[straube]

Our 1S opening is 10-15 with 5+ spades

Partner's responses are...
.....1N-semiforcing
.....2C-artificial GF
.....2D-hearts, 6+ hearts OR GI with 5
.....2H-constructive raise
.....2S-weak raise
.....2N-LR

ok, so there's always been the dilemma of 1S-1N, 2H auctions when responder has a fit. Easy to get too high with a courtesy raise and easy to miss game.

So seeing as how responder can't have three spades for his 1N and can't have six hearts and can't have five hearts unless less than GI...

how about passing 1N with 5S/4H and 10-11? Then 1S-1N, 2H shows either five hearts OR 12-15 OR perhaps a 6/4 (haven't figured that one out yet)

Responder then could strain to raise with a fit (say 9-11) or bid game with a four-fit and 12-13 hcps.

I've looked at some hands and find that sometimes I want to be in 1N and sometimes in a major. There's a fair number of ridiculous examples for each.

Any opinions on this idea?

[Mbodell]

how strong is the 1nt forcing? Does partner pass misfits with 6, 7, 8 points?

I'd say a semi-forcing 1nt means that a lot of 5=4=2=2 and even some 5=4=(31) are going to find that 1nt is the best place to play when you are 10-11.

[Zelandakh]

Another option to consider here would be transfer rebids

1♠ - 1NT
2♣ = 4+ diamonds
2♦ = 4+ hearts
2♥ = 6+ spades
2♠ = 4+ clubs
2NT = whatever, max 5044 perhaps
3♣♦♥ = Precision jumps (5-5 max)

It seems to me that missing game with 11hcp 54(31) opposite 13hcp 24(43) would be pretty painful, at least at IMPs.

[straube]

Mbodell, on 2012-November-19, 02:23, said:

how strong is the 1nt forcing? Does partner pass misfits with 6, 7, 8 points?

I'd say a semi-forcing 1nt means that a lot of 5=4=2=2 and even some 5=4=(31) are going to find that 1nt is the best place to play when you are 10-11.

It depends on whether we're vulnerable or not. Vulnerable, 1N is more constructive and we bid it when we think we can improve the contract (possible game or better part score). Maybe 8+ misfitting though pd and I may have slightly different takes on that. I mean, why disturb 1S is that's our best likely spot? NV could be a psyche I suppose (0 count) though we've never actually done that.

[straube]

Zelandakh, on 2012-November-19, 04:54, said:

Another option to consider here would be transfer rebids

1♠ - 1NT
2♣ = 4+ diamonds
2♦ = 4+ hearts
2♥ = 6+ spades
2♠ = 4+ clubs
2NT = whatever, max 5044 perhaps
3♣♦♥ = Precision jumps (5-5 max)

It seems to me that missing game with 11hcp 54(31) opposite 13hcp 24(43) would be pretty painful, at least at IMPs.

Well, that's interesting. I suppose then we'd pass on showing clubs unless we were max? Can you tell me more about the pros and cons of this? I can see that opener will likely get another shot at bidding. Anyone else tried this? awm?

[Siegmund]

I've tried something similar over 1H-1S an 1H-1NT(NF), where opener's 2C showed diamonds and opener's 2D showed clubs. Over 1S I was doing it to free up the 3-level bids to show bridge world hands of death in 1 call, so the 2C and 2D calls were forcing. In a limited system you have more scope for allowing responder to pass with a weak hand and long minor.

Over 1S, I experimented with a few other things -- like having 1NTF promise or almost promise 4 hearts, so that 2m could deny 4 hearts, and 2H could be an artificial GF. I liked how it handled the heart suits, but didn't overly like how it handled the weak minor suit hands. I never got it working quite the way I wanted it to.

[PhilKing]

straube, on 2012-November-19, 09:53, said:

Well, that's interesting. I suppose then we'd pass on showing clubs unless we were max? Can you tell me more about the pros and cons of this? I can see that opener will likely get another shot at bidding. Anyone else tried this? awm?

I've played it a bit and it's not too bad. I think you can handle the spade club hands by playing 2♣ as two-way - diamonds or max with clubs. Then Two Spades is cleaned up.

[straube]

So leaving out Zelandakh's interesting transfer idea (which I'm leaning against, but not sure), still looking for opinions on the original idea. After all, after you know pd doesn't have a fit for spades and doesn't have six hearts, etc, and knowing that you likely don't have a game, doesn't it make more sense to reserve a 2H rebid for something slightly more constructive? As far as I can tell, it's a crap shoot bidding 2H. You're hoping pd has 4+ hearts or at least two spades. More often than not, he'll have one or the other. Sometimes he'll have 1 spade and 3 hearts and you can score a ruff, but lots of times 1N ought to play ok.

[awm]

Not sure how transfers are supposed to help. The main advantage of transfers is guaranteeing opener a third call, which could be useful if opener has 16-18 and fears a pass of his rebid but not in a strong club system?

On the original question, I suspect you will do better bidding 2h than passing. Probably possible to sim this to some extent.

[straube]

The thing about transfers is that it's problematic when opener has clubs. For example, responder can't sign off in diamonds or invite with 3D after 1S-1N, 2C. We also may pass 1N with a weak hand with 5S/4C and miss a superior club fit. So yeah, in a limited system, I think I'd rather rebid naturally.

To awm, I'll look at some more hands. Hard to really tell though because it's frequently not obvious whether 1N or 2M is a superior contract on these deals. I think, however, doing this would find us a lot more heart games and that's the point of it. 1S-1N, 2H would almost demand a raise with a fitting hand.

[JLOGIC]

I don't understand the problem really. You are far ahead of natural bidding (where 2H is 11-18), and you are not much behind gazilli where you would be 11-15. This is a good auction for strong club since you don't have to courtesy raise as you call it, a raise is a real invite. Maybe you are just raising too much? I would routinely pass 2H with a 9 count and 4 hearts for instance which you can't do in standard.

If you are really that worried about this you could play what the swedes play (I call it swedish gazilli), that 2C is gazilli like even in the context of strong club, where 14-15 counts start with 2C. I don't really recommend this but it works for them. The downside being you cannot play 2C obviously.

You could also play 3C artificial over 2H if you want two ways to invite but again this is more common playing standard where the range is so wide on 2H.

I think passing with a 10 or 11 count and 5-4 in the majors is not a reasonable option. For starters, you might just have a game if partner bids it and it is probably really bad for partscore bidding to play 1N instead of a heart fit when you're that weak. I would rather play 3H than 1N and I will often get to play 2H in a fit or 2S in a 5-2 which should be better.

You could also stop opening light but I suspect like me you find it to be a big winner. It is not shocking that in an uncontested auction where you have marginal values that opening light will work against you, you have widened your range and it will cause you to sometimes get too high or too low. This is the tradeoff you make for the benefits of opening light.

[straube]

Thanks for your thoughts. I've just been concerned that the only real upside here for us in rebidding 2H is to improve the part score. We're talking about only passing with hands of 10-11 when pd has denied five hearts and a GI hand. So it's true that pd could have 12-13 or so and 4 hearts and then game is dicey.

So 1S-1N, 2H-2N is a fail
1S-1N, 2H-2S is likely not a big improvement
1S-1N, 2H-3H is likely an improvement, but maybe not a big one

I'm also trying to actually get responder to raise more often. I'd like that courtesy bump because opener possibly even has five hearts and a medium hand or perhaps four and a maximum.

Anyway, I think most folks think this is a bad idea and that's the input I was looking for. Thanks for weighing in.

[Zelandakh]

Adam is right that the main point behind second round transfers is in handling the 16+ hands. Nonetheless, they do offer a way to avoid curtesy raises if it is felt they are necessary. The simple answer is probably just to go with a more traditional approach and not make the curtesy raise as per Justin's post. As for not being able to differentiate between weak and invitational hands after the 2♠ (♠ + ♣) rebid, this is a general problem in this kind of system whenever Responder has a lower-ranking suit than Opener rebids. Here we have simple reordered the suits but there are an identical number of problem types - obviously IJS help with this if you are willing to give up Bergenesque raises. The more complete answer lies elsewhere but has its own drawbacks.

[straube]

Zelandakh, on 2012-November-20, 02:01, said:

Adam is right that the main point behind second round transfers is in handling the 16+ hands. Nonetheless, they do offer a way to avoid curtesy raises if it is felt they are necessary. The simple answer is probably just to go with a more traditional approach and not make the curtesy raise as per Justin's post. As for not being able to differentiate between weak and invitational hands after the 2♠ (♠ + ♣) rebid, this is a general problem in this kind of system whenever Responder has a lower-ranking suit than Opener rebids. Here we have simple reordered the suits but there are an identical number of problem types - obviously IJS help with this if you are willing to give up Bergenesque raises. The more complete answer lies elsewhere but has its own drawbacks.

So does,opener pass with minimum clubs?

[Zelandakh]

In the normal transfer scheme a 2♠ rebid shows a minimum with spades and clubs and makes a higher rebid with a stronger hand, often 2NT since strong balanced hands can go via 2♣. Since your openings are so limited I removed this from the suggested approach. Naturally you could put it back in although I feel that 2♠ as 10-15 5-4 or 10-13 5-5 is probably ok. Remember you have the 3♣ jump available for max 5-5 hands. The curtesy raise issue is pretty much nonexistent here since you are less likely to be making a low hcp distributional 5♣ than 4♥. That means you can afford to take preference to 3♣ with all the weaker hands. Genuine invites have to dump it in 2NT which is not as good as being able to bid an invitational 3♣. You will obviously need to check how much that hurts.

Note: I do not really like passing 1NT with unbalanced hands, even when minimum. I think you improve the contract by showing the second suit more often than not. Sometimes it is a price worth paying not to improve the contract. I would be worried that this situation is too common to be worth it though. You basically have to work out which problems you can live with and which you want to solve. There is not enough space to have everything (even when playing 1NT as the relay).