[bid_em_up]

There is an article in this months Bridge Bulletin that is written for beginning students. In it, the writer suggests (and I agree) that to start off with beginning students of the game only need to know about 5 (edit) artificial conventions.

Stayman
Blackwood
Jacoby Transfers

are the first three. She goes on to add that negative doubles would be her fourth choice (feel free to disagree, but I think it is appropriate), and then asks for suggestions for what the fifth convention should be.

After giving it some thought, I have not been able to decide on one "must have", so far. There are many worth considering, and so, I would like to see the ideas of others. Please list the convention name, along with your reasoning behind why you think it belongs in the "Top Five" of must have conventions for a beginning/novice player. This convention should fit well in a SAYC or 2/1 structure (imo), as that is likely what beginners are being taught.

I put this in the ADV/EXP forum as I want the ideas of those players. Feel free to elaborate if you disagree with the first 4 given and what you think they should be also.

Thanks.

[rogerclee]

Agree with the first four, 4SF/NMF would be, I think, the 5th.

[dicklont]

I miss the infodouble (edit: takeout double), which should be explained before the negative double, right?

[helene_t]

5 conventions:
- Strong 2♣ (or 1♣) opening if you plan to teach a system with a such
- Stayman
- t/o dbl ("a dbl on a suit is for t/o and a double on NT is penalty", we will introduce exceptions later)
- Western cuebid
- 4sf

Transfers and Blackwood are not things they need AFAIAC but if those conventions are universal in the environment they are going to play in, they come in as 6th and 7th.

[mtvesuvius]

I'd introduce these 5(6):

Strong 2♣
Western Cue
4SF/NMF
Blackwood
Stayman

Transfers are not 100% necessary imo, and I think that T/O Doubles should be 6th on the list...

[jdonn]

Where does the author get the number 5 from? If he/she could only think of four that were so obvious, then a beginning player should only need 4. Anyway I think the first 4 are fine, and the next one I add would be NMF. After that it would be unusual notrump (it's fairly easy to play and extremely common, and also important to learn early since something similar applies in so many situations, although I wouldn't add most of them until later.)

[bid_em_up]

I guess I should have said elaborated and said, what is the 5th artificial convention you would choose? (1st post edited to reflect this).

Takeout doubles (to me) are just part of the standard bidding system.

Weak twos could be considered an artificial convention as well, but again, to me, that is a part of the "standard" SAYC or 2/1 structure and would not apply here.

[FrancesHinden]

I'm not sure I even know what a Western cue bid is... but I would go with the first five (in no particular order) as

- Strong 2C opening
- Stayman
- Blackwood
- Take-out & negative doubles
- bids of the opponents' suit are not natural

I don't think Blackwood 'ought' to be on the list, because I think other things are more important (e.g. fourth suit forcing, a forcing major suit raise, a forcing minor suit raise). But in real life as soon as you play with anyone not from the same class, they will assume you know Blackwood so you probably have to teach it.

Jacoby transfers are low on the list. A pair of friends of mine, who have won various events and are regularly selected to play for their county, do not play transfers.

[bid_em_up]

jdonn, on Mar 3 2009, 11:29 AM, said:

Where does the author get the number 5 from? If he/she could only think of four that were so obvious, then a beginning player should only need 4. Anyway I think the first 4 are fine, and the next one I add would be NMF. After that it would be unusual notrump (it's fairly easy to play and extremely common, and also important to learn early since something similar applies in so many situations, although I wouldn't add most of them until later.)

I think the author already has #5 in mind, but likely ran out of space in the bulletin to present it in this months article. At the closing of the article, she makes a statement such as "What do you think #5 should be, write and let me know".

I was going to send her the link to this thread so that she may see the ideas of others.

[jdonn]

A few things. One is that I agree with OP that although takeout doubles are technically conventional, I think they are so inherent to standard bidding that I would teach them as such and not as a convention. I don't feel quite the same way about strong 2♣ since it's perfectly doable to learn strong two bids first. But I have no huge qualms with teaching weak two bids and considering a strong 2♣ also 'standard'.

I also disagree with those who don't think transfers are as important. Aside from the fact that it's essentially universal to use them when you play a strong notrump (at least in the US), I think the concept of a transfer in general should be introduced as soon as possible, because so many important things spring from it that will be an important part of ongoing bridge learning. The idea that a suit can show another, the idea that strong hands should declare, the idea that doubling an artificial bid shows that suit, the idea that transfering to a suit allows you to show twice as many hands, the idea that majors are more important than minors, and probably many more.

[P_Marlowe]

Hi,

My top 5 list

Stayman - ok
Blackwood - ok (I would like to kick it out, but it is universially played)
Take Out Doubles - missing from the list
FSF - ok (NMF not necssarily)
2C - opening (After reading Helens post, I agree with the inclusion into
the top 5)

Preempt Openings

# what does a 2 / 3 level preempt show, how to continue.
Usually the teaching in this area is bad.

Overcalls

I am not sure <<Preempt Openings>> and <<Overcalls>> count as
convention, but well ...

With kind regards
Marlowe

PS: Just read jdonns last post, and I agree, that saying a t/o double
is conventional is problematic, as always define, what you mean with
conventional, than we can formulate the appropriate answer.

[Ant590]

I would have unassuming cue bids in my top 5, with the necessary corollary of weak jump raises in competition.

I'm not sure if this is the same as a western cuebid (which I think I was told was a stop ask?).

[helene_t]

Some cases for not teaching transfers too early:
- They will have to learn natural responses to 1NT anyway since system is off (or may be off, depending on the local culture) in various competitive sequences.
- After a 1NT rebid, a non-reverse new suit by responder is weak, and NMF or CBS may apply. While a new suit is forcing after a 2NT rebid. This is similar to natural responses to 1NT and 2NT openings.
- It is not a design principle that the strong hand must declare. The 1NT response to a major is, for example, used with weak hands without a fit, thereby wrongsiding some notrump contracts.

In short: transfers are nice but they are exotic elements in most bidding systems. We are not going to teach beginners a system in which transfers belong to the core.

A case for teaching transfers "immediately", i.e. bypassing the natural reponses to 1NT:
- Stayman works differently when you don't play transfers. 1NT-2♣-2♦-2♥ is invitational, while it would be weak if you play transfers. This is confusing. I have told beginners to play this as invitational but in retrospect I think I was wrong. Better accept that invitational hands with five hearts cannot be shown until transfers have been introduced.

[Fluffy]

take out doubles is the only 1 convention actually needed.

one easy convention for beginners is support double, it happens a lot and they missuse it far less than blackwood.

[Phil]

Most important conventions for beginners:

0. Takeout doubles

1. Blackwood (its easy to learn, and even beginners understand the importance of avoiding slam off two aces)

2. Stayman

3. Jacoby Transfers

4. Negative Doubles

5. Unusual 2N

6. Michaels Cue


Most Important Conventions for Intermediates:

7. Proper use of cuebids of the opponents suit (strong raise, western Q, etc.)

8. 2N as various raises (Jordan and Jacoby 2N)

9. NMF

10. 4SF

[Gerben42]

In order of importance:

#1. Takeout Dbl
#2. 4th suit forcing
#3. Forcing with opponent's suit
#4. 2NT forcing raise of 1M
#5. Inverted minor

Blackwood or strong 2♣ are not needed to solve the normal hands. As for teaching transfers or even Stayman, I would rather teach them to bid first before adding something fancy.

Beginners should start with 5533, 15-17 NT and four weak two bids. Then you should focus on natural bidding after 1 of a suit, which covers most auctions really.

#1 through #3 are things that are needed all the time, and then #4 and #5 are needed to not cause impossible bidding problems. At least without Stayman you can still just guess to bid 2NT or 3NT, without inv. minor or a forcing major raise you have to invent suits you don't have.

[TylerE]

Honestly, in a ideal world beginners would taught EHAA (e.g. 4 card 1-bids, solid openings, preemptive 2s, weak/mini NT), which basically requires nothing artifical beyond Stayman. (Stuff like blackwood, NMF, and 4SF are nice of course, but really not strictly nessesary). The style can be surprisingly effective, and more importantly will help giving a novice/beginner a good sense of natural, constructive bidding, and hand evaluation.

[awm]

I think it's virtually impossible to bid without:

#1 takeout doubles
#2 fourth suit forcing

I think the principles behind these are also very important, those being that double is often a request for partner to bid (rather than a belief that opponents cannot make their contract) and that on occasion a call is needed in order to show strength and ask partner for further description. Other ideas that fall under these headings might be:

#1a negative doubles
#1b responsive doubles
#1c support doubles
#2a cuebid of opponents suit as a strong hand
#2b new minor force in some variety

Beyond those, I'd go with:

#3 stayman
#4 jacoby transfers
#5 blackwood

Although there are other things that are arguably more important than the last three (especially blackwood) such as reverses showing extras and understanding which sequences are forcing (but these are both "system" things more than "convention" things).

[kenrexford]

This seems like a silly exercise.

[Echognome]

I think it's at least ironic that this topic is in the advanced and expert-class bridge section.