[phil_20686]

Siegmund, on 2011-December-17, 00:14, said:

GCC legality:

Transfer responses are allowed if, and only if, they fall under "6. Defense to conventional calls."

Takeout doubles are conventions, so transfers ARE legal after 1suit-X. Also after Michaels/Unus2NT/Roman Jumps/etc. They are NOT legal if your opponent passes or makes a natural overcall. (Which is really too bad, because they are an excellent option for responder after an overcall.)

So transfer walsh is illegal in the ACBL? Really? or is this restricted to competitive auctions.

[Vampyr]

Gerben42, on 2011-December-17, 05:32, said:

The reason why I like transfers so much is that you have a huge problem with strong hands like:

---

Compare this to the auction:

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And bidding a natural NT with a small range of hands doesn't seem to gain much either. In fact we redouble with almost all 9-counts and do NOT play a forcing pass thereafter. It just shows "hey pd I have some values but no long suit, just so you know".

I play transfers here too, but most people play that 2♣ is forcing, so these hands are not really a problem.

[Mbodell]

phil_20686, on 2011-December-19, 17:56, said:

So transfer walsh is illegal in the ACBL? Really? or is this restricted to competitive auctions.

If by illegal you mean illegal in the GCC (which is in force in many/most ACBL games including BBO ACBL games), then yes. Transfer walsh is a midchart system, legal there (but remember you need to prealert it!), but not legal at GCC. That is probably either #1 or #2 of the things most good players want to see move to GCC (or at least away from a prealert) with the other being playing calls higher than 2♣ over a 1nt as showing an undisclosed single suit (especially 2♦ for a single major). Both of those are quite common prealerts you'll hear playing in NABC+ events (and would be even more common since they only get prealerted properly about 50% of the time IME).