In response to the question about "how did Precision come to be accepted?"..."seems not to have been unduly vilified by the powers to be".....
I was around at the time. In fact, my regular FTF partner and I were playing Precision when the summer Nationals came to Boston in 1970. The system was not complicated at all: it was a fairly easy shift from what we had been playing. And, the original CC Wei book was not long (the last 3rd to 4th part of the book contained sample hands from the Chinese Dream team., and the book was easy to read. IMO, it was not "vilified by the powers to be" because there was little in the system that they could object to, or that wasn't already being played in one form or another. In its original format, Precision wasn't much more than a combination of limited opening bids (11-15), 5-card majors (with forcing 1NT response), a forcing (16+ hcp) 1 club opening (Schenken 17+ was not unheard of), mini-Roman 2D with the stiff specified, a natural 2C opening (legal) and a 13-15 weak NT (K-S was also played by many at the time). Weak 2's were the norm at the time. There were only 2 sets of asking bids in the original version, Gamma and a combination "support-control" asking bid that followed Gamma- again, not too hard on the impaired memory cells. (and, asking bids were legal) Interestingly, the only aspect of the system that I recall running into resistance from the "powers to be" was the "impossible negative" structure, and this became permitted within a relatively limited amount of time. How did it (Precision) "become accepted"? I don't know. Maybe because it was a vast improvement compared to what many (including the "establishment") were playing and it worked well?
Friends of Fred Love of the game.
#62
Posted 2005-February-05, 15:19
"I don't know of any relevant bug. As long as I've been here, MP games have been far less popular (in the main bridge club) than IMP games."
IMP is the default.
Based on my experience as a programmer, this could be the entire reason.
Peter
IMP is the default.
Based on my experience as a programmer, this could be the entire reason.
Peter
#63
Posted 2005-February-05, 23:02
HI ALL
Fred .. i think yr methods are excellent and I am studying them in a desperate effort to improve... but no holy grail .. the fact that we cannot reach a concensus about methods is the only thing that makes continuing to play the game worth the trouble. Rgds all
Dog
Fred .. i think yr methods are excellent and I am studying them in a desperate effort to improve... but no holy grail .. the fact that we cannot reach a concensus about methods is the only thing that makes continuing to play the game worth the trouble. Rgds all
Dog
ManoVerboard
#64
Posted 2005-February-06, 09:02
>Yes, there must be thousands and thousands of people who wish to pay money and travel to tourney after tourney who want to play 52 boards versus 52 home grown systems day after day. Do not see why everyone cannot play a different home grown system every board.
>They have a minute or two to prepare a defense or they should know most conventions and systems used worldwide the past 80 years.
>I do not see why the preferences of the vast majority of ACBL members should be catered to when it may hinder the development of bidding theory and pleasure of a few.
(dont forget all the different signaling either!)
As Bobby Hamman writes in his book "Bridge is becoming a game of Language rather than deductive reasoning". Im far more interested in deductive reasoning, and correct card play than bidding systems. (But I will admit some of these bidding systems are clever and even brilliant). At this point Im concentrating on card play technique and defense, rather than bidding. (I have a long, long way to go)
>They have a minute or two to prepare a defense or they should know most conventions and systems used worldwide the past 80 years.
>I do not see why the preferences of the vast majority of ACBL members should be catered to when it may hinder the development of bidding theory and pleasure of a few.
(dont forget all the different signaling either!)
As Bobby Hamman writes in his book "Bridge is becoming a game of Language rather than deductive reasoning". Im far more interested in deductive reasoning, and correct card play than bidding systems. (But I will admit some of these bidding systems are clever and even brilliant). At this point Im concentrating on card play technique and defense, rather than bidding. (I have a long, long way to go)
#65
Posted 2005-February-06, 16:16
hrothgar, on Feb 5 2005, 09:20 AM, said:
luke warm, on Feb 5 2005, 04:43 PM, said:
those of you who know, or were around at the time, how did precision become accepted? it was artificial, it was relatively complicated, yet seems not to have been unduly vilified by the powers that be... i don't see how moscito, for example, is any more difficult to learn/defend against from that standpoint
There is an enormous difference between Precision and ROMEX and MOSCITO: Both Precision and Romex had very wealthy patrons.
Precision was paid for by C.C. Wei.
Romex was paid for by George Rosenkrantz
Yes, Precision had a wealthy sponsor. But, Precision wasn't really anything new. Vanderbilt wrote about a strong club system in the 1920's. (I once looked through the book, it must be around here somewhere, I was struck that the scoring table listed the value of a trick at NT as 35. Once upon a time, not all scores ended with a zero.)
#66
Posted 2005-February-06, 16:52
I've read posts here and then took a look at the voting pattern, without voting and I won't vote. The subject matter itself didn't surprise me but the votes in absolute terms did.
How do you know?
doofik
How do you know?
doofik