[Vampyr]

VixTD, on Jun 30 2010, 03:19 PM, said:

That said, the side who failed to alert are the offending side who have caused the problem. As Bluejak says, the new rule on alerting of doubles is easy to understand. They should be given a stern warning, to be backed up by a procedural penalty if they don't make some effort to change their ways.

I didn't give a "stern warning". They didn't know the regulation; that's not a crime. Now they know it.

[campboy]

Vampyr, on Jun 30 2010, 08:12 PM, said:

I am with Bluejak here; I think that to say that the new and old regulations are equivalent in complexity seems almost to be taking the piss.

Really? The new rule splits doubles up into three categories (natural suit bids at the 1,2 or 3 level; other bids at the 1,2 or 3 level; bids at the 4 level and above) with a different (and genuinely non-trivial) rule for each; the old rule only had two categories. However, under the old rule there were three conditions which had to be checked in order to determine which category you were in (natural suit? below the 4 level? has partner acted?) whereas under the new rule there are only two.

I am willing to accept that most people disagree with my opinion about the levels of complexity being similar (I did not say "equivalent"), but it is a genuinely held opinion and certainly not taking the piss. More to the point, it's not really important. So let me repeat the offending paragraph with that removed:

The drawback with the new one is that pretty much no-one is going to get it right unless they actually know what the rule is, because there are so many counterintuitive situations. The problem has always been that most people have no interest in finding out what the rule is (the rest will get it right anyway).

[NickRW]

helene_t, on Jun 29 2010, 11:37 AM, said:

Like if someone responds 2♣ to a 1NT opening and partner doesn't announce it...

Slightly off topic - but that is another funny one. AFAIK the only meaning of 2♣ in response to 1NT that is neither alertable nor announcable is a weak take out - except that even beginners have learnt Stayman - so weak take out appears to me to be a less common meaning than Gladiator or Keri - in other words it is highly unusual - and therefore one might think it ought to be alertable!

Anyway, at the risk of seeming like Mr Grump (again), when I started back playing Bridge in clubs a couple of years or so ago, I made it my business to read the Orange book - I didn't really understand the alerting regs pertaining to double - I found discussions and moans about it on the internet and was not really further enlightened. Started playing anyway, and it became immediately apparent that just nobody was alerting any doubles other than 1) non penalty doubles of 1NT and 2) support doubles (very few pairs play either of these). Since then the regs have been changed - and nobody has taken the slightest bit of notice whatsoever - and nobody is being damaged as far as I can see.

I suppose I would have a problem if a player from another club came along where they did enforce the regs - but frankly I am more concerned with people failing to put all their cards back in the boards properly, opening leads out of turn and revokes. (And we get a fairly regular trickle of players from other clubs - and do not have problems with them and conflict over alerting policy - so I assume other clubs are as far away from the theoretical EBU norm as we are!)

Nick

[bluejak]

Players do not really have difficulty with alerting doubles of NT, and the rule about above 3NT is a general one that players also find easy. The problems come in doubles of suit bids below 3NT.

For most players a rule that depends on the auction and changes based on it is more difficult than one that does not.

The way you have categorised it might be the way you see it, but it is not the way the average player does.

[blackshoe]

I wondered how the ACBL regulation looks wrt complexity. So I looked it up.

First, five types of doubles are defined:

Doubles (in increasing order of penalty orientation):
* Takeout: Partner is requested to bid.
* Competitive: Shows a desire to compete further; partner usually bids.
* Optional: Shows extra high-card values; offers partner a choice between bidding or passing.
* Penalty-oriented: Partner normally passes but occasionally bids.
* Penalty: Partner is requested to pass.

The entirety of the section on doubles, redoubles and passes is:

Quote

Except for those doubles with highly unusual or unexpected meanings, doubles do not require an Alert.

1♠-P-4♣ (splinter bid)-Dbl
If this double asks for the lead of any suit other than clubs, an Alert is required.

1♥-Dbl or 1♦-P-1♠-Dbl
If either double is penalty or lead directing only, an Alert is required.

3♥-Dbl or 3♥-P-P-Dbl
If either double is penalty, an Alert is required

Passes or redoubles with highly unusual or unexpected meanings require an Alert.

1♣-P-1♠-Dbl- Rdbl
If redouble shows three-card spade support rather than a good hand, an Alert is required.

1♠-P-2♣-2♠- P
If the second Pass says, "I do not want a spade lead on defense," an Alert is required.

The Alert Chart says most doubles and redoubles do not require an alert, but that highly unusual and unexpected ones do. WRT passes, the chart says only that highly unusual and unexpected meanings require an alert.

On the Convention Card, support doubles and redoubles and penalty doubles of overcalls are the only thing in red - indicating an alert is required.

The examples are, I suppose, useful, but they cannot possibly be comprehensive. The regulation itself admits that the meaning of "highly unusual and unexpected" is "fuzzy", but excuses itself on the grounds they couldn't come up with a better idea.

I suppose the regulation is simple, at least in form, but it sure lends itself to confusion and disagreement over what is and is not "highly unusual and unexpected".

I note that the list of defined doubles does not include "lead-directing", even though that's the only meaning other than penalty directly addressed in the examples. No, I'm wrong. There's an example of a support redouble, also not included in the list of definitions. Seems rather silly to define a bunch of types of doubles, and then not refer to them in the regulation.

[helene_t]

Many club players will persist that the rules are too complicated and that they will never be able to understand them, no matter how simple they are. I suppose due to the age of the bridge population it is just difficult to get any change broadly understood and accepted. Most of us are too old to learn new things. And UK is a conservative country.

Alertable agreements like conventional responses to 2NT and 2♣ openings are almost never alerted. Sometimes people will announce them, though . FSF is alerted some 25% of the time I would guess, like Blackwood Weak twos usually announced, sometimes alerted. Transfers usually announced but everybody says "transfer" rather than the correct "hearts" (or "spades"). And some alert transfers.

Players at my club generally play very vanilla so there isn't that much to alert. So it's not that it matters much. I guess I should just get over it.

[PeterAlan]

blackshoe, on Jun 29 2010, 08:10 PM, said:

Let's keep it (sort of) simple: if a player alerts, and his opponent does not ask for an explanation, the opponent continues at his own risk.

But it never is that simple, because of UI, especially if the opponent asks for an explanation and in the light of it decides to pass.

This brings me to a bugbear of mine, the host of defences to (weak) 1NT. I'm beginning to think that these should be announceable (mine is EBU-land) rather than alertable, to avoid the UI problems that the NT-opening side has, which cripples their ability to compete effectively.

I can give you an example from the Corwen (which also illustrates the problems cited above with the alerting of doubles) - I'm not giving the actual hand, since it's really the regulation of the auction that is my point. And this isn't club bridge, where you can smile when the sort of technical transgressions that Helene describes take place.

Neither side vulnerable. E (dealer) opens 1NT (weak), S overcalls 2C, alerted. W, who holds a 9-count with 5 hearts to AJ and 4 clubs to A, enquires, is told "Hearts and another", and decides to Pass. N bids 2D.

E holds 5 spades, and E-W, having been stolen blind in similar sequences in the past, have decided that they're prepared to compete to 2S in those circumstances (let's not distract ourselves with the bridge merits or otherwise of this view). E therefore bids 2S, and N predictably screams blue murder (actually, a reaction was forseeable; the totally OTT manner of it wasn't). The TD asks for the auction to continue, which it does: Pass from S and W, double from N (not alerted), pass from E, tank followed by pass from S, pass from W.

It looks as though N/S can take 9 tricks in D, so -100 will be OK, -300 won't. E asks S "You didn't alert the double, so it's take-out, right?". S: "We don't have an agreement on it". (N-S, both heavily capped, have been playing together for at least 15 years.) E: "Well, unless it's take-out, it's alertable". N: "No it isn't." E tried further enquiries about the 1NT defences in order to try and decide whether S's second suit is spades or clubs, but got nowhere.

Now I'm not asking for a lot of sympathy for E-W (who can make 8 tricks in both H and NT as escapes from 2Sx), but it does seem to me that the scales are tilted heavily in N-S's favour as regards being able to know what's going on, and inhibit E-W's ability to compete effectively or punish intervention without running foul of UI constraints. It's clear, as I read the rules, that an optional double is alertable: in fact N had the spades, and S's second suit is clubs. N-S both know this, but E can't tell.

PeterAlan

[VixTD]

Vampyr, on Jun 30 2010, 02:14 PM, said:

VixTD, on Jun 30 2010, 03:19 PM, said:

That said, the side who failed to alert are the offending side who have caused the problem. As Bluejak says, the new rule on alerting of doubles is easy to understand. They should be given a stern warning, to be backed up by a procedural penalty if they don't make some effort to change their ways.

I didn't give a "stern warning". They didn't know the regulation; that's not a crime. Now they know it.

That's fair enough, of course. I think I'd inform those who might not be aware, warn those who ought to know better, and only fine those who ought to know better, have been warned and still refuse to comply.

I don't want to acquiesce to a general acceptance that no one is going to learn to alert doubles and act as if they weren't alertable. If we're going to do that, let's formally rescind the regulation.

[blackshoe]

PeterAlan, on Jul 1 2010, 07:39 AM, said:

But it never is that simple, because of UI, especially if the opponent asks for an explanation and in the light of it decides to pass.

It seems to me that if you need to know, you had better ask, whether that gives UI to partner or not. And if you don't need to know, I suppose you shouldn't ask. Of course, some will then argue that not asking conveys UI — and maybe it does, but is it useful UI?

[jallerton]

VixTD, on Jun 30 2010, 03:19 PM, said:

CamHenry, on Jun 30 2010, 03:52 AM, said:

As a director, I'd say any experienced player - a strong club player, or someone who plays with moderate success in tournaments - should have asked rather than assumed.  I'd give redress to a novice here, but none otherwise.  The exception would be if the OS were known to the NOS, and known to be fully reliable in alerting.

I was going to try to formulate a reply to the original question (something people seem reluctant to do), and this is basically the approach I would take. There is certainly no automatic right of redress for the non-offenders - they would have to show that they either had good reason to believe it was a takeout double, or show that they could not ask without putting their side's interests at risk.

I agree with this. The TD needs to talk to the player and then form a judgement whether it is likely that this player both (i) really did believe that the double had to be take-out when it was not alerted and (ii) might well have acted differently had the double been alerted.

Unlike Henry I wouldn't automatically restrict redress to novices; apparently there is a Premier Grand Master who genuinely believes that the alerting rules "are so simple that people are actually starting to get them right pretty consistently".

[jallerton]

Vampyr, on Jun 30 2010, 08:12 PM, said:

bluejak, on Jun 30 2010, 02:35 PM, said:

I completely disagree with you on the matter of complexity. 

I am with Bluejak here; I think that to say that the new and old regulations are equivalent in complexity seems almost to be taking the piss.

OK, perhaps you have a point there, Stefanie. By my counting, the 1998 Orange Book took 18 lines (including exeplanations and examples) to explain the alerting rules on doubles, whereas the 2006 Orange Book takes 28 lines to explain the new version.

[jallerton]

bluejak, on Jun 30 2010, 02:35 PM, said:

The reason the current rule is so much simpler is that [considering doubles of suit bids below 3NT] it says alert if not takeout. The old rule said alert if not takeout in some situations, alert if not penalties in other situations.

One reason the old rule was much easier to apply is that [once the partner of the doubler had already taken a positive action] it said alert if not penalties. The new rule says alert if not penalties if RHO's bid has some meanings, alert if not take-out if RHO's bid has some other meanings. Under the new rule there are further variations when the last bid was 1NT/2NT/3NT [alert if not penalties] and when the last bid was above 3NT [when you shouldn't alert at all, except, that is, when you should].

[jallerton]

PeterAlan, on Jul 1 2010, 12:39 PM, said:

blackshoe, on Jun 29 2010, 08:10 PM, said:

Let's keep it (sort of) simple: if a player alerts, and his opponent does not ask for an explanation, the opponent continues at his own risk.

But it never is that simple, because of UI, especially if the opponent asks for an explanation and in the light of it decides to pass.

This brings me to a bugbear of mine, the host of defences to (weak) 1NT. I'm beginning to think that these should be announceable (mine is EBU-land) rather than alertable, to avoid the UI problems that the NT-opening side has, which cripples their ability to compete effectively.

I symphathise with your problem which derives partly from the (until recently fairly strong) advice from the EBU to players to not ask questions unless they were considering bidding.

I did suggest to the EBU a couple of years ago a possible solution to this problem. Why not make all conventional calls on the first round of the auction announceable rather than alertable? Although there would be some increased UI, most partnerships ought to know what their calls mean on the first round and, in the event of a misunderstanding occurring, there is usually UI anyway from the present system of alerting. Meanwhile the opponents would be much better informed and players using unusual systems would not gain through the opponents not knowing their system and being too afraid to ask (or not ask).