[tseager44]

♥I have modified step responses to a 2 club opening. it shows suit and points and tells opener how
far my (responders) hand could take us.

part game/game/ or possible slam .. ALL in one bid

2C

responses: part game only:
2D 2H 2S SHOWS 0-3 pts and a 4+ suit
(if hand is 3-3-3-4 then bid 2NT

FORCING TO GAME
3C 3D 3H 3S shows 4-9 pts and a 5 card suit
(if no 5 card suit--bid 3nt)

SLAM INVITE
4C 4D 4H 4S 10+ PTS AND A 5 CARD SUIT
(IF NOT 5 CARD SUIT--TAKE OVER AND ASK aCES ETC)

i USE THIS WITH various partners and all love it. try it..you'll like it

Tseager44

[Vampyr]

Sounds like fun, but you should really stay out of the 2♣ bidder's way. Also it will make your bidding a lot easier if you play that your 2♣ opener is GF unless it is whatever medium balanced hand you have included in the bid.

[wank]

this might sound harsh, but this method is absolutely terrible.

[1eyedjack]

I think I would expect to get better results if I never responded anything other than 2D.

[Kaitlyn S]

I've shown a few deals with how students playing 2D waiting and positiive responses showing 2 fo the top 3 honors might bid them. How would your methods do?

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I believe your first response is 3S? If the opener show his hearts, he might play 4H.

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I believe your first response is 3NT? Opener "knows" there aren't the points for slam and passes. In my auction, responder's hand revalues when he finds out opener has four spades via Stayman. Your methods have robbed yourself of the methods to find the 4-4 fit.

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I believe your first response is 3H?

If opener shows his clubs, you bypass your last makeable game. However, on a different hand, opener might need to bid his clubs to reach a good 6C contract.

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You start with 3S which says nothing about spade honors (and 4+ points.) Do you still reach slam from the correct side? (In 6S, South leads the CQ.)

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You start with a 3S response. When opener bids 3NT, will responder think he's bidding 3NT to make with a long minor and a stiff spade?


There is a pattern here. Your responses take too much room. You are preempting yourself. 2C already preempts your side enough; you need room to decide the best place to play.

However, I'm not an expert. Ask an expert. I don't have time to search the experts' websites now but I'm sure that most of the experts will tell you that point count steps are not a good system. If they were good, the experts would play them. The experts do not play them. Believe that they know more than you do. I certainly think they know more than I do and if they don't play point count steps, that's good enough for me.

[sfi]

What Kaitlyn said.

You mostly want the weak hand to bid 2D and hear what the strong hand has to say, with other bids showing something fairly specific and jumps being very precise. Then responder has an idea of how their hand will fit.

You need as much room as possible to show shape after a 2C opening, and you're taking up a lot of it quite frequently. In particular, your method is likely to work extremely poorly when one hand is two-suited and the fit is in the second suit, but there is a general theme that you're letting the responder show their hand rather than opener.

Kaitlyn presented samples from one basic method of responses. There are others, but the ones that work all share those elements.

[msjennifer]

Vampyr, on 2016-December-03, 08:30, said:

Sounds like fun, but you should really stay out of the 2♣ bidder's way. Also it will make your bidding a lot easier if you play that your 2♣ opener is GF unless it is whatever medium balanced hand you have included in the bid.

I agree entirely.Fun(?)at what costs.!,,

[msjennifer]

Instead of this awkward style of responding to a 2C opening,I would like to politely advise all to seriously consider the Precision system responses to a 1C (16+ any)opening ,may be with just a little change if found necessary.It keeps the level low as well as does not cause any confusions ,as happens sometimes ,with the "waiting"ambiguous response of 2D ( as followed by majority of players apparently).

[aawk]

Like any convention you use you should keep track if it is getting better results than the field you are playing against.

If your step convention is getting good results my guess is you play against a weak field and the boards are shuffled by hand.

So remains the question should you stop playing your step convention. No go right ahead have fun and learn bridge by trial and error.

A tip : systems based only on the HCP count and not taking the distribution into account are not winning in the long run.

[bb116]

Nice Job showing the flaws in this system, very respectful way of saying the system is awful (sorry to original poster)
If you want to get "fancy" at least play controls, 2D=0-1 , 2H=1A or 2K 2NT AK, 3NT 3K etc.
Some will say this is bad but at least the auction is kept low and opener knows at second call if slam a reality or not.

Kaitlyn S, on 2016-December-03, 13:40, said:

I've shown a few deals with how students playing 2D waiting and positiive responses showing 2 fo the top 3 honors might bid them. How would your methods do?

---

I believe your first response is 3S? If the opener show his hearts, he might play 4H.

---

I believe your first response is 3NT? Opener "knows" there aren't the points for slam and passes. In my auction, responder's hand revalues when he finds out opener has four spades via Stayman. Your methods have robbed yourself of the methods to find the 4-4 fit.

---

I believe your first response is 3H?

If opener shows his clubs, you bypass your last makeable game. However, on a different hand, opener might need to bid his clubs to reach a good 6C contract.

---

You start with 3S which says nothing about spade honors (and 4+ points.) Do you still reach slam from the correct side? (In 6S, South leads the CQ.)

---

You start with a 3S response. When opener bids 3NT, will responder think he's bidding 3NT to make with a long minor and a stiff spade?


There is a pattern here. Your responses take too much room. You are preempting yourself. 2C already preempts your side enough; you need room to decide the best place to play.

However, I'm not an expert. Ask an expert. I don't have time to search the experts' websites now but I'm sure that most of the experts will tell you that point count steps are not a good system. If they were good, the experts would play them. The experts do not play them. Believe that they know more than you do. I certainly think they know more than I do and if they don't play point count steps, that's good enough for me.

[Vampyr]

bb116, on 2016-December-04, 15:55, said:

Nice Job showing the flaws in this system, very respectful way of saying the system is awful (sorry to original poster)
If you want to get "fancy" at least play controls, 2D=0-1 , 2H=1A or 2K 2NT AK, 3NT 3K etc.
Some will say this is bad but at least the auction is kept low and opener knows at second call if slam a reality or not.

I'm assuming you meant that 2♠ is AK and 2NT is three kings. And do you show 4+ controls by bidding 3♣ or do you bundle it into the 2♦ response?

It doesn't matter much; you are still getting in the 2♣ opener's way much too often.

But the main thing is to keep it fun. When I was young, I dabbled with this and many other things, some of which I knew to be unsound. And I sometimes still do. My regular partner and I have just started playing an opening 1NT as 0-7 balanced or a weak two in diamonds. I don't think we will be playing it for very long, but in the meantime I expect to experience some very unusual triumphs and disasters.

[sdvdg]

I am an expert (Grand Life Master) and I definitely agree with Kaitlyn's analsis, on likely slam hands, the location of honors and finding your best fit is paramount.
As many players have told you, taking away opener's bidding room is not the way to go.
"with good hands, go slow to find out what you need to know."

That is why when players open a Strong and artificial bid, especially one club, it's best to get into their auction to make it harder for their side to find their fits.

Your method will frequently block your side from locating its best fit or correct level because opener has to do some good guessing when he does not fit your suit.
Remember opener has a game force or balanced 22+ HCP so the location of your few honors may be critical. Give the partnership bidding room to discover your best fit and whether to move towards a slam.

[wank]

shouldn't referring to a master point rank come with how long one has been playing bridge and how many events you play per year to make something akin to a body mass index figure?

[helene_t]

If you respond 2NT with a 3334 yarb (presumably you also have to do this with long clubs since 3♣ would be GF), what is opener supposed to rebid with a game forcing hand? Any bid at the 3-level would presumably be nonforcing. So with say 5-5 in the majors, opener will have to jump to either 4♥ and 4♠, just hoping that he picked a suit which responder has tolerance for? Same if responder bids 2♠ and opener has a game forcing hand with five hearts and a five card in a minor. Etc Etc

You really need to respond 2♦ with a very wide range of hands. This allows opener to bid his heart suit at the 2-level. So opener will be able to describe most 2-suited hands below 3NT. If opener has primarily diamonds it will always be awkward but it is rare that you have a GF hand with primarily a minor since it pretty much means that you have 11 tricks in your hand. Note that with primarily a minor, you should never open 2♣ with less than GF strength. A semi-GF hand with primarily a minor just opens at the 1-level.

It is ok to have the agreement to respond 2♥ with any reasonable hand five hearts since if opener has long hearts you have found your fit immediately, and if he has anything else the 2♥ response doesn't obstruct opener. But any other response, even 2♠, should be reserved for more specific hand types.

[mycroft]

Normally, yes; but GrandLM is a different beast. Yes, you need the 10K masterpoints (and that could be 2000 a year for 5 years or 500 a year for 20, but even that's an accomplishment of some sort), but GLM requires an Open National Win. Sure, there are "weaker" National Events (Mixed Pairs playing opposite days 2 and 3 of the main KO, anyone?) but the chance of a point-accumulator winning one is effectively zero.

Having said that (and having said everything I normally say about That Other Site and their Real Name Policy), a first post from someone relatively anonymous claiming to be a GLM - well, I *believe* them. But I'm a TD, therefore by definition I'm a gullible soul (or so my players tell me, along with "have you asked someone who can play?").

Having said that, he's not wrong. 2♣ is a horrible bid, automatically preempting yourself. Anything that preempts opener further should give enough information that one of "strain or level" should be determined just from the hand and the call. Which basically means "never", for bridge values of never.

[Vampyr]

If you really want responder to give information about point count early, you could try playing Roth. Here, 2♥ shows three or fewer points, without a king. After the 2♥ response, the partnership may stop below game. A 2♦ response shows a king or more than three points, and is game forcing.

[nige1]

tseager44, on 2016-December-03, 06:26, said:

♥I have modified step responses to a 2 club opening. it shows suit and points and tells opener how far my (responders) hand could take us. part game/game/ or possible slam .. ALL in one bid. 2C responses:

• part game only: 2D 2H 2S SHOWS 0-3 pts and a 4+ suit (if hand is 3-3-3-4 then bid 2NT
• FORCING TO GAME: 3C 3D 3H 3S shows 4-9 pts and a 5 card suit (if no 5 card suit--bid 3nt)
• SLAM INVITE: 4C 4D 4H 4S 10+ PTS AND A 5 CARD SUIT (IF NOT 5 CARD SUIT--TAKE OVER AND ASK ACES ETC)

Thank you for your suggestion, tseager44 but there are possible draw-backs:

• Your response structure (especially 2N) is likely to wrong-side the contract.
• "You take control and ask for aces" when you have 9+ HCP and no 5+card suit.
• You might have a problem describing shapely responding hands e.g 6+ card suits and 2-suiters.
• You might cut across opener's intentions when he has a shapely hand.

We play control step-responses : simple but quite effective.

• 2♦ = ART. At most a King.
• 2♥ = ART. 1 Ace or 2 Kings.
• 2♠ = ART. 1 Ace and 1 King.
• 2N = ART. 3 Kings (might right-side the contract).
• 3♣ = ART. 2 Aces or 1 Ace and 2 Kings...

[nullve]

If unbalanced hands have to meet the rule of 31 to qualify for a 2♣ opening, then the vast majority of hands that qualify will either be balanced or fall into a 3-point range for any given shape. My suggestion is to try to take advantage of this by pretending that stronger unbalanced hands don't exist, as in the following scheme over 2♣-2♦:

2♥ = Kokish: rules of 31-33, 5+ H, unbal. / 25+ bal.
...2♠ = expected
......2N = 25+ bal.
......3♣+ = rules of 31-33, 5+ H, unbal., nat.
2♠ = rules of 31-33, 5+ S, unbal.
2N = 22-24 bal.
3♣+ = rules of 31-33, otherwise standard

(On unbalanced rule of 34+ hands Opener will have to improvise. But at least he didn't have to open either 1-of-a-suit, 2N or 3N, as in EHAA!)

The point is that since Opener's strength will soon enough basically be known to within a 3-point range, there's hardly any need for Responder to say anything about his strength in response to 2♣.