[straube]

shevek, on Feb 3 2009, 10:49 PM, said:

We play the same opening, though it's 10-14 & can't be 5-5 (open 2♣)
Perhaps better is to open 1♠ with these but that's not clear and maybe illegal where you live.

We use symmetric relay over our 2♦, and all our limit openings, so

2♥  13+ near GF
2♠  constructive
2NT  11-13 inv
3♣  constructive (there is a case for this to show 5+♥s)
3♦  invite
3♥+  fit-showing

2♦  2♥

2♠  & 4♣s
2NT  6+ ♦s, high shortage
3♣  middle shortage
3♦  semi-balanced (3-2-6-2 or 2-2-7-2)
3♥  3-3-6-2
3♠  3+2-7-1
3NT  3-3-7-0

Then middle shortage drops in at 3♥ with 3-1-6-3.
High shortage via 3♦ with 2-2-6-3 & 2-3-6-2

2 suited structure is longer. Getting bored now ...

That's really similar to the structure I just posted. The main difference is that I used 2N as a forcing bid. I think I like 2S as invitational but nf.

[kenrexford]

If the idea is for 1♦ to guarantee a 4-card major, then that tightens up options. That does not eliminate options. Two more questions...

1. What is 1♣?
2. How is 2♣ played?

[straube]

Kenrexford,

1C is strong, 15+
2C shows 6 clubs or 5 clubs and 4 diamonds, no major. We have similar problems over 2C, but partner doesn't mind giving up a 2D asking bid there.

I posed this question to the group for two primary reasons. One is to see ideas for good but not too complicated (mine may be too complicated) artificial continuations. The other is to get a sense of the group as to whether 2H and 2S can be invitational or constructive but nf responses to 2D.

Do you think that partner's desire to make these responses nf is workable?
Are nf 2M responses sufficiently winning that one would be willing to play 3C as the first forcing response?

[jtfanclub]

How about....

2M = NF, lightly invitational.
2NT = Semi-Relay to 3♣
3♣ = Shows 5+ Hearts, Strongly Invitational (can rebid 3♦, but can't pass).
3♦ = Shows 5+ Spades, Strongly Invitational.
3♥/3♠ Invitational with 6 card suit.
3NT = To play
4♣ = Gerber! j/k
4♦ = Pre-emptive

2♦-2NT
3♣-3♦ Invitational hand.

2♦-2NT
3♣-3♥/3♠ GF with 5.

2♦-2NT
3♦ Club shortness, and therefore 6++ diamonds. (almost always 7+)

2♦-2NT
3♣-3NT Club length, choice of games.

2♦-2NT
3♣-4♣ Natural, invitational.

Main problem is that you lose the natural pre-empts of 3♣ and 3♦ and there's no good way to invite with clubs.

[kenrexford]

Let me see if I have this right. You are wanting to use a strong 1♣ approach with five-card majors and weak two-bids in the majors. You are sacrificing 2NT for minor two-suiters, which is a common tweak and workable.

The wrinkle is the 1♦ opening. Essentially, a 1♦ opening is an artificial opening showing a hand where with canape openings you would open 1♥ or 1♠, with the possible canape exception that the hand is actually balanced of some range that is not appropriate for a 1NT opening.

To accomplish that goal, you have a problem with minor-oriented hands. You essentially cover these with 2♣ and 2♦ openings that show usually 6+ in the opened minor (but no 4-card major) or longer in the opened minor with a 4-card holding in the other minor, the "problem hand."

I mean, it works OK, but why not just commit? Why pussy-foot around where you know that you want to go? Make that canape commitment. I think you are probably caught either in a situation where one of you wants to play canape and the other is hesitant or you both perhaps are inclined to play canape without even realizing it.

Sure, you can duct-tape the 2♦ opening and make it work better, but I think you need a reality check here. You think canape, so play canape.

Alternatively, there is yet another duct-tape cure possible (from experience with canape I know this). Make 1♦ your opening bid. Dropping the catch-all one level, to 1♣, gives you just enough room to unwind minors better.

If, for example, 2♦ showed long diamonds, period, and 2♣ showed both minors (2♦ asking bid), then 1♣ could also show "just clubs." A simple "what next," for illustration purposes only (there has to be better), is to -1 every normal call. If Responder would normally bid 1♠ in response to a 1♦ opening, he bids 1♥ in response to a 1♣ opening. Opener then has one more space available, with which he could for instance bid the otherwise-impossible 1♠ to show the club one-suiter. In other words, if you drop the 1♦ opening to 1♣, you gain one more space for one more meaning. This fails when competition enters, somewhat, but the principle still exists somewhat.

All that said, just go canape like I know you want.

[straube]

jtfanclub, on Feb 5 2009, 01:24 PM, said:

2♦-2NT
3♣-3♦  Invitational hand. 

2♦-2NT
3♣-3♥/3♠  GF with 5.

2♦-2NT
3♦  Club shortness, and therefore 6++ diamonds. (almost always 7+)

2♦-2NT
3♣-3NT  Club length, choice of games.

2♦-2NT
3♣-4♣  Natural, invitational. 

Main problem is that you lose the natural pre-empts of 3♣ and 3♦ and there's no good way to invite with clubs.

Thanks for the suggestion. Do you mean that 2D-3D (showing spades, invite) would show diamond tolerance?

Yes, the main problem we have designing a structure for this is not knowing whether opener has clubs or not. It's possible to find out if partner has a GF hand (and if the structure is arranged for this), but difficult if responder has GI or less.

[kenrexford]

One key to handling any situation when the asker is INV+ is to structure Opener's rebids in such a way as to allow escapes when escapes are warranted. For example, if 2♦-P-2♥ is an asking bid, Opener's responses should never exceed a safety level in the INV event.

When I play 2♦ as minors, 2♠ and 2NT cover many INV hands. 2♥ handles GF hands, INV hands with a minor fit, or INV hands with hearts. Thus, Opener bids:

2♠ = Min with three spades (below 2NT)
2NT = Min with no major (passable and below 3♣)
3♣ = min with hearts (can still get to 3♣ or 3♦ signoffs, not bypassing 2NT unless ability to support the heart INV situation)

See?

Similarly, you would want to define first of all when the asking bid will actually be INV only and then tailor Opener's rebids accordingly. Sometimes, you might invert meanings because of this concern. For example, you might have 3♥ show a spade frag and 3♠ show a heart frag, simply because Responder might want to pass 3♥ with long hearts and INV (even opposite shortness) and because 3♠ forcing to 4♥ to play hearts is OK when Opener has support in hearts.

The other thing is to then go back to see if the gap INV hands can better be handled. FOr example, a 3♦ call might serve some weird meaning, simply because of a problem holding.

[jtfanclub]

straube, on Feb 5 2009, 04:32 PM, said:

Thanks for the suggestion. Do you mean that 2D-3D (showing spades, invite) would show diamond tolerance?

You have two invitational bids for spades- 2♠ and 3♦. I prefer to separate them out for strong and weak invites, but you could always have no tolerence and tolerence instead. I usually prefer to disguise a misfit- if partner bids 3♦ and I pass, I'd rather not know about the misfit until the hands come down.

[straube]

kenrexford, on Feb 5 2009, 01:41 PM, said:

Let me see if I have this right.  You are wanting to use a strong 1♣ approach with five-card majors and weak two-bids in the majors.  You are sacrificing 2NT for minor two-suiters, which is a common tweak and workable.

The wrinkle is the 1♦ opening.  Essentially, a 1♦ opening is an artificial opening showing a hand where with canape openings you would open 1♥ or 1♠, with the possible canape exception that the hand is actually balanced of some range that is not appropriate for a 1NT opening.

To accomplish that goal, you have a problem with minor-oriented hands.  You essentially cover these with 2♣ and 2♦ openings that show usually 6+ in the opened minor (but no 4-card major) or longer in the opened minor with a 4-card holding in the other minor, the "problem hand."

I mean, it works OK, but why not just commit?  Why pussy-foot around where you know that you want to go?  Make that canape commitment.  I think you are probably caught either in a situation where one of you wants to play canape and the other is hesitant or you both perhaps are inclined to play canape without even realizing it.

Sure, you can duct-tape the 2♦ opening and make it work better, but I think you need a reality check here.  You think canape, so play canape.

Alternatively, there is yet another duct-tape cure possible (from experience with canape I know this).  Make 1♦ your opening bid.  Dropping the catch-all one level, to 1♣, gives you just enough room to unwind minors better.

If, for example, 2♦ showed long diamonds, period, and 2♣ showed both minors (2♦ asking bid), then 1♣ could also show "just clubs."  A simple "what next," for illustration purposes only (there has to be better), is to -1 every normal call.  If Responder would normally bid 1♠ in response to a 1♦ opening, he bids 1♥ in response to a 1♣ opening.  Opener then has one more space available, with which he could for instance bid the otherwise-impossible 1♠ to show the club one-suiter.  In other words, if you drop the 1♦ opening to 1♣, you gain one more space for one more meaning.  This fails when competition enters, somewhat, but the principle still exists somewhat.

All that said, just go canape like I know you want.

Our first consideration is to play a strong club. We also like 5-card majors, though. I admit that our structure has similarities to canape, but that's not why we came up with this in the first place. Our goal was to not make it easy for the opponents to overcall a major (at the 1 level) unless we also had sufficient interest in a major suit fit.

I don't, for example, like opening 1D with Kx xxx AQxx Kxxx.

If partner has a 4-card major, he'll offer it and I'll decline to raise...and in the meantime, we leave lots of room for the opponents.

So that's the thinking behind this. That we're able to canape is secondary, but is useful. So are auctions like

1D-1H, 2D as strong raise

and 1D-1S, 1N-4H where responder might have 4 spades and 6 hearts.

It also helps in competition. We've had auctions go...

1D P 1H (1S)
dbl (2S) ?

where responder was aware that the opponents were competing in a 7-card fit and that we had only a 7-card fit as well.

Or, sometimes in competition, we choose to compete in a 4-3 fit that others might not find. Like if it goes...

1D dbl (1N) 2H
P P ?

responder might look at his hand and decide that opener must have four spades.

Of course, those are some of the better things. I'm aware of disadvantages and one of those is opening 2D when we're not sure if opener has six diamonds or 5 diamonds and 4 clubs. I don't think the bid is sound, but partner points out that many of our matchpoint victories are after the 2D opening bid.

Anyway, that's some background on what we're doing and why. I've been interested in playing other structures, but partner is not interested and wants to fix our 2D opening. I'd like the discussion to stay on the 2D opening as much as possible. I know that other people play an almost identical 2D opening and they're probably having difficulties with it, too.

[mycroft]

In the original and a couple of the others, I see no place for GF/SI Diamond raise. I know the death of the minor suit has been predicted for 40 years, but face it, these bids suck. The only reason we're playing them is that having holes for opening-strength hands, or munging them in somewhere else (a more ambiguous 1D? Traditional Precision 2D?) sucks harder. But, there are two situations where having made the call, you're seriously ahead of the game: finding the "diamonds + stoppers" 3NT and minor suit slams. If you give all your advantage on one of those situations back by not having a call for it, it doesn't lessen the suck...

I don't know the answer to this (I play extended Precision 2D); but the 2NT puppet (or maybe 2NT, 3D transfers a la Rubensohl) sounds like a good start.

[awm]

My experience is that we do better with 2M as forcing.

It is very difficult to know when to pass these non-forcing bids. Should opener pass with singleton (could be 5-1 fit)? Should opener pass with three (could be nine-card fit and easy game)? Should opener pass with a max and doubleton (what if partner has invite)? It seems that the only really good time to pass is with two cards in the major and a minimum, but in this case you will normally have six diamonds (assuming 2254 usually opens 1NT) and it's easy to imagine that 2♦ outplays 2M even at MP scoring.

On the other hand, playing 2M as forcing makes things quite easy, and you can even play a very natural (non-relay) structure with good success.

[straube]

awm, on Feb 5 2009, 07:28 PM, said:

My experience is that we do better with 2M as forcing.

It is very difficult to know when to pass these non-forcing bids. Should opener pass with singleton (could be 5-1 fit)? Should opener pass with three (could be nine-card fit and easy game)? Should opener pass with a max and doubleton (what if partner has invite)? It seems that the only really good time to pass is with two cards in the major and a minimum, but in this case you will normally have six diamonds (assuming 2254 usually opens 1NT) and it's easy to imagine that 2♦ outplays 2M even at MP scoring.

On the other hand, playing 2M as forcing makes things quite easy, and you can even play a very natural (non-relay) structure with good success.

Right. If 2M shows 5 then it's hard to know when to pass. If one restrict's 2M to only invitational hands then the bid comes up less often than if it were invitational or better. So it comes up less and is frequently the wrong contract.

I'd thought about switching the meanings of 2H and 2S so that we could still play 2S sometimes...2D-2H, 2S=minimum, doubleton. If 2H were natural, 2D-2H, 2S may not have a great natural utility.

I think I could play 2M as forcing and showing the major suits, but then what would the rest of the structure look like?

[straube]

mycroft, on Feb 5 2009, 06:49 PM, said:

In the original and a couple of the others, I see no place for GF/SI Diamond raise.  I know he death of the minor suit has been predicted for 40 years, but face it, these bids suck.  The only reason we're playing them is that having holes for opening-strength hands, or munging them in somewhere else (a more ambiguous 1D? Traditional Precision 2D?) sucks harder.  But, there are two situations where having made the call, you're seriously ahead of the game: finding the "diamonds + stoppers" 3NT and minor suit slams.  If you give all your advantage on one of those situations back by not having a call for it, it doesn't lessen the suck...

I don't know the answer to this (I play extended Precision 2D); but the 2NT puppet (or maybe 2NT, 3D transfers a la Rubensohl) sounds like a good start.

I like the idea of a forcing diamond raise. I play a different system with another partner in which 2D promises 6 diamonds...and denies a major but not clubs. It's far easier to develop continuations for this because we have an anchor suit...we can always tough it out in 3D if we can't find a better fit. In this context, we use a 2H relay and then we've agreed that 3M are spinters...I guess we don't have a club splinter.

[straube]

cwiggins said:

Suppose you are playing that 2m shows 11-15 HCP, an unbalanced hand, and no 4-card major. I.e. you are either 1-suited in a minor (6+ long; other suits shorter than 4) or 2-suited with both minors (5+/4+).

What responses do you recommend?

What do you do with 5-5 in the minors? Do you open 2C or 2D? Do you use 2NT for minimum hands and 2m with better than minimum?

Angelina-Sementa's WBF convention card gives this as their response scheme

Over 2C:
2D = Relay
2M = Not forcing
2N = limit raise of clubs
3C = weak
3D = 5+ hearts and 5+ spades. Invitational or better.
3M = weak
3N = To play

Over the 2D relay:
2M = Minimum with 3 cards in bid suit and 4 diamonds
2N = Maximum with 4 diamonds
3C = 6+ clubs
3D = 6 clubs, 4 diamonds, maximum


Over 2D:
2M = Not forcing
2N = Relay
3C = 5+ hearts and 5+ spades. Invitational or better.
3D/3H/3S = Weak
3N = To play

Over 2N:
3C = 4+, minimum
3D = 6+
3M = 3-cards in bid major, 4 clubs, maximum

It feels like better schemes must exist. Perhaps:
- Make 2M forcing one round?
- Over 2D, make 2H a relay and 2N = 5+ hearts, forcing one round?

But I don't have any experience to judge what's important and what's not.

Thanks for any help you can provide.

I hope you don't mind, but your question was similar to one I asked recently and I wanted to add your structure to this thread.

[dake50]

Seems 3 problems constructively: 3NT, 4M, 5D or 5C. Slam if 'super' answer to any problem. 2M as stop, advance cue or 5-suit starts each on the right foot.