[the hog]

First prize one game with Inquiry
Second Prize two games with Inquiry?

Just kidding, Ben!

[jtfanclub]

As you all know, I'm an intermediate player who isn't shy in making his opinion known.

I can't imagine why I would want to answer this question on-line. How could my opinion on this help anyone else on this forum? If it's a quiz, then I'll think or write down my answers and then look at the correct answer later- this isn't school, and I don't need a grade. If it's an honest question, then I can't answer it- my hand evaluation techniques are average at best, as it is for most beginners and intermediates.

It has nothing to do with being shy, or being worried about being laughed at (Lord knows that must happen enough), it's simply that there isn't anything I or most other beginners/intermediates could contribute to the discussion.

As for what it means to me, the answer is it means 'I want to play in 4H'.

Someday I'll get fancier than that.

[paulhar]

Great post jtfanclub! What you are saying is quite obvious but a point apparently missed by all of us.

I'd like to follow up with some more questions for you and any other brave B/I's (beginner/intermediates) willing to answer.

1. When the original quiz was posted, and you came up with your own answers at home, did you like or dislike the fact that there were other 'expert' answers waiting for you when you finished the problems? (and why?) (By the way - I don't know the answer to this - that's why I'm asking.)

2. Is it a pipe dream to expect any but the bravest B/I's to post on this board under any circumstances? While you're certainly correct that B/I's won't want to post answers, I presume that there are other topics they would want to discuss.

3. My opinion: Although there's no reason to post, there's good reason to E-mail the teacher your answers (with thinking would be good too!) Reason: The teacher needs to know what issues & misconceptions to address when posting the answer. Frequently, misconceptions are uncovered that the teacher didn't think about when posting the question. Your comments?

[whereagles]

Just a small comment (didn't have time to go through the whole thread). Playing a natural system, you can assign undisturbed support bids like this:

1D 1H
2H = 12-14 balanced or unbalanced 5+ diams

1D 1H
3H = 15-17 unbalanced 5+ diams (balanced would have opened 1NT)

1D 1H
4H = 18-19 balanced (unbalanced has other bids)

1D 1H
3S/4C = 18-19 unbalanced, splinter

1D 1H
4D = 18-19 unbalanced, good 6 diams suit for discards

Most of the time responder just bids 4H, but sometimes he might be strong and is now well positioned to go on. This scheme is very descriptive, but does have the problem of occasionally overbidding you to 4H in the case 1D-1H-4H (you can have 18 opposite 5 and no super-fit).

If opps overcall, that's a different story.

[paulhar]

whereagles, on Jul 27 2004, 12:59 PM, said:

1D 1H
3H = 15-17 unbalanced 5+ diams (balanced would have opened 1NT)

What would I do with 4-4-4-1?

[whereagles]

4441 also qualifies as "unbalanced". In this case you won't have the 5 diamonds, but nobody's perfect And in any case 4441s only come up once every 50 hands or so.

Some people treat 4441s as this:
4441 singleton A, K or Q = balanced, NT-like hand
4441 singleton J or worse = pick best 4-card minor suit and bid as if it were a 5-card suit.

If you prefer, you can also twist that by allowing a 4-card 1M opener if no minor suit is an attractive lie, e.g.

AKQx
x
xxxx
Qxxx

Open 1S, even in a 5-card major system.

[paulhar]

whereagles, on Jul 27 2004, 01:19 PM, said:

nobody's perfect

Somebody was going to say it. I just happened to be the logged on at the time

Quote

If you prefer, you can also twist that by allowing a 4-card 1M opener if no minor suit is an attractive lie, e.g.

AKQx
x
xxxx
Qxxx

Open 1S, even in a 5-card major system.

Yeah, I used to do that a lot too. My favorite partner is a more devout follower of the Law of Total Tricks* than Larry Cohen himself. Opening 1S on this hand with this partner usually does no good except to make the opponents happy when I get to play 3S doubled on my 4-4 fit.

(For the newer players: A simple explanation of this Law (a guideline) is to compete to the 2 level if you think your side has 8 trumps and compete to the 3 level if pushed if your side has 9 trumps. IMO it's a good guideline.

[hallway]

I must have been having a bad hair day - fighting for my BILlies has as you can see already turned it WHITE nothing left now but to tear it out

**************


paulhar has sent you this email from http://forums.bridgebase.com/index.php.


I'm afraid that there may be some B/I's out there that may still be confused. If they also did not know that Rado is a top player, OR if they aren't reading the posts too carefully, they might think that you no longer wish to have experts post answers to the beginner's questions here (as I first thought), and that if they want a question answered by experts, they need to go elsewhwere. I sincerely hope that this is not the case, because the elsewhere some of them have been going is into the Expert forum where the answers involve conventions and gadgets I don't even want to think about.

It would be truly sad if the beginners thought that the experts weren't going to answer their questions in the Beg/Int forum anymore because they (the B/I's) misunderstood your post. I would have liked to clear this point up but I'm not going to put words in your mouth. But I think SOMEBODY should let the beginners know that the place they should be asking their questions is in the Beginner's forum because the people that answer them will take their beginner status into account.

***********


B/I's DO NOT BE CONFUSED - It is I who am confused !!

Ben - as a parting recommendation perhaps you should have it pinned at the start of the Forum that B/I's should - ONLY ASK QUESTIONS here . Hmmmm emailing/IMing answers might work - didn't back in Feb (?) 2003 when you tried so very hard - I sincerely hope it will now.

[inquiry]

I think BIL's should not only ask questions here, but also try to answer some. Sure their answers will be incomplete and sure some of their answers will be flat wrong. But you know what? Advanced players will give incomplete and wrong answers, as will Experts, and who knows, even Fred might miss one occassionally.

Being right or wrong is not the issue. Discussing bridge related issue is important. If you read other threads, you will see that experts disagree with each other over and over and over again.... EVEN WHEN THEY PLAY THE SAME SYSTEM. Every take a look at the bidding contest in the Bridge World where all those world class players are using hte same system (bridge world standard)? You get four or five different answers on every question, and many of them will say the other bids (which other experts think are right) are totaly "wacky".

So I guess what I am saying, in addition to everyone will give incomplete or wrong answers, the VAST majority of the time, there is no one right answer (no matter how strongly I feel that MINE is the absolute correct answer)...

I wil lsay this however, when someone posses a play problem here, only BIL's should answer. Clearly any beginner problem would be a piece of cake for even an advanced player, much less an expert. On that I think we can all agree....

And of course, wouldn't it be a very nice idea to separate beginners from intermediate in the forum. I think the BIL's who do post here are actually very advanced intermediates (if not already advanced players).. A novice/beginner forum has a nice sound to it...

Ben

[Robertn]

Rado, on Jul 25 2004, 05:03 PM, said:

Hi all friends
Suppose using natural methods ( 5 card Majors), what about these often seen bids:
1. 1♣-pass-1♥-pass
---4♥
2. 1♣-pass-1♥-2♦
---4♥
3. 1♣-pass-1♥-3♦
---4♥
4. 1♣-pass-1♥-4♦
---4♥
:-)))))))))))))))))
Rado

I think there's a distinction with this type of question between (i) what would be good agreements for a beg/int level player with a regular partner; (ii) what would be a good standard treatment to expect with pickup partners in the BIL (e.g. in a BB-basic / SAYC framework); (iii) what pickup partners in the BIL are actually likely to do; (iv) more advanced treatments etc, etc.

For the first auction, I'd use splinters where appropriate with a regular partner, but would avoid them with a pickup partner in the BIL unless mentioned on their profile.

For the second auction, I'd treat 3♦ as mainly asking for a stop and bid 3nt if appropriate opposite a pickup partner. I'd treat double as primarily penalties, though (depending on spades and vul) would be more likely to bit 3NT than double as opener here.

For the third auction, I'd treat 4♦ as showing interest in heart slam with ♦ control (ace or singleton/void). I'd probably use this with an intermediate pickup partner only, or sometimes a beg/nov I knew would understand. In deciding between dbl for penalties or 3nt, I'd try to estimate the scores from each assuming fairly minimum hand from partner.

For the fourth auction, one question is how much responder needs to go further given that opener may have stretched to bid 4♥. This is easier to judge with a known partner - a good reason to try and remember which BIL members are aggressive bidders (hi Sceptic!).

Robert (intermediate)

[paulhar]

inquiry, on Jul 27 2004, 04:12 PM, said:

I will say this however, when someone posses a play problem here, only BIL's should answer. Clearly any beginner problem would be a piece of cake for even an advanced player, much less an expert. On that I think we can all agree....

Wow! I was going to write a post that said just what you said, Ben, but I couldn't have said it nearly as well.

I totally agree that it would be great to have a separate Beginner forum. With my simplistic-minded quizzes, if I were to post any, I presume that would be the place for them.

I also agree that most of the Intermediates that post here are bordering on advanced, and I'll go one step further - some of the expert answers to the 'beginner' questions also seem to be aimed toward the top intermediates bordering on advanced.

Unfortunately, I have one small problem with the quoted paragraph, which I think is true as far as a teacher presenting a play problem. Do you still think that if the intermediate player poses the play problem? If the learning player thinks he might have misplayed a hand and wants to know how he could have done better, I'm not sure he would appreciate that all of his answers came from his peers. If you agree with what I just said, then we need some way of knowing whether the play problem came from a teacher or a beginner/intermediate.

New beginners & intermediate players are coming onto the forum all the time and I would not put the onus on them. There are very few teachers that might post quizzes on the board. So far, I know you have tried, I have tried, and Rado has tried. Wouldn't it be better if the teachers put on the post that only beginners were to answer? (or only beginners & intermediates if it were a harder problem?) If we said that, then you and I know that now, Rado would know soon, and if any of Maureen's BIL teachers wanted to post problems or quizzes, they would find out soon enough - after four or five experts posted, Maureen (or somebody) would let us know that this person was a teacher, and the experts would go away for that thread, and someone would E-mail the teacher with this policy (who might edit his original post to include the request for beginners only.)

If we did this, then we could assume that any play problem posted that didn't specify something like 'beginners only' would have been posted by a beginner or intermediate that wants the answer from someone who knows the game far better than they do. (IMO it would be nice if none of our answers involved esoteric squeezes - it's sometimes hard enough to get beginners not to draw too many trumps)

My guess (and please correct me if I'm wrong) is that this forum is for all of the following, also feel free to add to this list:
(1) Beginners & intermediates to ask questions to get advice from the 'experts'
(2) 'Experts' & teachers to post problems and quizzes for the benefit of beginners and intermediates (answers to come later or perhaps be on another link)
(3) Anybody to announce something that might be of interest to beginners/intermediates (this one's kind of hairy - we don't want it to be a spam forum. I think it was OK to announce a free lesson on this forum but others might not. If I charged for it, I think it would be out of line to post that.)
(4) Anybody to pose questions to the beginners & intermediates, where the answers to such questions will help the questioner to better serve B/I's
(5) Beginners/Intermediates to discuss things with other B/I's (they should put 'experts stay away!' in the further description field). Note that these posts would be for ALL B/I's; if they wanted to talk to only certain ones, they should open a chat room in BBO.

[1eyedjack]

I should have thought it not beyond the wit of man when posting in this section of the forums to differentiate in the header post whether it is (1) a "quiz" type post submitted by a teacher or advanced player for the benefit of the education of beginners and intermediates, to which only intermediates or below are invited to respond, or alternatively (2) a cry for help by an intermedate or beginner, who would probably value the response of an expert above that of a beginner (the expert being expected to take due notice of his audience).

The two types of post are utterly different in nature and the appropriateness of responses (and by whom) are similarly polarised.

Once the category of initial post is made obvious (should it need to be expressed) then members should I think rightly be criticised if they do not enter into the appropriate spirit.

A bit of common sense, please.

[paulhar]

paulhar, on Jul 27 2004, 12:04 PM, said:

1. When the original quiz was posted, and you came up with your own answers at home, did you like or dislike the fact that there were other 'expert' answers waiting for you when you finished the problems? (and why?) (By the way - I don't know the answer to this - that's why I'm asking.)

Sorry everybody, this was me posting without engaging my brain. Clearly if the teacher wants the students to be able to scroll down and see expert opinions, he'll post them himself. If he doesn't do that, the rest of the experts should stay away because the teacher will answer the question himself when he's ready. After he has posted the answer, if somebody (an expert) disagrees with it or thinks something was left out, I think the best way to handle this is to E-mail the teacher privately rather than to post it. Post only if the teacher ignores your E-mail. Of course, the beginners & intermediates should feel free to post anyway since this is their forum and the teacher should be more than happy to clear up any misconceptions. Opinions?

[Rado]

Hi all,
Sorry to disturb some, but in my view BBO forums are mainly for posting bridge problems/questions/cases/funny moments and everyone is welcomed to share her/his opinion on the theme. Typing longeous posts to explain someone's feelings maybe should be redirected to another forum.
Greetings
Rado