Positive Strong Club responses: controls or shape

[Chamaco]

Hi all,

having browsed through quite a few strong club system notes, I have noticed that many tend to respond to strong club with control step-responses, whilst others tend to give a positive response by showing their longer suit (or with other flat-shape responses).

 

FOR THE TIME BEING LET'S NOT DISCUSS HERE SEMIPOSITIVE NON-FORCING SUIT RESPONSES AND JUST CONSIDER THE SYSTEMS WHERE 1D IS NEGATIVE (0-6/7/8) AND OTHER RESPONSES ARE POSITIVE, EITHER SHOWING CONTROLS OR SHAPE

 

Which one do you prefer ?

I suppose step responss may be more vulnerable to preemptive actions, but if that was really bad, it would be unexplainable why many good players (Blue Team among others) chose to stick to a vulnerable stepshowing system.

 

Since I expect people who have played only shape-showing positive responses to favour that approach :) , as well as people who have played only control-showing to favour the latter <_< , it would be especially valuable to hear from someone who has played both ! <_<

[inquiry]

Well, let me start then, becasue I have played both.

 

There is no doubt that positive control showing responses (in steps), and then careful scientific bidding is superior to shape showing bids... if you do this on a piece of paper or in a bidding contest with your partner and no opponent bidding. Let's use the jargon, two=handed bridge to describe this. The problem is, however the following.

 

People just don't want to leave your big club auction alone. You open 1CL with anuthing from a balanced minimum 1C forcing opening bid to a monster two suiter unbalanced and all things in between. Your partner shows some number of controls. You both have not described anything dealing with shape. The opponents will get in here to mess you up if they can, and the higher they can do it, the better for them.

 

My bidding philosophy has become more and more, SHAPE first (and this is true even not playing big club), and catch up on stregnth later. This is true of my takeout double and overcalls, for instance. This is the four-handed approach... try to find your fit first, then worry about how high to go, rather than vise versa.. .which is what controls first do (you might know after the first response there is no chance for slam with controls first, or that you have enough controls for slam if a fit can be found...but you know what, it is not so terribly hard to get this information across later if you ahve found a fit.

 

So for me..... it is a no-briainer... in real world bridge.... where your opponents are in there with such philsophopy as "disturb there one club" or "Suction", use shape first bids. If you want to win some pretty bidding contest and show off awesome spiral scan auctions that find the key jack, then by all means, use controls first.

 

I believe is shape first so much, I even proposed an extension to the equality method I use over interfernce on a 2/1 type auction to that after interference over a 1♣ opening bid http://bridgebase.lunarpages.com/~bridge2/...indpost&p=39908 where I said, "Theory is shape first, points latter (sort of)... the higher you go, of course, GF in effect. These don't have to be wild 55 things either. Since the low ones are by transfer (with step between), there is plenty of room for both opener and responder to show plus values or not. " So, I suspect you could have guessed which way I would vote on this issue.

 

ben

[Gerben47]

Let me just throw around a few loose turns:

 

Hand type first

Game before slam

 

Let's have a look at this auction:

1♣ (pass) 1♠ (2♠)

 

Which would you rather know from partner as the strong club opener?

a) Responder has exactly 1 Ace and 1 King

B) Responder has a GF response with at least 5♥ (this seems to be the fashionable thing to play)

 

I don't think you will get many votes for (a)...

[Chamaco]

Let me just throw around a few loose turns:

 

Hand type first

Game before slam

 

Let's have a look at this auction:

1♣ (pass) 1♠ (2♠)

 

Which would you rather know from partner as the strong club opener?

a) Responder has exactly 1 Ace and 1 King

B) Responder has a GF response with at least 5♥ (this seems to be the fashionable thing to play)

 

I don't think you will get many votes for (a)...

Sure, the point is obvious

I was aware even before posting that the more undetermined the bid, the higher the vulnerabilty to opps preempting.

It is still my thought.

 

Yet, the meaning of my post is: if many good players including the Blue Team (or even Romex system- see other post on it) used to play conotrol steps, probably the risks and the benefits were not too far from the shape-first approach.

 

My chess experience has taught me that, no matter how bad a system/opening/move seems, if world champions have employed it recurrently in their career, it cannot really be that bad, and rarely can be discarded as obviously inferior.

 

I believe it takes experience of playing some years one system (controls) and some years of playing another (shape) in order to give an evaluation which is neither biased nor superficial.

 

That's why I still think that an objective opinion is probably the one given by people who had the chance to play both ways for some time.

[whereagles]

I read a book by Marc Smith, where he interview a couple of world class players. One of them was Garozzo, who at some stage said something like: "It took me many years to realize it was better to show shape after a strong club than controls". (I can check the precise statement if you want.)

 

Actually, there was someone (I think it was Truscott) who described priorities in bidding as

 

1. Shape

2. Points

3. Controls

4. Location of high cards

 

and this is the pattern followed by most relay systems.

[luke warm]

i find it very interesting that truscott would say that... he sure seemed to be a huge proponent of control showing bids, especially in his collaborations with rosenkrantz

 

as for garozzo's supposed comments, was that before or after his blue club won 8 world championships playing control showing responses to 1c?

 

i've played both also, and frankly i'm more comfortable playing shape first... however, i agree with chamaco on this... too many unbelieveably great players have played the other way for far too long for us to discount their philosophy... the current system i'm (still) studying, based on garozzo's et al system, is control showing... only time will tell whether it's more or less susceptible to interference

 

i honestly believe the responses don't matter as far as interference goes... people will interfere almost anytime 1c shows strong only hands, so the nature of 1c itself is the determining factor, imo...

[EricK]

i find it very interesting that truscott would say that... he sure seemed to be a huge proponent of control showing bids, especially in his collaborations with rosenkrantz

 

as for garozzo's supposed comments, was that before or after his blue club won 8 world championships playing control showing responses to 1c?

 

i've played both also, and frankly i'm more comfortable playing shape first... however, i agree with chamaco on this... too many unbelieveably great players have played the other way for far too long for us to discount their philosophy... the current system i'm (still) studying, based on garozzo's et al system, is control showing... only time will tell whether it's more or less susceptible to interference

 

i honestly believe the responses don't matter as far as interference goes... people will interfere almost anytime 1c shows strong only hands, so the nature of 1c itself is the determining factor, imo...

The point is whether the opponents of these great players were playing the best defenses.

 

Practically any detailed system in the hands of expert players with great bidding judgement will yield excellent results against "cautious" opponents. Remeber, only one pair on the Blue team played Blue Club. The others playrd different systems, and still had the same great results.

 

As people started to realise that they can interfere massively in a strong club auction without coming to great harm, systems like Blue Team club, which don't give opener shape information early on, went out of fashion.

 

Eric

[Chamaco]

Practically any detailed system in the hands of expert players with great bidding judgement will yield excellent results against "cautious" opponents.

 

The "cautious" opponents were world class players ranging from the US national team to the UK of Reese-Shapiro, to the great French team, so I would not go that far as to term them overly cautious.

 

Also, most people, including the italian books on the Blue Team, report the common expert opinion that there was not such a huge difference in card play skills between the Blue Team and the various US teams who challenged it.

 

According to many of these sources, it was in slam bidding where the italian fared much better.

 

 

Remeber, only one pair on the Blue team played Blue Club. The others playrd different systems, and still had the same great results.

 

Most of the World Championships were played by pairs playing the Neapolitan Club or derivations of it (although it is true that some did in fact play the Roman Club).

The Neapolitan Club uses control responses to the Strong Club Opening, so for the sake of this discussion it amounts to about the same.

[EricK]

Practically any detailed system in the hands of expert players with great bidding judgement will yield excellent results against "cautious" opponents.

 

The "cautious" opponents were world class players ranging from the US national team to the UK of Reese-Shapiro, to the great French team, so I would not go that far as to term them overly cautious.

 

Also, most people, including the italian books on the Blue Team, report the common expert opinion that there was not such a huge difference in card play skills between the Blue Team and the various US teams who challenged it.

 

According to many of these sources, it was in slam bidding where the italian fared much better.

 

 

Remeber, only one pair on the Blue team played Blue Club. The others playrd different systems, and still had the same great results.

 

Most of the World Championships were played by pairs playing the Neapolitan Club or derivations of it (although it is true that some did in fact play the Roman Club).

The Neapolitan Club uses control responses to the Strong Club Opening, so for the sake of this discussion it amounts to about the same.

It is true what you say about the strength of the opponents. But that does not mean that their bidding styles against strong club were optimal.

 

You only have to look at hands from the 1950s and 60s compared to today to see how much more aggressive bidding has become. Very weak pre-empts which are commonplace today were an absolute rarity in those distant days. The players were not "cautious" when it came to bidding the good hands, but they were more cautious when it came to interfering in the opponent's auction.

 

The Blue Team may have bid better than their opponents, but their opponents allowed them to bid as well as they did!

 

Eric

[luke warm]

i can't argue with that, eric, probably because there's a lot of truth to it... however, my point was and is that whether your responses to a strong club are shape or control doesn't matter as regards interference... it's really a logic problem

 

assume as a premise that a strong club (if the 1c bid signifies strength only, ie not polish club) WILL be interfered with ... it doesn't matter what the rebid means... therefore the argument reduces to: what is the better response to a strong club if there is no interference, shape or control?

 

this is a fair question since the interference is the same over both forms of response... it's a wash, so the original question stands

 

as for me, i know from experience that i prefer control responses over a strong 2c, but only if the opening is a game force... that's not quite the same as 1c, which may or may not be strong enough to force to game

[jtfanclub]

what is the better response to a strong club if there is no interference, shape or control?

 

this is a fair question since the interference is the same over both forms of response... it's a wash, so the original question stands

No, the correct question is "what is the better response to a strong club is there is no interference IN THE DIRECT SEAT".

 

The point of the earlier post is, assume there will be interference in the balancing seat when there is no interference in the direct seat. Which system is better? And since the two systems are very different with interference in the balancing seat, it's a valid question.

 

In fact, I assume that I have so much space after a 1♣ opener that I'm not worried about what happens if there's no interference. I can show controls or shape first, or just use 1♦ waiting. So the only thing I care about is which system is superior against interference by opener's RHO.

[luke warm]

that's fine, but it's not what the original question was about... besides, most people who think interferring with a strong club is the thing to do also think it's the thing to do in balancing seat if pard is unable to in direct

 

so since interference is a given, what structure is better in an environment of no interference: shape or controls?

[inquiry]

that's fine, but it's not what the original question was about... besides, most people who think interferring with a strong club is the thing to do also think it's the thing to do in balancing seat if pard is unable to in direct

 

so since interference is a given, what structure is better in an environment of no interference: shape or controls?

If you get the opponents to promise not to interfere over 1♣ or over the initial control showing response, I believe the control showing actions are superior. I said that in my first reply. However, i think it is better to assume that all 1♣ auctions are "potentially competitive auctions". If you show your "control" rather than start describing your shape, the bidding might be very high and out of your control when it gets back to you.

 

So I think it is best to treat all 1♣ auctions (and indeed many other type auctions as well) as potentialy competitive.

 

Ben

[luke warm]

ben, like you i designed a precision type system once, not very sophisticated tho... i had 3 sets of responses, shape, controls, and point count... we used the shape one 95% of the time and never used the point count one... so my experience with the control type isn't very extensive

 

having said that, if 1d=0-2, 1h=3, 1s=4, and 1nt=5 controls, opener knows a whole lot about partner's hand when/if balancer bids... not the shape, to be sure...

 

i'm sure the designers of the neopolitan system thought at the time that it was an improvement over whatever other precision systems were in use, and even tho bidding has gotten more aggresive since then vs. 1c, i think they were probably right... and imo even if eric's view re: the timidity of their opponents is true, the fact is they won an astonishing number of matches... since i don't believe *all* of those matches, or even most, were won because of the opponents bidding mistakes, it doesn't leave many other reasons

 

i'm not dogmatic about this, we all have our opinions...

[the hog]

There are 3 answers to this

 

1) Playing a full relay system, shape is 100% better than controls. Why? Because your shape shwong bids don't move up and down.

 

2) Playing a non relay system against automatons controls are 100% better than shape. Why, because you know at low levels at what level to play the hand.

 

3) Playing a non relay system agains real live people, shape is 100% better than controls. Why? What would you arther know in a similar auction to the following?

 

1C (P) 2C (4H) where 2C showed some no. of controls OR

1C (P) 1S (4H) where 1S showed a positive with some no. of S

 

As a VERY amusing aside, I was playing in the Victorian open team playoffs and we were discussing weird systems. One Northern Territory pair play a system totally based on points. Apparentlye they get to 3N and know they either have the points to play game or they don't and they have NO idea of either hands shape. They played one board in 4H on a combined 28 count in a 5-0 fit, another in 3N in a 1-1 C fit. So you can see where my sympathies lie. (Their system is apparently called version 52!!)

 

Cheers

Ron

[mikestar]

When Neapolitan was designed there was no Precision system. The only widely known Big Club system was Vanderbuilt's, originated concurrently with the game itself and no longer played by anyone. The Italians were in virgin territory. And control showing is superior if you are in the slam zone and the enemy is silent or limits their intervention to the one level.

 

In those days no one was as aggressive in defensive bidding as even an average player is today, so the decison made some sense, given the high importance of accurate slam bidding in IMP scoring--I imagine it was the wrong choice for matchpoints even in those comparatively innocent days.

 

Just ask yourself which is more likely after a Precison 1C:

 

1. We have a close slam, and very accurate investigative tools make us the winner.

 

2. We face fierce competiton and we desperately need to know how our hands fit.

 

 

In today's game, #2 is (conservatively) 10 times more frequent than #1 and the #1 cases aren't all loss. If the opponents are quiet, shape first still allows ample exchange of information--in the frequent case of finding a major fit at the two level allows for tools like Serious 2NT and all the asking bids/relays you could want.

 

And when you are in the slam zone but facing competition, shape first allows you to find more fits, so you can blast to slam. This is a winning action overall--for every time you get to an unmakable slam, you will induce at least one phantom save--and getting to a making slam in competition will score pretty well.

 

 

To sum up, whatever the merits of controls first in the Blue Team's heyday, it is the wrong choice now. This is particularly true the lower the minimum for 1C goes. The Italians required 17 and upgraded conservatively while Precision is 16 upgraded liberally as most play it, and Moscito player have been known to open a "big" club on a good 13!

 

I think that Romex is better able to get away with control showing because of its 18-19 minimum for 1N and the fact that 1N has a fairly tightly defined upper limit. Nevertheless, if I were designing a Romex system today, I'd use shape first.

[Antoine Fourrière]

In my view, opening a strong club is the real danger. (Even opening a Polish club isn't safe against legitimate overcalls, which is why I preach that both unbalanced minimums, somewhat like in WJ, and unbalanced game forces, somewhat like in Strefa, should find other openings.)

Now, if you do open a strong club after a pass by your RHO and your LHO also remains silent, I doubt shape first makes much difference - a delayed high-level bid once you know there is no slam doesn't bode well for the defence, and a low-level bid lets opener show his hand type -, except perhaps at unfavorable vulnerability.

(Of course, you might also play Moscito at favorable, PC at equal and Romex at unfavorable.)

[tlgoodwin]

A (very) long time ago I did a study of strong-club opening bids in the World Championships. It showed that the people opening a strong club did better when their opponents intervened than when they had a free run. Of course, they did pretty well in either case, since the big-clubbers at that time were mainly Italians, and they were winning every year.

 

I wonder what a similar (although more thorough) study would show today, now that there has been a lot more experience with and against the strong club. Everybody seems to assume that the way to defeat the strong club is to intervene against it aggressively. Maybe that is right -- but it would be interesting to see some data on the point.

 

TLGoodwin

[luke warm]

i agree, having data on it would be beneficial... i don't know but i imagine the average player isn't equipped to intervene as much as he does... but i still haven't heard anyone speak to what i said earlier... assume 2 systems, both strong club with the same criteria for opening... imagine one uses control responses and the other shape responses... why are shape responses better, given the supposed fact that interference will occur equally over either?

 

1c : 1d = strong hand : 0-7 hcp

1c : 1d = strong hand : 0-2 controls

 

with competition over both of those guaranteed (by those of you who say interference will occur), isn't it a wash? i go back to responses over a game forcing 2c bid... i've played all sorts, and i honestly think control responses are much better from the opener's point of view

 

the best thing to do is post some hands with a given set of interference bids and see how the overall system handles them

[Free]

Personally, I'm 50-50% fond of semi-positive responses, it has it's advantages and disadvantages. However, when you play these, you start with 1♣-1♦ as GF and you still don't know anything about both shape and exact strength, which can be a real problem.

 

This same problem is what you get with control showing, except you know 'exact' strength. You immediatly know if it's gonna be slam or maybe-slam on good distributions. BUT! How many more games do you play than slams?

 

Imo, it's good enough to look for games first, and later on for slam. That's why I think shape-showing is best. You say: "partner, we have at least GF, and this is my shape", and later on you can say: "Hey! I have more, lets go for slam, you know what suit we're going to play". Games are more important in the beginning imo, slams come later since their frequency is a lot lower...

 

It's most important to concentrate on games when you know opps intervene a lot. Therefor control showing will not gain on shape showing. If opps are quiet, then ofcourse I don't think it makes much difference what you play. Ben said control showing is best - he could be right - but I don't have any idea if one method is better than the other...

[Chamaco]

It seems to me that the underlying statement of many posters here is that after

1C-pass-ANY CONTROL SHOWING RESPONSE-?

4th hand preemption will most of the time result in a damage for the big clubbers.

Are we sure about it ?

Preempting is fun, as it is fun to watch opponents annoyed, but it can result also in many big penalty.

Increasing the frequency of preemption will increase the penalties resulting, and there must be a threshold where the payoffs are reversed...

 

At MP, I may agree on the effectiveness of increased preemption frequency: we may cause opps to find the wrong strain and score 400 instead of 420; we may go down 500 instead of 620. As we know, the cost-benefit justifies risks.

 

But I don't have such an evidence at IMPS.

In a team match, after 4th hand preemption, a good pair:

 

- many times will be able to find a reasonable contract iusing the normal devices used when opps open a preempt; actruially, in the big club case, they will be better placed because they alreeady know the no. of controls, so there is no risk of passing out undoubled opps.

Sure, some of the times you'll play 3NT when 4 of a mjor is better, or you'll end up in a moysian when you have a better contract available. (But even then, many times you'll be able to get away with it and collect your game score)

Some other times you'll miss a close slam.

These are the minuses.

 

But there are also pluses: many opponents will try preemption on rubbish, just to hinder the bidding machinery.

But in those cases, a good pair has good devices to penalize them.

I suspect that collecting the penalties of frisky preemptor will at east even the chances compared to some losses in the bidding accuracy for the right game contract when you have no clearcut slam values.

Let's not forget that penalizing phantom sacrifices are worth slam values.

I remember reading somewhere a declaration by Meckstroth (must be "win the Bermuda Bowl with me") who says that they gear their bidding system towards penalizing often opps preempting the big club.

 

And, since against these step responses the frequency of preemption will increase, and the quality of preemption will be lowered, it is likely that the number and amopunt of penalties inflicted to opps will also increase.

 

One more point is worth mentioning: after responder has shown a GF hand, it is much more dangerous to preempt.

Second seat preempt can be quite desruptive since reponder did not yet give any info to opener (no matter whether distribution , controls, or negative response).

Fourth seat preempt is much less effective because responder had a chance to limit his hand by means of the control step response.

 

e.g.

1C-(3S)-?

Now one of the problems is that responder may or may not have GF values.

 

But

 

1C-(pass)-POSITIVE RESPONSE-(3S)

?

 

Now opener knows that we are in GF, so that very often the issue will be finding the right strain or penalizing.

Under such conditions it is much easier, for an expert, to decide whether to settle for a safe plus penalizing opps or too bid with distributional hands.

So, I think it's an even money bet between the times you hinder the bidding machinery and the times when your wild preempts wil be penalized (in order to make them more frequently they'll have to be wild much of the times- otherwise you'd just be passing more often and this thread would not exist :-) ).

 

So the bottomline is: at MP , where the strains in which you play game matters a lot, this control steps may backfire, but at IMPSm, where suboptimal games score about the same and collecting penalties often pays off, I am not so sure.

 

Or, to put in another way: at IMPS the concept that preempting more frequently will be a winning action may be a commonplace, at least when the control steps have suggested or denied that slam is unlikely.Let's try to wash our head from this concept and try to verify the data... :-)

[mike777]

Great thread!

1) Assume preempts work, otherwise everyone would not be using them.

 

2) On Ron's hand one, 2c would be 0-2 controls and 6-7 long and poor clubs, at most one top honor. So controls and shape.

 

3) On Ron's hand two, 4 controls, no shape showing but how much worse off am I then over a (2/1)...1C=P=1S=4H bid? Maybe more, maybe less.

 

4) Above thread discussion on penalty doubles is excellent.

[Chamaco]

Great thread!

1) Assume preempts work, otherwise everyone would not be using them.

Preempting more frequently after a big club and a positive response necessarily means doing it lighter than usual, and taking more risk than usual.

 

My point is:

there is a difference in preempting in different situations: some preempts are more effective than others.

As more and more info are exchanged, it becomes more and more dangerous (especially at IMPS) to preempt because opps have more elements to decide whether or not to penalize.

This applies even if the info exchanged is only hcp and controls, without shape involved.

 

 

1) Opening Preempt: opps did not exchange ANY info so far. Most damaging.

 

2) Preempting after opps opened but before responder bid: still damaging but less than at point 1. Can be very dangerous opposite a limited opener.

3) Preempting after both hands bid: even if they did not exchange SHAPE info but only hcp (16+ by opener) and controls by responder, now they know a hell lot more.

They know they are in a GF, and the control response often helps determining the likelihood for slam.

So, at MP preempting here may pay off, but at IMPS not so sure, since even playing the wrong game often makes anyways, AND there is the added advantage of being able to choose for a severe penalty to opps.

 

 

So it is not a sure thing that 4th hand preempt will certainly work, and I do believe it may be true the opposite, at IMPS (not at MP).

 

In situation 3, I am suspecting that an expert pair of big clubbers will often collect penalties at IMPS from the frisky preemptors.

[mike777]

In "situation 2" I would guess most control showing systems are:

 

1)Still on over 1 level overcalls

 

2)Still on over some 2 level overcalls...say through 2D or so.

 

3)Off over 2nt overcalls and higher.

 

Would be interested to know more about Meckwell's response system and skewing towards penalty doubles if anyone knows.

[Chamaco]

In "situation 2"  I would guess most control showing systems are:

 

1)Still on over 1 level overcalls

 

2)Still on over some 2 level overcalls...say through 2D or so.

 

3)Off over 2nt overcalls and higher.

 

Would be interested to know more about Meckwell's response system and skewing towards penalty doubles if anyone knows.

Just to clarify my thoughts:

I do believe that after 1C-(overcall)-? it is better to give shape.

Here the "tempo" of the bidding is different, since if opps have a fit they wuill anticipate you (e.g. they can jump raise much safer at level 3/4), it's totally different from situation 3 where you have had the chance to show control without interference.

 

My whole thread was referred to auction that start

 

1C-pass-CONTROL SHOWING RESPONSE,

 

e.g. AFTER PARD OPENS ONE CLUB AND RHO PASS, CHOOSING BETWEEN SHAPE-FIRST OR CONTROL/SHOWING FIRST

 

so it was restricted to discussing "situation 3".

 

Of course the points you raise here ar of utmost interest too :-)