[awm]

peachy, on Jan 9 2009, 12:29 PM, said:

To say they were not damaged by the bidding makes no sense. They *were* damaged because they should not have been defending 4H.
....

This case cannot consider "how bad the defense was" against an illegal contract. After the infraction during the auction is remedied, the subsequent illegal call(s) cease to exist. They are certainly not reinstated for the purpose of penalizing the NOS for their bad defense.

This is not quite the case. The reasoning goes something like this...

Suppose that opponents, through some abuse of UI, reach 6NT (say there is a slow response to blackwood and opponents then choose to bid on when no logical person would do so off two aces). I am on lead with two aces. I lead one ace, then continue that suit. Eventually the contract makes.

Certainly if opponents had not abused UI, they would not have been in 6NT, and I would not have had the opportunity to let them score up 990. But come on! Their unethical bidding landed them in the soup, all I had to do was lead my aces and I was winning many IMPs! How is it fair that I pay no penalty for my idiotic defense on this hand? Certainly if I had lead my aces and set them a trick, the director would not then rule the contract back to five-making-five because "if the opponents had not abused UI, they would only be in five and I would not have had the opportunity to defeat them."

If the laws were interpreted as you suggest, then it would be to my advantage to take certain crazy actions when opponents may have abused UI. For example, suppose that opponents bid to game in an uncontested hesitation auction. I might as well double. If the game goes down then I win more by doubling. If the game makes then I will call the director and complain that opponents would not have gotten to game without the UI. This is what's called a "double shot" and is not allowed -- I have to continue to play "normal bridge" in order to get my adjusted result.

[nige1]

IMO

• The director should impose a score of 3♦= for both sides.
  
• Peachy is right. I hope the defenders' errors were not egregious because the relevant law seems unjust, daft, and incomprehensible to ordinary players -- just adding insult to injury.
  
• ACBLers are lucky compared with players in Europe, who are bemused by weird compromise 12C3 rulings that neither deter law-breakers nor provide redress for their victims. Directors usually differ on the appropriate fudge.
  
• Both directors and players are befuddled by these over-sophisticated and unnecessary laws.

[blackshoe]

nige1, on Jan 10 2009, 01:24 PM, said:

weird compromise 12C3 rulings

Law 12C3 said:

In individual events the director enforces the rectifications in these Laws and the provisions requiring the award of adjusted scores equally against both members of the offending side, even though only one of them may be responsible for the irregularity. But the director shall not award a procedural penalty against the offender’s partner if of the opinion that offender’s partner is in no way to blame.

[fyrish]

At the table, the director didn't even ask how the defence was played, he just assumed that any defence that let 4♥ make was inferior. This certainly seems tough on NS.

[nige1]

FrancesHinden, on Jan 9 2009, 11:04 AM, said:

see http://forums.bridge...?showtopic=3750 for more on this topic

awm, on Jan 9 2009, 05:21 PM, said:

If the laws were interpreted as you suggest, then it would be to my advantage to take certain crazy actions when opponents may have abused UI. For example, suppose that opponents bid to game in an uncontested hesitation auction. I might as well double. If the game goes down then I win more by doubling. If the game makes then I will call the director and complain that opponents would not have gotten to game without the UI. This is what's called a "double shot" and is not allowed -- I have to continue to play "normal bridge" in order to get my adjusted result.

fyrish, on Jan 10 2009, 02:32 PM, said:

At the table, the director didn't even ask how the defence was played, he just assumed that any defence that let 4♥ make was inferior. This certainly seems tough on NS.

IMO the double-shot law is flawed:

• As Frances's link illustrates, top directors don't understand double-shot law.
  
• This law protects experts who break the law. For example..
  • Directors rarely have the effrontery to apply this law to experts who anyway can usually concoct a plausible argument as to why their action wasn't really "wild and gambling".
    
  • Use of UI by an expert may to go unreported. His ordinary opponent will sometimes make a subsequent daft mistake. It is a brave opponent who will endure the hassle of calling the director, when the expected outcome is to be pilloried for errors and then deprived of redress.
  
  
• This law penalizes ordinary players. They are more likely to make mistakes and take peculiar actions. Also we must lean over backwards to avoid a likely winning action that to us would be normal, in case a director rules it "wild and gambling". It is galling to settle for some middle-of-the road action and a poor result, and then the director judges opponents innocent of any infraction and the action you wanted to take would have been successful.
  
• Double-shots aren't intrinsically immoral as awm implies. Opponents (not you) broke the law. Why should it be morally wrong to profit from their infraction.
  
• Anyway, you don't need a special law against double-shots. Without such a law, you would still be foolhardy to try a wild gamble, because to recover from the likely catastrophe, you must persuade the director that
  • An opponent was in receipt of UI that could have influenced his action.
    
  • There were was a less successful logical alternative.
    
  • The UI demonstrably suggested the successful alternatve chosen over other alternatives and
    
  • You were damaged as a result.

In summary: double-shot law encourages UI infractions by reducing the deterrent to law-breakers and denying redress to their victims. It is subjective and sophisticated but, for players, it adds no value whatsoever. It is daft and unnecessary.

[Trinidad]

This is one of my pet peeves. My rule is (I am a director myself):

Do not give a split score unless you are 200% sure that you need to give one.

It is very good that there exists a possibility for giving a split score. It prevents the non offending side from doing something wild or gambling and it forces them to keep playing bridge. (It doesn't force them to play error free bridge, but they are not allowed to make any serious errors: revoke, overruff partner's king of trumps with your ace, etc.)

However, in practice, there is no need to assign split scores. It just doesn't happen often that one side commits an infraction and the other a serious error (of the type 'where was your brain?') on the same board.

At times, you may think that you see a serious error. But invariably it turns out to be a reasonable action (not perfect, just reasonable) with the information that the player actually held. Directors also tend to forget that the non offending side has to play as if there was no infraction. (If they play on the assumption that there was an infraction, they will get a bad result when everything is normal, that is without an infraction.)

In this case, they need to assume that East has his 3♥ bid. If I am sitting South, and I see this auction and this dummy, assuming that everybody played by the rules, I would be very happy if I can take 2 tricks. I would be 98% sure that EW have missed a slam. It would be completely impossible that there would be a fourth trick. With this information, you cannot seriously call it an error if NS let the game slip through (and there are many ways how this could happen).

Occasionally you may see someone trying for something wild and gambling at lower levels (the double shot that Adam mentioned). In that case the player has never heard of a split score. Usually you can even get them to explain why they took the gambling action. (They will say something like "If it works: I win. If it doesn't: I don't loose.". And the look on their face will say: "Aren't I smart?"). You give him a split score to make sure that this was his last double shot (and will explain the rules carefully, with the Lawbook in hand, and the finger on Law 12C1b).

In my TD career, I have given a total of about three split scores. All of them occured in my first year as a TD. I don't remember them, but I am very sure that each of these rulings must have been incorrect.

Rik

[nige1]

nige1, on Jan 10 2009, 01:24 PM, said:

weird compromise 12C3 rulings

Law 12C3 said:

In individual events the director enforces the rectifications in these Laws and the provisions requiring the award of adjusted scores equally against both members of the offending side, even though only one of them may be responsible for the irregularity. But the director shall not award a procedural penalty against the offender’s partner if of the opinion that offender’s partner is in no way to blame.

blackshoe, on Jan 10 2009, 12:39 PM, said:

     

Thank you Blackshoe. Sorry all. As a mere player, I cited the wrong law.
Instead, (as Blackshoe is fully aware) I should have quoted

2007 Law Book, on 12C1c, said:

In order to do equity and unless the Regulating nuthority forbids it, an assigned adjustedJ score may be weighted to reflect the probabilities of a number of potential results.

Where is Kafka, now that we really need him?

[blackshoe]

The purpose of a score adjustment is to restore equity as best we can. Law 12C1© allows directors to do that when it is not clear precisely what "equity" is. Frankly, I don't see a problem with it, and I don't know why you do, Nigel. Nor do I see why we need Kafka. You seem to be doing a pretty darn good job in his place.

[blackshoe]

Rik:

If you're speaking of a split score under Law 12A1(, I would agree that such cases are rare, although I'm not so sure they're as rare as you seem to think. No matter, that's a minor nit. However, there is another kind of split score, and we in Zone 2 are still stuck with it. That's the one under Law 12C1(e), and that one is in my estimation much more common.

Actually, I'm not sure what the situation is in Zone 5 (Caribbean and Central America) because the website still lists the elections under the 1997 laws.

[skjaeran]

Gerben42, on Jan 9 2009, 02:40 PM, said:

(have fun, scoring program writers!).

Huh, in Norway we've had a program that could score like this for at least three years now I believe - probably longer.

[Trinidad]

blackshoe, on Jan 10 2009, 08:07 PM, said:

Rik:

If you're speaking of a split score under Law 12A1(, I would agree that such cases are rare, although I'm not so sure they're as rare as you seem to think. No matter, that's a minor nit. However, there is another kind of split score, and we in Zone 2 are still stuck with it. That's the one under Law 12C1(e), and that one is in my estimation much more common.

Actually, I'm not sure what the situation is in Zone 5 (Caribbean and Central America) because the website still lists the elections under the 1997 laws.

You are obviously right about the 12C1e split score. And no, I wasn't talking about 12C1e.

You are also right about 12C1b. It is not as black and white as I state. But my point is clear (and you agree with me, so why am I writing this? ):
Many TD's will give a split score as soon as the non offending side slipped or the TD disagrees with their actions. To those TD's, I would say that they certainly will make a lot less mistakes if they stop giving 12C1b split scores all together.

Rik

[mr1303]

It is one of my pet peeves where people just quote law numbers as opposed to what it actually says.

I do not have a copy of the laws next to my computer, and I'm sure many other people don't as well.

[dburn]

mr1303, on Jan 14 2009, 05:48 AM, said:

It is one of my pet peeves where people just quote law numbers as opposed to what it actually says.

I do not have a copy of the laws next to my computer, and I'm sure many other people don't as well.

If you have a computer and can post to this forum, you also have access to at least one copy of the Laws. You can visit this page to download the UK version, and the NBOs of other countries may provide a similar service.

[nige1]

mr1303, on Jan 14 2009, 05:48 AM, said:

It is one of my pet peeves where people just quote law numbers as opposed to what it actually says.
do not have a copy of the laws next to my computer, and I'm sure many other people don't as well.

dburn, on Jan 14 2009, 06:03 AM, said:

IIf you have a computer and can post to this forum, you also have access to at least one copy of the Laws. You can visit this page to download the UK version, and the NBOs of other countries may provide a similar service.

• David's link is to a PDF version.
  
• Anna Gudge and Mark Newton have posted a Word version of the latest version of the new laws
  
• What is frustrating is how few WBF documents are presented as easy-access, compact, web-friendly HTML pages.

[blackshoe]

Yeah, that's frustrating. If it was a little more frustrating, I might actually do something about it (it's not all that hard). But I see no point in just complaining, particularly complaining to people who can't or won't do anything about it. You might try making a suggestion to Grattan Endicott, or to various webmasters of NBO sites.

It is possible to include hyperlinks within a pdf document, btw. You don't have to produce html pages to make the laws "web friendly".

[paulg]

nige1, on Jan 14 2009, 02:01 PM, said:

• David's link is to a PDF version. 
  
  
• Anna Gudge and Mark Newton have posted a Word version of the latest version of the new laws
  
  
• What is frustrating is how few WBF documents are presented as easy-access, compact, web-friendly HTML pages.

I created an HTML version of the laws.

It is the least compact of the three versions (Acrobat easily the best) and the formatting is not so accessible.

Making reference documents available in PDF seems fine to me.

Paul

[nige1]

blackshoe, on Jan 14 2009, 11:43 AM, said:

But I see no point in just complaining, particularly complaining to people who can't or won't do anything about it. You might try making a suggestion to Grattan Endicott, or to various webmasters of NBO sites.

On the Bridge Laws Mailing List, I've often asked the WBFLC (Grattan Endicott) and NBOs to publish minutes, WBF conditions of contest, regulations, and laws as hyperlinked HTLML pages. We don't all have spare memory and fast internet connections.

[blackshoe]

Well, then you've done what you could do. Complaining about it here isn't going to get you anywhere.

[JanM]

Hijacking a little . I haven't been able to find an easy way to convert Word documents to good HTML. The converter in Word itself doesn't do a good job, copying and pasting usually messes up formatting and numbering. As a result, all of the Conditions of Contest posted on the USBF site are PDFs and I spend a ridiculous amount of time converting tables that are easy to produce in Word or Excel into web pages (I'm not good at HTML; I'm using the Joomla editor). I'd actually prefer to post HTML if there was an easy way to do that. Any suggestions?

[paulg]

I used OpenOffice for my test but it's probably similar to Word in terms of its effectiveness of generating HTML from a (ooo/Word) document.

I am pretty good with html so I don't tend to use an editor when working with it.

p