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whereagles, on Feb 10 2006, 05:09 PM, said:
So, what's more frequent? Raptor or nat 1NT? 
Suffering from acute simulationitis at the moment, I'm making a serious attempt to answer this question:
This time I'm assuming that first hand opens SAYC-style with 15-17 NT, again according to the Rule of 20 with 19+HCP hands excluded.
The Raptor point range is assumed to be 10-15 strictly, with no further contraints regarding suit quality or distribution of honours.
This is what I get:
(1x)-1NT*: 0.010394
Generated 1000000 hands
Time needed 3.238 sec
Quite interestingly, a Raptor overcall of that kind is quite exactly as common as a natural Notrump overcall: about 1 in 100 boards. This makes both conventions "moderately common" in my eyes :-).
If one adds additional contraints regarding suit quality, this number will be slightly lower, but since the choice of contraints would be somewhat arbitrary I've left it out (one could, for example, require at least 50% of the honours to be in the two long suits or something else along this line). Something similar applies to the natural overcall, where one would probably add stopper requirements (this is really tedious to specify, so make your own guesses about how that would influence the percentages).
Again, here is the Dealer file used to make the calculations (lengthy); you need the Dealer preprocessor for this one:
# 1 mio hands
generate 1000000
hw = hcp(west)
spw = spades(west)
hew = hearts(west)
diw = diamonds(west)
clw = clubs(west)
rule_20_opener = ( hw <= 19 and ( hw + spw + hew >= 20 or
hw + spw + diw >= 20 or hw + spw + clw >= 20 or
hw + hew + diw >= 20 or hw + hew + clw >= 20 or
hw + diw + clw >= 20 ) )
balanced = shape(west, any 4333 + any 5332 + any 4432)
open_1nt = ( hw >= 15 and hw <= 17 and
balanced )
open_one_suit = rule_20_opener and not open_1nt
open_one_spade = ( open_one_suit and
shape{west, 5+xxx} and
spw >= hew and spw >= diw and spw >= clw
)
open_one_heart = ( open_one_suit and
shape{west, x5+xx} and
hew > spw and hew >= diw and hew >= clw
)
open_one_diamond = ( open_one_suit and
shape{west, 4-4-4+x:d>=c + 4432 + 5+M6+d(xx):d>s,d>h}
)
open_one_club = ( open_one_suit and
shape{west, 4-4-xx:c>d + 4333 + 3433 + 5+M6+c(xx):c>s,c>h}
)
overcall_1nt = ( shape( north, any 4333 + any 5332 + any 4432 )
and hcp(north) >= 15 and hcp(north) <= 18 and open_one_suit )
five_plus_minor = ( diamonds(north) > 4 or clubs(north) > 4 )
majors_length = ( spades(north) + hearts(north) )
four_major = ( spades(north) == 4 or hearts(north) == 4 )
raptor_range = ( hcp(north) > 9 and hcp(north) < 16 )
overcall_raptor = ( raptor_range and majors_length < 8 and (
( open_one_club and four_major and diamonds(north) > 4 ) or
( open_one_diamond and four_major and clubs(north) > 4 ) or
( open_one_heart and spades(north) == 4 and five_plus_minor ) or
( open_one_spade and hearts(north) == 4 and five_plus_minor ) ) )
action average "(1x)-1NT*" overcall_raptor