[dake50]

How about taking the GF H1 (one suiters) and
H+D, H+C out of 1C-Force?
Say into 1D, with a strong rebid.

[hrothgar]

benlessard, on 2012-May-17, 21:50, said:

IMO

1D as H or SP
1H = S weak or GF
1S = No M w or GF
1NT = clubs w or GF
2C = D W or GF
2D = 6H W or GF
2H = 6S w or GF

Is by far the best setup I have played and im pretty convinced its one of the best setup. Not playing transfer over a strong clubs is IMO worse than not playing transfer over a strong Nt.

This looks HORRIBLE

I am presuming that the strong club opener is forced to bid "step" with hands that have no interest in exploring game opposite the weak hand type.
In turn, you need to use step +1 as a relay.

There is no room at the two level to explore alternative strains

[rbforster]

hrothgar, on 2012-May-21, 06:22, said:

This looks HORRIBLE

I am presuming that the strong club opener is forced to bid "step" with hands that have no interest in exploring game opposite the weak hand type.
In turn, you need to use step +1 as a relay.

There is no room at the two level to explore alternative strains

It doesn't seem much worse than others with an art semipositive response though. Most relay systems can't relay opposite a very weak hand (double negative) and you wouldn't be any worse off for GF hands than playing pure GF transfer except when a very strong hand uses Step +1 to relay opposite the GF (and then losing a step isn't so bad since you'll have lots of space). It seems better in competition too, since the DN hands get shape info in early and can be easily separated from the GF ones later.

And while there is little room to explore strain opposite the DN hand in some cases (there still would be for the lower transfers, open could often bid a natural 2M for example), most precision systems can't do this well either. You have normal precision auctions like 1c 1d 1h (strong) 1s (DN) blah, where opener guesses a suit at the two level instead of responder but that's not clearly any worse. Or 1c 1s (DN) blah.

[PrecisionL]

I play 3 different Strong Club Systems.
Our version of Millennium Club (15+ hcp) has non-forcing Major Suit responses @ 1-level:

1♣ - 1♦ = 0-8 hcp and 4+♥
1♣ - 1♥ = 0-8 hcp and 4+♠
1♣ - 1♠ = 0-8 hcp and no 4-cd major
1♣ - 1 NT = 6+ hcp and the Majors: 5-4 or better, or 4441 / 4414
1♣ - 2♣ = 8+ hcp, Artificial & Game Forcing with fit

Also, American Forcing Minors had some semi-positive responses to their 1♣ hand.

[benlessard]

Quote

I am presuming that the strong club opener is forced to bid "step" with hands that have no interest in exploring game opposite the weak hand type.
In turn, you need to use step +1 as a relay.

No & no
IMO relaying 0-5 hands is mostly a waste of time (We can with 2NT art GF but these never happened in thousands of hands). The goal of showing out weak hand with 6 card suit directly is that these hands are preemptive & can make game based with subminimum values quite easily. These hand also often lead to the only makable contract. Can you stop in 2m if opener has 5S+4H and you have 6m & 2pts ? How about a balanced hand vs 6m ? (some can stop at 2D but not many at 2C)

For the responses opener can bid a new suit not forcing if he has a good solid suit of it own and a void or stiff in responder suit. A raise should suggest 21-23 pts with at least 2 in partner suit and 2NT is art GF (but it never happend so far).

ex
1C-2C(D)
2D (15-20 many shapes) is going to be bid 90% of the times can be a stiff D
2M is natural (in our system its 15-17 but it can easily be 15-20 with zero problems in standard strong clubs system)
2Nt (art GF)
3C natural
3D (21-23 pts at least 2D)
3M for us its GF nat

All in all in a 15+ strong clubs most of the 6 card suits are GF not weak (the SP are elsewhere), and even when the suit is weak in a weak hand its often the best spot anyway.

Of course if its 5503 vs ??6? we will reach an ugly spot. But imo the preemptive effect and better overall partscore and magic games are just bigger plusses.

At the one level.

1C-1D-

1H = at least 3H 15-20 (not often 17-18)
1S = at least 3S 15-20 (not often 17-18)
1NT 17-18 bal denies 4H/ may have 4 even 5S
2C 15-20 nat unbal
2D any near GF hands
2H 4 trumps support 20-21
2S nat 17 pts
2NT = 21-22 bal



1C-1D-1H

pass im weak with 4/5 H
1S = inv no M or bal GF
1NT inv 4/5 S (not forcing)
2C = H+D GF or 6D inv
2D = H inv (note here we might play moysian fit) or H+C GF
2H = 6S inv (7-8 pts) or H+S GF
2S+ H+C GF


note that we are divising the hands 15-16& 19-20 vs 17-18/ so that when responder show an inv hand opener often has a clearcut choice. We are also often stopping at 1H/1S wich turn out to be a surprising winner so far.

hands where we dont have a fit
note that 8 vs 15-16 we are playing 1NT
6 vs 17-18 we are playing 1NT
0-5 vs 15-20 we are playing 1NT
only when opener is 21+ that we will play at least 2NT

We never miss a 44/53 H fit, we however might miss when opener has 5H and responder 3H.
We do miss some S fit when responder has H+S (0-6) and opener is 17-18 with 4S without 4H.

We often play in Moysian
good moysian at 2M (these are clearly better than 1NT in the long run).
random moysian at 1M (probably slightly better than 1Nt)
We do play some not so good Moysian 2H when responder is (6-8)INV with 4H & opener is 15-16 with 3H.