BBO Discussion Forums: I need a new gadget after 1m 1nt - BBO Discussion Forums

Thanks Mike, I always appreciate your contributions.
Straight to the point but always thorough in your reasoning.

neilkaz, on 2014-May-11, 13:45, said:

You would think ´so but I was passed only yesterday after 1♠ - 1NT; 3♥ so you never know. 3♥+3 was not a resounding IMP success. Nonetheless is clear what to do here without special agreements.

Thinking about Timo's agreement a little I wonder why we do not use a simple ♥->♣ and ♠->♦ translation if giving up natural 2M rebids. That is, 1♦ - 1NT; 2♥ = strong, both minors and 1♦ - 1NT; 2♠ = strong 1-suiter. I have no idea if that would work in practise but it does not seem worse on first glance.

PhilKing, on 2014-May-12, 07:20, said:

Agreed, it is not so tough. But I would never play it like that. Well, at least not until I turn professional.

By the way, I think "preemptive" is not a good word. "Shape-showing with a min" is probably better. (I guess that's what you intend to make of the bid.)

gszes, on 2014-May-12, 11:53, said:

Probably - I can't find a single instance of this auction occurring naturally in top-level bridge.

Zelandakh, on 2014-May-13, 09:41, said:

I just love the way that a poster puts something in the I/A forum and in response to some help with a completely normal auction, gets suggestions about coded responses, transposing suits, and using a 2♣ rebid as artificial, with (presumably) a relay method of clarification, or of reversing into shortness.

I can just see an I/A player perusing these posts and thinking wtf are these people smoking?

Or even worse: yes, those are great ideas, and my partner and I will adopt them tomorrow.

If people want to discuss esoterica, and esoterica can be fun, start a new thread elsewhere.

mikeh, on 2014-May-13, 11:32, said:

Cmon Mike, I didn't wanna say anything but what you call "totally natural" is not anything better, if not worse.. I am talking about jump shifts in a minor by opener. This is the weakest area of so called "natural approach" admitted by almost all bridge world. We have no idea whether opener has 5-4 5-5 6-5 6-3 6-4 7-3 7-4 in the suits . Imho it is actually even harder continuation than 1m-1NT-2M being short. At least responder has an idea and has much more space to explore. It is actually very simple, all you do is to invert the 4 card M (which is often useless) and the ambiguous 3m with shortness. Not only that, with this method you eat the cake but also keep it due to the space gained. And can easily get the full shape before 3 NT where your so called natural approach will have no idea about the first 2 suits let alone the 3rd suit if they have one!

[removed] Funny as it is, only criticism you could come up with was "it will be forgotten" You are correct, however I do not think neither Zel nor me deserved the way you are replying. I mean..WHAT? Start a new thread somewhere else? Jesus ***** Christ, the OP asked a new gadget and some of us suggested one [removed] Or simply say that you do not like the suggestion which you said already in your first reply and get over it! You can of course reply more than once and disagree more than once, but come up with something [removed]

It is funny at best (to put it politely) to show the people door from the topic, when they merely did what EXACTLY OP asked them to do! I may even be convinced that the gadget suggested is not suitable for this level. And you have the capability as one of the most an intelligent players I had seen, expertise in English language, and the respect from all of us to express your disagreement much better than you just did.

This post has been edited by diana_eva: 2014-May-13, 13:00
Reason for edit: edited for content

Hey, Tino, calm down!

I didn't spend any time discussing the merits of your suggestion, nor have I spent any time thinking about them, and it may well be that the idea has great merit. However, as the OP noted, she either didn't know or didn't remember that in standard, for the last 40+ years or more, a jumpshift by opener is gf. IOW, while she was asking for a gadget, it wasn't because she needed one but because she wasn't then aware that no gadget was needed. Every I/A player in NA, who learned the game in the last 40 years or more has been taught, tho obviously may forget, that 3♣ was the correct call with the OP hand.

That was, imo, the advice that the OP ought to have been given by the more expert posters, and indeed that is the advice that she was given. Several posters went beyond that straightforward advice to offer esoteric alternatives in the context of an I/A forum. Personally, I think that that approach is counterproductive. I may be wrong. I do know that the statistics on BBF suggest that many players come to read and never post. I assume, quite possibly wrongly, that a lot of those players are beginners or I/A, and that they are genuinely looking for help appropriate to their level. My approach is, at least usually, to aim my comments to the level of the forum.

I happen to think that is how we more experienced players should post...by all means if you want, describe a pet gadget, but make sure it is described as such and not as a suggestion that an I/A player should adopt it.

You disagree. Fine. I respect that. My view isn't entitled to any special status: I'm just a guy trying to help as best as I can, and I have certainly made mistakes here and elsewhere and maybe I made another one. But I wasn't trying to put you or Zel down. Both of you are amongst my favourite posters

mikeh, on 2014-May-13, 14:24, said:

Aww thanks Mike, you made my day! You are right that I love discussing esoterica and unusual bidding ideas. Sometimes something genuinely useful comes from such discussions too. I also agree that either of these methods would be unsuitable for the OP but I think she is sensible enough to know this herself. I tried to phrase my reply to Timo as specifically only valid once it was decided to use a 2M rebid as not natural. And I did not take offence either - am well aware I sometimes go off at a weird tangent.

I was able to discuss this hand over a beer with my partner today. I said, we don't need the gadget I wanted to introduce, we only needed to bid this hand properly, 1♦ 1nt 3♣
To which he replied "if 3♣ is forcing". These "standard" but infrequent sequences are difficult to remember, my partner didn't remember to use the bid and I didn't realize
he had that bid available when I was reviewing the hand. Perhaps it is better to use an unusual sequence, such as Timo's suggested 1m 1N 2M. Hopefully as long as we remember to use it, the
other partner should be woken up by the unusual sequence. I'm not about to give up on the suggestion, I like systems and yes, sometimes that is to my detriment but for the most part we handle it well.

jillybean, on 2014-May-14, 19:46, said:

Yes. The most important thing is to have an agreement that you both understand and can remember. If you want to "invent the convention" that 3♣ is game forcing and naturalish and have that be what you remember, great (and you'll find many other play that convention too). If you want to agree to the Timo convention and can remember that, great. A number of people are down on "conventions" because they assume that the non-conventions are obvious and easy to remember. Clearly that isn't always so for everyone. As others have noted there are additional benefits to choosing the "standard" agreements as the ones you play (flexibility to play with others, they should mostly work, you can get better discussion of hands with other people who are used to standard auctions, they keep you with the field, they often don't need to be alerted, etc.), but that shouldn't mean it is the only thing you can do.

I don't think it is so difficult to remember. One principle is that a new suit at the 3-level in an uncontested auction never limits your hand. Another principle is that jump shifts are GF. Both principles lead to 3♣ being GF (or at least F1R). While this exact auction may be infrequent, jump shifts and new suit at the 3-level in general are quite frequent.

It also follows from the principle that unless the auction strongly suggests that we can't have game values, there must be a convenient way of bidding strong hands. Now if you have some generic force (for example the agreement that 2♥ is a generic force or w/e) you could play everything else as nonforcing. But if all bids are natural, 3♣ must be the way to bid an 18-21 hand with both minors which doesn't want to bypass 3NT.

1♦-1NT-3♣ was game forcing when I first learned rubber bridge by reading Goren in 1961, and it seems to me to be widely regarded as standard today. The thought that this could be too difficult to remember so rather we will remember that 1♦-1NT-2♥ is artificial and might show diamonds and clubs rather than diamonds and hearts, all to be sorted out later shows an enthusiasm for gadgets that I don't share.

I don't rule out the possibility that someone somewhere has an approach that is superior to playing 1♦-1NT-3♣ as game forcing. I do rule out the possibility that it would be easier to remember than the simple natural almost universally played approach of a gf 3♣.

Mike is, of course, right here.

This seems a little bit like someone trying to get to the other side of his backyard.

- He tried to use his car to get to the other side, but it was too big to fit in there and the car got damaged. So he has a problem.
- He asks for a gadget to get to the other side of his backyard.
- Crowds gather to suggest monorails, conveyor belts, cable cars and teleportation.
- Mike passes by and says: "Have you considered walking those few meters?".
- And the crowd says: "But he asked for a gadget!".

I agree with Mike that, though a gadget may have been asked for, gadgets should not play any part in the solution of this problem.

Rik

I hope it is reasonable to expand the question a bit. Memory problems can sometimes be addressed by having large coverage defaults. Fo example:

Lacking specific agreements to the contrary, opener's first rebid will always be natural. Since 1x-1y promises only 6 points, and even that promise is sometimes violated. a reverse or a jump shift has to be strong. The reverse is forcing for one round, the jump shift is forcing to game, the jump to 2NT is a balanced hand that is too strong to open 1NT but, given responder's possible weakness, it is passable. A jump rebid in opener's suit, 1x-1y-3x, is strong and invitational. This covers most hands that actually come up and works pretty well. There of course can be issues. Opener starts with 1♦, responder bids 1♠ and opener has a 16 count with a crappy suit. I guess it depends on how crappy, at least for me. Or, in the OP, it is not 100% that game can be made in anything, but 3♣ is gf. Nonetheless, it seems to me that this general approach has stood up well and a partner is going to have to come up with a real sales pitch to get me to abandon it. I think the most frequent place where opener finds himself having to fake it is with a strong hand and six good clubs. After 1♣-1♠ he may feel the hand is too good for 3♣ and make up a reverse into 2♦. Usually this works out, but it is not great.

A main point is that when we speak of responder's second bid, most pairs have an artifical gadget already in place, nmf, fsf, cbs, xyz, whatever and so it is far more likely that a jump in a new suit is played as invitational rather than forcing. These in-place gadgets are widely used and probably worth the cost (although watching vugraph there was an interesting discussion of the pluses and the minuses of fsf as usually played) so we are free to expand on that base. But at opener's second call there are not, for most pairs, a lot of gadgets in place. I am fine with this lack of gadgets, but that's me.

mikeh, on 2014-May-13, 14:24, said:

Yes, I disagree. You are putting I/A players down. I/A means looking for new ideas and better treatments, so this is the correct forum. If my feeling on what I/A means is wrong, then there needs to be a new forum between I/A and expert. The expert forum is deemed out of bounds to us by experts, so if we can't discuss ideas in this forum, where is there?

fromageGB, on 2014-May-19, 08:35, said:

Agreed. There is nothing wrong with playing some gadgets at an intermediate -> advanced. Like, if an intermediate pair wants to play transfer walsh with a short club and a 14-16 NT is that REALLY a bridge to far?