[cherdanno]

cardsharp, on Aug 3 2010, 04:04 AM, said:

As someone who is probably the aforesaid 'strong expert', I wish my
The same is true of the national teams that I help. They are not 'super elite', just strong experts like myself. Teams that would expect to lose in the round of 64 of the Spingold. 70% of the lost imps are due to bidding judgement and bidding errors. Play and defensive errors are rare.

How much time do you spend looking for lost IMPs in the play? To give a fair assessment of that you also have to look at every contract where the two tables were in different contracts, and analyze whether the opposing team would have made more out of the spot your bidding put you in (including giving opponents more rope to make mistakes etc.).

[whereagles]

The reason cardplay is important for a beginner is that it trains your deduction and reconstruction skills more than bidding (if you make an effort to do it, of course). The skills you build-up with good cardplay help you later in making better bidding decisions.

That said, I don't quite agree that being excellent at cardplay is enough to win you national titles on a regular basis. Perhaps it is in some places, but bidding insufficiencies will cause needless swings sooner or later. I've seen it over and over again.

What I do agree is that being able to play at your near-best level (say 80 or 90% of it) on a regular basis makes a sizeable difference. Most of my mistakes come from concentration lapses or failure to make a simple inference. This is what justin was talking about, but it doesn't necessarily have to do with being an expert card player. More with being able to maintain the focus for 3 hours, which is yet another skill that's needed to win at high levels.

[paulg]

cherdanno, on Aug 3 2010, 10:21 AM, said:

cardsharp, on Aug 3 2010, 04:04 AM, said:

As someone who is probably the aforesaid 'strong expert', I wish my
The same is true of the national teams that I help. They are not 'super elite', just strong experts like myself. Teams that would expect to lose in the round of 64 of the Spingold. 70% of the lost imps are due to bidding judgement and bidding errors. Play and defensive errors are rare.

How much time do you spend looking for lost IMPs in the play? To give a fair assessment of that you also have to look at every contract where the two tables were in different contracts, and analyze whether the opposing team would have made more out of the spot your bidding put you in (including giving opponents more rope to make mistakes etc.).

A reasonable amount although it is certainly not exhaustive (perhaps if I were a paid coach then I'd do a lot more).

I tend to take a detailed look at all the hands where there was either (i) a swing in the match, (ii) a swing in the cross-imps on the board or (iii) a swing against par. I normally use a threshold of +/- 3 imps, so there is a lot of scope for missing small points.

[cherdanno]

So you miss any swing where your team bid 3D over their making 2H (unlike the other table), and could have made given they lead they got? Whereas if the other team bids 3D over 2H and makes on that reasonable lead they got, you declare it a swing on the bidding?

[paulg]

Perhaps I should have added that, personally speaking, first I'd like to be able to declare 1NT like a super-elite player, second I'd like to be able to play a 4-3 fit like a super-elite player and thirdly defend as well as them.

[helene_t]

cardsharp, on Aug 3 2010, 10:41 AM, said:

(perhaps if I were a paid coach then I'd do a lot more).

hehe I suppose that's a hint

[paulg]

cherdanno, on Aug 3 2010, 10:44 AM, said:

So you miss any swing where your team bid 3D over their making 2H (unlike the other table), and could have made given they lead they got?

Yes, I'd almost certainly miss this if they went down in 3D.

Quote

Whereas if the other team bids 3D over 2H and makes on that reasonable lead they got, you declare it a swing on the bidding?

I would 'examine' this board as it would trip one of the thresholds. There is a fair chance that I would mark it as 'unlucky' rather than a bidding/defensive charge. 'Unlucky' and 'Lucky' are used for boards where the pair did nothing significantly good or bad on the board but there was a swing.

[JLOGIC]

Helene's point about bidding is a very important one. Yes, bidding at all levels of bridge can create swings, however that doesn't mean that you will win or lose all of them because you took some bid. Maybe you made the right bid and will win imps for it 55 % of the time, or maybe you made the right bid knowing slam will be 45-60 % and hit the worst hand from partner and slam goes down (or maybe it makes) etc.

Also, a lot of swings come because auctions start differently. There are system swings but there are also style swings, like if you overcall Qxx KQTxx xx xxx vul 1H, you could win or lose imps for a lot of reasons because of it. Maybe the play is different and in your favor or not in your favor etc etc. That doesn't mean that the 1H overcall gains or loses a big swing every time.

In bidding the margins are really small, and your style can win or lose the match for you on any day. If you magically knew the "right" style or bid every time, you might lose the match because of it, and you will only be winning over the inferior style some of the time even if most of the swings are generated by the bidding.

In cardplay of course you can make the right play/line and go down but it happens much less often because the margins are much bigger. If I use good technique and make on a better line than you, that line may be 20 % bigger. In an endgame if I guess and you don't, I might have found a clue that makes my play 100 % and yours 0 %, or I might have weighted the clues correctly so that I was right and you were wrong. That means I win a big swing (say 12 imps) 100 % of the time that spot occurs. That is a MASSIVE swing in expectation which will almost never be rivaled by any particular bid.

As cherdano said, if you can pick up a game swing or 2 through better guessing/play/table presence whatever, that is a big swing for your team. Compare this to making 10 better bids in certain spots which gain you .5 imps a board expectation (which is a lot), where you pick up 5 imps throughout a match with a lot of variance involved.

There is just way more to be gained in the card play.

[wclass___]

Superior bidding methods and bidding judgment win

[junyi_zhu]

gurgistan, on Aug 2 2010, 02:43 PM, said:

On BBO, most players I have noticed define themselves on how well they play their cards.

This has led me to ponder just what is the relationship between cardplay technique and bidding acumen.

In a perfect world, we would be masters of all aspects of the game but living in an imperfect one which is more valuable?

If your Fairy Godmother could give you unrivalled prowess in either cardplay or bidding which would you choose?

I think the most important thing is not to make simple mistakes, no matter it is bidding or playing. Tough hands are tough, you may solve them sometimes or sometimes, they are just too tough. However, simple hands are the most important components in the game. Very often, I see a lot of imps or mps are earned not because how well you play this game, but because how badly your opps play this game, no matter at what levels of this game. Very rarely, players play a perfect game in any levels of competitions. Often, you make quite a few mistakes in even one hand and as long as you don't make the last mistake, you still can win.

[bucky]

gurgistan, on Aug 2 2010, 09:43 AM, said:

On BBO, most players I have noticed define themselves on how well they play their cards.

This has led me to ponder just what is the relationship between cardplay technique and bidding acumen.

In a perfect world, we would be masters of all aspects of the game but living in an imperfect one which is more valuable?

If your Fairy Godmother could give you unrivalled prowess in either cardplay or bidding which would you choose?

The truth is, most players on BBO don't know how good/bad they are in play or bidding. What they define themselves are just their own perception, which has very little value across the board. Many rate themselves as experts in the hope they won't be rejected when trying to join a table. But even if everyone is honest, one who perceives himself/herself as an expert may be inferior to another one self-rated as a beginner.

As to the original question, you have to ask yourself, which side of coin is more valuable? Head or tail?

[billw55]

junyi_zhu, on Aug 3 2010, 12:08 PM, said:

I think the most important thing is not to make simple mistakes, no matter it is bidding or playing. Tough hands are tough, you may solve them sometimes or sometimes, they are just too tough. However, simple hands are the most important components in the game. Very often, I see a lot of imps or mps are earned not because how well you play this game, but because how badly your opps play this game, no matter at what levels of this game. Very rarely, players play a perfect game in any levels of competitions. Often, you make quite a few mistakes in even one hand and as long as you don't make the last mistake, you still can win.

Interesting, I have heard this often, that being an expert has much more to do with avoiding errors than producing brilliancies. SJ Simon said as much 70 years ago. And even at the elite level, Fred has said that most matches are decided on errors.

[Rossoneri]

billw55, on Aug 4 2010, 01:31 PM, said:

junyi_zhu, on Aug 3 2010, 12:08 PM, said:

I think the most important thing is not to make simple mistakes, no matter it is bidding or playing. Tough hands are tough, you may solve them sometimes or sometimes, they are just too tough. However, simple hands are the most important components in the game. Very often, I see a lot of imps or mps are earned not because how well you play this game, but because how badly your opps play this game, no matter at what levels of this game. Very rarely, players play a perfect game in any levels of competitions. Often, you make quite a few mistakes in even one hand and as long as you don't make the last mistake, you still can win.

Interesting, I have heard this often, that being an expert has much more to do with avoiding errors than producing brilliancies. SJ Simon said as much 70 years ago. And even at the elite level, Fred has said that most matches are decided on errors.

That is true, and I'd rather much have better card play skills than bidding.

I've spent time dabbling with more sophisticated bidding and that didn't work out well. Spending more time on card play has made me a better player than I was.

Put it this way, most game contracts can be reached whether you're playing a super scientific system or vanilla SAYC. Would you prefer to bid the game scientifically and then go down because you missed a safety play or elimination play or would you prefer to just have 1M-2M-4M (say) and make the game?

How about, consider the fact that a good portion of the time you're not bidding, but you need to defend? That can easily add up to a lot of swings.

[bucky]

Rossoneri, on Aug 4 2010, 08:21 AM, said:

billw55, on Aug 4 2010, 01:31 PM, said:

junyi_zhu, on Aug 3 2010, 12:08 PM, said:

I think the most important thing is not to make simple mistakes, no matter it is bidding or playing. Tough hands are tough, you may solve them sometimes or sometimes, they are just too tough. However, simple hands are the most important components in the game. Very often, I see a lot of imps or mps are earned not because how well you play this game, but because how badly your opps play this game, no matter at what levels of this game. Very rarely, players play a perfect game in any levels of competitions. Often, you make quite a few mistakes in even one hand and as long as you don't make the last mistake, you still can win.

Interesting, I have heard this often, that being an expert has much more to do with avoiding errors than producing brilliancies. SJ Simon said as much 70 years ago. And even at the elite level, Fred has said that most matches are decided on errors.

That is true, and I'd rather much have better card play skills than bidding.

I've spent time dabbling with more sophisticated bidding and that didn't work out well. Spending more time on card play has made me a better player than I was.

Put it this way, most game contracts can be reached whether you're playing a super scientific system or vanilla SAYC. Would you prefer to bid the game scientifically and then go down because you missed a safety play or elimination play or would you prefer to just have 1M-2M-4M (say) and make the game?

How about, consider the fact that a good portion of the time you're not bidding, but you need to defend? That can easily add up to a lot of swings.

I think when people talk about bidding skill, they mean bidding judgment, not specific methods/systems. I would rather spend time on improving bidding judgment than on sophisticated systems. Bad bidding judgment can get you to bad contracts where no amount of cardplay skill can save you. On the other hand you need cardplay skill to do justice to good contracts. So both are essential.

[Fluffy]

agree with han

[OleBerg]

Just my observations:

Looking at the best players in my country, I consider some to bid really well, while I find that others are not spending nearly enough time on their system.

But they are all good card-players.

So definitely card-play at expert+ level.

At lower levels i strongly believe bidding well is very important. Not getting to the right contract is often costly, while less than good card play is not always punished.