[Blackpuddi]

Teams seems to be popular on BBO. At the moment it seems only possible to play a head to head match. If you wish to play the other individuals in a team you have to start another team match. I feel it whould be possible to play a match were you play both pairs in a team. I think a tourney where a number of teams could play two or three boards against a number of other teams in a mutiple teams tourney would be popular.

[onoway]

I agree wholeheartedly but there are lots of problems trying to do it. At the moment any one player who absentmindedly refuses the invitation or has gone to make a cup of coffee or forgotton he logged on invisible or logged off for whatever reason or is kibbing/sitting at a teaching table can mess up the setting of a match. I don't see any way around that. And, the more players involved the more likely you will find at least one who does something like this.
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Then the chances of someone else refusing the re-sent invitation are greater as they don't understand why they are getting another invitation when they think they are already on their way to a match..
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Setting multiple matches with the same hands would likely work really well with people who are very familiar with the setup and are patient!! It takes a while to enter all the information when you are setting multiple tables.
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In IAC teams, we get around some of the time issues by having the captains set the matches and naming bbo_iac as TD instead of themselves to run the matches. That way the matches all start at approximately the same time. I dont know how you could load hands into such matches though.

[Blackpuddi]

I can see the possible problems couldn't the software associated with teams be changed to allow for the option of opting for a set number of boards where after half the boards have been played it would automatically change opponents.

[shintaro]

I have asked a similar question sometime ago regarding running 'True' Multiple teams where you play say 24 boards and use a Standard American Whist movement.

And yes I know there are problems with say 10/11/12 teams.

You should just have to enter the Number of Teams that will play and then the software should be able to set up the software automatically.

You would have to type in ALL the teams as well and the problems Onoway has written can surface.

As the software is at this moment (unless I have missed something) you have to set up your teams matches to only play Half the number of Boards then 'Manually' reset the pairs for aother set of boards. Then having to Manually add the 2 sets of achieved scores together at the end.

[mike777]

Side note...


BBO has the software and the permission to run ACBL team events.

For more information talk with "Jacki" "ACBL" yellow on BBO

[shintaro]

onoway, on Nov 3 2009, 02:18 AM, said:

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Setting multiple matches with the same hands would likely work really well with people who are very familiar with the  setup and are patient!! It takes a while to enter all the information when you are setting multiple tables.
.
In IAC teams,  we get around some of the time issues by having the captains set the matches and naming bbo_iac as TD instead of themselves  to run the matches. That way the matches all start at approximately the same time. I dont know how you could load hands into such matches though.

onoway we think we have found a similar answer to setting up multiple teams.

Amongst us as a set of TD's Acol Club we can each set up a match .

We think we can all then use the same LIN file for each match
(we have a LIN file ctreator)

But am interested in your setting up using bbo_iac as TD


You can then add yourselves using the ~ in between each TD after bbo_iac

Will give this a test soon and feed back



And Mike will ask jacki TY but as we are not ACBL not sure

[helene_t]

Maybe it could be implemented by modifying the pair tournament feature rather than by modifying the team match feature.

It could work like a pair tournament, except that you could enter a team of four rather than a pair. Or, you could register with a partner only, and then other pairs could ask you for teaming up. At tourney start, idle pairs will be teamed up at random.

Register form:
Augment the "register" form with additional fields:
- Teammate1 (text field, optional)
- Teammate2 (text field, optional)
- Available pairs (list, single selection, optional)
- List us as an available pair (checkbox)

If you specify Teammate1 and Teammate2, your entry as a team will be accepted once all three accept.

If you specify an idle pair, your entry as a team will be accepted once all three accept.

If you specify neither, you will become an available pair if you checked that you want that. In that case, other pairs can ask you for teaming up.

Further, it would be nice if teammates could be picked from the available individual players (partnership desk). For example the "available players" list could be (up to) triple selection, with by default the first chosen being invited as a partner and the two others as teammates.

Chose/dissolve team form (new form to be added, with a link from the tourney home page):
This form has these fields:
- Teammate1 (text field, optional)
- Teammate2 (text field, optional)
- Available pairs (list, single selection, optional)
- Available players(list, double selection, optional)
- List us as an available pair (checkbox)
- Dissolve team (button)
- Invite teammates (button)
- Close (button)

If you are registered as a pair but don't have a team yet, you can invite an available or two individuals as teammates. Or you can alter your "List us as an available pair" flag.

If you have teammates, you can use this form to dump your teammates. The form will then stay visible so you can check your "List us as an available pair" or invite a different pair. If you dump your teammates, they will receive a notification that they have been put on the list of available pairs and that they can change that if they don't want to.

[shintaro]

Helen

As I understand the set up for pairs Tourney at the moment

1 You enter as a Pair
2 You are then placed in a seating position by the software
3 A standard Mitchell movement is employed (except they are all head to head matches) i.e. Every Pair plays the same 2 Boards at one time.

Thus the problem seems to be getting the opposite pairs to be in the opposite orientation as Teamates against the same Team. for the 1st round after which the software would do the same movent of E/W pairs.

Duno if this is possible but interesting.

I would like the views of Uday or Fred regarding the alteration of the programme

[onoway]

[We think we can all then use the same LIN file for each match
(we have a LIN file ctreator)]

I would be interested in how this is working for you...we had discussed this but wondered a bit as it would seem you would have to give the captains setting the matches the .lin file before the match. I have no doubt they are all fine upstanding citizens but the possibility of temptation to take a peek could become an issue, justified or not.

It is quite interesting to see what sort of things become issues over time. One which has come up in a minor way from time to time in the IAC matches is that if a captain leaves him or herself on as a director, they are able to see the progress of the match, although our rules say barometer is off. Sometimes I have great sympathy for people who organize events where there is actually something at stake.

[shintaro]

Hi Onoway

We are mainly NON playing Directors so not a problem regarding security of LIN files.

We also use 'Barometer On' so that the teams can see how they are going on board by board. (except when we forget to tick the box or Double click when ticking thus turning it off )

But it is a lot of work having to reset every half manually then if we run an overall competition we would have to Manually put out the overal results.

[suokko]

bbo league for nordic countries and some more but that is played over a semester.

[onoway]

I am interested in hearing what other people do regarding the barometer. We started out with it on but after discussion (they dont know how they are doing in live matches) we now leave it off.

This works most of the time somewhat better imo as we sometimes have very lopsided matches and it's one thing to think your side is doing badly but hope maybe your teammates are saving the day and quite another to KNOW with 4 hands to go you are getting thoroughly pulverized. I feel now that the barometer off leads to more real results; that people continue to try their best until the end rather than being tempted to abandon ship or do strange things (which would result in director calls). I don't play in the series team matches, but then I am also the only TD for them so trying to minimize potential problems is a priority.

This is one reason why we haven't attempted to load hands as yet.. I am not clever with computers so whatever the system used it has to be relatively quick and simple .

What I would like to see - the simplest solution I can think of- would be to have a code which allowed the TD to save the hands from the first match and then send them to the other tables as the matches are set....wouldn't matter what the hands WERE as long as they were the same for all tables. This format could also be used by TP tourneys perhaps...That wouldn't deal with the issue of using preselected hands, but it WOULD deal with the issue of different teams playing different hands within one match structure, which is the main concern. Possibly it could be set up to use either preselected or randomly generated (for the first match) hands. I have no idea if this would be difficult to do or not.

[shintaro]

Hi we have not conducted our test yet but will do after Christmas then will let you know the outcomes.

Your point about not having the Barometer on thus stopping possible 'Gambling' actions to try recover is valid

[1eyedjack]

These are all excellent ideas in my view, but I worry about priorities.

To my mind, the higher priority has to be improving the mechanism for setting up team games under the existing head-to-head structure.

I do not suggest that one avenue of improvement should be pursued to the exclusion of another, but it seems to me that the shortcomings in the existing method of setting up head-to-head team games were expressed years ago in these forums and there is to date no noticeable improvement.

It is obvious why this is: development of Flash interface has been a higher priority still than either improvement suggested for the team games.

But there must surely come a time when the extent of the delay itself affects its priority for implementation.

Just my opinion, for what it is worth, and by all means judge it worthless.

[Vampyr]

I have played in Multiple Teams events many times, and run them a few times. The American Whist and Stagger movements that are normally used are not at all complicated. I cannot believe that writing a programme allowing BBO to handle these movements would take more than a few minutes.