[pilowsky]

For a few weeks, many months ago, (about 2 months after I started playing duplicate Bridge) I toyed with the idea of opening with a void or a singleton. Naturally, I was greeted with howls of derision. My 'system', was eventually banned from the Club because unlike splinters, short ♣s, multi-2's precision and all the other rainbow sticker things it was far too outrageous.
Since then I have learned a lot about Bridge and how BBO works, so just for fun, I played 14 hands on solitaire this morning so that no actual humans would be offended . Naturally, not everything went as planned but I only played hands with a singleton or void and redealt any that did not have that shape. After 14 hands, the Robots stopped letting me redeal at which point I had the following result:
1010,-300,990,130,-100,450,-600,420,420,1470,450,-200,650,480 giving a pretty handy positive score in excess of 5000 - I don't recommend this unless you want to get thrown out of the room .
Here are a few of my favourites:
Hand 1 OK just warming up - N opens 1♠ E overcalls 3 ♦ I am void in ♥ and have AKQ4 ♠ so 6♠ making 6♠+1 https://tinyurl.com/unjzgqz
Hand 3 6NTS= The bidding was a lot of fun https://tinyurl.com/wll2c9l
Hand 4 This hand very interesting East opens 1♥ I overcalled 4♠ making 11 https://tinyurl.com/w6kluqf. 2/1 suggests 1♥ is 5+♥ and 11-21 HCP causing huge problems with people used to playing SAYC. I would now routinely open 4♥ as East. Clearly, in this unusual hand, South can still overcall 4♠. In most cases The preemptive 4♥ would at least give EW the opportunity to consider the possibility of 5 or 6 if W was stronger.
Hand 5 Just included this one because it comes up a lot I think of them as the 'majors equivalent of a gambling 3NT'. bid 4 with a long rich major like this and an outside trick or two - seems to make most of the time. This one was a bit aggressive.
Hand 9 'The crazy Michaels' Here I am risking a Michaels on a shapely distribution North passes East calls 1♦ I bid 2♦ meaning 5 ♥ and 5 ♠. West passes suggesting that NS have the HCP and North calls 4S making https://tinyurl.com/yx3emvmp.
Hand 10 Saved the best till last - 6NT+1: South opens 1♠ with a singleton A♠ North bids Jacoby 2NT meaning I have a balanced hand with 4 ♠. I take it to mean that North has everything that I don't have and bid 6NT. Effectively the same technique as garbage Stayman - using an artificial bid to get onto the best spot. https://tinyurl.com/ram22f8
Finally, as with many retirees that take up this game again after a decades-long gap it is a great pleasure. The past 10 months have been a wonderful learning experience. The practice hands on BBO rate me as 'Intermediate', so there is still a lot of work to do - I look forward to it.

[FelicityR]

Thanks for sharing. I once did a 'crazy' thing by taking a hot balloon trip on a whim - there was a spare place. Not ideal as I feel jittery flying and suffer vertigo just standing on a ladder!

But learning bridge, rewriting the 'rules', opening singletons and then getting banned from your club, now that's seriously bonkers!

Enjoy your bridge, but don't think you'll get many players wanting to partner you if you carry on

[pescetom]

pilowsky, on 2019-December-20, 16:30, said:

For a few weeks, many months ago, (about 2 months after I started playing duplicate Bridge) I toyed with the idea of opening with a void or a singleton. Naturally, I was greeted with howls of derision. My 'system', was eventually banned from the Club because unlike splinters, short ♣s, multi-2's precision and all the other rainbow sticker things it was far too outrageous.

I realise it is not the point of your post , but I would have no qualms about you playing this fun sounding 'system' in our club, providing you had a clear System Card and met the basic WBF systems policy requirements for a 1 level opening of this kind: minimum 8 HCP, never more than 2 cards in the named suit nor promised length in another suit. I would ask you to pre-alert it so that opponents could devise appropriate defences. It might not be legal in your RA or under your club regulations for low level tournaments of course.