Is a system too complicated?

[Douglas43]

There are a number of online events where you'd be very welcome, assuming you could get some teammates, where you'd get some good practice.

• EBU Lockdown League: weekdays at 6pm (https://www.ebu.co.u...lockdown-league, EBU members only, 8 boards per evening)
• Scottish Online League: Monday evenings (https://www.sbu.org.uk/results/sol5, SBU members only, 24 board matches)
• Scottish Bronze League: Wednesday evenings (https://sites.google...u-bronze-league, SBU members only, 16 board matches)
• Scottish Lockdown Swiss Teams (which I help run): Thursday evenings (https://sites.google...swissteams/home, open to all, free, 24 board matches, mainly Scottish)
• BBO InterCity League: Wednesday evenings (http://intercity.cloudapp.net/, next series starts in the spring, open to all, free, 16 board matches, mainly Europeans)

 

And all the EBU congresses are online, so you get a day's bridge for a tenner or so

[paulg]

• BBO InterCity League: Wednesday evenings (http://intercity.cloudapp.net/, next series starts in the spring, open to all, free, 16 board matches, mainly Europeans)

 

This is a fun event, but unfortunately the organiser refuses to mandate exchange or even use of convention cards, so can be a rough and unfair ride.

That is fair, but the organiser has been consistent and even in the 36th edition has 70+ teams. In this edition I've sent system cards to opposing captains before matches as I known who has been playing: in the past that has been problematic since I've still been looking for pairs one hour before the game.

 

It is a less rigid and flexible event, but abusers tend not to be invited next time.

[hrothgar]

in my humble opinion allowing acol bidding system to be used in open BBO games would lead to giving a substantial advantage to its users over opponents who re totally no used to dealing with it.

 

And why precisely should we care about this?

 

Bridge is a game of skill.

If you are not skilled in different aspects of the game, then you shouldn't expect to do well.

 

Players who only know how to play Acol will be at an equal disadvantage to those who only know how to play 2/1.

 

Players who know how to play both will be better positioned.

 

This is right and proper

[pilowsky]

yea - dulce et decorum est

[Gilithin]

yea - dulce et decorum est

One of the classics.

[AL78]

So, this is the tricky bit. The system is 4Cm, Weak NT, with standard openings at level 1. So, on the face of it, it is Acol based.

The 2 bids are Muidberg (2C=Str, 2D=Multi, 2M=Mm inter, 2N=mm weak). This structure is not that uncommon in an Acol club.

 

However, all responses a 1C opener are artificial with transfers and relay responses

1C

-1D/H Transfer to H/S

-1S Transfer to D or 6-9Bal

-1N Both majors or 10-12Bal

-2C Inverted

-2D Both majors weak

-2M Weak major 6+ suit.

-2N GF Bal

 

I take your points though about not being fair. We can tone the system down to play in the Acol room. So that might work at least in part for all parties.

In general we play in open competitions also and I've always thought the standard in the Acol club to be good enough so that people have at least been exposed to a system or 2.

 

That isn't Acol, so I would question your decision to try and play in the Acol club with it. I don't go to a bridge club and expect to be able to play poker. There are EBU games on BBO where many of the participants will be playing some form of Acol where you can test your system, and people won't get the hump.

[gordlink]

I often play the Toucan system which uses transfers over 1C openers, 1D is either 4 diamonds with a singleton or 6+ D. Majors are standard 2/1 and 1NT is 15-17. Originally, we pre-alerted, but now we just alert/explain the bid, not the ramifications. The system is legal and was named by Matt Smith, National ACBL Head Director. For those who want to improve their game, I recommend Toucan. I found it helped me "see" the distribution far better and it right sided the contract. Duplicate Bridge is made up of mostly seniors, people set in their ways and usually not friendly towards persons who play something different from themselves. Since we switched from pre-alerts to alerting just the bid as a transfer to the suit we identify, we have found we no longer get complaints. The opponents "see" the transfer or relay as some people call them, just like transfers over NT openers. Transfers are legal and right siding the contract is worth a half a trick. So try alerting only the bid, not the system. Good Luck.

[Douglas43]

I often play the Toucan system which uses transfers over 1C openers, 1D is either 4 diamonds with a singleton or 6+ D. Majors are standard 2/1 and 1NT is 15-17. Originally, we pre-alerted, but now we just alert/explain the bid, not the ramifications. The system is legal and was named by Matt Smith, National ACBL Head Director. For those who want to improve their game, I recommend Toucan. I found it helped me "see" the distribution far better and it right sided the contract. Duplicate Bridge is made up of mostly seniors, people set in their ways and usually not friendly towards persons who play something different from themselves. Since we switched from pre-alerts to alerting just the bid as a transfer to the suit we identify, we have found we no longer get complaints. The opponents "see" the transfer or relay as some people call them, just like transfers over NT openers. Transfers are legal and right siding the contract is worth a half a trick. So try alerting only the bid, not the system. Good Luck.

 

Completely agree with you about the transfers. They are pretty common and defence is easy-peasy. Even in the UK where 5cM is not standard, it's club-level stuff. The challenging aspect of the OP's system is the two-way bids that are not actually transfers (like the 1NT response). hence my suggestion that the OP might supply a suggested defence to them to speed the game up.

[mycroft]

The "best" defences, which I have been told is fundamentally behind "normal", are in fact easy. I also notice that those people - in the ACBL, the same people that need "complete, relatively simple, written" defences to conventions they don't want to play - have just shrugged their shoulders and said "oh, this is the best possible defence".

 

But with it now allowed (with Pre-Alert) in ACBL Open events, we shall see if better, or more aggressive, defences get developed.

 

Of course, none of this is relevant to the OP - "easy" or not, if it's not what the club wants in their game, then it shouldn't be played in that game. There are lots of games available for people to play in. Same as, if the *club* doesn't want me to play EHAA, whether or not it's technically legal to their rules, I find another club, or I play something acceptable to them and take my EHAA sessions to another game.

[Pertinax]

Acol is bidding system based around a philosophy of simple, natural bidding where you can usually just "bid what you think you will make" (Dormer). EBU Standard Acol is a simple 4 Card Major Acol with only a few simple Duplicate conventions like Transfers. All Duplicate players can just sit down and play it, or play against it. The EBU has several levels of system restrictions for Duplicates in England based around the concept of EBU Standard Acol, and players are used to those, and like them.

 

There are different forms of Bridge. Bridge in the Relaxed and Acol Room are not tournaments, with experienced partnerships using complex partnership agreements battling it out, but casual walk-up Bridge. It involves players of varying abilities who are playing simple bridge without agreements and they are there to have fun and play cards as a social activity of an evening. Yes you can play whatever system you like on BBO. The counter is that opponents don't have to like your slow relay system, or play against you in a casual card game and "Ignore" you. It is hard to see what you would gain from practising against such players anyway.

 

The EBU runs Acol duplicate tournaments, the Main Room has players who play all sorts of systems And if you make friends and learn how the Acol Room functions, you will find that there are some very good players who play more complex system there too.

[barmar]

Once again I have to lol at systems in the ACBL. Transfer responses to 1C are so common in Australia that people forget to pre-alert them in club games and nobody bats an eyelid.

And millions of people speak German, yet most Americans can't understand it. I guess we must be pretty stupid.

 

Nobody bats an eyelid because it's so common. Familiarity and experience matters.

[sfi]

Nobody bats an eyelid because it's so common. Familiarity and experience matters.

Straw man aside, that's sort of my point. The ACBL is so restrictive on systems that really simple things to deal with aren't allowed there. Which means people never learn how to defend against them and don't get to experiment with using them either.

[mycroft]

I play a system that's totally Natural (no forcing or artificial openings, fewer artificial responses than "standard", ...) that until recently was considered "YELLOW" by Australian regulators - as dangerous and scary as Forcing Pass. They've changed it now - a couple of years before the ACBL changed to allow Transfer responses to 1♣.

 

Different spaces, different parochial attitudes.

 

I will admit, the ACBL has a lower opinion of their rank and file's attitude to strange than most - and from my experience, they're right. How much is cause and how much is effect is a question for the ages, but they're right.

 

Having said that - totally irrelevant to the OP (I know, thread drift is a thing). The OP wants to play relays and transfers in a room restricted to one "Approach Forcing system", and wonders why he's getting pushback. He's been informed that that is a reasonable thing (even if no club in Oz would do it), and ->here are places he can do what he wants (play his system against the kinds of systems he'll meet in English tournaments, rather than a swath of US-style 2/1) where he won't get that pushback. And it is, and there are.

[barmar]

Straw man aside, that's sort of my point. The ACBL is so restrictive on systems that really simple things to deal with aren't allowed there. Which means people never learn how to defend against them and don't get to experiment with using them either.

It's a chicken-and-egg problem.

 

But clubs aren't required to follow ACBL's restrictions, they can be more liberal, and many clubs are. And higher-level tournaments use the less restrictive convention charts.

[helene_t]

It may not be too complicated but it's not Acol so you shouldn't play it in the Acol club.

 

As for normal EBU clubs it's more difficult to say. Those that specify ebu level 3 in the regulations obviously don't allow transfer responses to 1c, but since level 3 is retired there are probably many clubs that technically allow level 4 conventions despite not having had a debate about liberalisation.

 

But legal stuff aside, if your system annoys several opponents you shouldn't play it there, although you might look into improving the way you disclose the methods.

 

If you want to practice your system against Acol you could maybe find a willing couple to practice with privately.

 

Otherwise get a Jack license, then the bots can play Acol. They may not have an adequate defence against your system but you can add twalsh to Acol I think.

[sfi]

It's a chicken-and-egg problem.

 

But clubs aren't required to follow ACBL's restrictions, they can be more liberal, and many clubs are. And higher-level tournaments use the less restrictive convention charts.

I agree about the problem. I do think the general approach followed by the ACBL - of selectively allowing agreements - is fundamentally flawed and detrimental to the game. So I'm definitely on the side of the chicken. Or the egg, depending on how the analogy works here.

 

It's good to hear that many clubs are more liberal than published regulations, and I haven't paid much attention to the regs that came out a year or two ago. So it might have improved significantly.

[sfi]

I play a system that's totally Natural (no forcing or artificial openings, fewer artificial responses than "standard", ...) that until recently was considered "YELLOW" by Australian regulators - as dangerous and scary as Forcing Pass. They've changed it now - a couple of years before the ACBL changed to allow Transfer responses to 1♣.

I'd be surprised if this were true. The only thing I'm aware of that would make a natural system yellow would be super light openings. And that hasn't changed for quite a while. What about your system was considered yellow?

[mycroft]

Yep, 2 level openers < Ro15.

 

And the Open chart really has liberalized bridge far beyond where I thought they would go for anything that wasn't restricted like the Mid-Chart was (effectively, "If you're not a pro, good luck finding a Mid-Chart game you can play in often enough to be worth learning a Mid-Chart *system* (as opposed to bolt-on preempts)"). Even the Open+ chart is more available than old Mid-Chart games were.

 

The big keys were:

• moving from allowing bids to disallowing bids.
  
• removing effectively all restrictions starting with responder (which is something pretty much everywhere else was doing for years).

 

Because of the requirements (now, consistent across the ACBL rather than up to the unit or district to decide) that mean that "most" tournament players will be playing Open chart at least some of the time, most clubs I've heard about have decided to take the ACBL's suggestion and make their non-limited games Open Chart.

[sfi]

Fair enough. I didn't realise they had restrictions on two-level openings, but I'm happy to believe it.

 

Good to hear about the changes in the ACBL. I look forward to seeing it in action if/when I get back there.