[bill1157]

A new partner wants to play precision with all 2 level openings in a suit weak, 1♦ opening shows all unbalanced hands without a 5 card major; 1NT 12-15 all balanced hands including 5-3-3-2.

Any thoughts?

[whereagles]

I thought about that myself. Would go as far as making 1NT 12-14 and lower the hcps for 1♣ to 15. I believe it's very playable and can put a serious dent over 4th player. For instance:

1♦ (1x/dbl) 3♣ = at least 3-3 minors, pass or correct, to play at this level.

and now 4th player has a hell of time coming in.

The lowering of 1♣ to 16+ or bal 15+ is ok when it comes to penalty doubling because a flat 15 is normally a good hand to defend with anyway.

[kenrexford]

Unbalanced hands with no 5-card major would include, presumably, any 4-by-one, minor two-suiters, minor one-suiters, and hands that look like major-minor canape hands (longer in minor). I think it is probably doable, having played something similar to that in the context of a strange early canape system.

The key is obviously in the unwind, especially in comp. When we dealt with this before, we teetered between 1♣ and 1♦ as the strong opening bid, becuase that one smidge of level really helped with the multi one-bid (opening 1♣ as the omni-unbalanced intermediate). Of course, this cramped strong 1♦ openings a tad, but the payoff seemed to favor the 1♣ opening for the omni-int hands.

You might consider some self-protection when the vulnerability is bad, such as opening a few intermediates when Red on White, mostly to protect against the interference that is so juicy for the Opps. The problem hands to deal with in this context, IMO, are the major-minor canape hands.

So, if I were to go back to this route, I'd likely make 1♦ the strong artificial opening, and I'd have a red-v-white 2♣ and 2♦ opening structure (only at these colors), probablly with 2♣ showing 5+♦/4♥ and 2♦ 5+♦/4♠. This would purify a 1♣ opening as showing minors, 4-by-1, or either minor (without a major), or clubn-major canape (in other words, usually clubs).

I might even toss in a weakish minors 2NT to take off a few more pounds from the burden of the omni minor.

[Gerben42]

Has been done before, for example in the system Oltbrink.

[Dirk Kuijt]

Marshall Miles latest book, "My System: the Unbalanced Diamond" is based on ideas like this.

[akhare]

What is the rest of the system? If it looks anything like Miles' system, my reaction would echo that of forum regular who put it rather succinctly when told that someone was playing the system -- "Why??!!!" .

It seems to be a significant improvement to take some pressure off the bid by offloading some hands to 2♣ / 2♦ natural, showing 6+ in the bid suit.

You can optionally include 4 card side suit in 2♣ / 2♦ as well, which might make the 1♦ opening even easier to handle.

Otherwise, good luck trying to figure out whether you have a one, two or three suited hand in competition...

[the hog]

bill1157, on Mar 21 2010, 02:56 AM, said:

A new partner wants to play precision with all 2 level openings in a suit weak, 1♦ opening shows all unbalanced hands without a 5 card major; 1NT 12-15 all balanced hands including 5-3-3-2.

Any thoughts?

Has also been done before in the original version of Symmetric relay. (The 1D opening I mean, not including 5332Ms in 1NT, but I don't see this as a problem. Also 6 card minor s/s hands were opened with 2C/2D).

I remember speaking to Stephen Burgess about this opening once and I said I thought it included too many shapes. he disagreed and said this was a real winner.

[spotlight7]

Hi:

Whatever floats your boat is ok to play. If you want to get better results, you seem to be going against your chosen Precision style bidding methods.

Precision tends to limit bids. One non club bid shows less than 16.

Most Precision players now play 2C openings that show 6+ clubs. Polish club players normally admit that the Polish 2C opening(that might be only 5 cards) is a weak link in the system.

I fairly recently came over to the Dark Side and now open most 10 counts in my Big Club based system.

One problem with Precision is that minimum balanced NT hands after 1C cause you to overbid or play a wide range NT rebid.

Playing a 14-16NT plays very well in a Precision base. You get to bid 1C-1D-1NT with 17-19 and you can open 2NT with 20-22(-)

Regards,
Robert

[bill1157]

Having 2♣ and 2♦ as weak 2's would take some pressure off the 1♦ opening. Also I am right now watching board 19 in the spingold where a weak 2 club would direct a lead to beat 3NT ...

[glen]

bill1157, on Mar 21 2010, 04:31 PM, said:

Having 2♣ and 2♦...I am right now watching board 19 in the spingold where a weak 2 club would direct a lead to beat 3NT ...

You mean a 2nd seat, red vs. white, 5 card weak two bid with a side four card major?

[bill1157]

glen, on Mar 21 2010, 04:33 PM, said:

bill1157, on Mar 21 2010, 04:31 PM, said:

Having 2♣ and 2♦...I am right now watching board 19 in the spingold where a weak 2 club would direct a lead to beat 3NT ...

You mean a 2nd seat, red vs. white, 5 card weak two bid with a side four card major?

yes

[straube]

bill1157, on Mar 21 2010, 04:31 PM, said:

Having 2♣ and 2♦ as weak 2's would take some pressure off the 1♦ opening. Also I am right now watching board 19 in the spingold where a weak 2 club would direct a lead to beat 3NT ...

Having weak 2C and 2D puts more pressure on 1D not less.

You're also putting more pressure on your 1N which is a four-pt range instead of the more common 3-pt range. Some would say (others would differ) that your 1C has more pressure because it handles 16 pt balanced hands. Some play 1C is 16 unbalanced or 17 balanced.

You haven't described your 1D rebids after 1M response. What do you bid after
1D-1S for instance? And after your rebid, how does responder invite and force? How do things proceed in a sensible way?

Does a 1N rebid handle everything with spade shortness? How do you show a 5m/5m? Do you open that 2N? Do you jump rebid to 3C? Does a 2C rebid show 6 clubs or a 5m/5m?

I think you need to tell us more about your structure.

Whatever it is, there's no way your constructive bidding will be as sound. Whether having a 2C and 2D preempt is worth that loss is something you'd have to test at the table. Personally, I think it's a big loss, but perhaps you'll find out differently.

[Free]

I've played that for a while, 1♦ showing "any 10-15 without 5M". This may mess up opps bidding if they're not prepared. I remember opening 1♦ with a 4=3=0=6 and opps didn't have a ♦ bid available as they considered the ♦ opening natural.

Our responses were quite simple:
1♥ = natural or INV+ relay
1♠ = natural, F1
1NT = NF
2X = NF
2NT = both minors, weak
3X = NF
...

We had a full relay scheme after 1♦-1♥, so the strong options were ok. When opps intervene however, it's much more difficult. It's been a very long time, so I don't remember exactly, but 2nd hand intervention was the most difficult part of the system.

The biggest advantage is that you have 2m openings available for weak openings. I've played 2m as weak with at least 4-4 m-M. Was a lot of fun, although very agressive!
Btw, you even have your 1NT opening free. As we didn't find a decent meaning within the regulations, we decided to just play 10-12 balanced...

[JmBrPotter]

Bill,

Yes, the general idea you mention is playable. The comments about switching your strong opening to 1♦ have merit, especially if you wil play in ACBL sanctioned events. If 1♦ is 15+, you may use a waiting bid, negative response, or positive response over both 1♣ and 1♦. That flexibility may help. If you keep 1♣ strong, an artifical 1♥ response to 1♦ must show game forcing values to comply with the ACBL General Convention Chart.

I've applied similar ideas to a system with 1♥ and 1♠ openings less limited than normal Precision practice. It seems to work well so far.

[akhare]

JmBrPotter, on Mar 22 2010, 07:55 PM, said:

Bill,

Yes, the general idea you mention is playable. The comments about switching your strong opening to 1♦ have merit, especially if you wil play in ACBL sanctioned events.

Despite the fact that there are many viable strong 1♦ systems out there, the thought of it makes me cringe.

It's probably the symmetric relay element of my brain whispering at the wasted all important step -- "the horror, the horror" ..

[awm]

I don't really think this is a good method. The biggest problems are going to be in competitive sequences, where you can't raise opener's unknown minor nor make any particularly useful assumptions about opener's shape. Marshall Miles' system includes this exact 1♦ opening and it does not work well for him at all when it comes up.

With that said, if your gains from freeing up 2♣/2♦ are sufficiently large the tradeoff might be a win. However, I don't think natural weak twos have sufficient frequency to compensate, and the assumed fit type preempts which are more frequent seem more randomizing (i.e. a lot of wins, a lot of losses, net wins minus losses not really that high).

[JmBrPotter]

awm, on Mar 22 2010, 08:35 PM, said:

I don't really think this is a good method. The biggest problems are going to be in competitive sequences, where you can't raise opener's unknown minor nor make any particularly useful assumptions about opener's shape. Marshall Miles' system includes this exact 1♦ opening and it does not work well for him at all when it comes up.

Adam,

You are quite correct about competitive auctions over 1♣ and 1♦ being the principle problem. We're working on it. Now, at the one-level, we abandon artificial methods and switch to a "colors first" natural approach. At the two-level and three-level, we use Lebenshol. Above the three-level, we treat the situation as if bidding over an opening preempt.

Since the 1♣ and 1♦ opening in our methods partition hands hands stronger that 10-13 balanced and unbalanced hands too strong (or too un-one-suited) for a weak two opening bid between the two openings (1♦ getting only 15+ hands and 1♣ getting a puddle of minimum range 1, 2, & 3-suited hands unsuitable for the 1-suited or 2-suited 1♥ and 1♠ openings). The partitioning and the natural bids allows inferences that help in competition.

The weak 2♣ opening is not such a big deal except that our opponents were often the ONLY pair their way who did not begin their auction with an opening bid. Sometimes, they miss their top spot. Folks who chose to open 3♣ with a weak two type hand may present too fat a target for penalty doubles when frustrated opponents cannot find a better spot (because the preempting side has too few ♣s and too many losers in the adverse suits).

Our frequent 1NT and 1♣ openings often create action absent from other tables. Opponents who believe that you are stealing sometimes take interesting risks. Sometimes, we have gone plus 100 to plus 800 on hands passed out at other tables courtesy of ill-advised intervention. Other times, we get a plus 90, plus 110, or a plus 120 on a passout. Sometimes, we go for a telephone number when we do not sell out soon enough.

If you'd, like a copy of the system book, wing your e-mail to ClioBridgeGuy >at< att >dot< net, and I'll send it to you. I'd appreciate your feedback based on a more complete system review.

[wclass___]

IMO this is way superior:

1♦ ... 5m+4M
2♣ ... 5♣+unbal no 4M
2♦ ... 5♦+unbal no 4M

[bill1157]

straube, on Mar 21 2010, 06:06 PM, said:

bill1157, on Mar 21 2010, 04:31 PM, said:

Having 2♣ and 2♦ as weak 2's would take some pressure off the 1♦ opening.  Also I am right now watching board 19 in the spingold where a weak 2 club would direct a lead to beat 3NT ...

Having weak 2C and 2D puts more pressure on 1D not less.

You're also putting more pressure on your 1N which is a four-pt range instead of the more common 3-pt range. Some would say (others would differ) that your 1C has more pressure because it handles 16 pt balanced hands. Some play 1C is 16 unbalanced or 17 balanced.

You haven't described your 1D rebids after 1M response. What do you bid after
1D-1S for instance? And after your rebid, how does responder invite and force? How do things proceed in a sensible way?

Does a 1N rebid handle everything with spade shortness? How do you show a 5m/5m? Do you open that 2N? Do you jump rebid to 3C? Does a 2C rebid show 6 clubs or a 5m/5m?

I think you need to tell us more about your structure.

Whatever it is, there's no way your constructive bidding will be as sound. Whether having a 2C and 2D preempt is worth that loss is something you'd have to test at the table. Personally, I think it's a big loss, but perhaps you'll find out differently.

We played this system thursday night and it worked fine. The main thing is after a 1♦ opening you have to allow for the possibility that opener's suit is ♣'s.

The only hand that presented a problem was this one:

QT6.Q.AT3.KQ9753 opposite J43.9873.KQ54.J8

where the bidding went: 1D-(X)-P-(1H)//2C-(2H)-P and we missed a club partial. Maybe I with the right hand should have bid something?
Anyway I personally like having a 4 point NT range. The advantages of opening 1NT are so great that it is well worth widening the range no matter what system you play.

After 1D-1S you would bid your minor at the 2 level, perhaps 1NT with 1=4=4=4. And I don't know how this will work, but we made a 2NT opening 5-5 in the minors.

Bill