[tx10s]

hrothgar, on 2015-January-25, 06:10, said:

I'm not arguing about your knowledge of probability, but rather your sampling methodology.

You constructed one data set that shows a result.
You are unable to replicate this same result with other, more recent data sets (and claim that the dealing algorithm has changed)
Other people have also constructed surveys based on your claim and have produced different results.
Color me unimpressed.

I haven't carefully re-read your postings, however, as I recall you never even provided the raw data that you were working from.
(You provided summary spreads that you said demonstrate that the deal's are weighted)

A few years back, there was a program being discussed on this site called Bridge Browser which maintained a pretty extensive database of hand records.
As I recall, Inquiry has a copy.

It should be possible to mine this database and perform a pretty detailed statistical analysis of historical records...
(This is not to be construed as an offer to do said work, especially since I am still unburying myself from a month in Vietnam and Myanmar)

Actually, I constructed 9 data sets showing the same result. Unfortunately, some of the earlier ones were not properly documented as they were originally for my own interest. I did provide two sets of data showing the date and tournament number so others could verify or refute that data. I'm not sure how to provide the raw data short of printing out each hand (240 for each of the two data sets) and describing every potential finesse and which direction was favored by the cards involved in that finesse. I would appreciate if anyone would like to review those tournaments and tell my why my analysis is wrong. Since people got confused when I split the potential finesses by who played the hand, I have simplified below those tables for easier understanding. A review of either set would prove or disprove my contention. I know that would involve some work by someone else, but a lot less work than printing out all 120 hands and going through an explanation of all 274 or 319 potential finesses (depending on which data set was chosen). I understand if no one wants to do that much work. At this point, I believe the subject has been beat to death and all of you can believe what ever you want. From my standpoint, the finesse distribution is now normal, and that was the goal of my post in the first place. I will admit that I am cynical enough that I will look at another 20 tournament some where down to road to confirm that the finesses distribution has remained normal.

Date	Tourn	Win	Lose
31-Dec	5357	4	7
1-Jan	9466	8	8
1-Jan	9705	7	7
1-Jan	864	2	3
2-Jan	7203	5	6
3-Jan	3698	4	12
4-Jan	9091	9	11
4-Jan	92	9	9
5-Jan	5308	5	12
5-Jan	6810	5	13
6-Jan	1798	5	1
6-Jan	3864	3	8
6-Jan	4027	7	2
8-Jan	3839	7	12
8-Jan	4589	5	13
10-Jan	1077	2	9
11-Jan	5532	4	11
11-Jan	6086	4	4
12-Jan	1855	5	10
12-Jan	2753	5	11[code]
			
	Totals	105	169

Date	Tourn	Win	Lose
30-Dec	8543	7	12
30-Dec	8087	4	10
28-Dec	6682	9	12
27-Dec	9647	8	10
26-Dec	5426	2	9
25-Dec	8188	8	9
25-Dec	7119	10	6
22-Dec	274	10	11
22-Dec	9197	5	7
21-Dec	3321	4	16
18-Dec	8278	7	9
15-Dec	341	5	8
15-Dec	9043	4	7
13-Dec	4753	8	14
12-Dec	5947	4	6
11-Dec	8708	6	8
10-Dec	2817	5	10
9-Dec	7999	5	6
9-Dec	6195	9	10
7-Dec	4475	7	12
			
	Totals	127	192

[tx10s]

Before you jump all over me, yes I know there are 240 hands in 20 tournaments, not 120. That is what I get for trying to reply too quickly and not pay attention to side details.

[Wilson Cat]

Just finished another frustrating $1 robot reward hand, and really.......these hands are NOT random. In general, one way finesses work approximately 10% of the time in these tournaments (I don't care WHAT BBO's statistics say about this issue) and the hands are set up so that a player can not possibly generate enough points to gain a reward based upon skill alone. I have come to the conclusion that the whole Robot Reward Tournament set-up is basically a scam. Why not truly give random hands to all 3 players once the South hand is given high points. Maybe don't set it up so that the Q or K can be finessed close to 50% of the time?? Or at least be honest with players that the game is completely rigged against them.

[Bbradley62]

Wilson Cat, on 2015-February-11, 13:46, said:

Just finished another frustrating $1 robot reward hand, and really.......these hands are NOT random. In general, one way finesses work approximately 10% of the time in these tournaments (I don't care WHAT BBO's statistics say about this issue) and the hands are set up so that a player can not possibly generate enough points to gain a reward based upon skill alone. I have come to the conclusion that the whole Robot Reward Tournament set-up is basically a scam. Why not truly give random hands to all 3 players once the South hand is given high points. Maybe don't set it up so that the Q or K can be finessed close to 50% of the time?? Or at least be honest with players that the game is completely rigged against them.

Do you want to tell us what the tournament number was, so we can look at it and see if there's any basis for your complaint?

[Bbradley62]

Ok... Tournament #7970. Scores range from -830 to 6520. Let's look at the hands, as if you were declarer, although sometimes you defended and sometimes you passed the hand out...

Board 1: No one-way finesses
Board 2: ♦K offside
Board 3: ♠KJ onside, ♥Q offside
Board 4: ♥A and ♣A onside, ♦K offside
Board 5: ♥K offside
Board 6: ♣A offside
Board 7: None
Board 8: ♥Q ♦J onside, ♥A, and ♦K offside
Board 9: None
Board 10: ♦K offside
Board 11: ♦Q offside
Board 12: ♦Q and ♣A onside
Board 13: ♥Q onside, ♥A and ♠A offside
Board 14: ♥K onside, ♦K offside
Board 15: ♥K offside
Board 16: None
Board 17: ♠K, ♥A onside
Board 18: ♦K offside
Board 19: None
Board 20: ♦A, ♥K onside, ♠K offside
Board 21: ♥Q onside, ♥A offside
Board 22: ♣Q onside
Board 23: ♠A offside
Board 24: ♠A onside, ♠Q offside
Board 25: ♥A and ♦A onside, ♠AQ offside
Board 26: None

So... 19 onside, 20 offside. That's a long way away from "one way finesses work approximately 10% of the time".

[hrothgar]

Wilson Cat, on 2015-February-11, 13:46, said:

Just finished another frustrating $1 robot reward hand, and really.......these hands are NOT random. In general, one way finesses work approximately 10% of the time in these tournaments (I don't care WHAT BBO's statistics say about this issue) and the hands are set up so that a player can not possibly generate enough points to gain a reward based upon skill alone. I have come to the conclusion that the whole Robot Reward Tournament set-up is basically a scam. Why not truly give random hands to all 3 players once the South hand is given high points. Maybe don't set it up so that the Q or K can be finessed close to 50% of the time?? Or at least be honest with players that the game is completely rigged against them.

Why would BBO want to bias the hands?

BBO is going to award $$$ to someone. You might not have won money this tournament, but someone did.
I fail to see the incentive for BBO?

Equally significant, BBO has been insisting for quite some time that it doesn't bias its hands in this manner.
Were BBO is be exposed to be lying (and were this true, it wouldn't be that difficult to demonstrate) their credibility would take a big hit.

You are essentially proposing that BBO is engaged in a risky behavior, with no clear benefit, and big downside...
Other than the thrill of ***** with you, just what's in it for BBO?
Why would they do such a thing?

[1eyedjack]

hrothgar, on 2015-February-11, 16:05, said:

Why would BBO want to bias the hands?

Neither Wilson Cat nor ts10x, nor earlier similar complainers, as far as I can tell, suggest that their observations result from deliberate policy.

I suppose you might take the view that it would be extremely unlikely to generate such results accidentally?

[1eyedjack]

Actually I take that back . Wilson cat wording does suggest culpability. Ts10x does not

[barmar]

Bbradley62, on 2015-February-11, 14:55, said:

So... 19 onside, 20 offside. That's a long way away from "one way finesses work approximately 10% of the time".

And if you exclude the hands he passed out, it's 16 onside, 15 offside. Even further from "work ~10% of the time".

[Bbradley62]

1eyedjack, on 2015-February-11, 23:53, said:

Wilson cat wording does suggest culpability. Ts10x does not

Except, maybe, for this statement:

tx10s, on 2015-January-19, 15:58, said:

My guess is whoever wrote your randomizer dealing program put the bias in and did not tell anyone.

[barmar]

I have looked at the dealing code many times. It's not as good as it could be, but there's definitely nothing that would bias finesses.

[GreenMan]

Bbradley62, on 2015-February-11, 14:55, said:

So... 19 onside, 20 offside. That's a long way away from "one way finesses work approximately 10% of the time".

He did say "approximately."

[Antrax]

It might be cool to have the software automatically calculate this figure. You finish a tournament (or query for a range of hands) and the software tells you what percentage of your side's finesses were on. Probably not worth the investment though.

[tx10s]

Antrax: Please excuse me for using your message to post, but I cannot get the code style to work in Fast Reply

Well, your programmer is one cocky little SOB. He (or she) did not wait much more than a week to change the program back to the 40-60 finesse split. After Bbradly62 tested 11 tournaments I played after my comment and found that now 52% of the finesses favored the player, I pretty much gave up, especially, when at the same time, access to all hands from 2014 was deleted, leaving only 3 weeks of data instead of the normal ~ 2 months that BBO usually keeps. I did decide to monitor the finesse distribution just to see if it stayed “normal”. Much to my surprise, the first three hands I played all averaged less than 40% of the finesses in favor of the player, so I started documenting the tournaments I played. The first 11 tournaments averaged 40.7% of the finesses oriented in favor of the players. At that time, something was apparently changed, as the next 9 tournaments averaged 52% in favor of the players. Since the change occurred on February 8, I understand why Wilson Cat’s data was normal, and I never made a ridiculous claim of 90% of the finesses being offside, as if that were the case, it would be too obvious. I know you do not believe anything I write, so below is a table summarizing the results, followed by a complete listing of all 339 potential finesses in those 20 tournaments. I am assuming you will not accept my data as such, so I sent a Power Point file to BBO support which has a picture of all 240 hands with my finesse picks listed below each hand. It is a 25 Meg file and I had to split it so it could go through gmail, so posting it here is virtually impossible. I also sent a Word file with the finesses list as it would probably be easier to look at then this very large forum post. As I said earlier, I chose all potential finesses whether or not they were or should have been taken. There are always some marginal picks that all may not agree with, but I did my best to use a consistent approach in these picks and I seriously doubt you are going to find enough of my picks that you disagree with to change my conclusion.
Hrothgar keeps asking why “we would do this”, and I truly believe it is not a “we”, but a “he” (or she), and I do not have a clue why. By the way, this is not the only bias I found, just the easiest to prove, (or so I thought). Not all of the bias is against the players, for instance there seem to be way too many cheap slams available in Robot Bridge. I reviewed about 60 tournaments and found that 30 total points made slam over 75% of the time. A lot of people are bidding these cheap slams, so I know I am not the only one who has observed this. Additionally, 24 total points seems to make game a lot more often than one would expect. Again, a lot of people are bidding the 24 total point games. I do not have the raw data for either of those, and at this time, it is not even worth pursuing. I only bring them up to show that I do not think everything is biased against the players. My whole objective in this futile exercise was to improve Robot Bridge by getting the program to deal fully random hands. I am curious, do any of you actually play Robot Bridge?
I will check back in a little over a week to see what reasons that you have that my data is crap. Hopefully it will involve more than Hrothgar trying to intimidate me with his advanced degree from MIT. Of course, I will be surprised if any of you actually looks at all the data. In the end, it is your game and you can do whatever you want with it.

Data #	Date	Tourn	Win	Loss	%	Running Avg	Running Avg last 9
1	2-Feb	3250	9	14	39.1%	39.1%	
2	2-Feb	3741	5	11	31.3%	35.9%	
3	2-Feb	4653	7	12	36.8%	36.2%	
4	3-Feb	9794	12	9	57.1%	41.8%	
5	4-Feb	7401	4	11	26.7%	39.4%	
6	5-Feb	2979	4	9	30.8%	38.3%	
7	6-Feb	7612	6	9	40.0%	38.5%	
8	6-Feb	8558	5	10	33.3%	38.0%	
9	7-Feb	4251	8	5	61.5%	40.0%	
10	7-Feb	4742	6	8	42.9%	40.2%	
11	8-Feb	9418	8	10	44.4%	40.7%	
12	8-Feb	84	11	3	78.6%	43.4%	78.6%
13	9-Feb	5411	10	14	41.7%	43.2%	55.3%
14	9-Feb	6821	12	11	52.2%	44.0%	54.1%
15	10-Feb	2896	7	6	53.8%	44.5%	54.1%
16	10-Feb	3918	5	6	45.5%	44.6%	52.9%
17	11-Feb	7057	4	4	50.0%	44.7%	52.7%
18	11-Feb	9806	8	9	47.1%	44.9%	51.8%
19	12-Feb	3299	11	12	47.8%	45.1%	51.1%
20	12-Feb	5848	15	9	62.5%	46.3%	52.9%
							
	Totals		157	182	46.3%		

“No finesses” includes 2 way finesses or finesses that do not make any difference (ex: one side hold A with QJ in separate hands so two tricks no matter where K is located). The first letters are AKQJ (Ace, King, Queen, Jack, the last of the letter combinations is one of CDHS (clubs, diamonds, hearts or spades). Then there is a gap with a single letter, NSE or W for north, south, east or west.
Tournament 3250 Feb 2
Hand 1: KD S in front AQD W: Loss, AH W in front KQH N: Win
Hand 2: AKS S in front QS W: Loss, KD W in front AQD S: Win, KC E in front QC S: Win
Hand 3: AQC S in front KC W: Loss, QD E in front AKD S: Win, AH N in front KQH E: Loss
Hand 4: QH W in front AJH N (KH S): Win. QS E in front AKJS S: Win. KD S in front AD W: Loss
Hand 5: KJS S in front AQ10S W: 2 Losses, QH N in front KH E: Loss, KDE in front AJD S: Win
Hand 6: AQD S in front KD W: Loss
Hand 7: AKJC S in front QC W: Loss, KJD S between AD E and QD W: Loss and Win
Hand 8: AQS E in front KS S: Win, KQC S in front AJC W: Loss
Hand 9: No finesses
Hand 10: KC S in front AJC W: Loss
Hand 11: No finesses
Hand 12: AQC S in front KC W: Loss
Totals: 9 Wins, 14 Losses

Tournament 3741 Feb 2
Hand 1: KH E in front AQH S: Win, QD S in front KD W: Loss
Hand 2: No finesses
Hand 3: AQJD S in front KD W: Loss
Hand 4: No finesses
Hand 5: AKJ S in front QS W: Loss, QC N in front KC E: Loss, KH W in front AQH N: Win
Hand 6: No finesses
Hand 7: No finesses
Hand 8: AS S in front KS W: Loss, QC N in front KC E: Loss
Hand 9: KH S in front AHW: Loss, QC E in front AKJ C S: Win
Hand 10: KJS S between QS E and AS Q: Win and Loss
Hand 11: AQC W in front KC N: Win
Hand 12: QH N in front KH E: Loss, KD S in front AD W: Loss, QC N in front KC E: Loss
Totals: 5 Wins, 11 Losses

Tournament 4653 Feb 2
Hand 1: No finesses
Hand 2: KQS S in front AJ10S W: Loss, AJ10H E in front KQH S: Win
Hand 3: QH S in front KJH W: Loss
Hand 4: AC E in front KQC S: Win, QS N in front KS E: Loss, AD E in front KD S: Win, KQH W in front AJH N: Win
Hand 5: KS E in front AQS S: Win, KH N in front AH E: Loss
Hand 6: AQS S in front KS W: Loss, KQD E in front AJD S: Win
Hand 7: No finesses
Hand 8: KQS S in front of AS W: Loss, KC W in front of AJC N: Win
Hand 9: No doable finesses
Hand 10: KC N in front of AQC E: Loss
Hand 11: AQJH S in front of KH W: Loss, AQD S in front of KD W: Loss, KJC N in front of AQC E: 2 Losses
Hand 12: AKJH S in front of QH W: loss (Q has to be W to set contract)
Totals: 7 Wins, 12 Losses

Tournament 9794 Feb 3
Hand 1: AS W in front of KQS N: Win, KD E in front of AQD S: Win
Hand 2: KQD S in front of AD W: Loss, KH N in front of AQH E: Loss, QC S in front of KJC W: Loss
Hand 3: AD E in front of KQD S: Win
Hand 4: No finesses
Hand 5: No finesses
Hand 6: KD S in front of AQD W: Loss
Hand 7: AQH E in front of KH S: Win, KJC S in front of AQC W: 2 Losses, KD W in front of AQD N: Win
Hand 8: AQD W in front of KJ10D N: 2 Wins
Hand 9: AQH E in front of KJH S: 2 Wins
Hand 10: AJC S (KC N) in front of QC W: Loss (1 way finesse), KJD N in front of QD E: Loss (1 way finesse)
Hand 11: AQC S in front of KC W: Loss
Hand 12: KS W in front of QS N: Win, KH E in front of AQH S: Win, KC W in front of AQC N: Win
Totals: 12 Wins, 9 Losses

Tournament 7401 Feb 4
Hand 1: KQC N in front of AC E: Loss
Hand 2: KJC S between AC W and QC E: Win and Loss
Hand 3: KQH N in front of AJH E: Loss
Hand 4: KD S in front of AD W: Loss, AQS S in front of KJS W: Loss
Hand 5: No finesses
Hand 6: No finesses
Hand 7: AQJH E in front of KH S: Win, AQJS S in front of KS W: Loss
Hand 8: KS W in front of AS N: Win, KJC S in front of QC W (1 way finesses): Loss
Hand 9: KH N in front of AQJH E: Loss
Hand 10: QH S in front of KJ H W: Loss
Hand 11: KD E in front of QD S: Win, QC N in front of KJC E: Loss
Hand 12: QD N in front of KD E: Loss, KC N in front of AC E: Loss
Totals: 4 Wins, 11 Losses

Tournament 2979 Feb 5
Hand 1: KD E in front of AJD S: Win
Hand 2: KS N in front of AS E: Loss, AKH W in front of QH W: Loss
Hand 3: KS N in front of AQS E: Loss
Hand 4: No finesses
Hand 5: KQS S in front of AJ10S W: Loss, QC E in front of KJC S: Win
Hand 6: KH S in front of AH W: Loss
Hand 7: QD W in front of KJD N: Win
Hand 8: No finesses
Hand 9: No finesses
Hand 10: AC W in front of KC N: Win, AH N in front of KH E: Loss
Hand 11: AJH N in front of KQH E: Loss
Hand 12: KD S in front of AQJD W: Loss, AKC S in front of QC W: Loss
Totals: 4 Wins, 9 Losses

Tournament 7612 Feb 6
Hand 1: KH S in front of AH W: Loss
Hand 2: KS W in front of AS N: Win, QD S in front of KD W: Loss
Hand 3: AKH S in front of QH W: Loss
Hand 4: KS S in front of AS W: Loss, AH S in front of KH W: Loss
Hand 5: QS E in front of AKJ S S: Win, AD E in front of KD S: Win
Hand 6: KD E in front of AQD S: Win, AKJ S W in front of QS N: Win
Hand 7: No finesses
Hand 8: AKC W in front of QC N: Win
Hand 9: KQD N in front of AD E: Loss
Hand 10: AKJ C S in front of QC W: Loss
Hand 11: KS N in front of AQJS E: Loss
Hand 12: AD S in front of KD W: Loss
Totals: 6 Wins, 9 Losses

Tournament 8558 Feb 6
Hand 1: AQS S in front of KS W: Loss
Hand 2: KH W in front of QH N: Win
Hand 3: No finesses
Hand 4: AQH S in front of KH W: Loss, KQC E in front of AC S: Win
Hand 5: KJS N between AS W and QS E: Win and Loss
Hand 6: KD S in front of AQD W: Loss
Hand 7: AKJC S in front of QC W: Loss
Hand 8: KD E in front of QD S: Win, KH S in front of AH W: Loss
Hand 9: No finesses
Hand 10: AQC S in front of KC W: Loss
Hand 11: AS W in front of KQS N: Win, AQJD S in front of KD W: Loss, QC N in front of KJC E: Loss
Hand 12: AKJD S in front of QD W: Loss
Totals: 5 Wins, 10 Losses

Tournament 4251 Feb 7
Hand 1: KH S in front of AH W: Loss
Hand 2: QD N in front of KJ D E: Loss, KC W in front of QC N: Win
Hand 3: No finesses
Hand 4: KS E in front of AQS S: Win
Hand 5: KS W in front of QS: Win, QH E in front of AKH S: Win, KD E in front of AD S: Win
Hand 6: AQC S in front of KC W: Loss
Hand 7: KS E in front of AQS S: Win
Hand 8: AQS N in front of KS W: Loss
Hand 9: No finesses
Hand 10: KJS W in front of QS N: Win, KH S in front of AH W: Loss
Hand 11: KS E in front of AS S: Win
Hand 12: No finesses
Totals: 8 Wins, 5 Losses

Tournament 4742 Feb 7
Hand 1: AQH S in front of KH W: Loss, AQJ D W in front of KD N: Win
Hand 2: AC S in front of KC W: Loss, AKJD S in front of QD W: Loss
Hand 3: KH E in front of AQH S: Win
Hand 4: AQJS S in front of KS W: Loss
Hand 5: KS E in front of AQS S: Win
Hand 6: No finesses
Hand 7: QS N in front of KJS E: Loss, KH E in front of AQH H S: Win
Hand 8: AD N in front of KD E: Loss
Hand 9: KQS S in front of AS W: Loss, KD N in front of AD E: Loss
Hand 10: KH E in front of AQH S: Win
Hand 11: No finesses
Hand 12: KC E in front of AQC S: Win
Totals: 6 Wins, 8 Losses

Tournament 9418 Feb 8
Hand 1: KD S in front of AD W: Loss
Hand 2: No finesses
Hand 3: KS S in front of A W: Loss, KC W in front of QC N: Win (one of 2 finesses that can’t be taken as no way to get to dummy, counted as one)
Hand 4: No finesses
Hand 5: QS N in front of AKJS E: Loss, AKJ S in front of QD W: Loss
Hand 6: KH S in front of AH W: Loss
Hand 7: No finesses
Hand 8: Q10H N in front of KJ9H E: 2 Losses
Hand 9: KD W in front of AD N: Win, KC S in front of AC W: Loss
Hand 10: KS W in front of QS N: Win, QH E in front of AKH S: Win, KDE in front of AQD D: Win
Hand 11: KS N in front of AQS E: Loss
Hand 12: AQH s in front of KJH W: Loss, KD E in front of AD S: Win, AQC W in front of KJC N: 2 Wins
Totals: 8 Wins, 10 Losses

Tournament 84 Feb 8
Hand 1: No finesses
Hand 2: AQS S in front of KS W: Loss
Hand 3: AC N in front of KC E: Loss
Hand 4: No finesses
Hand 5: KH E in front of AQJH S: Win (KC finesse is worthless because K cannot be dropped)
Hand 6: KS E in front of AS S: Win, AQC E in front of KJ10C S: 2 Wins
Hand 7: No finesses
Hand 8: KQS E in front of AS S: Win, KQD W in front of AD N: Win
Hand 9: KD E in front of AQJD S: Win
Hand 10: KS N in front of AS E: Loss, AD W in front of KD N: Win
Hand 11: QC E in front of AKJC S: Win
Hand 12: KC E in front of AQC S: Win, QS E in front of KJS S: Win
Totals: 11 Wins, 3 Losses

Tournament 5411 Feb 9
Hand 1: AKJS S in front of QS W: Loss, AQC S in front of KC W: Loss
Hand 2: KS W in front of AQS N: Win, AQD S in front of KD W: Loss, AJH N in front of Q10H E: Loss. AC E in front of KC S: Win
Hand 3: AD E in front of KQD S: Win, KQS W in front of AJS N: Win
Hand 4: AQS S in front of KS W: Loss, KH S in front of AQH W: Loss, KC N on front of AQC E: Loss, AD S in front of KD W: Loss
Hand 5: KJC N between QC W and AC E: Win and Loss
Hand 6: KC S in front of AQC W: Loss, KD E in front of AD S: Win
Hand 7: KH S in front of AQH W: Loss
Hand 8: KS E in front of AQS S: Win, KD W in front of AQD N: Win
Hand 9: AH S in front of KH W: Loss
Hand 10: AQD N in front of KD E: Loss
Hand 11: Q10S N in front of AJS E: Loss, KH S in front of AH W: Loss, QD E in front of AKJD S: Win
Hand 12: AKJD S in front of QD W: Loss, KS W in front of QS N: Win
Totals: 10 Wins, 14 Losses

Tournament 6821 Feb 9
Hand 1: KJD S between AD E and QD W: Win and Loss
Hand 2: KH W in front of AH N: Win, KQC E in front of AJC S: Win
Hand 3: AQS S in front of KS W: Loss. KC W in front of AC N: Win, QD E in front of AKD S: Win
Hand 4: QC E in front of AJC S: Win, QH N in front of KH E: Loss
Hand 5: KC E in front of AQC S: Win
Hand 6: KJS N in front of Q10S E: Loss
Hand 7: QH W in front of AJ H N: Win, KC E in front of AQJC S: Win
Hand 8: AKJD S in front of QD W: Loss
Hand 9: QH S in front of KH W: Loss, AQD S in front of KJD W: Loss. AQC E in front of KC S: Win
Hand 10: AH N in front of KQH E: Loss, AQC S in front of KC W: Loss
Hand 11: AC E in front of KC S: Win
Hand 12: AH S in front of KH W: Loss. KC W in front of QC N: Win, AQD N in front of KD E: Loss
Totals: 12 Wins, 11 Losses

Tournament 2896 Feb 10
Hand 1: KS S In front of AQ W: Loss
Hand 2: KS S in front of AQJ S W: Loss, KD E in front of AQD S: Win
Hand 3: KC W in front of AQJC N: Win
Hand 4: KJH S in front of Q10H W: Loss
Hand 5: KJH N in front of QH E: Loss
Hand 6: AQJS E in front of KS S: Win, KJC S in front of QC W: Loss
Hand 7: No finesses
Hand 8: No finesses
Hand 9: KD E in front of AQD S: Win
Hand 10: KH S in front of AH W: Loss, KJD W in front of QD N: Win
Hand 11: KQC W in front of AC N: Win
Hand 12: KD E in front of QD S: Win
Totals: 7 Wins, 6 Losses

Tournament 3918 Feb 10
Hand 1: No finesses
Hand 2: No finesses
Hand 3: KJC S between AC W and QC E: Win and Loss
Hand 4: No finesses
Hand 5: No finesses
Hand 6: KS S in front of AS Q: Loss, QD E in front of KJD S: Win
Hand 7: AH S in front of KH W: Loss, KJK10D N in front of AQD E: 2 Losses
Hand 8: AQJ S E in front of KS S: Win, AD E in front of KQD S: Win
Hand 9: AKJ H N in front of QH E: Loss
Hand 10: KJD W in front of Q10D N: Win
Hand 11: No finesses
Hand 12: No finesses
Totals: 5 Wins, 6 Losses

Tournament 7057 Feb 11
Hand 1: QH S in front of KH W: Loss
Hand 2: AKH S in front of QH W: Loss
Hand 3: KS N in front of AQS E: Loss, AQD E in front of KD S: Win, KJC W in front of AQC N: Win
Hand 4: No finesses
Hand 5: AQJ S W in front of KS N: Win, QC N in front of KC E: Loss
Hand 6: No finesses
Hand 7: No finesses
Hand 8: No finesses
Hand 9: No finesses
Hand 10: No finesses
Hand 11: QD W in front of AKJD N: Win
Hand 12: No finesses
Totals: 4 Wins, 4 Losses
Tournament 9806 Feb 11
Hand 1: No finesses
Hand 2: QD S in front of KJD W: Loss
Hand 3: KS E behind AS N: Loss
Hand 4: QS W in front of AJS N: Win
Hand 5: KS E in front of AQS S: Win, AHS in front of KH W: Loss, QD W in front of AJ10D N: Win
Hand 6: AS W in front of KQS N: Win
Hand 7: AS N in front of KQS E: Loss, KD S in front of AQJD W: Loss
Hand 8: AQC W in front of KC N: Win, KJD S between AD W and QD E: Win and Loss
Hand 9: AQS E in front of KS S: Win, KQC S in front of AC W: Loss
Hand 10: No finesses
Hand 11: No finesses
Hand 12: KS E in front of AQJS S: Win, KQH N in front of AH E: Loss, KQC S in front of AC W: Loss
Totals: 8 Wins, 9 Losses

Tournament 3299 Feb 12
Hand 1: KD S in front of AQD W: Loss
Hand 2: QH N in front of KH E: Loss, AQS E in front of KS S: Win, AQD S in front of KD W: Loss, AQJC S in front of KC W: Loss
Hand 3: KH S in front of AH W: Loss, KC S in front of AC W: Loss
Hand 4: KS S in front of AQS W: Loss, KJD N between QD W and AD E: Win and Loss
Hand 5: QS S in front of KJS W: Loss, KC N in front of AQC E: Loss
Hand 6: KJC S in front of Q10C W: Loss, KQH E in front of AJH S: Win
Hand 7: No finesses, just very bad robot bidding
Hand 8: AQH E in front of KH S: Win, KS E in front of AQS S: Win
Hand 9: KJS W in front of QS N: Win, KH E in front of AQH S: Win
Hand 10: KH E in front of AQH S: Win
Hand 11: QH W in front of KJH N: Win, QC N in front of KC E: Loss, AQ10S S in front of KJS W: Loss
Hand 12: KJD E in front of AQ10D S: 2 Wins
Totals: 11 Wins, 12 Losses

Tournament 5848 Feb 12
Hand 1: QD E in front of AKJD S: Win, AC E in front of KQC S: Win
Hand 2: AKJDS in front of QD W: Loss
Hand 3: QH E in front of AJ10H S: Win
Hand 4: KJS S between AS E and QS W: Win and Loss, QD S in front of KJD W: Loss, AQJC E in front of KC S: Win
Hand 5: AS E in front of KS S: Win, KH S in front of AQJH W: Loss
Hand 6: QD N in front of KJD E: Loss
Hand 7: AQS S in front of KS W: Loss, KD W in front of AQD S: Win, KC W in front of AQC N: Win
Hand 8: KD E in front of QD S: Win, AQC S in front of KC W: Loss
Hand 9: QS W in front of AJS N: Win, AQC S in front of KC W: Loss
Hand 10: KJS E in front of AQ10S S: 2 Wins, KQC E in front of AJC S: Win
Hand 11: KD E in front of QD S: Win
Hand 12: KS N in front of AS E: Loss, KJD S between QD E and AD W: Win and Loss
Totals: 15 Wins, 9 Losses

[hrothgar]

You do understand how blindingly stupid flawed your sampling methods are?

You can't play a bunch of tournaments, notice a weird pattern in the hands, and claim "Look, here's where they changed the dealing code and here's where they changed it back".

The proper way to do this type of analysis is to specify in advance the start and end of your sample period and use this test your hypothesis.
Go and do something like this and I'll look at your data

<For example, specify that you plan to play at least a tournament a day, over the course of a two week long period, starting on day foo and ending on day bar>

(And I make this offer knowing that its a complete waste of time since you are apparently paranoid/egotistical enough to believe that the BBO programmers will deliberately modify the dealer code to make you look stupid)

[Bbradley62]

tx10s, on 2015-February-14, 17:10, said:

I am curious, do any of you actually play Robot Bridge?

It is easy enough to confirm (through myhands) that Jack, hrothgar, barmar and I all play lots of robot bridge.

[Bbradley62]

I know you (close enough) duplicated some of the numbers I posted earlier, so we seemed to be doing the same counting, so I wanted to duplicate yours...

tx10s, on 2015-February-14, 17:10, said:

“No finesses” includes 2 way finesses or finesses that do not make any difference (ex: one side hold A with QJ in separate hands so two tricks no matter where K is located). The first letters are AKQJ (Ace, King, Queen, Jack, the last of the letter combinations is one of CDHS (clubs, diamonds, hearts or spades). Then there is a gap with a single letter, NSE or W for north, south, east or west.

Tournament 3250 Feb 2
Hand 1: KD S in front AQD W: Loss Stiff, no finesse, AH W in front KQH N: Win
Hand 2: AKS S in front QS W: Loss, KD W in front AQD S: Win, KC E in front QC S: Wintoss-up due to missing both KJ
Hand 3: AQC S in front KC W: Loss, QD E in front AKD S: Win, AH N in front KQH E: LossNo finesse, you're winning one H and losing one H
Hand 4: QH W in front AJH N (KH S): Win. QS E in front AKJS S: Win. KD S in front AD W: LossIf anything it's a win due to Q and T, so you get 2 of the first 3 diamonds, but I'll call it irrelevant
Hand 5: KJS S in front AQ10S W: 2 Losses, QH N in front KH E: Loss, KDE in front AJD S: WinMissing KQ it's a 75% proposition and shouldn't be considered with the 50% ones
Hand 6: AQD S in front KD W: LossSee your explanation about split QJ
Hand 7: AKJC S in front QC W: Loss, KJD S between AD E and QD W: Loss and Win
Hand 8: AQS E in front KS S: Win, KQC S in front AJC W: Loss
Hand 9: No finesses
Hand 10: KC S in front AJC W: Lossirrelevant non-finesse
Hand 11: No finesses
Hand 12: AQC S in front KC W: LossAgain, see comment re: split QJ
Totals: 9 7 Wins, 14 8 Losses
Not nearly as bad as you made it out to be.

[barmar]

tx10s, on 2015-February-14, 17:10, said:

Antrax: Please excuse me for using your message to post, but I cannot get the code style to work in Fast Reply

Click on Use Full Editor to get out of the fast reply and into the regular post editor.

Quote

Well, your programmer is one cocky little SOB.

I promise you, cross my heart and hope to die, that we have not touched the dealing code in years. The last change we made to it was when we implemented Best Hand robot games, and that was just to implement the part that swaps the human's hand with the best hand.

Now please will you let this go. You've been told over and over that your understanding of statistics is flawed. I'm not an expert on statistics, either, that's why I defer to the expertise of people like hrothgar and Helene.

[1eyedjack]

barmar, on 2015-February-14, 22:18, said:

Now please will you let this go.

It is a common enough accusation (and for that reason if no other I suspect shared by a significant silent minority) that if it can be put to bed then some effort to that end is worthwhile.

Provided, of course, that someone is prepared to put in an equal effort into testing the hypothesis by their peers as is put into promoting it. Which is no small task to ask someone freely to undertake just for the price of some goodwill.

For all that he seems to have some strange notions, tx10s has made the bravest attempt yet at supporting his allegation.

For as long as these rumours persist, I personally think it would be worth the programmers doing something to keep count automatically, and periodically publish some statistics about the randomness of deals, which could include onside honours.

[hrothgar]

1eyedjack, on 2015-February-15, 02:21, said:

It is a common enough accusation (and for that reason if no other I suspect shared by a significant silent minority) that if it can be put to bed then some effort to that end is worthwhile.

Provided, of course, that someone is prepared to put in an equal effort into testing the hypothesis by their peers as is put into promoting it. Which is no small task to ask someone freely to undertake just for the price of some goodwill.

For all that he seems to have some strange notions, tx10s has made the bravest attempt yet at supporting his allegation.

For as long as these rumours persist, I personally think it would be worth the programmers doing something to keep count automatically, and periodically publish some statistics about the randomness of deals, which could include onside honours.

Here's a rub...

Every whackjob has their own quack theory about how the hand records are biased. tx10s thinks that the finesses are being manipulated, however, we've also seen accusations that there are too many extreme shapes, that there are too many voids, that the trump suit doesn't split right, yada yada yada.

Trying to prove that the dealing program is unbiased with respect to all of these diverse claims takes an enormous amount of work.
Sadly, I'm not aware of any general purpose routine designed to test that bridge deals are unbiased.
There are some tests like diehard design to test the quality of a random number generation, but testing bridge hands is would require a lot of special cases.

(I suppose, in theory, one could use Thomas Andrews library of hands and see whether the dealer was drawing from them in a uniform fashion, however, given the accusation that BBO is deliberately skewing the deals this probably wouldn't be a suitable test)