[Manastorm]

There is a thread on Bridgewinners about alerts and disclosure, which gained many posts very quickly. An unusual system, not much space to disclose it, what to alert and so on. One of the participants describes 1♣ opening as 11+, 2+♣ and forcing, alternatively it was described as 11-13bal or other hand types. What I gather is that the first one is very economical and opaque. I think it is unacceptable, unless a simulation proves that the main bulk of respective hands are actually opened with 1♣, because if not, it is not what it says. I don't actually know, if the system as a whole was described in such was that 1♣ is a trash bin opening, when some slack should be allowed. The second basicly is ok as long as 11-13bal is predominant, I doubt that is the case, however I am ok with it anyways, since who wouldn't ask details and get the full answer. I find it very odd that the pair can't explain a simple 1♣ opening coherently.

What comes to the actual discussion on BW, my sympathy is fully on the side I harshly reprimanded. I don't think it is necessary to be include forcing nature of the opening explicitly, since other hand types probably contain the message. Admittedly I don't like to find excuses for not disclosing it openly, but the lack of space and time exists. The transfer response was fine, acceptance was as good as it gets and pass seemed like the most obvious want to play you ever see.

[helene_t]

People usually try to be helpful when explaining and alerting. There can be issues with players who think their weird agreements are normal and don't require explanation/alert, there can be issues with players who have poor communication skills, and online there's the extra challenge with different languages and people being used to playing under different local regulations.

But inadequate disclosure is rarely, IMO, a result of an intention to gain an advantage by concealing information.

There's a skisma between adequate disclosure and overburdening opps with barely relevant information. And if you give opps long lectures about all the fine details of your system, it can come over as bragging. "Look how sophisticated our agreements are, and you just play vanilla bridge ha-ha-ha!"

I think it's ok to disclose a Polish 1♣ opening as "12-14 bal or some strong hand, forcing". Of course it is not complete but the phrase "... or some strong hand" already implies that there's more to say, so they can ask.

[mycroft]

It's the relatively modern "clubs or balanced" with transfer responses. They've just made it forcing because they've FanTunes'ed it (so it's totally unlimited). I do think that a forcing opening that can be 11 is something unexpected enough to note; "11+, 2+!C; BAL or 14+w/!C, F1" seems appropriate. A recentish description of their 1♣ is: "all balanced hands outside of range for 1N or 2N including a 5 card Major or 14+ with clubs. Responses are transfer walsh style although we have some widgets that let us play the hand from either side if we think its advantageous positionally."

so 11-13 or 17-19 or 22+ BAL, or 14+ with real clubs.

I think the discussions on the pass are interesting; I've actually pm'ed my answer to the OP. I think that the questions I want answered are:

• What other NF, non-INV responses do you have?
  
• How heavy/light do you invite opposite 11-13? (and I guess, "can you invite and stop in 2♠?")

I definitely have sympathy for "we think this is the best place for us to play" not being sufficient without "here's the list of other options for zero-counts". If that's their only response with non-INV, then my interest in action is different than if they have 1NT and 2♣ with hands that may not want to play the 4-2 fit; similarly, if they'll invite on shapely 10s, balancing is less dangerous than if they invite heavy, and might have a bad 12 for the pass.

Everything else can either wait until the play, or even wait until dummy comes down and we see it.

[mycroft]

Helene, I think a Polish club has to mention the intermediate club hand to be fair.

"12-14/18-19 BAL, 15+ w/♣, or 19+any, F1" or the like.

[pescetom]

mycroft, on 2020-November-03, 15:03, said:

It's the relatively modern "clubs or balanced" with transfer responses. They've just made it forcing because they've FanTunes'ed it (so it's totally unlimited). I do think that a forcing opening that can be 11 is something unexpected enough to note; "11+, 2+!C; BAL or 14+w/!C, F1" seems appropriate. A recentish description of their 1♣ is: "all balanced hands outside of range for 1N or 2N including a 5 card Major or 14+ with clubs. Responses are transfer walsh style although we have some widgets that let us play the hand from either side if we think its advantageous positionally."

so 11-13 or 17-19 or 22+ BAL, or 14+ with real clubs.

I think the discussions on the pass are interesting; I've actually pm'ed my answer to the OP. I think that the questions I want answered are:

• What other NF, non-INV responses do you have?
  
• How heavy/light do you invite opposite 11-13? (and I guess, "can you invite and stop in 2♠?")

I definitely have sympathy for "we think this is the best place for us to play" not being sufficient without "here's the list of other options for zero-counts". If that's their only response with non-INV, then my interest in action is different than if they have 1NT and 2♣ with hands that may not want to play the 4-2 fit; similarly, if they'll invite on shapely 10s, balancing is less dangerous than if they invite heavy, and might have a bad 12 for the pass.

Everything else can either wait until the play, or even wait until dummy comes down and we see it.

I agree with this and love your description of the opening (finally I understand it!). I thought the original description of the opening was at least reticent (how can you not say "forcing?") and the original description of the response even worse, in the light of the subsequent and sheepful explanation ("4 card only with a crappy 4333 on Monday mornings" or whatever). I do agree with the majority who thought that pass does not require an explanation, but consider that a red herring set up by the poll (I abstained).

[nige1]

helene_t, on 2020-November-03, 14:59, said:

People usually try to be helpful when explaining and alerting. There can be issues with players who think their weird agreements are normal and don't require explanation/alert, there can be issues with players who have poor communication skills, and online there's the extra challenge with different languages and people being used to playing under different local regulations. But inadequate disclosure is rarely, IMO, a result of an intention to gain an advantage by concealing information.

I'm unable to read minds but I fear that Helene-t underestimates the frequency of prevarication. Experiences differ. For example, at a Welsh congress, opponents told me "no agreement". Later, I had to return to the table to retrieve my system-card. I interrupted a discussion revealing that opponents had a definite agreement. 2 occasions, against different pairs: one incident involved competitive bidding; the other, defensive carding. On both occasions, I called the director to no avail.

helene_t, on 2020-November-03, 14:59, said:

There's a skisma between adequate disclosure and overburdening opps with barely relevant information. And if you give opps long lectures about all the fine details of your system, it can come over as bragging. "Look how sophisticated our agreements are, and you just play vanilla bridge ha-ha-ha!"

IMO, frequent rationalizations for non-disclosure are "Bridge logic" "General Bridge Knowledge" and "Avoiding confusing opponents with detail". Unfortunately, players seem to have widely different interpretations of "Bridge logic", etc... I'd rather put up with bragging than with non-disclosure of relevant agreements

[mycroft]

One of the things I'm noticing with this thread (combining the BW one in my mind) and others is that what the bidder thinks is important about the bid frequently doesn't match what the opponents think is important.

Some of that is just not understanding; I have noticed I have a weird frame of mind where I do think about these things; it's the same weird frame of mind that allows me to trivially enumerate Lebensohl hands at the 2NT level, where many Just Can't (even though they know what each rebid means when partner bids it). Therefore, I really appreciate the OP of the BW thread for asking.

It's so obvious to the Martian pair that since they have no dedicated "strong bid", that all their 1 bids must be forcing, that they can't see that "11+, BAL outside range or 14+, clubs" isn't obviously forcing to people who don't play their system, and that that actually is critical information. So it gets missed.

Similarly, they know their system so well, that "what would you need to know besides 'we think 1♠ is the best place for us to play on this hand'?" has no answer for them at all, whereas for people used to having to decipher odd systems, the question "what other non-Forcing, non-Invitational calls do you have besides pass?" is critical to understand what hands would pass (of course, they *know* all that, and *use* that in their further bidding if there's competition - again, I'm not intending to imply malicious intent here, it's just so ingrained in their minds that they can't think otherwise. Or "well, obviously, you'd have to be able to get out of bad 4-2 fits, especially if you have a club fit as well, so of course nobody would make everything but pass show cards" - when in fact, a system I learned how to play, but never played because of ACBL Defence Database restrictions, did exactly that with 1♣-1♦; 1♥-p (okay, legitimately, 1♠ could be very few 0+, but also could be GF, so you only did that when you preferred *2♠* to 1♥). So "well, of course partner can bid 1NT or 2♣ to play" doesn't "feel" like information the opponents would need.

I find that those playing truly out there systems are almost always very forthcoming in explanation (frankly, the exceptions are those who learned their system where it was "the system" in their area - Poles playing Polish club being the obvious example, but not the only one. Again, that's a "doesn't everybody know this?" issue, not a "unwilling to disclose" issue). It's the people who play basically "area Flight A", who are the ones who will try to ascribe to GBK stuff they don't feel like telling the opponents (here, the other great sentence is "why should I have to do their thinking for them?") Again, some don't know; some I strongly believe deliberately intend to get an advantage from their experience (and better "bridge logic").

Again, I commend the OP of both threads, and the people on this thread, for asking these questions and listening to the answers.

[pescetom]

mycroft, on 2020-November-05, 10:09, said:

One of the things I'm noticing with this thread (combining the BW one in my mind) and others is that what the bidder thinks is important about the bid frequently doesn't match what the opponents think is important.

Some of that is just not understanding; I have noticed I have a weird frame of mind where I do think about these things; it's the same weird frame of mind that allows me to trivially enumerate Lebensohl hands at the 2NT level, where many Just Can't (even though they know what each rebid means when partner bids it). Therefore, I really appreciate the OP of the BW thread for asking.

It's so obvious to the Martian pair that since they have no dedicated "strong bid", that all their 1 bids must be forcing, that they can't see that "11+, BAL outside range or 14+, clubs" isn't obviously forcing to people who don't play their system, and that that actually is critical information. So it gets missed.

Similarly, they know their system so well, that "what would you need to know besides 'we think 1♠ is the best place for us to play on this hand'?" has no answer for them at all, whereas for people used to having to decipher odd systems, the question "what other non-Forcing, non-Invitational calls do you have besides pass?" is critical to understand what hands would pass (of course, they *know* all that, and *use* that in their further bidding if there's competition - again, I'm not intending to imply malicious intent here, it's just so ingrained in their minds that they can't think otherwise. Or "well, obviously, you'd have to be able to get out of bad 4-2 fits, especially if you have a club fit as well, so of course nobody would make everything but pass show cards" - when in fact, a system I learned how to play, but never played because of ACBL Defence Database restrictions, did exactly that with 1♣-1♦; 1♥-p (okay, legitimately, 1♠ could be very few 0+, but also could be GF, so you only did that when you preferred *2♠* to 1♥). So "well, of course partner can bid 1NT or 2♣ to play" doesn't "feel" like information the opponents would need.

I find that those playing truly out there systems are almost always very forthcoming in explanation (frankly, the exceptions are those who learned their system where it was "the system" in their area - Poles playing Polish club being the obvious example, but not the only one. Again, that's a "doesn't everybody know this?" issue, not a "unwilling to disclose" issue). It's the people who play basically "area Flight A", who are the ones who will try to ascribe to GBK stuff they don't feel like telling the opponents (here, the other great sentence is "why should I have to do their thinking for them?") Again, some don't know; some I strongly believe deliberately intend to get an advantage from their experience (and better "bridge logic").

Again, I commend the OP of both threads, and the people on this thread, for asking these questions and listening to the answers.

A commendable post, although ultimately I think you are a tad generous - many of these partnerships have spent thousands of hours refining and playing their Martian understanding, yet they can't find 2 or 3 hours to write a clear system card or sit down with a Director and discuss how they should best disclose their first two levels of bidding?

I agree 100% that "those playing truly out there systems are almost always very forthcoming in explanation" whereas "those who learned their system where it was "the system" in their area" are often a real problem. Around here the latter often play some obscure canape' system and are about as forthcoming as a clam when you try to understand what they are actually saying to each other. My impression is that they are well aware that the limits of their system are compensated by the obscurity of their habitual explanations and they jealously defend the latter which they have come to regard as their right ("everyone knows what "preparatory" means").

But yes I have also encountered some blatantly devious opponents, skilled players with no system card and no intention to divulge important agreements. Not many fortunately, but they exist.

[mycroft]

With what I'm thinking about, it's either blinders or just a quirk of how (some) people think. I automatically go to enumerating the options, because that's how my mind works. Many others don't, but they can retain sequences much better than I - but that means to enumerate the options, they need to follow all the sequences, and that takes time and effort.

Some, I will admit, aren't willing to do things. Some have subsumed so much knowledge that they can't see how everybody else doesn't "just know that". Some have worked with odd systems so much that to them, this bit of bridge logic *is* "just obvious". But even if it makes sense when explained, it isn't "obvious" to anyone that hasn't played a limited opener system that 1♠-4♠ can be both KT854 6 J85 T862 and AQ8 KT64 QJ85 Q4, because for them that's a totally unresolvable "can we make slam" problem with opener's 20 count, for instance.

I am one to give the benefit of the doubt, potentially more often than it is deserved. I think it is deserved to do so with this pair, not least because they asked the question - and seem willing to assist in getting a good answer, even when the outraged masses of BW are outraged. Sure, it almost certainly came from someone complaining about their disclosure, but those actively intending to play "minimum I can get away with" would have listened to the director explaining the problem, thanked her, and promptly ignored it.

[pescetom]

mycroft, on 2020-November-05, 17:12, said:

I am one to give the benefit of the doubt, potentially more often than it is deserved.

I wonder how you would categorise the disclosure of an opponent I encountered yesterday, in an italian club tournament on BBO. His profile had a star on it, expert, no convention card. He opens 2♣ with no alert, I ask for an explanation, silence. I wait and finally he provides "forcing". Gee thanks. Next round he rebids 2NT which wins the auction, turns out he had 21 HCP 3=4=4=2. No big deal, but I wonder if a 2NT opening would have been alerted either.

[mycroft]

To me, sounds like "if you don't know standard how to play, I'm not here to tell you."

We get that a lot here with our "think they're world class" players.

If it was deliberate attempt to avoid saying something, that's one thing. If it's "if it wasn't normal, I would have said something", it's an attitude I prefer wasn't in the game.

[pescetom]

mycroft, on 2020-November-07, 13:26, said:

To me, sounds like "if you don't know standard how to play, I'm not here to tell you."

We get that a lot here with our "think they're world class" players.

If it was deliberate attempt to avoid saying something, that's one thing. If it's "if it wasn't normal, I would have said something", it's an attitude I prefer wasn't in the game.

That's much how it sounded to me too.
I checked him out later: once a world class player.
I'm sure he didn't care two hoots (as lamford would say) about winning that local tournament, so certainly no deliberate attempt at anything.
I would have been happy with a system card, as always.

[johnu]

pescetom, on 2020-November-07, 13:52, said:

I'm sure he didn't care two hoots (as lamford would say) about winning that local tournament, so certainly no deliberate attempt at anything.

Maybe for some people, but others are ultra competitive and would do anything for an edge, even if questionable in their thirst to win.

[mycroft]

Remember, there are those (and I'm not putting the person referenced here in this category, but I know several) for whom "winning" does not necessarily mean coming first in the scores. "I'm smarter than you" and "I'm better than you" is a game you can always play, and you get lots of chances to win it.

Note: I'm also not saying this is a game that should be played, and in many cases is against the Proprieties. Just that it *is* played.

[pescetom]

mycroft, on 2020-November-08, 11:07, said:

Remember, there are those (and I'm not putting the person referenced here in this category, but I know several) for whom "winning" does not necessarily mean coming first in the scores. "I'm smarter than you" and "I'm better than you" is a game you can always play, and you get lots of chances to win it.

Note: I'm also not saying this is a game that should be played, and in many cases is against the Proprieties. Just that it *is* played.

It's played against opponents, against partner, even against the Director. Does not work well online however (luckily for me as I am vulnerable to such bullying). If I had to guess, in this case his agreements are something like 2NT shows 18-19 and 22-23 goes through Multicolor: he considers this obvious or ininfluential or simply can't be bothered to disclose his agreements in a trivial competition. Maybe he's a bit tired of bridge.