[ArtK78]

mycroft, on 2013-July-08, 13:40, said:

The one that I have sympathy with (and this is *all* I have sympathy with in those two editorials) is Meckstroth's argument, re: the 10-12 NT, that several pairs have [had - M] agreements that opener would not raise a 2M takeout unasked, no matter what their support. This allowed responder to pull to 2M, especially NV, with the kind of hand where -400 beats -420 or more, and where if doubled, they had an okay spot. And since, even after you spot the psychic, it's really hard to work out if it's 4 or 6 in the opponents' "suit", it's an incredibly effective agreement. You lose a lot on the hands where opener *should* be competing to 3, though, so your so-called "psyches" have to be relatively frequent to make up for it, of course.

Even better, though, if you failed to disclose this agreement - and several pairs did just that. They could have agreed 2M "to play, 0-2 or 5+M" (well, they can in the current GCC and the GCC when the infamous editorials came out; not sure if the regs at the time people played this allowed it) and Alerted and explained it; but then it would lose a lot of its effectiveness, especially with the agreement that opener would not compete (which also works better when the opponents don't expect 4-card support in their play or defence).

Unfortunately, that means that I get looked at askance when I open a legitimate 10-12, and I'm not allowed to open KQT8 KJT9 85 T85 1NT, even though everybody and their dog would open the same hand with ♠AKQ8 ♥KQT9 a "15-17" 1NT. Although I bet if you went asking about evidence that the deviation regulation should be ruled much more harshly than, say, a 6-12 2♥ opener (to take another "if you stretch these bounds, you can't play conventions") on KQT9xx and out, you'd find nothing except, possibly, those editorials.

What editorials? Are you posting in the correct thread?

[mycroft]

Very late, sorry, but:

Yes, I think so, and two front-page editorials in the ACBL Bulletin from 20+ years ago, basically saying that we have to consider any deviation from those evil 10-12 NT players as psyches and hit them hard because they do all this other stuff as well (like "well, we can't play 9-12, so we upgrade frequently, not just KQTx KJTx Txx 9x, but 'that's a good enough 9 that it's a 10'", or "our 2-level takeouts are "to play" without explaining that they have an agreement that they can *not* be raised by opener, even in competition, even when holding KQTx support - specifically because they're frequently psychic). Oh, and you have to assume that anyone that plays 10-12 is "evil".

Note the section on "risk-free psychs" quoted from the ACBL tech files above, explaining exactly this argument as official policy. I will admit that the bit about "it's illegal to upgrade any 9-Work-point hand into a 10-12 NT" is somewhat off-topic.