Whats the funniest system you have played?

[mycroft]

I invented a system which was the GCC equivalent of Clockwork Orange.

 

We didn't play all of it (especially the relay system after 1A-1B). But we did play some of it, and got a good board after 2C Minor Suit Flannery.

 

5-Rule Club is fun, especially if you play it with someone who's never played a strong club system before.

1. 1C is 16+ any
   
2. 1D after 1C is 0-7, only NGF bid
   
3. 1NT is 13-15 bal
   
4. 1D is 13-15 unbal
   
5. 1M, 2m are 8-12, 4+
   

We added a couple of things, and when we were told "in this club, weak 2s have to show 5 and 5", and it was stupid to play 5-7 weak 2s, we changed 2M to be 13-16, 6+M, which really helped the system (but that's, of course, not the point).

 

I have played Kontrast (From the Internet Archive, I really need to get my website back up) in serious competition, and it was a lot of fun.

[mycroft]

Heh, from Midnight Special, much as I a) like it, and b) admire Noble, there are a couple of things he has wrong.

 

1) after "no conventions 1NT", he can't play 1NT-X-pass as "conventional" (I assume that "disdain for 1NTx" means "don't want to play here"), it must be "I think 1NTx is the right place to play".

2) after "no conventions 1NT", he can't play negative doubles (allowed usually by "any meaning for double is allowed").

 

And for Cyberyeti, for Clockwork Orange, did you have separate systems for Levels 2, 3, and 4?

[olien]

I like the "your card" system, although I think its technically called chameleon

[Elianna]

I like the "your card" system, although I think its technically called chameleon

 

I remember you playing inverted psycho suction. That was amusing.

[mtvesuvius]

We had some discussion about this a long time ago, possibly before you joined the forum:

http://www.bridgebase.com/forums/topic/20638-a-3-card-major-system/

Unfortunately the thread got hijacked by the usual ACBL legality nonsense but there were some good ideas from AWM and Gerben on how to work out the responses to the multi 1♦ opening.

Thanks for the link Helene, I vaguely remembered reading something like that on here... Even though I joined in late '08, I probably was linked there a couple times... It's an interesting read, and something that I am definitely going to try out sometime -- Seems like a lot of fun.

 

 

Have played "guess the system" where you and your partner pick a system separately and act as though your partner is aware of what you have chosen and take their bids accordingly. You have to guess what system partner has picked in the fewest hands possible. I have only played that online.

 

In a real tournament in Ireland, I played with some of the university players and the most exotic thing we played was psychosuction openings and psychosuction responses.

 

Something new for a midnight game... Combined with a version of Bridge Bingo, this would be a lot of fun to do.

 

"Your Card'

 

In pairs events you arrive at the opponents table and ask "what are you playing" and play that.

 

Then at the end you ask them

"Did we bid this correctly".

 

D./

 

I've done this in a few regional pair events, and my favorite is when they ask what a bid means and you can answer: "Well, what you YOU think it is?"

If the opponents didn't have a convention card filled out, we played relay precision to punish them. And best of all, you can look at what methods you're playing... In the middle of the auction!

[olien]

I remember you playing inverted psycho suction. That was amusing.

 

3NTXX - down 9

 

thank god we weren't playing money bridge

[rbforster]

Semi forcing pass was somewhat entertaining for a month or so. Iirc,

 

P 0-7 or 13-15 all non preempts

1C strong 16+

1suit, 2C 8-12 natural; 5+ suits except diamonds 4+

1NT 10-12 including 4414

2DHS weak twos, 5-10ish (so 1M...2M showed a max)

2N weak minors

 

and after pass, similar with a nebulous 1D that included 8-9 and 13-15 balanced. Suited openers were now 8-15 in 3rd/4th, and a 1NT response by a PH was semi forcing but showed 13-15 balanced.

 

"You wont miss game passing 15's if your partner opens all his 8's"

[Elianna]

3NTXX - down 9

 

thank god we weren't playing money bridge

 

It was probably the most amusing hand I played that week. And the look on your face was amusing too. I would have given you back your money for that expression! :)

[kaltstart]

A few years after I started playing bridge, I stumbled upon an article in the German bridge magazine about the strong pass systems being played in the 70ies. I don´t remember the names, but there was an example bidding sequence of 2 Dutch players using a strong pass system with a 1♠ fert. Being fascinated and lacking additional informations (no good internet access like today), I just invented one system around this fert, which might be nonsense, but it was great fun. I vaguely remember the minor openers which showed the majors, 4+, 7-11 hcp but not the rest.

 

My partner and I were allowed to play it once in the club and even became first. If, by the way, someone can give me a hint about those Dutch players, I´d be grateful.

[Cyberyeti]

And for Cyberyeti, for Clockwork Orange, did you have separate systems for Levels 2, 3, and 4?

Was in the old general/restricted days and the card was designed to be general licence legal at the time (although probably immoral and fattening).

 

Favourite moment - I used to play at a club with no system restraints and some pairs played forcing or medium passes on occasions. The county captain came down for some practice as it was where most of the strong players in Norwich played. Sits down against us, we play some boards and he said "I came down for some serious practice, and find you're playing some experimental licence crap". When we told him it was general licence legal he pretty much literally fell off his chair.

[tolvyrj]

We played years ago a no-name variant:

Pass: any hand 13+ hcp.

1♦ any hand 0-7 hcp. no A+K

1M 8-12 hcp. 0-2 or 5+ cards in the suit

and so on. No round passes in our table.

Single funniest convention i have used was Blakseth 2♠ opening; pre-empt, any one or two suited hand.

[Bende]

A friend of mine had constructed a system with his partner based around a strong (17+) pass and a 1♦ fert (0-7). When they arrived at the tournament they were supposed to play in, the organizers changed the system restrictions so that forcing passes where not allowed. To remedy this, they just moved the 17+ hands into the 1♦ opening which now became weak/strong. They just didn't use the pass for any hands at all. Not the best but quite fun and very aggressive :).

[olien]

In a midnight I played the following:

 

Regardless of vul, we used the following openings:

Pass=any 13+

1♣=catchall 8-12

2m=6+m 8-12

2M=destructive weak 2's

 

At Green

1♦=4+♥ 8-12

1♥=4+♠ 8-12

1♠=any 0-7

1NT=8-10

 

 

At Red vs Red:

1♦=4+♥ 8-12

1♥=any 0-7

1♠=4+♠ 8-12

1NT=10-12

 

 

At Red vs Green:

1♦=any 0-7

1M=4+M 8-12

1NT=11-12

 

 

Was a bit crazy, but very fun. We never discussed responses, but that opposite partner's opening pass: 1♣ was the negative, and anything else showed 8+ HCP.

 

The best part was one pair of opponents summoned the director to ask about the legality of our system, and the director laughed and replied "this is the midnights" and walked away.

[wickedbid1]

A friend of mine had constructed a system with his partner based around a strong (17+) pass and a 1♦ fert (0-7). When they arrived at the tournament they were supposed to play in, the organizers changed the system restrictions so that forcing passes where not allowed. To remedy this, they just moved the 17+ hands into the 1♦ opening which now became weak/strong. They just didn't use the pass for any hands at all. Not the best but quite fun and very aggressive :).

 

Vulcan Variable Diamond -- i like that. Pass could be any mixed raise (8-9).

[aguahombre]

"IRV" (Original concept attributed to Irv Kostal).

 

Not really "funniest", because --if it were legal-- it would be quite workable.

 

1st and 2nd seat 1-bids and 2C are as if opener's RHO had opened 1♣ (hypothetically out of turn and accepted if in 1st seat).

 

Pass=could be as much as 12-14 balanced, and not forcing.

1C=any hand which would have made a takeout double of 1♣.

1D thru 1N=overcall of 1C---system on/1NT.

2C=Michaels (split range).

 

Responder becomes "advancer", with traditional advances to partner's 1C as if it were a takeout double of 1C.

 

3rd and 4th seat openers are "balancing" bids. 1NT=12-15 and 1C=balancing double of 1C.

 

Higher openings are whatever they would have been in a normal style; except 2D=4-4-4-1 with clubs as the known suit (11-14 or 23-25).

[helene_t]

Goulash tourney become more fun if you play a system adapted to them:

- all openings are wide ranging. no weak 3-bids or 2-bids

- no balanced openings. In the unlikely event you are dealt a strong balanced hand, just pass.

- 1NT through 2NT show specific twosuiters: 1NT=minors, 2m=that minor and the major of same colour, 2M=that major and the minor of opposite colour, 2NT=majors

- 1-level openings tend to be 6-4 or such as 1-suited hands would open at the 3- or 4-level.

- not sure what a 3NT opening should mean, I am open to suggestions. Maybe a more extreme major twosuiter.

[dburn]

The standard defence to a strong club in my college days was:

 

Double, 1♦ and 1NT were CRASH (but denied a good hand);

1M was a natural overcall (but denied a good hand);

Two-level bids showed either that suit or the next two higher suits (but denied a good hand);

2NT showed any strong two-suiter;

Higher bids were natural and weak (3NT and 4NT were majors resp. minors with a lot of shape).

 

With a good hand, one passed and bid on the next round if appropriate. With a bad hand unsuitable for any of the above, one also passed of course.

 

We occasionally played this method as opener or in second seat, pretending that RHO had opened a strong club (we replaced double with 1♣). A notable triumph occurred when I (perforce) passed a balanced 21 count as dealer, finding partner with a jack and the field in 2NT down at least one.

[Vampyr]

"IRV" (Original concept attributed to Irv Kostal).

 

Not really "funniest", because --if it were legal-- it would be quite workable.

 

Not sure if it's "workable" -- not too easy to get to a club contract!

 

Anyway, you could make this system legal quite easily -- use a 1♦ opening as a sort of catch-all -- hands in which the longest suit is clubs, hands woth 9+ HCP otherwise unsuitable for a takeout double of clubs, etc. Basically, any bids that would make it true that a pass is weaker in all cases than an opening one-bid.

[noodle]

funniest system i played on BBO was acromymed PHICS ( Pass Hearts 1club Spades )

 

pass was 8+ 4H + 1C was 8+ 4S + 1D was a long minor or fert (0-7 bal) 1H 1S were 5-5 0-7 1NT was 0-7 w/C or bal 8-11

2C was multi (weak D or STR) and 2D to 2N were ehaa 0-7 transfers

 

greatsest sequence was Pass (hearts) P 3H preemptive usually 1 or both opponents quit the table at that time.

 

Noodle

[hrothgar]

My memories of really silly bidding invariable involve

 

1. A midnight swiss

2. A bottle or two of tequila

3. EHAA

[mr1303]

I remember trying out the Fa'had relay system, after David Bird had written something about it in some of his Abbot books. This involved every opening and every response being a transfer, amongst other things.

[JLOGIC]

Indian notrump:

 

3NT = I'll play 3NT.

3S = You'll play 3NT.

Double = penalty.

 

Other bids are not allowed, except when they double our 3S or 3NT. If you play against this system you are sure to get some very tough defensive guesses.

 

Han calls it Indian notrump, but when I created it it was called the caddy system. Basically sometimes some caddies would want to play bridge during the midnights but they had never played bridge (ok, sometimes it was just my way of trying to get on the good side of the only girls my age at bridge tournaments! but it was fun also), so I told them how to count points and to open 3S with 13+ and I'd bid 3N, and I would open 3N with the same hands. If we were a passed hand it was 15+ lol.

 

I have several funny stories about this. One time, my partner and I were fortunate enough to reach the finals. We sat down...against Joe Grue and Fulvio Fantoni! Brutal. We lost of course...one hand I led something, and Joe played the T from dummy with KT9x and my partner played the ace from AQJx! Why? Because the only carding she knew was 2nd hand low, third hand high :(

 

Another time, the caddy system had evolved, and now we also played 4C/4D showed any hand with 7+ hearts spades, and if I had 7+ hearts/spades I'd open 4H/4S. So, my partner goes into a massive tank....and opens 4S! I decided she had not forgotten the system, and simply decided her hand was too strong to open 3S. So I bid 6N and she had a 22 count. LOL.

 

Perhaps the funniest was reading RGB at some point, some thread about asymmetric systems. Much to my surprise, this system was brought up:

 

http://groups.google.com/group/rec.games.bridge/browse_thread/thread/85c578b79751dbcd/a167ecefef076e67?lnk=gst&q=asymmetric+system+lall#a167ecefef076e67

 

Haha. Thanks for being a good sport about it barmar! Can't believe that thread was 2004...needless to say I am too old to be chasing caddies now.

 

Anyways, it was definitely fun playing it back in the day on BBO vs randoms with Scott Waldron and then others like Han.

[WellSpyder]

Thanks for posting, Justin - I enjoyed the reminiscences. Systems always make more sense when you understand the rationale behind their construction! (Interesting to see from the discussion you linked to that pran and bluejak still seemed to disagree about everything even then :) )

[dake50]

Std American.

It is so funny to see such heated disagreement about a "standard".

[vianu2]

When i was 20 i was one of the caddies involved in the previous post:D. At that time I had read some great books and i was convinced i'm good enough.So i started to play bridge for moneys against experienced players .Everyone can relax playing bridge and socializing, but when moneys is at stake and especially when the amount is very significant, entertaining bridge turns into something else already.

Once i played against someone who used to live with moneys earned in the game.

He spent all the night ( a very precious time) convinced that he caught a fish .

The system he used was a very simple approach. 3NT all the time was to play , 4H/4Sp also to play and promising at least 4cards. 1Cl/1D to protect the lead in that minor.

Those things didn't cost me that much and i survived.

But sometimes the auction began with 1h/1sp and there i had lot of trouble with that specific opening.

I tried to improve with my partner during the game, but no consensus arrived. In my mind, if someone failed to open 4M having 4+ cards, then he was ready to play 6 or 7.

So i took control and overcaled every 1M opening at high levels.Sometimes it worked, as he believed i'm not as crazy as goof.

God gave me lot of good hands and a partner very skilled as declarer.

The gambler said at the end that there was stupid luck and what a waste of time .

 

After some years i grew up and also my self confidence. Now i was looking for expert players to play with real tourneys. After some unsuccessful attempts, finally i accepted to play in a national event with someone who was refused by all others. Despite all his bridge experience, (20+ years), he wasn't able to overcome the basis .

We agreed to "t/o" X any 13+ hand any shape, to play any X in competition as punitive (except at the level 1 lol), and to use "blackwood" every time we have as responder more than 15.

God gave me again only good hands and i was declarer 80% of cases. Of course i opened 1NT with any 14+ semibalanced.

Is there a board i will never forget.

My partner didn't play all 4 transfers so when i opened my 14 points hand he passed with 5 points six diamonds. Bidding goes 1nt-pass-pass to my RHO who had 21 balanced.

The RHO , known as a good player, and being aware he's playing against two novices, doubled my 1NT.

X-pass-pass ( LHO having 0 ) and now my partner saved in 2D.

RHO doubled again (a little faster now) and then, with 9x in diamond, and a nice 4-3-2-4 with all 9's and two 10's , i decided to have at least an advantage, being declarer.Then i bid 2NT with insanity, expecting my partner to pass.

But partner didn't give up and bid 3D over my 2NT, got doubled, so i needed to go to 3NT now, which he finally passed, got doubled in tempo , partner (very nervous) thrown on the table j heart, k j diamond and two tens, and no matter there was some defense for -1, I made the contract.

And that's when the fight started ...LHO why double? RHO why not signal?

We won the second place...unfortunately my partner was declarer in 2 boards and he was the only one who managed to go down there.