GCC and Bracketed KOs

[blackshoe]

The midchart for KO with >1500 average does not always apply to bracketed *compact* KO. I've been in bracketed compact KO in ACBL with all teams >1500 average where midchart was not allowed due to the compact nature of the KO.

[Temperance "Bones" Brennan]"I don't know what that means."[/Temperance "Bones" Brennan]

 

I guess a compact KO is not a KO. :blink: :unsure:

[paulg]

They seem to hate playing even against strong club which is of course GCC.

As an alien who only plays at the Nationals, where presumably the standard is relatively high compared to other events, with a Mid-Chart laden system, the convention that causes the opposition most trouble is our team mates' weak notrump.

 

When you see the carnage that this causes, especially in events like the LM Pairs, it is no wonder that anything more complicated is feared even though, in practice, people cope better with it.

[Cthulhu D]

Only because they don't play it at the club. America's bridge homogeneity costs here

[barmar]

When, if you're not a full-time player, do you get to decide to modify your system so that it is irreparibly Mid-chart (say, by making 2♣ ART INV+, to make 1NT SF work, like we were discussing in the previous thread), without having to worry about "which system are we playing today" at 1305 once the brackets come out? 10000? 15000? How many teams have that?

You probably would already be prepared for this. Most pair and swiss team events are GCC, so unless you ONLY play KOs you have to have a GCC convention card that you use in these games.

 

Maybe the reason you chose to play in the KO was because you expected to be able to play your more enjoyable Mid-Chart system. Oh well, that's life.

[Phil]

Blackshoe, I rarely play in bracketed KO's these days, but when I do its usually Bracket I or II, and I can play what I want. I can count on two hands the number of long matches I've played in the last 12 months, since most of my regional and sectionals are spent playing open swiss or pairs. However there was a time 9-10 years ago when I did play Bracket III in medium sized regionals where midchart wasn't allowed. At least I don't think so - I honestly do not remember, since I didn't play anything MC then.

 

As far as the MC you want to play is concerned, listing something thats under the heading of a system is beside the point. Multi 2N is at least as hard to defend against as Multi 2♦, and I cannot believe its integral to modern Romex, since its a destructive method. Its somethings thats probably fun to play, but you can make this argument about any MC method. You're a director, and you have seen first-hand the confusion a newer player faces. You open 2N (weak with one minor), and your partner alerts it, and I can tell you that a lot of players that have more than 1,500 will have issues with it, much less someone with 150. With all multi-style calls, there is intended confusion. If you accept this, then you should also accept that a newer player is going to be more confused. As a matter of fact, in spite of the alert, a newer player who can't instantly assimilate that 2N is a weak bid and not a strong one and will pass with a 15 count in spite of the alert.

 

Frankly, something like a Precision 2♥ isn't any tougher to defend against than a Precision 2♦, and you can make a senisble argument it should be GCC. But you could make it legal if you required 4♥ (and do something else with specifically a 4315), couldn't you?

[antonylee]

I thought a Precision 2♥ would be harder to defend than a Precision 2♦ because you cannot expect responder to keep the auction alive for you.

[barmar]

For the most part, the decision about whether a method should be GCC or Mid-Chart is not so much about how hard it is to defend against, but simply familiarity. Even if something is relatively easy to defend against, you still need to know what the defense is, and average players are only likely to have discussed defenses to conventions that they encounter on a regular basis. When you play in a GCC event, you expect fewer surprises.

 

Yes, there's a bit of a Catch-22 in this. How is a convention supposed to become common enough that it can move to the GCC, if players are rarely allowed to play it? The answer is that many clubs are more liberal, and that's where new ideas (they may be common overseas, but they're new to most of our players) can gestate.

 

And to some extent, most players probably don't consider this to be a problem. The game is good enough as it is; if Multi never makes it into the GCC, they're fine with that.

[Phil]

I thought a Precision 2♥ would be harder to defend than a Precision 2♦ because you cannot expect responder to keep the auction alive for you.

 

I'm not sure where you are going with this. Presumably if I have a takeout x of hearts, I can double 2♥ and if I'm short in spades, I can double 2♠ when it comes back. Other strong hands seem to be on equal footing whether or not its 2♦ or 2♥.

[Siegmund]

I am surprised how many posters in this thread think it is easy to find Midchart events at live tournaments.

 

Just because a regional CAN allow Midchart in the high brackets of KOs and in the A section of flighted games doesn't mean they will. Some regionals in my area will allow Michart for the top KO bracket (ONLY the top bracket, even though brackets 2 and 3 may well meet the 1500+ requirement); a few of them also in the A/X Swiss on Sunday...some of them just don't. A request to play up usually gets you moved up one bracket or not at all.

 

A strong B player or a part-time regional pro playing in the middle brackets could very easily go a whole year without playing a single hand in a non-GCC event except at the NABCs. And those like me who prefer matchpoints are even more SOL. There are a lot of fun toys I've never gotten to try since I can only use them on the internet, and it's not worth getting too hooked on them.

[blackshoe]

As far as the MC you want to play is concerned, listing something thats under the heading of a system is beside the point.

I'm not sure what your point is. All I was doing, or trying to do anyway, was to provide some context explaining why I want to play these conventions.

Multi 2N is at least as hard to defend against as Multi 2♦, and I cannot believe its integral to modern Romex, since its a destructive method.

Integral, no. In Godfrey's Stairway to the Stars, the authors have their characters traveling to Europe to play in a WBF tournament — Lille, I think — and they find that they can't play this 2NT opening there, because it's Brown Sticker. So they just left 2NT as a transfer to clubs, and let 3D show any preempt. Easy enough. I think the impetus for this convention in the system was that they didn't need 2NT to show a balanced strong opening any more, because in both versions (Romex and Romex Forcing Club) they have other ways to show that hand (Kokish, basically). You could leave 2NT undefined, for that matter. Same with 4NT. But the "Precision 2♦" hands have to go somewhere, and 2♦ (in a Romex context) is already taken.

 

You're a director, and you have seen first-hand the confusion a newer player faces. You open 2N (weak with one minor), and your partner alerts it, and I can tell you that a lot of players that have more than 1,500 will have issues with it, much less someone with 150. With all multi-style calls, there is intended confusion. If you accept this, then you should also accept that a newer player is going to be more confused. As a matter of fact, in spite of the alert, a newer player who can't instantly assimilate that 2N is a weak bid and not a strong one and will pass with a 15 count in spite of the alert.

In the clubs here, players with 150 masterpoints play in the games where, as I mentioned before, what one club owner calls her "babies" play. I don't play in those games. I wouldn't even if she would let me. If such players "play up" well, I suppose it boils down to whose expectations govern - if the "playing up" 150s don't want to see MC, the "playing up" 350 (me) does, and the 1500s don't care one way or t'other, I guess I lose. As for the 1500s who will have issues with a Mid-Chart convention, maybe they ought to stop crawling around on the floor and get up and walk, fer crissakes. ;)

 

Look, I know I'm in the minority, and I know the ACBL, and the Districts, Units, and clubs, will cater to the large group who don't want to see anything unfamiliar. I just wish they'd throw the few of us who aren't afraid to try something new a bigger bone than "top brackets of KOs or Flight A" once in a while. :(

 

Frankly, something like a Precision 2♥ isn't any tougher to defend against than a Precision 2♦, and you can make a senisble argument it should be GCC. But you could make it legal if you required 4♥ (and do something else with specifically a 4315), couldn't you?

Maybe. I haven't thought about it, beyond wondering if I could fit all four distributions into the already nebulous 1♦ opening, and how we might untangle that after the opening bid.

 

Perhaps I should just take baby steps, and try to get folks to accept that Romex (without the 2 card bit, or any fancy conventions) is strictly GCC. Frankly, I don't have much hope for that, either. Actually, I'm pretty much resigned to vanilla 5 card majors/strong NT, or maybe Precision if I get lucky finding a partner. But I don't have to like it. :(

[Elianna]

I don't really have a strong opinion about this. Personally, I just want to know what to expect before I enter an event. I don't like entering a KO and not knowing it was Midchart or GCC until a director is called about a convention.

 

And I don't like certain people in my district characterizing me as a b***h because I want the rules evenly enforced, and am ruining their fun. I might be a b***h, but not for that reason.

 

But the main reason I posted is to say that people should not write a higher number of masterpoints on their KO card than they actually have. Teams have gotten in trouble and been kicked out of events for this, being treated in the same way as people who write lower numbers to get in lower brackets. (I realize that some directors encourage this, but as some directors are strict about it, you should be really careful about it.)

[rduran1216]

without fail the worst field ever).

 

 

Teams in the loser swiss I played in in san diego on saturday of the last regional.

 

Lou Ann O'Rourke, Scottsdale AZ; Marc Jacobus - Curtis Cheek - Mike Passell, Las Vegas NV; Steve Weinstein, Andes NY; Robert Levin, Henderson NV 64.00

4.44 2

 

Rebecca Clough - Roger Clough, Culver City CA; Alex Fowlie, San Marcos CA; Judy Roberts, Kearney NE 62.00

3.33 3

 

Chi-Chong Yu, Hacienda Hgts CA; Jack Chao, Chino CA; David Wei Chuan, Rancho Mirage CA; Shiu-Ming Huang, San Marino CA 61.00

2.50 4

 

Susan Key - Chris Compton, Dallas TX; Eddie Wold, Houston TX; Geoff Hampson, Las Vegas NV 54.00

1.87 5

 

Ron Lien, Brea CA; Aaron Jones, Long Beach CA; Yas Takeda, Hacienda Hgts CA; Mark Tang, Seal Beach CA; Subba Ravipudi, Downey CA 52.00

[blackshoe]

Today I asked the Chairwoman of the Tournament Committee for our next upcoming Regional (Syracuse, next month after the Nationals) if there were any events or sections of events in which the Mid-Chart would be allowed. Then I had to explain to her what the Mid-Chart is. :blink: In the end, her answer was "I don't have a clue, ask Bernie". Bernie will be directing. I told her that deciding which events, etc., might be Mid-Chart is a TO function, not a director function. She said again "I don't have a clue, ask Bernie". :(

 

Maybe I'll just have to play the "Nuttin'" system. :ph34r:

[TimG]

Today I asked the Chairwoman of the Tournament Committee for our next upcoming Regional (Syracuse, next month after the Nationals) if there were any events or sections of events in which the Mid-Chart would be allowed. Then I had to explain to her what the Mid-Chart is. :blink: In the end, her answer was "I don't have a clue, ask Bernie". Bernie will be directing. I told her that deciding which events, etc., might be Mid-Chart is a TO function, not a director function. She said again "I don't have a clue, ask Bernie". :(

 

Maybe I'll just have to play the "Nuttin'" system. :ph34r:

 

In New England, the Executive Board makes decisions like this (mid-chart or not). If there is a tournament chairman, he/she would not have been in on the decision making process unless he/she also happened to be on the Executive Committee.

[blackshoe]

In New England, the Executive Board makes decisions like this (mid-chart or not). If there is a tournament chairman, he/she would not have been in on the decision making process unless he/she also happened to be on the Executive Committee.

Does the Executive Board inform the Tournament Chairs what the rules will be, or is it a secret? :ph34r:

[barmar]

Does the Executive Board inform the Tournament Chairs what the rules will be, or is it a secret? :ph34r:

Does it have to be one or the other?

 

The important people to inform are the directors, not the chairs. And assuming they do so, the chair should refer you to the director, as she did.

 

I think the main responsibilities of tournament chairs in our local tournaments are logistical: dealing with the venue, arranging for refreshments, hiring caddies, etc. Anything related to the bridge play is handled by the directors.

[blackshoe]

The chair is usually responsible, among other things, for advertising the tournament. If the EB isn't telling the chair about allowed Mid-Chart events that need to be advertised, whose fault is that? Certainly not the TD's. If I were a tournament chair, I wouldn't assume that the EB has told me what I need to know, I'd ask. Of course, I might not get a straight answer (I can envision an EB whose response is the same as my Tournament Chair's but they're wrong; it's their responsibility to make that decision — at least in New England).

 

"This is what I've observed to happen, therefore this is what is supposed to happen" is not a valid logical argument.

[barmar]

I don't think I've ever seen information about convention charts on the advertising for any tournament. I'd expect it to be in the Conditions of Contest, not the flyers.

[CSGibson]

I don't think I've ever seen information about convention charts on the advertising for any tournament. I'd expect it to be in the Conditions of Contest, not the flyers.

 

We regularly have it on flyers, because mid-chart defenses to 1N are legal in our district in all events.

 

This is an example of such advertising on the Seaside regional (Lower right hand corner of the flyer)

 

http://www.acbld20.org/tourn2012/Seaside/images/1209002.pdf

[TimG]

The chair is usually responsible, among other things, for advertising the tournament. If the EB isn't telling the chair about allowed Mid-Chart events that need to be advertised, whose fault is that? Certainly not the TD's. If I were a tournament chair, I wouldn't assume that the EB has told me what I need to know, I'd ask. Of course, I might not get a straight answer (I can envision an EB whose response is the same as my Tournament Chair's but they're wrong; it's their responsibility to make that decision — at least in New England).

 

Actually, in New England, we have a Tournament Manager/Business Manager. That person is responsible for negotiating with sites (which includes room rates, convention space, hospitality, and other things) and producing tournament advertising. We also have a Caddy Master who is responsible for all things caddy (this job may have been eliminated recently and could now be the responsibility of the Tournament Manager).

 

The Tournament Chairman is generally responsible for finding volunteers to man the hospitality and partnership desks. I'm sure there are other responsibilities, but it is mostly involved with coordinating local volunteers. In New England, I would expect a Tournament Chairperson who was asked about convention charts (or any other conditions of contest sort of item) to consult an official before answering (or simply refer the questioner to the appropriate official).

 

Things are done differently in other districts. It could well be the case that in some districts the Tournament Chairman has many more responsibilities. I think the number of districts with a Tournament Manager/Business Manager can be counted on one hand.

[Mbodell]

We regularly have it on flyers, because mid-chart defenses to 1N legal in our district in all events.

 

This is an example of such advertising on the Seaside regional (Lower right hand corner of the flyer)

 

http://www.acbld20.org/tourn2012/Seaside/images/1209002.pdf

 

This is a good example up above of a couple of things that you sometimes see that show that it isn't all KO with players above 1500 and where compact KO are often not real KO for midchart purposes.

 

ACBL Mid Chart allowed in: 1) All stand alone Flight A/AX events and top bracket of Open Bracketed KO’s (excluding Compact KOs). Mid chart defenses to the opponents’ 1NT are allowed in all events.

 

So you can only play midchart (not counting defenses to 1nt) in the top bracket of the five full KO and then on the final Sunday A/X Swiss. And this is for a regional which in ACBL is the biggest most prestigious type of tournament after the nationals.

[blackshoe]

Yep.

 

In our case (the Syracuse Regional) it's the Unit that handles the details. AFAIK, the District (most of the people on the District board seem to be from Maryland and SE Pennsylvania) just hands off the whole thing to the Unit. The Tournament Chair for this Regional is from Rochester, one of two (or three, perhaps) reps from here to the Unit Board. The Chair's duties don't seem to be defined anywhere, so maybe I got it wrong. It did surprise me, though, that someone involved with the planning and organization of a tournament wouldn't know what the Mid-Chart is, and at least who is responsible for deciding whether it applies (and IMO it's not the TD).

 

When I see him, I'll talk to Bernie (who will be the TD) and see what he says.

[CSGibson]

This is a good example up above of a couple of things that you sometimes see that show that it isn't all KO with players above 1500 and where compact KO are often not real KO for midchart purposes.

 

 

 

So you can only play midchart (not counting defenses to 1nt) in the top bracket of the five full KO and then on the final Sunday A/X Swiss. And this is for a regional which in ACBL is the biggest most prestigious type of tournament after the nationals.

 

 

To be fair, I am a player with less than 1500 MP's, and in my regular partnership we have a couple of mid-chart methods* (though my regular partner has more than 5000 mps, and we regularly play with other top local pairs as partners, so we get to play in bracket 1 a lot on MP weight for D20 tournaments despite my relatively low MP total). We have found that we can play those methods regularly in sectionals, regionals, nationals, and even club games with regularity if we try (for the club games we have 2 clubs in the area, one of the club owners has given us permission to practice in his open game using mid-chart methods, as is his discretion). If we can't play those mid-chart conventions, we have a couple of different adjustments we make to make our system GCC legal.

 

*our mid-chart methods are the incorporation of bad 3 card limit raises into 2C over 1M, and using 2H to show either a balanced 11-12, a balanced 16-17, or a game forcing hand with clubs over either of our minor suit openings. For the first, we simply take out the bad 3 card limit raises, loading everything into either the traditional limit raise or a direct raise to 2M. For the 2nd, we play that 2H guarantees 3 clubs, giving it an anchor suit and (I think) making it GCC legal.

[blackshoe]

It seems District 4, Unit 112, and my local clubs aren't as enlightened as the equivalents in Chris's neck of the woods. Or maybe it's just that there's more "old fogeys" here (I'm old - well, maybe not as bridge players go - but I'm not a fogey). :unsure:

[barmar]

We regularly have it on flyers, because mid-chart defenses to 1N are legal in our district in all events.

Maybe we would have it on the flyers if we allowed it, too. If not mentioned explicitly, it may be safe to assume only GCC is permitted.