[Hilver]

L.S.

What could be the advantage of opening 1NT with a balanced 14-16 count in stead of 12-14,13-15, 15-17 or 16-18?

Someone aquainted with a 14-16 NT?
What's Your opinon about this?

Jan Veerbeek

[JanM]

I think that most people who play a 14-16 NT play it in the context of a strong club system. They don't want to open 1♣ with a balanced 16, and their other 1-bids are a little lighter than "standard" so they want the 1NT rebid to be limited to a maximum of 13, thus the 14-16 1NT.

[BillHiggin]

14-16 is a popular range with systems based on transfer walsh (see http://sieged.blogspot.com/ ).
In those systems, the opening bid with balanced hands that are weaker or stronger than the 1N range (but not worth 2♣ or 2N) are opened 1♣. On good days, responder transfers to a major. Then opener either makes a simple acceptance with a balanced hand that is weaker than the 1N range or rebids 1N with a balanced hand that is stronger (both assuming less than a 4 card fit for the transfer suit). Two way checkback systems apply over either of the balanced rebids. They gain significantly with that 1N rebid when the rest of the world must jump to 2N (burning a whole level). By slightly weakening the 1N opening range, that stronger range becomes 17-19 which happens a lot more than 18-19 (and they can keep a 3 point range for the weak NT type hand and open all 11 balanced hands).

[helene_t]

There was an article in the Dutch BF magazine "Bridge" in which Leon Jacobs recomended playing 1NT-14-16 in a 2/1 system with a non-forcing 1NT response to 1M. Even if 1M-1NT is forcing, it still help in the case of 1♦-1NT

More generally, it helps that the range for balanced hands too weak for 1NT is 12-13 so that responder knows whether to bid game or not, for example in
1m-2m(inverted)
2N
and
1♦-2♣
2N
and maybe even
1♦-1♥
1♠-2♣(FSF)
2NT

[Gerben42]

I prefer 14 - 16 for a "standard" system well over 15 - 17 because it simplifies a lot of auctions like inverted minors. In addition it creates a problem for the opponents who don't know if they want to use a "strong NT" defense or a "weak NT" defense.

If you play both 2♣ and 2♦ including strong hands (i.e. for example with a Multi 2♦ or so) this style is very playable because you can move up your 19 - 20 NTs to the 2-level.

You don't have to open every balanced 11 for this style either, esp. vulnerable.

About some other ranges:

13 - 15: Only useful in an agressive strong ♣ system, otherwise you'd be better of with 14 - 16 imho.

16 - 18: Useless.

17 - 19 (I've seen this, yes): Close to unplayable

[gwnn]

wtp with 17-19? sounds like the equivalent of 10-12, cause you have to cater to the same ranges with your other bids (roughly): 12-14, 15-17. It seems to be a superior treatment to 10-12 because you get the mexican NT type out of it.

non hijacking comment: it's cute since opponents don't always defend well against your 24 hcp 3NT contract. The disadvantage is doing something with your 17 counts. Sometimes you downgrade them to 1NT, sometimes you upgrade a 19 count to 2NT, to make the 2NT rebid of "17-19" a little less wide.

[Free]

I sometimes play 14-16 in a standard system, and we usually win on the hands with 14HCP, but lose most on hands with 17hcp. So a better range imo is 14-16(17), no need to change any of your NT ranges (17+-19 instead of 18-19 is not a huge difference, and you can keep your 2-level openings unchanged).

[Gerben42]

Quote

wtp with 17-19? sounds like the equivalent of 10-12, cause you have to cater to the same ranges with your other bids (roughly): 12-14, 15-17. It seems to be a superior treatment to 10-12 because you get the mexican NT type out of it.

I've seen it only once. The pair in question had a 13 - 16 rebid of 1NT. Ugh... If not you must cater for opening both 1♣ and 1♦ on offshape balanced hands, I can only say YUCK!

[bill1157]

As opening bids become weaker, the NT range will drop (16-18 NT presuposes opening 13+,15-17 suposes 12+) so if you open balanced 11-13 counts, it would make sense to play 14-16 NT

[han]

I like how 14-16 1NT openings mesh with a 1NF 1NT response to 1M. We open some balanced 11-counts but not all, more white than red.

[awm]

There's some advantage opposite a passed hand.

Assuming you don't open balanced 11-counts or unbalanced 10-counts often in first chair, it is possible that you could have a game in the auction Pass-1m-1M-1NT(up to 14). This means in third seat you need to either pass balanced 10-11 point hands, be prepared to pass 1M when you open a balanced 10-11 point hand, or be prepared to play 2NT with 10 opposite 11 after you open a balanced 10-11 point hand and rebid 1NT only to hear 2NT from partner.

If 1NT is 14-16, then there is not really a hand that makes 3NT after Pass-1m-1M-1NT(up to 13).

There is also some advantage to playing a notrump range where it is unclear whether it's weak or strong. I think 14-16 is right on the border as to whether you want a penalty double available or not (opposite 13-15 I think you want a penalty X, opposite 15-17 better not unless your opponents are known to psych frequently/upgrade hyperactively).

With any notrump range, you get some swings either way. For example, if opener has 12 and responder 11, you play 2NT in standard methods (1m-1M-1NT-2NT) whereas you play 1NT using 14-16 (no reason to invite opposite a 12-13 or 11-13 1NT rebid). On the other hand, if opener has 14 and responder 9, you play 1NT in standard methods (1m-1M-1NT-P) whereas you invite opposite 14-16 and reach 2NT. So basically the hands where you end up in 2NT on an invite-decline are different hands. It's not clear that this is a net win for one style or the other but probably 2/3 of the swings you see due to notrump range are because of this (I think they normally cancel out in the long run).

[Apollo81]

awm, on Mar 12 2008, 05:48 PM, said:

There is also some advantage to playing a notrump range where it is unclear whether it's weak or strong. I think 14-16 is right on the border as to whether you want a penalty double available or not (opposite 13-15 I think you want a penalty X, opposite 15-17 better not unless your opponents are known to psych frequently/upgrade hyperactively).

I don't think it's borderline. Penalty doubles are by far the best treatment IMO. Most of the people I see playing 14-16 tend to upgrade liberally into this range.

[Cascade]

Apollo81, on Mar 14 2008, 08:57 AM, said:

Penalty doubles are by far the best treatment IMO. Most of the people I see playing 14-16 tend to upgrade liberally into this range.

Isn't this true for any range ...

Well I guess the typical club player doesn't upgrade much but most playing 14-16 don't fit into that category. I bet if they played any other range they would upgrade too (or at least like to). Its much rarer to find a bridge player who downgrades.

[awm]

Well of course there is a question of what people mean when they claim a particular range.

I'd say that if you disclose "14-16" but 13 is actually the most common point total, you're not really disclosing your methods properly.

It's a bit confusing because there are some people who play "14-16" but actually play "13-15" because they upgrade so often, whereas there are other people who play "14-16" but actually play "15-17" except that they occasionally upgrade nice 14s or 17s.

My feeling is that if you virtually never have less than 14 "real high card points" when you open 1NT then playing penalty doubles is probably a losing proposition (yes you can have game on power when some opponent has 14 real hcp, but it's rare without a running suit). On the other hand, if you often have less than 14 "real hcp" for 1NT then penalty doubles are probably a win. The question is what range implies "often less than 14 real hcp"? Certainly "13-15" does. Probably "15-17" doesn't, although I do know some people who upgrade a lot of 13s into their 15-17. What "14-16" means really depends on the frequency of the upgrades... but the point is that it's very close to the threshold and opponents can lose either way.

[irdoz]

I came across this data (published in an isreali bridge magazine) based on an analysis of hands at european/world championship level between 1992 and 2002.

Average imp score when you open 1nt

Overall +0.52 imps average
16-18 -0.21
15-17 0.57
14-16 0.24
13-15 0.43
12-14 0.53
10-12 0.69

(I think to make a real comparison of the effectiveness of different ranges youd have to include 2nt data for hands opened 1minor etc.)

Heres the average if you 'stretch' and open a 1nt 1+ points below yr stated range...

Overall -0.31
15-17 -0.28
14-16 -0.76
13-15 -0.44
12-14 -0.56
10-12 +0.74

Hmm... seems at this level on average stretching doesn't work out well (with 10-12 being a big outlier)

[effervesce]

Thanks for that irdoz - I dont suppose you know what the sample size was? Interesting to see the 10-12 come up on top - especially at IMPs. It would be even more interesting to see what the 10-12 gets at different vulnerabilities.

Of course, these numbers have to be taken with a holistic view in the bidding system it's used in, as the NT ranges affect basically everything else in it. Anyone have a frequency analysis of the different ranges? It's all nice and dandy to have a bid which gets +5 imps everytime it comes up, but if it come up once in a blue moon....

[Cascade]

effervesce, on Mar 19 2008, 01:15 PM, said:

Thanks for that irdoz - I dont suppose you know what the sample size was? Interesting to see the 10-12 come up on top - especially at IMPs. It would be even more interesting to see what the 10-12 gets at different vulnerabilities.

Of course, these numbers have to be taken with a holistic view in the bidding system it's used in, as the NT ranges affect basically everything else in it. Anyone have a frequency analysis of the different ranges? It's all nice and dandy to have a bid which gets +5 imps everytime it comes up, but if it come up once in a blue moon....

10-12 will be highest in terms of frequency. Is that what you mean?

[AlternaG]

It's not so surprising that 10-12 is + imps and the others are minus in the "stretch by 1" scenario, since we're balancing the preemptive value of 1N (should be + imps for us) vs. the misleading of partner about our HCP (likely - imps).

I don't know what systems people were playing over these NTs, but if I open a 16-18 NT, and points are distributed randomly throughout the other 3 hands, it is more likely that our side has the points for game, prompting a raise by partner, than if I open a 10-12 NT (where P has to have 13-15 of the remaining 28-30, rather than 7-9 of 22-24).

I suspect partner says "Eh, we have some points, but not enough for game; let's just play a safe 1N" more often with a 10-12 NT, or transfers and passes at the 2 level or something, and the one point I lied about is less likely to make a difference. Conversely, if partner bids a thin game (you have to, right? It's IMPs!), that fib I told could be devastating.

At least these were my first thoughts...

[matmat]

irdoz, on Mar 18 2008, 06:58 PM, said:

I came across this data (published in an isreali bridge magazine) based on an analysis of hands at european/world championship level between 1992 and 2002.

Average imp score when you open 1nt

Overall +0.52 imps average
16-18 -0.21
15-17 0.57
14-16 0.24
13-15 0.43
12-14 0.53
10-12 0.69

(I think to make a real comparison of the effectiveness of different ranges youd have to include 2nt data for hands opened 1minor etc.)

Heres the average if you 'stretch' and open a 1nt 1+ points below yr stated range...

Overall -0.31
15-17 -0.28
14-16 -0.76
13-15 -0.44
12-14 -0.56
10-12 +0.74

Hmm... seems at this level on average stretching doesn't work out well (with 10-12 being a big outlier)

i find it curious that there is a peak at the 15-17 range. there's a clear trend in increasing imps from the higher ranges to the lower ranges otherwise.

any idea why?