[Liversidge]

I have found a number of sources that give a reason for playing low to encourage (why waste a potentially useful card) but none in defense of normal attitude signals. There must be good reasons or playing low to encourage would not be called "reverse" attitude signalling. Could someone enlighten me please.

[1eyedjack]

Bridge is quite a mature game. When it was invented not a lot of thought went into the relative merits of high v low to encourage from a theoretical viewpoint, and more focus was placed on signals being arranged so that an encouraging signal was more likely to be noticed by a partner who was "observationally challenged".

Disregarding the significance of a high card being potentially "active", it is certainly more noticeable than a low card to a partner who may have a tendency to be unobservant.

While a defender may be actively seeking a signal when he leads (say) an Ace or King, he may not be paying quite so close attention to (eg) your discards on declarer's lead. Likewise it is by no means certain that you have any particular desire to encourage anywhere, in which case it is more natural, if lazy, to follow or discard from the bottom up.
So at its inception it was probably natural to gravitate to high encourage. That therefore became the de facto standard, and the reverse became, the, er, reverse.

A respectable proportion of the time a defender does not need to see a signal from partner in order to know what to do next. And if the natural inclination when not signalling is to play low, then there is a certain sense here in making high to signal interest as being the exceptional treatment and most likely to be noticed.

And to be frank I don't think that the theoretical advantages of low to encourage are more than pretty marginal. Otherwise, as you say, the high-encourage camp would not have lasted long.

Nor is it conclusive that low to encourage is always best. If you google for Skanian defensive signalling methods, there are some situations where high to encourage is superior. Skanian codified the circumstances, so that depending on those circumstances you played a mix of high or low to encourage accordingly.

[Liversidge]

Many thanks. Makes a lot of sense. I am a novice and play with several partners at different social level clubs. One occasional partner plays at a higher level than the rest of us and has asked me to play reverse attitude signals. I will point out to him that although his logic is sound for regular partners who play a lot and stay focussed, he may well have cause to regret asking someone like myself!

[TylerE]

 1eyedjack, on 2014-February-15, 13:13, said:

And to be frank I don't think that the theoretical advantages of low to encourage are more than pretty marginal.

Maybe so, but the gain is certainly non-zero and you'd be hard pressed to find many other ways in this game to get free matchpoints. Even if it only gains one match point every 5th session (and I suspect it is worth a bit more than that), that's essentially free since the extra mental effort is zero after a short adaption period.

[paulg]

 Liversidge, on 2014-February-15, 14:55, said:

Many thanks. Makes a lot of sense. I am a novice and play with several partners at different social level clubs. One occasional partner plays at a higher level than the rest of us and has asked me to play reverse attitude signals. I will point out to him that although his logic is sound for regular partners who play a lot and stay focussed, he may well have cause to regret asking someone like myself!

I think most inexperienced players find that the first time they play reverse signals it goes well, but the second time ...

[ArtK78]

I have played upside down count and attitude signals since the 1970s. I have not regretted the change from standard signals.

There was an article many years ago in The Bridge World in which three Martians came to Earth and found an Earthling to complete a foursome for bridge. There was only minimal discussion of methods before they started to play. The Earthling and his Martian partner had a disaster because the Martian assumed that they were playing upside down signals. The Martian commented that it was only logical.

Quite frankly, I agree. I cannot recall experiencing any situation in which I would have preferred to be playing "standard" signals other than those random occurrences where the rank of your singleton makes it clear to partner that you have a singleton.

[mikeh]

'Standard' signalling is far, far older than the game of bridge, even bearing in mind that there were a number of versions of bridge before contract bridge was invented in the 1920's. Whist players used signals. I'm not sure when signalling became accepted as part of the game of whist, since there was definitely a tradition that one shouldn't use 'artificial' methods, such as signalling, to convey information, but whist was around in the 1700s.

I have played upside down (or reverse) signals for many years, but occasionally play Saturday night social team games with players who are more comfortable with 'standard', and my perception is that there is very little difference in outcome, while still being firmly of the belief that upside down is undoubtedly technically best.

By analogy: say you saw a line of play that would work 40% of the time, and an alternate that would work 42% of the time. In the real world, assuming you chose one line and your opp at the other table the other, it is very close to a toss up as to who wins. But in the long run, it is inarguably best to consistently take the 42% line.

There will always be hands on which you wish you played the other way around. Playing standard signals, you may be unable to pitch from the suit you want, so you have to play a discouraging signal in another suit, and you hold 987, with lots of small spots missing from view. Or you want to encourage but you hold AQ32 behind dummy's K, so your 3 looks like a small card. However, you can 'reverse' these problems quite easily...whatever method you use, you will occasionally hold cards where your methods aren't going to be easily understood.

My experience, by the way, is that for most people, once they play 3 or 4 sessions in a row or rapid succession with upside down signals, the memory problem tends to go away. The barrier to adoption isn't as high as people fear it is.

[nige1]

An argument for reverse attitude is that a low card in a suit that you like is usually less costly than a high card in that suit; whereas you can often spare a high card from a suit that you don't like. But you may feel it's more important to play the same way as others in your group. Bridge-teachers seem to wedded to their county's traditional methods, even when they're rarely played even by fellow nationals. A pity, IMO, now that so many learners are practising on-line. In the UK, for example, teachers might usefully switch from old-fashioned Acol to 2/1 or Precision (or at least try a modern version of Acol).

This post has been edited by nige1: 2014-February-17, 18:45

[1eyedjack]

 TylerE, on 2014-February-17, 10:18, said:

Maybe so, but the gain is certainly non-zero and you'd be hard pressed to find many other ways in this game to get free matchpoints. Even if it only gains one match point every 5th session (and I suspect it is worth a bit more than that), that's essentially free since the extra mental effort is zero after a short adaption period.

So by that argument, why not go the extra mile, and take the tiny but free incremental benefit that Skanian signals provide by codifying and adopting the particular occasions when in the long term high encouraging provides a technical edge? Maybe you normally do, but have an eye to the fact that we are posting in the beginner forum? I can certainly agree with that.

[Mbodell]

 nige1, on 2014-February-17, 12:02, said:

An argument for reverse attitude is that a low card in a suit that you like is usually less costly than a high card in a suit that you don't like. But you may feel it's more important to play the same way as others in your group. Bridge-teachers seem to wedded to their county's traditional methods, even when they're rarely played even by fellow nationals. A pity, IMO, now that so many learners are practising on-line. In the UK, for example, teachers might usefully switch from old-fashioned Acol to 2/1 or Precision (or at least try a modern version of Acol).

I think it is worth thinking about discards separate from following suit. I think standard attitude discards make most sense (I mostly want to discourage by pitching small cards in suits I don't like), while upside down attitude when following suit makes the most sense (I want to keep the high cards in suits I like).

[mycroft]

Oddly enough, I can play reverse attitude without a problem, but inevitably when I play reverse count it takes forever to get me into it, and I don't think I ever had it without a hitch. I've played "reverse attitude only" in more than one partnership, specifically because of this.

There shouldn't be a reason why reverse count is any harder than standard; but for many people, me included, it is.

[sfi]

 Liversidge, on 2014-February-15, 10:54, said:

I have found a number of sources that give a reason for playing low to encourage (why waste a potentially useful card) but none in defense of normal attitude signals. There must be good reasons or playing low to encourage would not be called "reverse" attitude signalling. Could someone enlighten me please.

There are a number of situations, but the most obvious one is something like this:

---

West leads a top honour. Playing reverse signals there is no way for East to avoid blowing a trick. This is easily fixed by agreeing to play standard signals when leading a high honour and dummy only has small cards in the suit.

Another situation is leading this suit against NT:

---

Low encourage blocks the suit, while high encourage allows E-W to cash 5 tricks. This type of situation requires more thought to identify and resolve, and probably not worth worrying about in a casual partnership.

[ArtK78]

In response to sfi's latest post.

Playing the correct card based on the situation is more important than playing the correct "signal." So, regardless of what your carding agreements are, you must play the ♠2 on your first hand and any heart other than the 4 on your second hand (I would recommend the 10).

Partner may not read the situation correctly, but at least you don't blow a trick by woodenly signalling.

[1eyedjack]

I don't think sfi was advocating throwing a trick in favour of an accurate signal. He was simply providing, as requested, example hands where low encourage (or high discourage) would cost were you to signal.

[sfi]

Indeed - I was just answering the question since nobody else had actually done so. In the first example my partner actually tried the 10 which seemed as good as anything. Sadly he really did have the 2 so couldn't even play his spot card in hopes that I wouldn't be able to read it as low. In the second case I think the 8 has the best chance of letting partner read it, but definitely you need to play one of the top cards.

But Art's point is one worth noting. All signalling methods have lose cases, one shouldn't signal at the cost of a trick, and it's worth knowing what those are for your chosen methods.

[ArtK78]

But those losing cases are random events - more clearly seen when your singleton is either high or low and can be read as a singleton in one signalling method but not in the other. One has to dismiss those random events when evaluating the value of a signalling method as long as the random events are equally distributed. I suppose one could invent a signalling system that had so many unreadable situations that it would make the method unusable. When comparing "standard" signalling methods with upside down signalling methods, the random events are more or less equally distributed.

[wank]

people who play reverse tend to be more militant about it than those who play standard, so take their opinions with a pinch of salt. those with a sense of personal superiority, justified or not, are those most likely to eschew a majority position.

Better? when you're encouraging reverse is obviously better because you keep your high cards whilst throwing a low one to signal. similarly, when you're discouraging standard is obviously better because you retain your high cards when you throw a low one to signal. so which one to keep?

Encouraging: the suit you want to encourage will often be your longest, so you will have more options, for example, if you have AQ962, playing standard, you can choose to signal with the 9 or 6 to encourage depending how important the 9 seems, based on dummy, declarer's bidding, etc. the longer and stronger the suit is, and the more seriously you want to encourage the suit, the more options you will have for which card to signal with and the very fact it's your strong suit means it will often be be quite painless to lose a high card - discarding the 9 from AKJ92 will not normally be an issue for example.

Discouraging: as a defender you're often reacting to declarer, trying to keep your defensive stops, etc. i think protecting your short suit holdings is normally more important than having the 4th round winner in a suit. Sfi's example with JTx opposite AKx is the classic example of why using a high card to signal from a weak suit can be catastrophic.

this is not 'random'.

by the way, amongst the best players who do play reverse, they often still play standard in certain situations - trick 1 for example. you may or not think it's worth it to change your methods through the hand based on such factors.

[1eyedjack]

 wank, on 2014-February-18, 11:45, said:

people who play reverse tend to be more militant about it than those who play standard, so take their opinions with a pinch of salt.

I don’t disagree with the rest of your post, but out of interest how do you justify discounting the weight given to an opinion backed by conviction, compared with one who admits to having no particular strong feelings? I would have thought that a passionately held view should, on balance, add gravitas. Sure there are exceptions, but numbers ...

[Liversidge]

 1eyedjack, on 2014-February-18, 13:42, said:

I don’t disagree with the rest of your post, but out of interest how do you justify discounting the weight given to an opinion backed by conviction, compared with one who admits to having no particular strong feelings? I would have thought that a passionately held view should, on balance, add gravitas. Sure there are exceptions, but numbers ...

I have been reading a book called "Bridge - common mistakes and how to avoid them" by Andrew Robson, who is widely regarded as the best British Bridge player around (Silver medal in the World Individual Championships). I have just got to the back page, headed "A new simple signalling idea", where he strongly encourages players with regular partners to embrace reverse attitude signals.

As for the "New..." the book was published in 2005.

[mikeh]

 wank, on 2014-February-18, 11:45, said:

people who play reverse tend to be more militant about it than those who play standard, so take their opinions with a pinch of salt. those with a sense of personal superiority, justified or not, are those most likely to eschew a majority position.

The vast majority of bridge players start with standard. It thus becomes the default approach for players who are too lazy to think about the issue, or who see that there may be merit in switching but don't think it is worth the effort, or who think that their partners won't want to do it.

Those who change are almost by definition going to be mostly players who like to think about the game and are prepared to invest effort into improving their game.

It is thus inevitable that those who adopt upside down signals will, on balance, feel more strongly about their choice than those who, in reality, have never made a choice.

No beginner ever makes an informed decision to play standard rather than reverse: they are taught standard, and the very term we use to describe this approach is evidence of that.

Your argument is therefore incorrect.