[jillybean]

For clarification
Permitted 1nt openings. snipped from the ACBL Convention Charts.

10+ hcp
A range no greater than 5hcp
Any 1NT opening bid that is Strong and Forcing.

*Natural*
A 1NT opening bid that contains no voids, no more than one singleton, which must be an ace, king, or queen, and that does not contain 10 or more cards in two suits combined.

Disallowed
*** In segments of fewer than 6 boards, a non-Forcing 1NT opening that does not meet the definition of Natural.
In segments of 6 boards or more, a non-Forcing 1NT with a void or with 10 or more cards in 2 suits or with fewer than 10 HCP.

“Psych”: Generally, 2 cards fewer or an Ace weaker than the minimum expected for a bid would meet the definition of a Psych, as would an Ace stronger than the maximum expected.

(Question an "Ace" weaker or stronger is specifically 4hcp?)

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Playing 10-13 or 12-14nt - legal
Playing 15-17nt - legal deviation allowed once or twice (corrected)

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Playing 15-17nt - legal psych
Playing 14-16nt - legal psych
Playing 10-13, 12-14nt - disallowed , stiff ♣8

---

Playing 10-13nt - disallowed, stiff ♦6 but legal in segments of 6+ boards.
Playing 12-14 - disallowed, stiff ♦6
Playing 15-17 - legal psych

Before some smart-a comments that this hand is not a 1nt opening!! I'm not measuring bridge skill, just legality

[blackshoe]

Why do you say the first one is disallowed if your agreement is 15-17?

[jillybean]

blackshoe, on 2025-April-15, 16:25, said:

Why do you say the first one is disallowed if your agreement is 15-17?

The hand has 12 hcp which is outside of your 15-17 range and does not meet the criteria of '4 hcp weaker than expected' required for a psych.

[sanst]

 jillybean, on 2025-April-15, 17:19, said:

The hand has 12 hcp which is outside of your 15-17 range and does not meet the criteria of '4 hcp weaker than expected' required for a psych.

Its by definition impossible to regulate psychs. Anyway, Law 40C is clear: a player is allowed to deviate from her or his agreements.
Once more I get the impression that the ACBL is opposed to imaginative improvisation in an attempt to protect weaker players. IMO that goes not only against the spirit of the game, but doesn't help the players to improve their bridge. I've learned a lot from playing against strong(er) pairs, although it quite often meant a beating for poor me and my equally poor partner.

[blackshoe]

The only hard and fast numerical limit on natural 1NT openings is that you 1) can't have an agreement to open on less than 10 HCP and 2) if you open 1NT with less than 10 HCP you are deemed (and therefore doomed) to have an agreement to do so. Opening a 15-17 HCP 1NT with 12 HCP is a legal deviation.

NB: you can't have a range greater than 5 HCP either, so you can't open 1NT with 12 very often or very frequently lest you come to have an implicit agreement to do so. 12 to 17 is a six point range. But nothing I have seen says that you should be deemed to have this agreement the first time you do so, as would be the case if you open with less than 10 HCP.

The alternative rule is "you are permitted to use your judgement to choose a range for your 1NT opening, so long as the minimum is not less than 10 HCP and the range is no more than 5 HCP. Once you choose your range, you are not permitted to use your judgement to deviate from it unless the deviation is at least 4 HCP less than the minimum." IOW you can't deviate unless it's a psych, you can't psych based on shape, and you can't psych high (e.g. with 21 HCP -- if you're wondering why anyone would want to do that, so am I, but that's not the point). Such a regulation would conflict with Law 40C and would therefore be illegal. IMO, at least (and I'm not alone).

[jillybean]

I’ll just go with, “you are permitted to use your judgement to choose a range for your 1NT opening, so long as the minimum is not less than 10 HCP and the range is no more than 5 HCP. “
Anything +- 4 hcp is a legal psych

[hrothgar]

blackshoe, on 2025-April-16, 02:59, said:

NB: you can't have a range greater than 5 HCP either, so you can't open 1NT with 12 very often or very frequently lest you come to have an implicit agreement to do so. 12 to 17 is a six point range. But nothing I have seen says that you should be deemed to have this agreement the first time you do so, as would be the case if you open with less than 10 HCP.

You might want take a closer look at how this was enforced in Memphis.

A single instance is sufficient to establish that you are using an illegal range.
There is no such notion of establishing an implicit agreement

[jillybean]

hrothgar, on 2025-April-16, 04:34, said:

You might want take a closer look at how this was enforced in Memphis.

A single instance is sufficient to establish that you are using an illegal range.
There is no such notion of establishing an implicit agreement

I could be totally wrong but from what I have heard, enforcement was not consistent.
With such complex Laws, any consistency in interpretation and application is a dream.

[hrothgar]

jillybean, on 2025-April-16, 08:47, said:

With such complex Laws, any consistency in interpretation and application is a dream.

This regulation is not at all complex.

The ACBL is simply very bad at documenting these sorts of things

[barmar]

jillybean, on 2025-April-15, 17:19, said:

The hand has 12 hcp which is outside of your 15-17 range and does not meet the criteria of '4 hcp weaker than expected' required for a psych.

I think ACBL is trying to distinguish between upgrading/downgrading and outright psyches. If you deviate from your agreement by a small amount, it's likely to be a judgement call, often based on features that aren't well represented by HCP (e.g. downgrading because of flat shape, or upgrading because of good spot cards). But it would be incredulous that such features could add up to the equivalent of 4 HCP, so that's presumed to be a psych.

Ideally we wouldn't just assume that small deviations are up/downgrades, we would ask the player to explain what features of the hand warranted this judgement and somehow determine if this was reasonable (perhaps have an expert panel judge it). But this may not be practical. OTOH, having an objective definition of psychs is not unreasonable.

[blackshoe]

"Objective" does not necessarily require "numerical".

[johnu]

blackshoe, on 2025-April-16, 20:20, said:

"Objective" does not necessarily require "numerical".

For purposes of bidding rules, I think objective has to include some sort of numerical equivalence. Otherwise everybody has a different standard which defeats the purpose of bidding rules. Some people think bidding rules should not exist which is an argument, but as long as they do, everybody should have to conform to the same rules, IMO

[barmar]

blackshoe, on 2025-April-16, 20:20, said:

"Objective" does not necessarily require "numerical".

Can you give an example of how you would define this objectively, in a way that could be put in a rule book, without numbers? It doesn't necessarily have to be Work points, it could also be quick tricks, losing trick count, etc.

I've heard people say things like "I don't count high card points, I look at the hand and judge how strong it is for both offense and defense." While I admit that I can also look at a hand and have an intuitive feel for whether it's a good hand or bad hand, I still go through the routines of counting HCP, losers, etc. and adjusting for length, intermediates, etc.

And even if they DO just look at the hand and know if it's an opening hand, that intuitive approach can't be enumerated in a rule book, or used in disclosure.

[mycroft]

I've explained my ideas on limits:

• Fraction of the Range of the call. The "within an Ace or a card" requirement works well for 11-21 1 of a suit openers. But lying by 100% of the disclosed range of a 15-17 1NT (or 20-21 2NT) call? If that's not "gross", then either we are allowing *massive* misinformation, to the point of illegality (15-17 to which good 12s are "only a deviation" is a 12-17 NT, sorry) or we need a new definition.
  
• Violation of "reason for convention". Basically, if a conventional call is designed to handle a specific hard-to-describe shape, and you call on a hand that the call was *designed to* not include, I don't care if it's "a card", it's a psych. My classic example for this one is Flannery (standard definition) on 4-4 (that isn't ♥AKQJ) or 5-5 or 2♦ Precision or mini-Roman on 4324.
  
• the Illogical Alternative test. If I take this hand to a number of your peers, and nobody even thinks of doing what you did, it's a psych.

None of these are "numerical" the way we use it usually on the charts ("percentage" isn't a specific number, nor is "Illogical Alternative"); all are objective and clearly judgeable by any player that can understand Logical Alternative or Rule of X, and any director that can follow Law 16 or 70.

NOTE WELL: None of these also are regulations in any RA I know about (although I would expect not total disagreement over any of them from at least some of my fellow directors). Not (even Bridge) Legal advice here, in other words!

[blackshoe]

A psych is a deliberate action. IOW a player who psychs knows he's doing it. If the director comes along and tells a player "you psyched" when that player knows damned well he did not do any such thing, well, either the director is incompetent, the rules have been misinterpreted by his teachers, or the rules need to be clarified.

Put another way: if the lawmakers want to remove the word "deliberate" from the definition of "psych", so be it, but until they do, it ain't a psych if the player didn't intend to psych.

[axman]

blackshoe, on 2025-April-19, 02:05, said:

A psych is a deliberate action. IOW a player who psychs knows he's doing it. If the director comes along and tells a player "you psyched" when that player knows damned well he did not do any such thing, well, either the director is incompetent, the rules have been misinterpreted by his teachers, or the rules need to be clarified.

Put another way: if the lawmakers want to remove the word "deliberate" from the definition of "psych", so be it, but until they do, it ain't a psych if the player didn't intend to psych.

The last time I peeked deliberate psychologicals were almost as mind bending as Oooops. The distinction that makes it psychological is not that it was deliberate but that it was psychological. To place one’s self in nevernever land at the behest of the ACBL infers a lack of survival instinct.

[mycroft]

Well yes. I took "deliberate" as given, and was Objectifying (*) the "gross" part.

(*) Not Objectivisting, sorry AW (no m).