[bixby]

How many times in BBO robot play have you said to yourself, either immediately upon seeing dummy or after a couple of tricks have been played, "ah, good, now all I need is a 3-2 split." Well, that is the time to kiss your contract goodbye, because the BBO robots are specially programmed to split 4-1 whenever that happens. Except that a 5-0 split is also permitted. And I've seen more 4-0 splits in a week on BBO than in a year off it.

Oh, I know you're going to deny this, or say it has something to do with imperfect human shuffling, but the cards at my bridge club are computer dealt, so I'm very used to computer-dealt hands, and boy, if the BBO robots don't have a built-in "now all I need is a 3-2 split" detector, they sure act like they do. Five missing cards are supposed to split 3-2 68% of the time, and if I get a 3-2 split on BBO 50% of the time when I think "now all I need is . . ." I'd be surprised.

[DozyDom]

Please tell me this is a joke and I'm just bad at picking up on humour.

[johnu]

 bixby, on 2019-May-10, 12:06, said:

How many times in BBO robot play have you said to yourself, either immediately upon seeing dummy or after a couple of tricks have been played, "ah, good, now all I need is a 3-2 split." Well, that is the time to kiss your contract goodbye, because the BBO robots are specially programmed to split 4-1 whenever that happens. Except that a 5-0 split is also permitted. And I've seen more 4-0 splits in a week on BBO than in a year off it.

Oh, I know you're going to deny this, or say it has something to do with imperfect human shuffling, but the cards at my bridge club are computer dealt, so I'm very used to computer-dealt hands, and boy, if the BBO robots don't have a built-in "now all I need is a 3-2 split" detector, they sure act like they do. Five missing cards are supposed to split 3-2 68% of the time, and if I get a 3-2 split on BBO 50% of the time when I think "now all I need is . . ." I'd be surprised.

You need to apply and pay for an executive BBO Robot membership which programs robot hands to have even splits when you are declaring, and gives you and your partner robot extreme splits when the opponents are declaring. Believe me, it is well worth the money.

[steve2005]

I have the same problem with shuffle and dealt hands at local club.
Should I apply for a special membership there?

[hrothgar]

 bixby, on 2019-May-10, 12:06, said:

How many times in BBO robot play have you said to yourself, either immediately upon seeing dummy or after a couple of tricks have been played, "ah, good, now all I need is a 3-2 split." Well, that is the time to kiss your contract goodbye, because the BBO robots are specially programmed to split 4-1 whenever that happens. Except that a 5-0 split is also permitted. And I've seen more 4-0 splits in a week on BBO than in a year off it.

Oh, I know you're going to deny this, or say it has something to do with imperfect human shuffling, but the cards at my bridge club are computer dealt, so I'm very used to computer-dealt hands, and boy, if the BBO robots don't have a built-in "now all I need is a 3-2 split" detector, they sure act like they do. Five missing cards are supposed to split 3-2 68% of the time, and if I get a 3-2 split on BBO 50% of the time when I think "now all I need is . . ." I'd be surprised.

Out of curiosity, why do you think that BBO would ever bother to implement a feature like this?

Regardless, I have an offer for you...

Let's play 8 X 16 board challenge matches (That way we can each see the complete set of hands and make sure that no one cherry picking the hands...)

At the end of the match, we'll run a hypothesis test to see whether the hands split unevenly or not.
(95% confidence level)

If the null hypothesis can not be rejected, I'll pay to have $100 BBO bucks put in your account.
If the null hypothesis can be be rejected, you pay to put $25 into mine...

[bixby]

Oh yes, I know you're all scoffing at me, I expected that, but let's just check out this deal, shall we? It occurred just now, only a few hours after my post:

Matchpoints, I am in second position at favorable vulnerability, and I hold:

KQ64 / AKQ5 / A4 / A85

After a pass by East I open 2C, and with opponents silent it goes:

2C 2D
2NT 3H
3S 5NT
??

5NT is described as "Quantitative invte to 7NT. 5S, 11-13 HCP."

Now what? After some thought I decide that even though 7NT is inadvisable because I am at the low end of my point range, 7S seems worth a try in light of my prime points and good spade fit. 7S is passed out, and on the opening lead of the CQ I see:

A8752
86
KJ8
K32

KQ64
AKQ5
A4
A85

Brilliant! 7NT would require a diamond finesse or some other piece of cleverness or good fortune, but I am going to claim 7S after simply drawing one round of trump, because even if trumps are 3-1 I can draw trumps, discard a low club from dummy on my third heart, and ruff dummy's third diamond in hand. Only a 4-0 trump split can beat it.

I win the opening lead in hand, congratulate myself once again on having made the right choice in a high-level bidding situation, and plunk down the SK, upon which robot West gives me the sickening familiar long pause that is, of course, the prelude to showing out. Down one.

Only a 9.6% chance, you say? Not around here!!

[bixby]

And hrothgar, thank you for suggesting that bet, but you're not getting the full point. The bias against 3-2 splits doesn't apply to all deals. It only kicks in when the human declarer is thinking, "ah, good, now all I need is a 3-2 split." Probably the system provides a bias in favor of 3-2 splits on other deals so that the statistics work out overall. It really is a diabolically clever bit of programming.

[johnu]

 bixby, on 2019-May-10, 19:41, said:

I win the opening lead in hand, congratulate myself once again on having made the right choice in a high-level bidding situation, and plunk down the SK, upon which robot West gives me the sickening familiar long pause that is, of course, the prelude to showing out. Down one.

That's never happened to me since I became an executive BBO Robot VIP member. All the bad splits are reserved for the non-VIP members so overall, the suit distributions for BBO are perfectly normal.

[hrothgar]

 bixby, on 2019-May-10, 20:28, said:

And hrothgar, thank you for suggesting that bet, but you're not getting the full point. The bias against 3-2 splits doesn't apply to all deals. It only kicks in when the human declarer is thinking, "ah, good, now all I need is a 3-2 split." Probably the system provides a bias in favor of 3-2 splits on other deals so that the statistics work out overall. It really is a diabolically clever bit of programming.

Quite the persecution complex you got there...