[friday999]

When playing in casual how long are you allowed to take thinking during
bidding before something takes over and bids for you? there is no warning. Is there a way to stop this happening?

[pilowsky]

Well, that depends. If you start the table, you can think for as long as you like. people will come and go and probably complain that you are slow, perhaps say mean things but the table is yours and you can stay as long as you want. I would not recommend thinking for longer than about 15-30 seconds at the most on a casual table that you are visiting. Longer than this and people will start to think you are having connection problems and are likely to throw you off. This is especially true in the Competitive area. Remember, people may be grabbing a quick game on their phone or at lunch and do not want to mess about. BBO is quite different from the Club.
If you like to play slowly the best thing to do is get three friends and set up a table together. then you can take as long as you want.
Another possibility is to kibbitz other games for a while to get a feel for the pace of play.
If you really want to take your time you can join the Prime Club and play against 3 robots. They are very patient, never complain and you can take as long as you want. Great practice. But you do have to pay after the first month.
There are other options.

[friday999]

 pilowsky, on 2020-June-21, 06:54, said:

Well, that depends. If you start the table, you can think for as long as you like. people will come and go and probably complain that you are slow, perhaps say mean things but the table is yours and you can stay as long as you want. I would not recommend thinking for longer than about 15-30 seconds at the most on a casual table that you are visiting. Longer than this and people will start to think you are having connection problems and are likely to throw you off. This is especially true in the Competitive area. Remember, people may be grabbing a quick game on their phone or at lunch and do not want to mess about. BBO is quite different from the Club.
If you like to play slowly the best thing to do is get three friends and set up a table together. then you can take as long as you want.
Another possibility is to kibbitz other games for a while to get a feel for the pace of play.
If you really want to take your time you can join the Prime Club and play against 3 robots. They are very patient, never complain and you can take as long as you want. Great practice. But you do have to pay after the first month.
There are other options.

thanks pilowsky for taking the time to reply. I was playing with 3 friends who had been attending a bridge class before lockdown and we all wanted to take our time but on one occasion a robot took over and made the bid. This has happened to a few other ex students I know who just want a friendly game with no time pressure. You say "if you start the table you can think for as long as you like ". Can that person do something to extend that option to the rest of the table?

[pilowsky]

Yes you can, a regular post writer who is a much better player than me called paul gipson alias paulg has made a video all about it https://www.youtube....h?v=pdSpzQD2xNs
you can find this and other similar useful info by googling "how to set up a table on bbo"

[friday999]

 pilowsky, on 2020-June-21, 16:23, said:

Yes you can, a regular post writer who is a much better player than me called paul gipson alias paulg has made a video all about it https://www.youtube....h?v=pdSpzQD2xNs
you can find this and other similar useful info by googling "how to set up a table on bbo"

Thanks Pilowsky.

[gbb483]

The other problem is that BBO has a few bugs, one of which is that it thinks you've gone away when you haven't. I was once replaced by a robot whilst I was dummy! I believe there is continual 'handshaking' going on behind the scenes between your device and the BBO server, and when that fails (which could be just a few seconds) the server decides you've absconded. I have yet to determine exactly where the hiccup is occuring, but if I use my WiFi and the landline connection I have problems; if I use my mobile 3G connection (on a SIM enabled tablet) I don't have problems.

P.S. If you really do take a long while to bid, the system will flash up a warning messgae (so I've been told), before removing you. If you aren't seeing those messages, then it is probably the client/server handshaking (i.e. lack thereof) which is biting you.

[friday999]

 gbb483, on 2020-June-23, 13:42, said:

The other problem is that BBO has a few bugs, one of which is that it thinks you've gone away when you haven't. I was once replaced by a robot whilst I was dummy! I believe there is continual 'handshaking' going on behind the scenes between your device and the BBO server, and when that fails (which could be just a few seconds) the server decides you've absconded. I have yet to determine exactly where the hiccup is occuring, but if I use my WiFi and the landline connection I have problems; if I use my mobile 3G connection (on a SIM enabled tablet) I don't have problems.

P.S. If you really do take a long while to bid, the system will flash up a warning messgae (so I've been told), before removing you. If you aren't seeing those messages, then it is probably the client/server handshaking (i.e. lack thereof) which is biting you.

Thanks gbb483

[pescetom]

 gbb483, on 2020-June-23, 13:42, said:

The other problem is that BBO has a few bugs, one of which is that it thinks you've gone away when you haven't. I was once replaced by a robot whilst I was dummy! I believe there is continual 'handshaking' going on behind the scenes between your device and the BBO server, and when that fails (which could be just a few seconds) the server decides you've absconded. I have yet to determine exactly where the hiccup is occuring, but if I use my WiFi and the landline connection I have problems; if I use my mobile 3G connection (on a SIM enabled tablet) I don't.

Barmar affirmed recently here that such handshaking takes place, but my impression is that if this is so it is at least partly broken in the Android client - that client will quickly log you out if wifi disappears, but it will time out on server without warning you if you look at history for too long.

[gbb483]

 gbb483, on 2020-June-23, 13:42, said:

. . ., but if I use my WiFi and the landline connection I have problems; i. . .

Well its not the WiFi - if I have a wired connection to the landline router I still have problems - so its related to my ISP.