[pooltuna]

gwnn, on Oct 13 2010, 09:21 AM, said:

yes pooltuna, that was very funny a year ago when you first posted it.

The trouble is that too many people believe penalty doubles never apply.

[gwnn]

The trouble is that the best posters on the forums play penalty doubles only in positions where people like Meckwell or Fantunes or Helgeness or other Bermuda Bowl winners play penalty doubles, while some other posters on the forums named after water or fish play penalty doubles in positions where only people like my Auntie Gladys would play them as penalty, for example 1m-p-1H-(2S); X or 1S-p-1N-(2C); X

[pooltuna]

gwnn, on Oct 13 2010, 11:04 AM, said:

The trouble is that the best posters on the forums play penalty doubles only in positions where people like Meckwell or Fantunes or Helgeness or other Bermuda Bowl winners play penalty doubles, while some other posters on the forums named after water or fish play penalty doubles in positions where only people like my Auntie Gladys would play them as penalty, for example 1m-p-1H-(2S); X or 1S-p-1N-(2C); X

Well I assume you have specific examples where I called for a penalty X on these. If so I erred on the first one (1m-p-1H-(2S)) where with a trump stack I can pass and expect partnership protection. On the second one I would guess you pass up this free shot at the opponents as they will not be in game unless they can find an XX but I won't!

[655321]

I don't agree with gwnn's first post in this thread.

[aguahombre]

655321, on Oct 13 2010, 04:13 PM, said:

I don't agree with gwnn's first post in this thread.

In case there is doubt, that means it wasn't funny the first time, either.

Ever helpful, here. Actually there must be something in between "Everything is takeout" and "double means double". the Vugraph commentators in one match observed that the trend is cyclical and top experts are coming back around to more penalty oriented doubles.

I wonder if that will throw a wrench into EBU alerting policy when the trend moves more.

[gwnn]

Really, I wonder what sequences they referred to and what other people here think. I haven't played bridge for long (just over 5 years) and don't know much about these tendencies. My gut feeling would be that they have not started playing more and more penalty oriented doubles but what do I know? I would be happy to have a little more information.

[aguahombre]

gwnn, on Oct 13 2010, 04:49 PM, said:

Really, I wonder what sequences they referred to and what other people here think. I haven't played bridge for long (just over 5 years) and don't know much about these tendencies. My gut feeling would be that they have not started playing more and more penalty oriented doubles but what do I know? I would be happy to have a little more information.

Sorry, don't have specifics. It was a conversation in general about doubles which, over the past several years have become more and more artificial or takeout-oriented, and that the trend seems to be moving back.

I don't know if their observations were accurate, but they seemed to believe it. I don't have the contacts any more to try to validate their statements, nor will it affect what pard and I have decided to make takeout or penalty.

I was just sharing what they shared.

[phil_20686]

aguahombre, on Oct 13 2010, 05:56 PM, said:

gwnn, on Oct 13 2010, 04:49 PM, said:

Really, I wonder what sequences they referred to and what other people here think. I haven't played bridge for long (just over 5 years) and don't know much about these tendencies. My gut feeling would be that they have not started playing more and more penalty oriented doubles but what do I know? I would be happy to have a little more information.

Sorry, don't have specifics. It was a conversation in general about doubles which, over the past several years have become more and more artificial or takeout-oriented, and that the trend seems to be moving back.

I don't know if their observations were accurate, but they seemed to believe it. I don't have the contacts any more to try to validate their statements, nor will it affect what pard and I have decided to make takeout or penalty.

I was just sharing what they shared.

Game theory would suggest that changing tendencies is optimal. Easiest to understand in the pre-empting region:

Suppose everyone plays junk preempts at the 3 level, now you can afford to reopen fairly light as its quite unlikely that they are making and you are generally quite happy for partner to pass out with balanced hands even if you have less HCP than the oppos because with a 6322 handand Kjxxxx they will just have a lot of losers. Now, we will call these players "Doves".

Suppose a "Hawk" comes along. He decided that he will only preempt on fairly strong hands, noticing that since my half of the pack is independent of oppos half of the pack, if I preempt only on must more distributional hands they will reopen and pass out on the same hands, and often I will now be making because my half is much more distributional. Soon, noticing how many good scores this Hawk is getting in 3sx=, many players start to do this, until it becomes the new norm.

Consequently, peoples reopening doubles become stronger and partner is more likely to bid rather than leave preempts in as the "new normal" for preempts is now stronger. Now, a player comes along and realises that he can benefit from the "expectation" that his preempt will be stronger by making junk preempts.....

I expect similar things happen with nt overcall styles. In ye oldie days people overcalled with actual playing strength, so people played t/o doubles, so people started to steal over a nt, so then people move back to pen oriented doubles, and people move back to stronger overcalls....

My experience re doubles have been that there has been a shift to not making t/o doubles opposite a nt with weak distributional hands so that the nt opener can make penalty passes on more hands.

What are peoples feelings on the following hands after 1N (2h) ?

Kxxx x xxxx xxxx
Qxxx x Qxxx xxxx
QJxx x Qxxx Jxxx
QJx xx Qxxx Kxxx

[Free]

pooltuna, on Oct 13 2010, 05:00 PM, said:

gwnn, on Oct 13 2010, 09:21 AM, said:

yes pooltuna, that was very funny a year ago when you first posted it.

The trouble is that too many people believe penalty doubles never apply.

That's not true. The only thing most people here think is that takeout doubles are waaaaaaaaaaaay more frequent than penalty doubles (in fact they don't think but know this fact). Moreover, even if we hold a penalty hand we'll get to penalize opponents most of the time since partner will usually make a takeout double.

Summarized: you lose a very infrequent penalty opportunity (one where you have the penalty hand and partner can't Dbl for takeout) and gain on pretty much every competitive hand. Since competitive hands are much more frequent, you'll win on average.

[RJWP]

phil_20686, on Oct 13 2010, 06:14 PM, said:

aguahombre, on Oct 13 2010, 05:56 PM, said:

gwnn, on Oct 13 2010, 04:49 PM, said:

Really, I wonder what sequences they referred to and what other people here think. I haven't played bridge for long (just over 5 years) and don't know much about these tendencies. My gut feeling would be that they have not started playing more and more penalty oriented doubles but what do I know? I would be happy to have a little more information.

Sorry, don't have specifics. It was a conversation in general about doubles which, over the past several years have become more and more artificial or takeout-oriented, and that the trend seems to be moving back.

I don't know if their observations were accurate, but they seemed to believe it. I don't have the contacts any more to try to validate their statements, nor will it affect what pard and I have decided to make takeout or penalty.

I was just sharing what they shared.

Game theory would suggest that changing tendencies is optimal.

Game Theory in Bridge

I agree with you as far as in theory. But as you know game theory has a flaw. It cant handle the unpredictable...
So my conclusion is: Optimal strategy is knowing your opponents tendencies, but keeping unpredictable yourself.