[Fluffy]

The idea is simple: Instead of bidding to the 3 level with strong hands and rebidding your suit with weak ones do something different: Save as much sapce as possible with good hands (cheapest bid), and describe with the weak

so for an auction like

1♠-2♣

2♦: (15)16+ any distribution

anything else 11-14(15) natural.

There would of course be problems when you have to rebid the suit in the relay, so having to jump at the 3 level (specially in the 1♠-2♦ sequence where you will find out about the 5th heart too high), but on the other cases you seem to do it just fine.

[qwery_hi]

Fluffy, on Jan 26 2009, 07:51 PM, said:

The idea is simple: Instead of bidding to the 3 level with strong hands and rebidding your suit with weak ones do something different: Save as much sapce as possible with good hands (cheapest bid), and describe with the weak

so for an auction like

1♠-2♣

2♦: (15)16+ any distribution

anything else 11-14(15) natural.

There would of course be problems when you have to rebid the suit in the relay, so having to jump at the 3 level (specially in the 1♠-2♦ sequence where you will find out about the 5th heart too high), but on the other cases you seem to do it just fine.

One issue is this - if opener is minimum, then the natural bids which are 11-15 give away information to the opponents when there is only game. A case in example -

assume responder is Qxx KJxx Kxxx Axx, and responds 2♣ to 1♠. Now if opener's 2♦ is any 11-15 without 4♥, responder can easily place the contract (4♠). In the other scheme, opener would bid 3♣, giving away information.

If opener if 16+, then giving away extra information is not that much of an issue, if we end up in game, the extra values should compensate. If we're in slam, then the extra info would have helped us get there.

~my $0.02

[Fluffy]

thx gweri, this looks true when responder has fit, however when he doesn't, bidding your shape with weak hands helps to find the best game.

[FrancesHinden]

I'm going to bust my reputation for simple natural bidding totally by replying to this thread...

I play in one regular 2/1 partnership and we've been working a lot on structure recently. (As MickyB knows, it's not all yet firmly embedded in long term memory - his team was the recipient of a generous 4NT-1 after a system screw up a couple of weeks ago.)

The main (and most obvious) conclusion is that you can't play the same methods after, say, 1S-2C as after 1S-2H.

After 1S-2C you can play really anything sensible, you have so much room - that's why it's becoming common to put more hand types into the 2C bid. We have kept this fairly natural and play 1S - 2C - 2D as 12-14/18-19 balanced or diamonds, with a 2H shape relay over it. 1S - 2C - 2S shows a sixth spade, and 2NT is 15-17 balanced. If you are going to open 1NT on all hands with a 5-card major you could probably do something even more sexy, but we like opening 1S on these hands. This works fine, and to my mind better than sticking all good (or all minimum) hands into the 2D rebid.

After 1S - 2H we are experimenting with playing 2S as most minimum hands (with a 2NT ask), 2NT as showing six spades, 3m as 5-5 and 3H as 15+ with heart support (with a shape relay over it, of course). I think this is not optimal - in fact I think best would be to go for totally artificial rebid structure, but we've decided the memory strain on that is just too much.

After 1S - 2D and 1H - 2D we are thinking of doing something slightly different again - playing step 1 as all balanced ranges, step 2 as 5-4 with one of the two missing suits, and step 3 as 6 cards in the major. But that is still under development.

[Fluffy]

now you say it, as I have told before, we are also using 1♠-2♣-2♦ as balanced or natural (difference is we use 2NT as (15)16+).

It doesn't happen very often, but I remember having once a problem because we couldn't ditinguish between 4 diamonds and 5 diamonds. How do you make the diference?

[qwery_hi]

Fluffy, on Jan 27 2009, 04:44 AM, said:

thx gweri, this looks true when responder has fit, however when he doesn't, bidding your shape with weak hands helps to find the best game.

After 1♠ - 2♣ - 2♦ showing any 11-15 w/o 4 hearts, responder can use 2♥ as a relay and opener can then describe his shape. This is from Ambra (what I remember). Opener has announced he is minimum, so if responder needs to explore more for the best game, he can use the 2♥ relay in this structure. Ambra is available of Dan Neill's website.

[FrancesHinden]

Fluffy, on Jan 27 2009, 10:08 AM, said:

now you say it, as I have told before, we are also using 1♠-2♣-2♦ as balanced or natural (difference is we use 2NT as (15)16+).

It doesn't happen very often, but I remember having once a problem because we couldn't ditinguish between 4 diamonds and 5 diamonds. How do you make the diference?

This is one of the easier bits, we were able to stick with the 'fundamentally natural' approach...

1S - 2C - 2D (balanced or natural) -
2H = relay
2S = 3-card spade support
2NT = natural, wants to declare
3C = good suit
3D/3H = 6 clubs, 5 cards in the suit bid
3S = 4 trumps
3NT = please present the dummy
4C = sets trumps, demands lowest first round control
4D/4H probably don't exist
4S = 4225, no first or second round side suit controls

1S - 2C - 2D - 2H -
2S = 5242/5341
2NT = 12-14/18-19 balanced
3C = 5143
3D = 5251/5152
3H = 5341 extra values
3S = 6-4 good diamonds (most 6-4s show the 6th spade first)

[david_c]

Fluffy, on Jan 27 2009, 01:51 AM, said:

Save as much sapce as possible with good hands (cheapest bid), and describe with the weak

so for an auction like

1♠-2♣

2♦: (15)16+ any distribution

anything else 11-14(15) natural.

Actually, that gives you less space with the good hands, does it not? In a pure relay system (which I think is close to optimal on this sort of sequence because responder so often has a strong balanced hand) this scheme would have opener's good hands resolving exactly one step higher than his weak ones. In a more natural system the difference is less extreme but it still looks to me like you are losing space on the good hands rather than gaining it.

[Fluffy]

not always, it saves space for responder to describe. And saves space for opener when weak.

But best thing is that you don't have to rebid 2♠ with a good 6331.

[david_c]

Fluffy, on Jan 27 2009, 01:38 PM, said:

But best thing is that you don't have to rebid 2♠ with a good 6331.

Yes. IMO any decent system should avoid lumping in good single-suiters with random minimums. Most of my systems use opener's 2NT rebid for the good single-suited type.

[OleBerg]

Seems to me like you are aproaching a relay-system. So why not go whole hog, and play 2♣ as a completely artificial gameforce?

This would also free other bids. I have not delved into this, but maybe something like this could work:

1♠ - 2♣ = Art. gameforce without hearts as primary suit.
1♠ - 2♦ = Transfer to hearts, at least invitational values. (Like 9+)
1♠ - 2♥ = A good three-card raise.
1♠ - 2♠ = A not-so-good three-card raise.

1♥ - 2♣ = Artificial gameforce, (Maybe it should deny four spades???)
1♥ - 2♦ = A good three-card raise.
1♥ - 2♥ = A not-so-good three-card raise.

Of course some more work will have to be put into it, but I won't take the fun away from you.