[andych]

1NT opening with either 12-14, 13-15, etc, on average your side is holding the more balance of strength. So opening 1NT with 12-14,13-15 is prempting yourself??

[1eyedjack]

andych, on May 4 2006, 05:56 AM, said:

1NT opening with either 12-14, 13-15, etc, on average your side is holding the more balance of strength. So opening 1NT with 12-14,13-15 is prempting yourself??

There is certainly an element of that, but it is not as bad as you suggest.
You are only preempting "yourself" on those hands where responder cannot respond and where 1NT is the wrong spot. That cuts out hands where responder has a game try, or where responder is so distributional that he can confidently remove 1NT to a suit contract, or where responder would choose NT as the denomination anyway had he been in possession of more accurate facts about your hand.

[awm]

Opening with a descriptive bid isn't preempting yourself. Otherwise one could argue that since any time I have 11+ points I hold the majority of strength, we should play 1♣ artificial showing 11+? Or maybe forcing pass shows 11+? Stuff like that just doesn't work out.

When you open weak NT and your side has most of the strength you are very well placed. You can penalize opponents if they are foolish enough to enter the auction, and responder has already a very good description of opener's hand (and plenty of room to communicate more below game).

When you open weak NT and the strength is fairly even, you sometimes lose the ability to find your best suit fit. Then again, so do your opponents. Occasionally you will play 1NT when you should play some other partscore, or play 1NT when your opponents can make two of a major. My feeling is that this roughly balances out.

When you open weak NT and the opponents have the balance of the strength, sometimes you go for a number (especially vulnerable). On the other hand, a lot of opponents don't have sophisticated agreements over weak NT, and they may end up defending a doubled partial for 300 when they should be bidding game, or they may bid the wrong game.

My feeling is that weak NT is a huge win against weak players or players with little experience against it. Weak NT also garners some advantages at NV even against good opposition (although in a standard system there are compensating disadvantages for strong NT hands opening one of a minor at times). At vulnerable I suspect weak NT is a loser against good opposition, although depending on your overall system structure there may be compensating advantages.

[foo]

*sigh* another person picking on Weak NT's in inappropriately...

First some history. Weak NT's are more "natural" than Strong NTs!
Weak NT's were the original 1N opening of Bridge. 1N literally means "I can take 1 trick more than book (7) with no trump suit if you have the hand you are expected to."
Strong NTs were introduced to simplify bidding for weaker players.

Here's the true Good and the Bad about playing Weak NT's...

The Bad Stuff about Weak NTs:
1) The weaker your 1N opening range, the more often you will end up playing 1N instead of a more playable, and possibly taking more tricks in, partscore in a suit with a fit.

2) There are some 13- HCP minor suit oriented hands that can not be opened because of rebid problems playing Weak NTs that are normal openings in Standard.

3) The Strong NTer's have a clarity to their suit opening HCP range that Weak NTer's do not because a Strong NTer can not have a flat hand of medium strength; Strong NTer's are either minimums (the vast majority of the time) or 18-19 HCP when they open with a flat hand.


The Good Stuff about Weak NTs:
1) =Disciplined= Weak 1N openings find good games on 12+12= 24 that are more difficult for Strong NTer's to find.

2) The auctions 1m-1M;2M and 1m-1M-3M are much more accurate playing Weak NTs than they are playing Strong NTs.

3) Playing Weak NTs, 1m openings are either
3a) a real m suit or
3b) 15+ HCP or
3c) both
This greatly facilitates game and slam bidding, particularly m suit game and slam bidding when it is right.

4) Weak NT pairs can afford to be more disciplined about their 3rd seat openings.


Notice what is =not= on either list:
1) Trying to "steal" the hand with a Weak NT. Nope. It is supposed to be a descriptive and _constructive_ bid when played correctly. Disciplined Weak NTs are not supposed to be any form of preempt!

2) "You will end up X'd, going for a number, and getting a bad score more often playing weak NTs".
EMPHATICALLY Not.
In fact, usually Weak NTs are usually =more= dangerous then Strong NTs to X for penalties since
a) the odds that there is decent transportation between the closed hand and dummy are greater playing X'd Weak 1N contracts than X'd Strong 1N contracts.
When you do catch a Weak NT opposite a very poor dummy, the Defending side often has a Game they just missed.
A decent run out structure is nice, but frankly probability says the Strong NTer's need it even more (whether they are willing to admit it or not).

I by strong preference play 1N=12-14 in all seats and all vulnerabilities. I teach Standard and 2/1, so I'm comfortable with either.
Weak NTs and systems containing them are effective tools if used properly.

[Blofeld]

I think that you missed one of the major advantages of the weak no trump:

1NT is one of the most descriptive opening bids, and places partner very well if the auction turns competitive. Weak no trump hands are considerably more common (also probably more likely to engender competitive auctions) than strong no trumps, so you gain this advantage more frequently.

[foo]

Blofeld, on May 6 2006, 05:40 AM, said:

I think that you missed one of the major advantages of the weak no trump:

1NT is one of the most descriptive opening bids, and places partner very well if the auction turns competitive. Weak no trump hands are considerably more common (also probably more likely to engender competitive auctions) than strong no trumps, so you gain this advantage more frequently.

I agree with you (1N= 12-14 occurs greater than 2x more frequently than 1N= 15-17), but I do not think this as big an advantage as many Weak NT pairs try to claim it is, especially when playing against decent opposition who know better than to just casually jump into a Weak NT auction.

The partscores They miss will be to a large degree balanced out by the times We play 1N when We should be playing in 2ofasuit.

OTOH, the ability when playing 1N= 12-14 for 1m-1M;2M to show precisely 15-17 Support points and for 1m-1M;3M to show precisely 18-19 Support points is IME a serious advantage that doesn't get the recognition it deserves...

[pbleighton]

"Notice what is =not= on either list:
1) Trying to "steal" the hand with a Weak NT. Nope. It is supposed to be a descriptive and _constructive_ bid when played correctly. Disciplined Weak NTs are not supposed to be any form of preempt!"

"Supposed to be" or not, they ARE preemptive. You won't prevent the opps from reaching games very often (though they may wind up in the wrong game, or in game when they shouldn't be). You WILL get them into bad contracts. You will also get 1NT-All Pass a lot, where they miss a good part score.

Peter

[foo]

pbleighton, on May 6 2006, 06:35 AM, said:

"Notice what is =not= on either list:
1) Trying to "steal" the hand with a Weak NT. Nope. It is supposed to be a descriptive and _constructive_ bid when played correctly. Disciplined Weak NTs are not supposed to be any form of preempt!"

"Supposed to be" or not, they ARE preemptive. You won't prevent the opps from reaching games very often (though they may wind up in the wrong game, or in game when they shouldn't be). You WILL get them into bad contracts. You will also get 1NT-All Pass a lot, where they miss a good part score.

Peter

1N openings are "preemptive" in the sense that they eat the entire one level.
For that matter, so is a Strong Artificial 2C opening.
Or a 2N= 20-21 opening (Now we lose the one and two levels. 2N has been called "the slam killer" for exactly this reason.)

That does not mean any of the above are =Preempts=.
For a preemptive 1N opening, you have to be playing 1N=10-13 AKA Kamikaze NT's

The difference is that a Preempt is made on the =expectation= that the opps have most of the HCP. Playing disciplined Weak NTs, or any of the other examples I used, the expectation is that the side opening has the majority of the HCP.

[mycroft]

The difference between 1NT 12-14 and 2C strong or 2NT 20-21 is that the number of times that par is their contract making is much higher with weak 1NT. "The difference is that a Preempt is made" against *it being their hand*, not "that they have most of the HCP". How does that "Law" thing start - oh yeah, "If the HCP are relatively equal (15-25 or closer), then..." If they have the better fit, or spades when our fit is a minor, then when we open a weak NT, the probability is that par is them declaring. In Strong NT methods, they are likely to have the best "last guess"; when we open a weak NT, they get their "last guess" right off the top.

When I open a weak NT, I don't expect to be preempting; I don't even expect that I'm on the losing end. But I do expect that when I am, that I'm more likely to be -100 into -110 or -140 when I do preempt their partscore investigation than -500 into air; I do expect to pick off the odd NT game their way; and I expect to lose when I've "preempted" my own partscore investigation and end up +90 into +110, or +90 or +120 into +140.

The biggest swings with a weak NT come when they walk into the juggernaut; the next biggest from the anti-field siding of many contracts (Strong NT land only); the next biggest when the let us play rather than competing because of the danger of walking into the juggernaut. Strangely enough, two of those, even all three, are what happens with "classic" preempts.

Weak 1NT is a very constructive bidding tool, it allows for other very constructive bidding tools (and one massive hole, as Fred has commented on before), but it frequently either wins the partscore battle outright, or buggers it up enough that the side that does win it is in the wrong spot.

Michael.

[foo]

mycroft, on May 9 2006, 11:09 AM, said:

...Weak 1NT is a very constructive bidding tool, it allows for other very constructive bidding tools (and one massive hole, as Fred has commented on before)...

What "massive hole" was Fred talking about with relation to Weak NTs?

[1eyedjack]

foo, on May 9 2006, 05:53 PM, said:

mycroft, on May 9 2006, 11:09 AM, said:

...Weak 1NT is a very constructive bidding tool, it allows for other very constructive bidding tools (and one massive hole, as Fred has commented on before)...

What "massive hole" was Fred talking about with relation to Weak NTs?

Well, there was a thread in which Fred had this to say:

http://forums.bridgebase.com/index.php?sho...indpost&p=53565

Whether he would categorise that as a "massive hole" is perhaps for him to say, but judging from his earlier post in the same thread I suspect otherwise.