[gnasher]

sfi, on 2012-June-27, 19:35, said:

I have played PC off and on for a few years, and it is true that you don't need nearly as many conventions as you do with std. american or 2/1

Can you give some examples of conventions that are needed in Standard American or 2/1 but aren't needed in Polish Club?

[mgoetze]

gnasher, on 2012-June-28, 03:51, said:

Can you give some examples of conventions that are needed in Standard American or 2/1 but aren't needed in Polish Club?

Gazzilli obv.

[sfi]

gnasher, on 2012-June-28, 03:51, said:

Can you give some examples of conventions that are needed in Standard American or 2/1 but aren't needed in Polish Club?

Mostly they are consequences of the limited major opening rather than the 1C itself.

For one, you don't need to find a way to deal with the death hands (good hand with 3 card support and a 6 card minor) by faking reverses and the like. Similarly, you don't need to worry about how to bid strong one-suited hands that you open 1 of a suit but are now worth forcing to game opposite any response. Auctions like 1H-1S-3C/D are better defined as well, since they are guaranteed to be 5-5 and have good playing strength rather than lots of HCP.

You also gain space with your 18-19 point balanced hands, since those often get shown at the one level (1C-1D-1NT). And if they don't (1C-1H-2NT), then responder already knows that opener has exactly a doubleton heart. So you no longer need a checkback-style bid to look for 3 card support. In exchange you get an artificial 2D bid that you have to learn in these two auctions, but it works pretty well.

[bluecalm]

Also after 2/1 you have to accommodate 18-21 range without going beyond 4M too often.
In polish club you have two ranges so all "reverse" bids after 2/1 are 15-17 in standard:

1S - 2C
???

Let's say you have strong one suited hand in spades here. If you jump there will be no way for responder to show his range and allow space for cuebids (because if he bids 4S with minimum you may still have 18-21 and if he bids 4D/4H cuebid every time then you don't know his range if you are in 15-17). If you bid conventional 2S (any one suited or something) then you need artifical follow ups to differ between 11-14, 15-17, 18+. Those things are done in serious 2/1 systems but people playing "vanilla" runs into trouble all the time, especially with popular but imo very weak style of raising 2/1 without extras:
1S - 2D
3D = should be extras or you are completely screwed at 3 level and responder still in 11-21 range.

Quote

by faking reverses and the like.

This is btw pretty amazing. The way to solve this is to either play "multireverse" (reverse = any 16+) or conventional 2NT (which only works in polish/dutch club style). This is necessary in 2/1 even more so than:
1C - 1M
2D
relay in polish club which you can easily live without and which is much simpler to learn (you just respond by steps how many M card you have and what range). However somehow you always hear that in pc you need to learn artificial stuff while much more complicated convention absolutely needed in sane 2/1 is played by feel (let's fake a reverse here or jump there without any clear rules).

[gnasher]

sfi, on 2012-June-28, 07:12, said:

Mostly they are consequences of the limited major opening rather than the 1C itself.

For one, you don't need to find a way to deal with the death hands (good hand with 3 card support and a 6 card minor) by faking reverses and the like. Similarly, you don't need to worry about how to bid strong one-suited hands that you open 1 of a suit but are now worth forcing to game opposite any response. Auctions like 1H-1S-3C/D are better defined as well, since they are guaranteed to be 5-5 and have good playing strength rather than lots of HCP.

You also gain space with your 18-19 point balanced hands, since those often get shown at the one level (1C-1D-1NT). And if they don't (1C-1H-2NT), then responder already knows that opener has exactly a doubleton heart. So you no longer need a checkback-style bid to look for 3 card support. In exchange you get an artificial 2D bid that you have to learn in these two auctions, but it works pretty well.

So, as I understand your argument:

Conventions needed in 2/1: Checkback after 2NT rebid
Conventions needed in Polish Club: artificial 2♦ rebid

Isn't that one each?

I'm not disputing that there are difficult hands and sequences in 2/1, and I agree that Polish Club benefits from its limited openings just as any other limited system does. But I don't think either system actually *needs* many conventions, if by that you meant that the system just doesn't work without them.