[straube]

Playing a strong club relay system, would it be better to use 2N as natural in 3rd and 4th? I have a hard time imagining a good use for it in 4th while in 3rd seat you have increased risk of preemption by your LHO. Obviously you lose some slams, but how many when pd is a passed hand and we open light?

[Free]

Meckwell play 2NT natural in all seats, so it must have merit.

When I played MOSCITO I never had much problems opening 1♣ with strong balanced hands. I never missed being able to open natural somehow. However, when playing my home grown Meckwell-based system these days, I enjoy the fact that a certain NT range is excluded from the 1♣ opening (especially when opps interfere). Having a good 2NT response structure obviously helps a lot...

Basically it comes down to this: do whatever you're comfortable with. Preempting in 4th seat is quite useless, so you might as well exclude a certain hand type from your 1♦ openings (or other openings, for example a 4♦-6♣ or 5-5m distribution). 3rd seat changes a lot, so preempts make a lot more sense here. However, 2NT doesn't preempt a lot because it's forcing, so opps get 2 chances to intervene. 1st and 2nd seat are different as well because you may preempt partner.

[straube]

Thanks. Another thought would be to make 2N natural but let opener choose between 1C and 2N.

Say I had KQxx AKx QJxxx AQ I think I'd like to open 2N but if I had Axxx AKx QJxxx AQ I might prefer 1C because partner could have spade shortness and we are more likely to have a slam here.

Not seeing the value to 2N (for minors) which we currently are using. I don't remember if it's ever come up.

[awm]

While there must be some merit to strong 2nt in any seat its worth pointing out:

(1) 3rd seat is the best time to preempt
(2) the kinds of slam that are hard to bid over 2nt strong generally do not involve responder having an opening hand (or even all that close to one)

[SteelWheel]

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Meckwell play 2NT natural in all seats, so it must have merit.

Meckwell also play 2NT=19-21 HCP. I'm sure it works for them, but I'm not sure I would feel comfortable with such a wide range--unless I could play the cards as well as they do...

In most of my Precision partnerships, we play 1♥ rebid by opener as forcing, with responder virtually puppeted to bid 1♠; opener's third round bid clarifies whether he has hearts, hearts and another, or has a big balanced hand. In third seat, this works out as well as opening 2NT big and balanced in our experience--and sometimes we get to play 1NT making when the field is in 2NT going down.

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3rd seat is the best time to preempt

Agreed. When playing GCC events, we play 2NT as unusual for minors, less than an opening bid. If playing Mid-Chart, we usually play 2NT as a bad 3minor preempt in 1st and 2nd seat, unusual in 3rd.

[Zelandakh]

I play 2NT as 21-22 balanced in fourth and open those hands 1♣ in the other seats. I think I read somewhere that the reason Meckwell choose a natural 2NT is to avoid the rebid problem on those hands when the opps barrage; also, I do not think 2NT for the minors is particularly effective against experts (but it is great against B/Is). That may or not be the truth but you can follow similar reasoning to that of the Mexican 2♦ to make a good case for 2NT natural.

[Free]

SteelWheel, on 2012-December-06, 22:48, said:

Meckwell also play 2NT=19-21 HCP. I'm sure it works for them, but I'm not sure I would feel comfortable with such a wide range--unless I could play the cards as well as they do...

That's not true, they play a 2-point range which varies according to seat and vulnerability.

[dake50]

The counter argument is how many bal are mis-bid with your 1C bal hands rebid?
I think those are handled well after 1C.
So, as you suggest, something for 2NT.
I like solid spades with a side void,
leaving both 'Namyats' 4C and 4D as solid hearts, bid void.
Even solid minor with a side void can be untangled: which minor?/which void?
At least I have a difficult-to-describe shape in 2NT.

[straube]

dake50, on 2012-December-07, 18:06, said:

The counter argument is how many bal are mis-bid with your 1C bal hands rebid?
I think those are handled well after 1C.
So, as you suggest, something for 2NT.
I like solid spades with a side void,
leaving both 'Namyats' 4C and 4D as solid hearts, bid void.
Even solid minor with a side void can be untangled: which minor?/which void?
At least I have a difficult-to-describe shape in 2NT.

One thought would be to use 2N to show a good 1-suited minor (like 14-15 hcps) and use 2m openings as preempts. I've often wondered about 2m limited openings in 4th seat (especially) and even third seat.