see they disallow psyches of any conventional opening bids, whether they are strong/forcing or not. So that answers the question about Polish Club at least. I don't claim to know what their stance would be about Fantunes. I doubt the ACBL knows either ;)

[helene_t]

In Fantunes, 1♦/♥/♠ are natural so u can psyche them. As for 1♣, there was a somewhat confusing rant in a recent editorial of The Bridge World but I suppose that a 1♣ opening that does not promise three clubs is non-natural andd that non-natural is the same as artificial.

[Free]

Isn't it "strong ARTIFICIAL openings" which aren't allowed?

 

Problem with that definition is that it doesn't define 'strong', is a strong 1♣ system with 1♣ showing 12+HCP a strong opening? In sayc a 2♣ opening is clearly strong, in precision, 1♣ is the 'strongest bid', so I guess you can say it's strong. But what about fantunes openings? They are normal solid openings 90% of the time, and they are natural... And PC, it's also unlimited, and includes the strongest hands, but it's not necessary a strong bid...

 

In short: people can discuss about it, and frankly, I have no idea who would be right!

[Miron]

The ban of any bid is questionable. The laws allows player to make ANY bid...

When a tourney denies the right to psych it is against the law. So the tourney proposition should be automaticly canceled... (so it works with "normal" laws, doesn't it? If something in a document is against law, the document can/should be canceled... (it least i think it works this way))

[barmar]

The Laws also allow SOs to regulate conventions, and artificial bids are inherently conventional. I believe the WBF Laws Commission has agreed that the law on regulating conventions allows SOs to prohibit psyching conventional bids, i.e. that law supercedes the law that allows psyching.

[blackshoe]

The Laws of bridge apply everywhere. Law 40A says

A player may make any call or play (including an intentionally misleading call - such as a psychic bid - or a call or play that departs from commonly accepted, or previously announced, use of a convention), without prior announcement, provided that such call or play is not based on a partnership understanding.

Law 40D says

The sponsoring organization may regulate the use of bidding or play conventions. Zonal organizations may, in addition, regulate partnership understandings (even if not conventional) that permit the partnership's initial actions at the one level to be made with a hand of a king or more below average strength. Zonal organizations may delegate this responsibility.

The WBFLC has stated (in one of their minutes, iirc) that Law 40D gives SOs an untrammeled right to regulate conventions - which means they may ban psyching of conventional bids in spite of what 40A says. The bottom line here is that whether a conventional club opening (at any level) may be psyched is a matter for SO regulation.

 

In the ACBL, under the General Convention Chart (GCC), item 2 under "Disallowed" is

Psyching of artificial or conventional opening bids and/or conventional responses thereto. Psyching conventional suit responses, which are less than 2NT, to natural openings.

So in the ACBL it is illegal to psyche a Precision 1 ♣, a Polish 1 ♣, or any other artificial 1 ♣ opening. It is also illegal to psyche an artificial 2 ♣ opening. However... the permitted meanings of that opening under the GCC include "strong" (the other permitted meaning is artificial, 3 suited) but "strong" is nowhere defined. A traditional strong two bid required significant high card strength, but as the TD at a recent sectional here in Unit 112 said "players are opening 2 ♣ on weaker and weaker hands these days". It has apparently become ACBL policy (confirmed in a telephone conversation with Rick Beye, ACBL CTD) to allow such openings "if the player believes his hand qualifies as strong". The hand in question at that tournament was [hv=d=e&v=n&s=sakqj8642hj54dcj5]133|100|Scoring: IMP

5 losers, 2 quick tricks, 8 playing tricks[/hv]

 

The bidding at one table was 2♣ - (P) - 2♦ - (P) - 4♠ - all pass. The hand was misdefended, allowing 4♠ to make, because both defenders assumed the high card strength they couldn't see was in declarer's hand. The TD ruled there was no psyche (he did say it was "close") and did not address whether there was adequate disclosure (neither member of the bidding pair had a convention card). There were, of course, no alerts, and no explanation was offered (none was requested, either, since there were no alerts).

 

Lesson learned: always ask in such auctions what opener's minimum holding might be. Lesson learned from questions asked previously in ACBL events: don't expect a complete, or even adequate, answer - the two most frequent answers I've seen are "huh?" and "it's standard". <_<

 

Other SOs may have different regulations, btw. I believe the EBU Orange Book defines "strong" in the context of a 2♣ opening as "rule of 25 or better". I believe it was Paul Soloway who said that a strong 2♣ opening should have more quick tricks than losers (which means the example hand above is short four quick tricks). Mr. Soloway was not speaking as an SO, though. :unsure:

[awm]

The ACBL restriction is against psyching artificial or conventional openings. This is not a restriction on psyching strong openings. Thus:

 

Psyching a polish 1♣ is not allowed, it's artificial.

Psyching a Fantoni-Nunes 1♣ is not allowed, it's also artificial (natural is 3+ in a minor).

Psyching a Fantoni-Nunes 1♦, 1♥, 1♠ is fine. These are totally natural bids.

Psyching a strong two bid is fine. These are natural calls.

Psyching a strong 2NT is fine. This is a natural call.

Psyching flannery is not allowed; it's artificial (although not strong).

 

Whether this sort of rule should be allowed by the laws of duplicate bridge is unclear. Certainly there are indications that SO's are not allowed to ban psyching or otherwise restrict what bids a player can make (they can only restrict the agreements partnerships can have regarding the meaning of those bids). From a practical standpoint though, psyching artificial calls can be difficult to adjudicate, in that the weirder your methods are the harder it becomes to distinguish between a psych and an illegal understanding. For example, if you play that a strong 2♣ virtually forces a 2♦ waiting response, it's quite safe to open 2♣ on a weak hand with diamonds. If you actually play this convention, it would be disallowed at some levels and certainly requires an alert and explanation at others, but you could get around all that by just claiming "oh 2♣ was a psych."

[barmar]

For example, if you play that a strong 2♣ virtually forces a 2♦ waiting response, it's quite safe to open 2♣ on a weak hand with diamonds. If you actually play this convention, it would be disallowed at some levels and certainly requires an alert and explanation at others, but you could get around all that by just claiming "oh 2♣ was a psych."

Which is why the ACBL GCC prohibits the agreement that 2♣ shows either a strong hand or weak 2 in ♦ (which agreement would presumably be used by many partnerships that use 2♦ artificially, such as Multi, Mexican, or Flannery). So you can't use it as a convention, nor can you get away with it as a psyche.