[the hog]

It is hardly a personal attack on Adam. I didn't say he was fat, ugly or insult him or whatever, what I did suggest was that he had not played those methods and I suspected certainly not played them in serious competition. Further he has frequently decried the use of artificial methods. His comment about Viking Club, for example, was not a very sensible one. His comments about Mafia methods are also not very sensible in the context of a MP discussion. Playing MPs you want to find a M suit fit as quickly as possible without giving too much away. This is precisely what Mafia methods do.

Re Moscito, how do you feel at MPs leading to or defending an auction that has gone 1D 4S, (where 1D shows 10-14 with 4+S), rather than say:-
1C 1H 1S 4S or anything similar? Which is more likely to induce a favourable lead or a more accurate defence? What about an auction like 1D 2S? Want to come in on that on the assumption that the opponents have found an 8 card fit? Well they might have, then again they may not. I have seen some juicy penalties against nothing.

No one, (well I am certainly not), is saying that systems of this ilk are a match point panacea. However what you lose on the roundabouts you pick up on the swings.

You may not like these methods, thats fine. No one is forcing you to. There is a lot about 2/1 which I dislike as well - so what, no system is perfect or we would all be playing it. What I would ask though is that you keep comments sensible and accurate. In my opinion Adam failed to do either.

[hrothgar]

awm, on Mar 17 2008, 07:44 AM, said:

In fact, my experience has been that transfer openings and MAFIA are lousy methods. And I don't see people winning things left and right by playing them...

Out of curiousity, does anyone have a good write up of the methods played by the Polish team that won some silly little event this last weekend?

Needless to say, I'm most interested in whether or not they we're using MAFIA type response over their (artificial) 1♣ opening...

On a similar note, I find it vaguely amusing that the transfer openings that you are decrying do seem to be bleeding over into more "mainstream" bidding...

Admittedly, folks are calling this "Transfer Walsh", and they're using it as a response structure over 1♣ openings rather than as an opening in its own right, however, the basic motivation in adopting the method is pretty much the same.

[awm]

First of all, I have nothing against transfer openings per se. I do think there is something silly about passing your transfer openings when you don't have length in the suit opener bid. Sure, sometimes when partner opens 1♥ (spades) and you pass with a weak 2245 hand, you might pick off the opponents heart fit and they might miss their 4♥ game. Or maybe they have 3NT and can't figure out how to get in the auction. But it seems like the majority of the time partner will happen to have a max, and you will play 1♥ on something like 17 hcp in a 3-2 fit instead of defending a heart partial. Most of the time this means -150 or -300 instead of -140. I suppose the former case is a push at IMPs and the second is a small loss. But they are both lousy MP results.

Okay, certainly some people don't really pass the transfer openings. That's fine. Transfer openings do give opponents some extra bidding space but most opponents don't make good use of it, and there are compensating advantages. What I think is really bad, is the MAFIA-style opening. There is a general question: Suppose I can give everyone at the table some information about my hand. Am I better off giving this information or concealing it? In general I think partner can make better use of such information than opponents. For example, if partner knows I have exactly five spades, he knows exactly how many spades we have between us. This makes it very easy for partner to decide whether spades is a good fit, and if so how high to compete. Sure, the opponents also know that I have five spades, but this seems to help them substantially less, since they still do not know our side's combined assets in the suit. People who support this MAFIA-style opening consistently argue that "this is so much harder to defend because opponents have no idea the size of our fit" but I think it's fairly easy to see that this puts partner at a much more substantial disadvantage than it puts opponents. There is a reason five-card majors have replaced four-card majors in most of the world -- the added information helps partner a lot more than it helps opponents.

Contrary to the claims that "at matchpoints you always want to play in a major" I think finding a good fit is quite important at MP scoring. It's not unusual that if I have a weak four card suit and partner has three-card support, we can't make 2M, whereas even three of our nine-card minor fit may well have play. Even devoted four-card majorites rarely open 1M with four small in the major and AKQxx in a minor, but this is exactly what Moscito players are doing. And while you occasionally get an advantage because opponents "don't know about the minor" you'll also often get a disadvantage when you reach the wrong contract or when you defend the hand (the lighter you open, the more often you end up defending after your side opens after all) and partner has no clue what to lead. And while there are some hands that go 1♥-P-4♠ with four-card support and leave opponents in the dark, there are also hands where "regular precision" players would bid 1♠-4♠ with three card support and you end up having some relay auction that gives opponents tons of chances to double stuff for the lead or insert a low-level call and tons of information about opener's shape.

It seems that a lot of the Moscito opening structure has been formed to accommodate the relays. This is the main reasoning most people give behind the transfers. This is also a major reason behind the MAFIA/4M opening structure, to increase the frequency of 1♦/1♥ openings in order to make the relays more efficient. But any system where your lower openings are dramatically more frequent than higher openings (ideal for relay) is going to give partner less useful information in competitive auctions. And when you open pretty light, competitive auctions are going to be the vast majority of auctions. While I'm sure there is the occasional uncontested slam bidding win, there will be lots of auctions like 1♦-2♠-? where you can't raise on 3-card support or 1♦-1NT-AP where you don't know what to lead.

[hrothgar]

Quote

First of all, I have nothing against transfer openings per se. I do think there is something silly about passing your transfer openings when you don't have length in the suit opener bid.

Nothing in life is perfect:

The choice to pass the transfer opening with weak hands is based on a fairly simply cost benefit assessment:

1. If we pass a transfer opening with a very weak hand we will (on occasion) suffer a loss when we play in a silly contract

2. If we pass a transfer opening with a very weak hand we will (on occasion) enjoy a gain because all of our responses promise real values. In turn, opener will be much better positioned to compete effectively if the opponent's blunder in to a misfit auction

If you believe (as I do) that the benefits from 2 outweigh the costs from 1 then you're content to pass the transfer opening.

Quote

What I think is really bad, is the MAFIA-style opening. There is a general question: Suppose I can give everyone at the table some information about my hand. Am I better off giving this information or concealing it? In general I think partner can make better use of such information than opponents.

It seems strange that you would make this type of elementary mistake given your extensive experience playing against transfer opening structures. Playing MOSCITO responder's first bid provides very specific information about his strength and the length of his trump support. The auction

1♦ - 1NT shows ~ 7- 11 HCP and precisely 2 card trump support
1♦ - 2♥ shows ~ 7-11 HCP and precisely three card trump support
1♥ - 2♠ shows ~ 7 - 11 HCP and precisely three card trump support

It's certainly true that responder doesn't know the precise length of the trump fit. However, opener knows precisely what's going on.

Things certainly get a bit more dicey in a competive auction when there is an overcall directly over the transfer opening. Such is life...

Here once again, it seems reasonable to consider the auction

1♣ - (P) - 1M playing a "standard" 5 card major system. Somehow, folks are content to muddle along playing a 1M response that shows 4+ cards in the bid suit rather than an ever so much more scientific 5+ card major style.

[MickyB]

hrothgar, on Mar 17 2008, 06:00 PM, said:

Quote

First of all, I have nothing against transfer openings per se. I do think there is something silly about passing your transfer openings when you don't have length in the suit opener bid.

Nothing in life is perfect:

The choice to pass the transfer opening with weak hands is based on a fairly simply cost benefit assessment:

1. If we pass a transfer opening with a very weak hand we will (on occasion) suffer a loss when we play in a silly contract

2. If we pass a transfer opening with a very weak hand we will (on occasion) enjoy a gain because all of our responses promise real values. In turn, opener will be much better positioned to compete effectively if the opponent's blunder in to a misfit auction

If you believe (as I do) that the benefits from 2 outweigh the costs from 1 then you're content to pass the trasnfer opening.

Sure, but if you don't play transfer openings then you don't have this problem.

Quote

Quote

What I think is really bad, is the MAFIA-style opening. There is a general question: Suppose I can give everyone at the table some information about my hand. Am I better off giving this information or concealing it? In general I think partner can make better use of such information than opponents.

It seems strange that you would make this type of elementary mistake given your extensive experience playing against transfer opening structures. Playing MOSCITO responder's first bid provides very specific information about his strength and the length of his trump support. The auction

1♦ - 1NT shows ~ 7- 11 HCP and precisely 2 card trump support
1♦ - 2♥ shows ~ 7-11 HCP and precisely three card trump support
1♥ - 2♠ shows ~ 7 - 11 HCP and precisely three card trump support

It's certainly true that responder doesn't know the precise length of the trump fit. However, opener knows precisely what's going on.

Things certainly get a bit more dicey in a competive auction when there is an overcall directly over the transfer opening. Such is life...

It seems a bit much to call Adam's statement "an elementary mistake" when you admit that you are less well placed over a direct seat overcall - hardly infrequent.

There is also the problem that MOSCITO's raises often tell opener precisely what is going on - he's in the wrong contract. This is particularly true of two balanced hands with a 4-4 fit, you land up forcing yourself to the three-level in order to put opener in control of the auction.

[helene_t]

hrothgar, on Mar 17 2008, 07:00 PM, said:

Here once again, it seems reasonable to consider the auction

1♣ - (P) - 1M playing a "standard" 5 card major system. Somehow, folks are content to muddle along playing a 1M response that shows 4+ cards in the bid suit rather than an ever so much more scientific 5+ card major style.

For some reason, Montreal relays never became popular. In North America I suppose it could be explained by it not being GCC legal. But it isn't popular in Europe either. Maybe because it can't be played in Polish Club and not after a 1♦ opening either.

Anyway, there are many differences between opening and responding, I don't see anything paradoxical in playing 5-card major openings and 4cM responses. In fact, the 4cM responses justify 5cM openings to some extent: since responder will take responsibility of looking for the 4-4 fit anyway, opener may as well focus on the 5-3 fit.

[mikeh]

helene_t, on Mar 17 2008, 01:19 PM, said:

hrothgar, on Mar 17 2008, 07:00 PM, said:

Here once again, it seems reasonable to consider the auction

1♣ - (P) - 1M playing a "standard" 5 card major system.  Somehow, folks are content to muddle along playing a 1M response that shows 4+ cards in the bid suit rather than an ever so much more scientific 5+ card major style.

For some reason, Montreal relays never became popular. In North America I suppose it could be explained by it not being GCC legal. But it isn't popular in Europe either. Maybe because it can't be played in Polish Club and not after a 1♦ opening either.

Anyway, there are many differences between opening and responding, I don't see anything paradoxical in playing 5-card major openings and 4cM responses. In fact, the 4cM responses justify 5cM openings to some extent: since responder will take responsibility of looking for the 4-4 fit anyway, opener may as well focus on the 5-3 fit.

Indeed: if we go back to the late 50's and into the 60's, that is when the transition to 5 card majors effectively took place in NA expert circles... I am not saying that 4 card majors disappeared, but 5 card majors were already the norm when I began playing in the early 1970s. And the suggested approach to responding changed along with this.

It used to be that responder only bid a 'biddable' 4 card major in response to a minor opening, and would bid, for example, 1♠ with AKxx Jxxx in the majors.

This was because opener usually did not hold a biddable 4 card major when he opened a minor.

Once it became normal to open 1♦ on, for example, xx AKxx KQxx Qxx, it became imperative to respond 1♥, otherwise the fit was missed unless responder had a gf hand, and, even then, the fit was discovered only at the cost of uncertainty as to responder's shape.

So there nothing paradoxical in 5 card openings and 4 card responses: in fact, it was a logical pairing... one led to the other.

As for the Montreal relay, it is inconsistent with a more popular idea, which is that opener, after 1♣ 1♦, should bid 1N with all balanced hands... different schools have different definitions of 'balanced' but most experts no longer bid strictly up the line. We have had several threads explaining (and rejecting, in fairness) the merits of this approach.

In addition, the availability of tools such as the support double/redouble and the use of relays after a minor-major-single raise has made the need to immediately differentiate responder's major suit length less of an issue than it was when the montreal relay was devised.

Going to the original post for a moment: in my view there is no doubt that, in a perfect world, one would play a different card and a different attitude at mps than one does at imps. I suspect that few partnerships have the resources or willingness to do this. Most of us, I think, see ourselves as enjoying, and perhaps being better at, one form of bridge than the other.

All my partnerships are geared for imps... we cope, to the extent that we do, by changing mindset rather than system... we double for penalty a bit more at mps, we tend to bid notrump or or a major rather than the perhaps safer minor (these decisions arise far less frequently than books on mp tactics might suggest) and, of course, our declarer play will be far more adventuresome than at imps, where 'technique' is fundamentally different in objective.

[kenrexford]

That seems to be the rub -- you must establish a partnership base theory and adjust when in the form of scoring you are not geared toward. If the partnership has one player geared IMP and the other geared MP, the resulting mess is unplayable and hopeless.

[joshs]

In my experience, the right part score at MPs is a somewhat over-rated concept.

Yes there are hands where you have 110 in a major, vs 120 in NT. Or 140 in a major vs 130 in a minor. But there are other hands where by playing in the 5-2 or 4-3 major suit fit you go minus, while you had a +90 or even +110 in a minor. Further, sometimes even if you are not in your best strain, the fact that you are not in your best strain keeps the opps from balancing, and gives you a decent score.

Is it better to be in the right strain? yes, I just think that many of these decisions are swinging 1/5 of a board on average, and only occasionally are they really big swings. I would be interested in analyizing hands from national pairs finals on these.

The biggest area where i think party score considerations really matter is 3 card raises:
xx Kxx AKxx QJxx

You open 1D, partner bids 1H, and I think its clear to bid 2H, even though raising on 3 cards, especially without a singleton, does hurt slam and game bidding some. 2H is really likely to be a better contract than 1N. So its a swing at both mps and Imps, but a bigger deal at mps.

At Imps, you want to play 3N (instead of 4M) much more than at MPs, but many systems don't let you play 3N having found a major suit fit, so if anything such agreements are already MPs oriented, since 3N is rarely correct at mps when you have an 8 card major suit fit.

The other thing is if you find a 4-3 major suit fit, have about 24-25 points, and don't think 3N is making, there is no reason to bid game at MPs. 3M making 3 or 4 will already be a good score.

I am not sure what system changes are really necessary to capture all of these. I don't think they are big ones. Its mostly judgement...

More or less, I think low information auctions with a lot of blasting are much better at MPs then they are at IMPS. Other than that...

[Cascade]

joshs, on Mar 18 2008, 09:38 AM, said:

The biggest area where i think party score considerations really matter is 3 card raises:
xx Kxx AKxx QJxx

You open 1D, partner bids 1H, and I think its clear to bid 2H, even though raising on 3 cards, especially without a singleton, does hurt slam and game bidding some. 2H is really likely to be a better contract than 1N. So its a swing at both mps and Imps, but a bigger deal at mps.

That's not my experience.

Raising with three has often helped my game and slam bidding.

Anecdotally a week or two ago we had the auction

1m 1♥
2♥ 4♥

I had six hearts and some sort of distributional 8-count (two bullets). I don't have the exact hand at my finger tips.

The reasonably competent opponents bid at the other table bid

1m 1♥
2m 2♥ end

Basically whenever responder has five or more cards in the raised major you are well placed early in the auction after the raise. Well this has been my experience.

[gwnn]

I'd really like to try simple 4cM 10-13/13-15 NT EHAA once in a MP event with not many more agreements. I wouldn't try this in a team event.

[sathyab]

benlessard, on Mar 16 2008, 11:29 PM, said:

MP events usually bring a weaker field then imps events, so many thing out of the ordinary will do much better in MP then in Imps.

LOB and weak nt effectivness are strongly dependant on the skill of the opponents imo. We play 10-14 nt and the number of gift we get is anormal.

No idea where you pulled that from. If you look at North American events, the three-day pair events are pretty tough. I haven't heard of any client-server pair ever winning either the LM pairs or the Blue Ribbon pairs event in recent history.
If you're extracting a lot of gifts from your opponents you should be winning major pairs events regularly.

On the other hand, sponsored teams routinely do well in major team games; my guess is they do a lot better at IMPs than in BAM.

You can't win MP by doing extra-ordinarily well on a few hands or lose it by doing poorly on a few deals. At IMPs, you can play 61 boards of close-to-perfect bridge and lose it all on the other three. Look for instance at the fate of Rubin's team in the finals of the Vanderbilt. Three bidding misunderstandings, two by Weichsel and Lesniewski and one by Verhees and Jansma collectively accounted for more than the margin of victory. No matter how much they outplayed the opponents on the other deals, the format of scoring doesn't allow you to wipe out those three expensive errors. I have no idea why anyone thinks this format of scoring is superior to BAM or MP.

[mike777]

sathyab, on Mar 17 2008, 06:21 PM, said:

benlessard, on Mar 16 2008, 11:29 PM, said:

MP events usually bring a weaker field then imps events, so many thing out of the ordinary will do much better in MP then in Imps.

LOB and weak nt effectivness are strongly dependant on the skill of the opponents imo. We play 10-14 nt and the number of gift we get is anormal.

No idea where you pulled that from. If you look at North American events, the three-day pair events are pretty tough. I haven't heard of any client-server pair ever winning either the LM pairs or the Blue Ribbon pairs event in recent history.
.

Goren won alot of MP events as a client, would be surprised if there are not more. I forget if he ever won a Nat mp event but I would guess he did. As for even more recent years not sure but a few years does not make a trend.

Clients do win BAM tourneys even the major ones.

The rest of your main point is pretty interesting point of view though.

[Winstonm]

Ken,

Returning to the main point as I understand it.

MP scoring is about frequency of gain.
Imp scoring is about amount of gain.

The best imp systems IMO are game/slam intensive.
I will leave it to you to decide how best to maximize frequency of gain.

I believe it is obvious that if the goals are different that there should be a distinction in how to meet those goals.

[benlessard]

In north America its clear that the IMPS field is stronger then the MP field and its not close.

+ add to that that irregular methods face a bigger advantage when you play 2 boards vs several opponents then when you play 13. In MP there is often new or temporary partnership (even in top events) while in teams events regular partnerships is the norm.

Im not saying that its easier to win a MP event. 2000 players will give you 1000 pair & only 450 teams (they are some teams of 6) so its tougher to be first out 1000 then first out of 450. Add to that the fact that MP events are more popular and you will see that winning MP events is tougher.

As for the /pro client comparaison. In a sponsored teams the client play 1/3 of the boards while in pairs he has to play all of them. And sponsor in teams are often much better player then sponsor in MP (if you have to pay for 5 players consistenly you tend to take bridge more seriously then if you pay for 1 partner occasionnally)

[joshs]

Cascade, on Mar 17 2008, 05:41 PM, said:

joshs, on Mar 18 2008, 09:38 AM, said:

The biggest area where i think party score considerations really matter is 3 card raises:
xx Kxx AKxx QJxx

You open 1D, partner bids 1H, and I think its clear to bid 2H, even though raising on 3 cards, especially without a singleton, does hurt slam and game bidding some. 2H is really likely to be a better contract than 1N. So its a swing at both mps and Imps, but a bigger deal at mps.

That's not my experience.

Raising with three has often helped my game and slam bidding.

Anecdotally a week or two ago we had the auction

1m 1♥
2♥ 4♥

I had six hearts and some sort of distributional 8-count (two bullets). I don't have the exact hand at my finger tips.

The reasonably competent opponents bid at the other table bid

1m 1♥
2m 2♥ end

Basically whenever responder has five or more cards in the raised major you are well placed early in the auction after the raise. Well this has been my experience.

My opinion is: when partner has 5+ cards it helps your game bidding,(as long as you raise on 3 on the "right" hands) and hurts your slam bidding. When partner has only 4 cards, it hurts.

This is a typical bidding problem:
Axxx Qxxx KQxx x
Partner opens 1D, and raises 1H-2H

Opposite 4 hearts you have a game force, opposite 3 hearts and only 4D you probably want to stop in 2H or 3D. If you play 3D here as non-forcing (my preference, since I raise on 3 a lot), it hurts your slam bidding. If 3D is forcing, this bidding problem sucks and you might end up in 3H opposite xx Kxx Axxx AQxx. (OK, here you might bid 2S, and partner will bid 2N, which you might pass, and might make. Or you might bid 3D next and maybe you play that as non-forcing, but you get my point.)

Anyway, I think its right to raise on 3 a lot. My point was merely that no matter how much you think its right to raise on 3 at IMPs, its right to raise on 3 even more at MPs, since the difference between the score for 1N and 2H is very significant at MPs, and you will do a lot better in 2H on average when your side has the typical half the deck.

[awm]

There is this business in MP scoring about the "tens" like how +130 is better than +120 which is better than +110. A lot of times this seems rather random and I tend not to worry about it all that much.

A more significant concern is the difference between setting opponents one trick and making your own partial. This is often something that relies on judgement... you bid to 2♠ and opponents balance three of a suit; now you need to decide whether to pass, double, or bid 3♠. This type of decision is what matchpoint bidding is about to a great degree. Of course, these decisions matter at IMPs too but even the worst possible situation (we sell to their contract and both it and 3♠ make) is only 6 imps, and much more frequently the imp difference is like 2 or 3. At MPs these decisions are often the difference between winning or losing.

It seems that methods where you find your best fit quickly and have a good idea of how many cards are in that fit help a lot on these decisions.

Actually I suspect Fantoni-Nunes methods are a pretty good matchpoint system. It seems like they are likely to lose in slam auctions over their 2M openings (which take up a lot of space and aren't too precise on shape) and even their one-level openings include some space-destroying responses like jumping to 2M to create a game force. But at matchpoints, these types of methods really shine, as they are virtually always bidding an actual suit (no strong artificial club for them) and they are taking away a lot of space on the intermediate hands that are more likely to lead to partscore auctions.