[mike777]

It seems some years Suction is legal, some years not! IN ACBL?

Is Suction legal over Opp nt?

Is Suction legal over OPP strong club? or strong 2clubs?

If not why not, Politics?

Any version of suction to make it legal if illlegal?

Thank you in advance.

[luke warm]

just asked same question in another thread and the answer was no, not legal... i guess that's over 1nt, 1c, 2c

i'd like for it to be legal, but it isn't the highest on my list .... there are so many stupid illegalities it makes you gag

[pclayton]

Jlall, on Nov 11 2004, 10:17 PM, said:

over 2C and 1C (strong) its legal, not over 1N. reason is over a 1N opener a bid of 2D or higher must have at least one known suit or it is deemed destructive (same reason multi opener is not legal at club games/sectionals etc). If u open a strong artificial bid anything goes.

Well, not everything goes over strong ♣. The random 1♠ showing 13 cards isn't OK.

[mike777]

If my memory serves me, is this not an on going debate in ACBL? I thought for many years suction was legal over opp. 1nt. then illegal..then legal again..anyone old enough to remember this debate, and the issues for and against JLALL points over the past 20 years?

[inquiry]

Suction should be legal over a 1♣ opening bid. But illegal over 1NT opening bids by the GGC... which states....

COMPETITITVE (bids)
....
"7. DEFENSE T0:
a.) Conventional calls (except see #9 responses and rebids above and #7 under disallwed below).
b.) natural notrump opening bids and overcalls, exept that [b]direct calls other than double and 2♣ must have at least one known suit.
c.) Opening bids of 2♣ or higher."

This means (a and c) that suction should be legal over a strong 2C (anything goes over two club or higher conventional bid and of course a strong 1C is a conventional bid). However, section b, says anything goes over a 1NT opening but, at least one suit must be KNOWN for bids above 2♣. Since suction is either a single suit or two other suits, not one suit is known, so it would be illegal there.

As for the wonder 1♠ bid over 1♣, and why that is not allowed. the answer is in the first "dissallowed" item. Which says that "Conventions and/or agreements whose primary purpose is to destroy the opponents’ methods (are dissallowed)." Clearly a 1♠ overcall that tells you partner absolutely nothing about your hand (a wonder bid as in, let everyone wonder what I have), falls squarely into that category..... to bad, because I used this bid a lot in the old days. Note this one spade bid is even disallowed on superchart.

Ben

[Free]

pclayton, on Nov 12 2004, 07:49 AM, said:

Jlall, on Nov 11 2004, 10:17 PM, said:

over 2C and 1C (strong) its legal, not over 1N. reason is over a 1N opener a bid of 2D or higher must have at least one known suit or it is deemed destructive (same reason multi opener is not legal at club games/sectionals etc). If u open a strong artificial bid anything goes.

Well, not everything goes over strong ♣. The random 1♠ showing 13 cards isn't OK.

Lol, just use my defense against strong ♣ and you can still bid 1♠ most of the time without giving much info away to opps It means 0-3 ♠s, so there is at least 'something' known about your hand

[inquiry]

Suction should be legal over a 1♣ opening bid. But illegal over 1NT opening bids by the GGC... which states....

COMPETITITVE (bids)
....
"7. DEFENSE T0:
a.) Conventional calls (except see #9 responses and rebids above and #7 under disallwed below).
b.) natural notrump opening bids and overcalls, exept that [b]direct calls other than double and 2♣ must have at least one known suit.
c.) Opening bids of 2♣ or higher."

This means (a and c) that suction should be legal over a strong 2C (anything goes over two club or higher conventional bid and of course a strong 1C is a conventional bid). However, section b, says anything goes over a 1NT opening but, at least one suit must be KNOWN for bids above 2♣. Since suction is either a single suit or two other suits, not one suit is known, so it would be illegal there.

As for the wonder 1♠ bid over 1♣, and why that is not allowed. the answer is in the first "dissallowed" item. Which says that "Conventions and/or agreements whose primary purpose is to destroy the opponents’ methods (are dissallowed)." Clearly a 1♠ overcall that tells you partner absolutely nothing about your hand (a wonder bid as in, let everyone wonder what I have), falls squarely into that category..... to bad, because I used this bid a lot in the old days. Note this one spade bid is even disallowed on superchart.

Suction is allowed at midchart level over 1NT, but must be pre-alerted.

Ben

[inquiry]

Free, on Nov 12 2004, 10:14 AM, said:

Lol, just use my defense against strong ♣ and you can still bid 1♠ most of the time without giving much info away to opps It means 0-3 ♠s, so there is at least 'something' known about your hand

No that would still be ruled illegal, if defined that way. You might get away with it as saying it is meant as a three suiter excluding spades, or a two suiter with hearts and unknown minor.. something like that. I am pretty sure a 0-3 spades would fail the test of slipping by the restriction against methods designed to primarily destroy the opponents’ methods

[hrothgar]

inquiry, on Nov 12 2004, 05:20 PM, said:

No that would still be ruled illegal, if defined that way. You might get away with it as saying it is meant as a three suiter excluding spades, or a two suiter with hearts and unknown minor.. something like that. I am pretty sure a 0-3 spades would fail the test of slipping by the restriction against methods designed to primarily destroy the opponents’ methods

I have NEVER seen the clause that Ben is referencing applied to defenses over the opponent's strong club openings.

[hrothgar]

Much of the convention regulation within the ACBL boils down to politics.
The use of suction over natural NT openings is an excellent example.

Some portions of the ACBL wanted to ban Suction over NT openings because they believed that it was too difficult for average club players to defend agaist a method that doesn't provide a known cue bid.

Other players very much wanted to continue to use these methods. Some of these players have/had a fair amount of political clout. For example, Howard Piltch loves the method and even tries to get people to call this "Piltch" over NT. As a result there was a flurry of back-and-forth with this defense being banned then permitted then banned again. As I recall, a lot of this insanity happened to coincide with Piltch's term as president of the ACBL.

To this day, tournaments in New England that use the GCC have specific exceptions designed to allow Howard to use his toys.

[mike777]

To summarize:

Suction legal over strong club and strong 2c

Suction legal midchart over opp nt

Assume Suction legal over most/all versions of Polish club also?

Again thanks for input.

[inquiry]

hrothgar, on Nov 12 2004, 10:29 AM, said:

inquiry, on Nov 12 2004, 05:20 PM, said:

No that would still be ruled illegal, if defined that way. You might get away with it as saying it is meant as a three suiter excluding spades, or a two suiter with hearts and unknown minor.. something like that. I am pretty sure a 0-3 spades would fail the test of slipping by the restriction against methods designed to  primarily destroy the opponents’ methods

I have NEVER seen the clause that Ben is referencing applied to defenses over the opponent's strong club openings.

Then you must not play (1♣)-1♠ as a wonder bid.. .because if you did, you will have had it read to you and a director expalining how you are violating the GCC... as I have done to me (only once, I changed my method to something better anyway).

If you were European, I would refer you to the Orange book, where section 9.1.5 states very clearly, "You may not have an agreement to make random calls, including overcalls. Even random calls without an agreement are likely to be an offence against the Proprieties."

A 1♠ overcall on random hands, clearly violates this section. And this is the intent of the ruling to stop 1♠ meaning "I have 13 cards" as a way to disrupt the opponents bidding. I have even seen a discussion of using 1♠ to mean, "this is my third best suit". That was, I believe, defined as brown sticker, but I may mir-remember it.

We have some certified ACBL directors prowling this board.. maybe they can help clarify this for us (you?, me?).

Ben

[hrothgar]

inquiry, on Nov 12 2004, 06:26 PM, said:

Then you must not play (1♣)-1♠ as a wonder bid.. .because if you did, you will have had it read to you and a director expalining how you are violating the GCC... as I have done to me (only once, I changed my method to something better anyway).

If you were European, I would refer you to the Orange book, where section 9.1.5 states very clearly, "You may not have an agreement to make random calls, including overcalls. Even random calls without an agreement are likely to be an offence against the Proprieties."

A 1♠ overcall on random hands, clearly violates this section. And this is the intent of the ruling to stop 1♠ meaning "I have 13 cards" as a way to disrupt the opponents bidding. I have even seen a discussion of using 1♠ to mean, "this is my third best suit". That was, I believe, defined as brown sticker, but I may mir-remember it.

We have some certified ACBL directors prowling this board.. maybe they can help clarify this for us (you?, me?).

Ben

Here once again, "Wonder bid" has a specific meaning...

A "Wonder Bid" describes an overcall that shows either length in the specified suit or a three suited hand with shortness in the specified suit. Wonderbids are not the same as "random" overcalls that show any 13 cards.

Random 1♠ overcalls are banned on the basis of concealed partnership understandings, NOT becuase the overcall is deemed destructive. Players how are bidding a "random" 1♠ typically do so as part pf a comprehensive overcall system. The 1♠ hand normally denies a hand suitable for any other more descriptive response.

For what its worth, the 1♠ overcall that Free uses over a strong club would be allowed at any level of play in the ACBL.

Equally significant, the ACBL Conventions Committee refuses to define the term "Destructive". This is part of their ongoing attempts to allow themselves broad lattitude to ban methods that they themselves don't play. Unfortunately, this creates a impressive number of contradictatory rulings as clueless low level directors apply their own [poor] judgement.

In a similar fashion, the ACBL goes out of its way to publish suggesting limits regarding players rights/abilities to psyche. When pressed, the ACBL will offically rule that players can repeated make the same psyche playign with the same partner. However, the ACBL prefers to promote misleading information that low level idrectors can misapply.

[mcphee]

Understanding the ACBL approach to conventional bids is hopeless. To fully appreciate the humor I offer this;

In the late or mid 50's Sidney Lazard was all but run out of town when he showed up at some sectional and played weak 2 bids! And those were the days when the range was 8-12.

It's difficult to keep up with the changes to the alert methods. I understood, perhaps mistakenly, that suction was allowed if the opps made an aritficial bid. This means that it would be leagal to use it when plays bid 1NT F.

[mikestar]

Suction is GCC legal over an artifical 1NT or a natuaral but forcing 1NT. Suction is GCC legal over a natural and non forcing 1NT in the balanicg seat, but not in the direct seat.

1S over a strong 1C on bad hands is GCC legal as long as there are substantial negative inferences and these are propertly disclosed. I ruled this crash type defense GCC legal in a club game after consulting the available ACBL info:

Pass = most constructive hands
Dbl = two suits, same color
1D = two suits, same rank
1H = two suits, same shape
1S = balanced or too litte playing strengh on the vulnerablilty for another bid.
1N = three suited
2C+ = natural preempt
2N = monster two suiter (constructive)

[jtfanclub]

mikestar, on Nov 12 2004, 11:58 AM, said:

I ruled this crash type defense GCC legal in a club game after consulting the available ACBL info:

Pass = most constructive hands
Dbl = two suits, same color
1D = two suits, same rank
1H = two suits, same shape
1S = balanced or too litte playing strengh on the vulnerablilty for another bid.
1N = three suited
2C+ = natural preempt
2N = monster two suiter (constructive)

Interesting. I'm not sure if it's legal or not. A lot will depend upon if there's a HCP attached to pass (for example, if a pass promises 9 and 1♠ has at most 8). Otherwise, it still lends itself too much to undisclosed agreements and psychic pickups- somehow, the partnership always knows when 1♠ is medium strength balanced, and when it's too weak for another bid.

[mycroft]

Part of the Suction/GCC problem is that as hrothgar says, there are parts of the ACBL world that won't lose it, and parts that won't have it. So things happen that confuse the populace...

Summer 2000 NABC was in Anaheim, part of the southern California enclave where everybody's grandmother plays Suction, and pretty much every tournament in that area is "GCC + any defence to 1NT". But it's posted in the information. It was "emergency decisioned" that GCC at that NABC meant GCC+NT defence - IIRC about two weeks before the tournament started. However, it was mentioned prominently in *all* the tournament bulletins (along with their rule about non-present CCs, which they've just this past year reworded to remove references to "Class A conventions" - something that has been undefined for 20 years. But that's another rant, and I'm glad they have finally fixed it. Now if they would just enforce it).

Unfortunately, there were many people who found out Suction was allowed in Anaheim, and assumed that meant it was "back on the GCC". Some of them were, eventually, cleared of their misunderstanding...

Unfortunately, this is a disagreement that will never go away (along with 1H-1S F1 and 1NT showing spades). Frankly, they've allowed transfer advances of overcalls, which I believe to be much harder to understand than either of the above two (and harder to impromptu defend against than one). I'm not as jaded as Richard, but I will go as far as to say that the ACBL has always seemed to allow conventions particular well-placed experts play faster than those they don't (and I don't just mean members of the Laws and Conventions committee). And that goes back at least 40 years...possibly back to Culbertson vs. Rapee and Blackwood.

I also (as many people know) believe that the average tournament player (clubs can and do do whatever they want) is capable of handling a lot more than Mommy Dearest thinks they can. I also agree with DWS that most of the people who want to "go back to when bridge was bridge and not Code" really want to "allow my favourite conventions, and no others." Witness the rousing success of the Yellow Card (1970's)/Classic Card (1990's) only games.

But when I play or direct ACBL tournaments, I follow the rules, and I expect everyone else to.

Michael.

[guggie]

please, what is suction? In holland we use it for a way to pester opps in a slow way, so they gat mad. I do not think this is meant here;-)

[Gerben47]

Suction is the defence where a bid in ♣ shows ♦ or the majors, a bid in ♦ shows ♥ or the blacks, and so on. This is not allowed as a defence against 1NT in the USA as it lacks an anchor suit.

I like to play this more aggressive: 2♣ shows either ♣ or the reds and so on


Can I ask a question of my own? What exactly is a 'random' bid and what isn't. If I play 1♠ as 'any distribution 0 - 7 HCP' is that a random bid? I think not, what I think they want to ban is a bid where both Pass and 1♠ can be bid with 0 - 7 HCP but you choose either one when you feel like it. Is this correct?