[kugw]

Need help in putting pen to paper and writing down system in all its glory and complexity.

Are there other methods of recording system structure, notes, agreements, etc other than for example:
opening bid hcp suit length hand shape notes
1C, 1D, 1H, 1S 11 4 any natural may contain longer suit

Does anyone have any ideas?

[Balrog49]

Every partnership has a point of diminishing returns with respect to system notes. For "serious" partnerships, a few pages of notes may be enough. Long-term, world-class partnerships, however, often need hundreds of pages of notes.

The organization of system notes depends on the players. Some people think about bidding very differently from others so the notes must be organized in a way that's acceptable to everyone who uses them.

Very complex systems usually require two sets of notes:

- complete system notes with openings, responses, rebids, relays, etc. in nested tabular format in order to be sure that everything is covered or intentionally undefined. They must include passed-hand bidding, contested auctions, slam bidding style, defensive bidding, carding, etc.

- condensed system notes intended to be reviewed often, that contain agreements that have been forgotten or have gone off the rails.

For example, my old Superprecision notes are hundreds of pages but my 2/1 notes are a single, five-page document. They're short enough to review for a single-session club game. I have a template with my own preferences that I give to each partner for modification. There's a matching, online convention card for each of course.

I'm a retired technical writer and once thought about doing professional-quality system notes and convention cards for a fee, but the truth is that working on other people's system notes can be terribly boring.

[kugw]

Balrog49, on 2015-November-29, 15:31, said:

Every partnership has a point of diminishing returns with respect to system notes. For "serious" partnerships, a few pages of notes may be enough. Long-term, world-class partnerships, however, often need hundreds of pages of notes.

The organization of system notes depends on the players. Some people think about bidding very differently from others so the notes must be organized in a way that's acceptable to everyone who uses them.

Very complex systems usually require two sets of notes:

- complete system notes with openings, responses, rebids, relays, etc. in nested tabular format in order to be sure that everything is covered or intentionally undefined. They must include passed-hand bidding, contested auctions, slam bidding style, defensive bidding, carding, etc.

- condensed system notes intended to be reviewed often, that contain agreements that have been forgotten or have gone off the rails.

For example, my old Superprecision notes are hundreds of pages but my 2/1 notes are a single, five-page document. They're short enough to review for a single-session club game. I have a template with my own preferences that I give to each partner for modification. There's a matching, online convention card for each of course.

I'm a retired technical writer and once thought about doing professional-quality system notes and convention cards for a fee, but the truth is that working on other people's system notes can be terribly boring.

Thanks for your reply. I agree that other people's system card can be boring. As for my own system notes as you say nested format it is most likely going to be. Once again thanks for the reply.

[PrecisionL]

I have used Excel and Word for nested system notes. Prefer Word, formatting is easy and you can assign suit symbols to rarely used keys (shift #).

[kugw]

PrecisionL, on 2015-November-29, 23:20, said:

I have used Excel and Word for nested system notes. Prefer Word, formatting is easy and you can assign suit symbols to rarely used keys (shift #).

Thanks for your reply. Have also used Word for the reasons you have outlined. I guess what I am trying to do is to have system notes that do not run to hundreds of pages yet still cover the system and it's complexities.