[akwoo]

Tramticket, on 2020-December-02, 01:58, said:

I am prepared to accept these numbers. But ...

I suggest that they ought to lose more than 5. But they never seem to end in the ridiculous contract because their partner always seems to have a justification not to bid 4M, despite holding a five-card suit. They might be "life novices", but they do know what type of hand partner will hold and bid on that assumption. Is it unreasonable that we should also know?

Most of their two gains will occur when they don't win the auction, declarer makes a plan based on the likely suit distribution. The plan would be different if properly informed.

At least 3 of the 5 they lose is when partner does NOT bid 4M when it makes.

Yeah sometimes you get fixed by poor disclosure when you play against people who don't know what they're doing. You gain more because they don't know what they're doing. It's part of bad players randomizing games.

The alternative is to make it against the rules to be bad at bridge, which drives people out of the game. Maybe you're lucky to be in a place with enough good players that you actually can still have a game after driving out all the bad players, but I'm not, and I'd like to have face-to-face games again when conditions permit.

[helene_t]

Tramticket, on 2020-December-02, 02:03, said:

But the strange thing is that they are playing by the EBU rules and they can (and do) continue to do this in external competitions. A course in rules and ethics will be ineffective if the rules are poorly drafted.

Oh but I don't propose a course in some idosyncratic club rules. The EBU rules are well written and players who want to play external need to know them.

I'm not sure what I would do at club evenings. Maybe "in principle" follow EBU rules and just not enforce them too strictly? It's not ideal but you can't penalize people for lack of alerts if alert rules are broken all the time. So I would focus on the most important, simple and obvious alert rules like artificial 2-openings and NT defences.

People don't alert negative freebids either but often they don't really play negative freebids, they just don't know if a freebid is forcing or not. And I wouldn't go into a discussion of whether non-agreements can be alertable.

[Tramticket]

helene_t, on 2020-December-02, 02:47, said:

The EBU rules are well written and players who want to play external need to know them.

In most areas, I would agree with you that the EBU rules are well written.


But compare the previous Blue Book:

Quote

BB3D2
If a partnership agrees to make take-out doubles of suit bids on almost all hands with opening bid values (not just on hands that are shot in the opponent's suit or have substantial extra values) , this should be disclosed on the system card. Similarly the practice of doubling for take-out on unusually weak hands should be marked on the system card.

BB3H3
A take-out double suggests that the doubler wishes to compete, and invites partner to describe his hand. Take-out doubles are frequently based on shortage in the suit doubled and preparedness to play in the other unbid suits, failing which significant extra values may be expected. Partner is expected to take-out, though a pass may be made on a hand very suitable for defence in the context of what he can be expected to hold for his actions (if any) to date.

with the current wording:

Quote

BB3D2
If a partnership agrees to make take-out doubles of suit bids on almost all hands with opening bid values including length in opener’s suit, this should be disclosed on the system card. Similarly the practice of doubling for take-out on unusually weak hands should be marked on the front of the system card.

BB3H3
A take-out double suggests that the doubler wishes to compete, and invites partner to describe his hand. Partner is expected to bid, though a pass may be made on a hand very suitable for defence in the context of the level of bid doubled and what he can be expected to hold for his actions (if any) to date.

[AL78]

TylerE, on 2020-December-01, 21:52, said:

The problem here isn't the whacky double.

It's East taking *3* free bids on a ratty 4 count.

He is a gambler by nature.

[AL78]

akwoo, on 2020-December-02, 02:27, said:

The alternative is to make it against the rules to be bad at bridge, which drives people out of the game.

It wouldn't just drive people out of the game, it would kill the game, because it would effectively make it against the rules to be a beginner, then how do people learn the game?

[barmar]

Where does this end?

I also find it frustrating when opponents make 2-level vulnerable overcalls with 9-10 counts (sometimes even less) and I end up declaring. I play them for most of the side strength because they "have to have" those cards for their bid.

But I don't think we need to require "aggressive" overcalls to be alerted. However, maybe Lawrence needs to revise "How To Read Your Opponents' Cards" to accomodate the more free-wheeling style of modern bidding.

[Tramticket]

barmar, on 2020-December-06, 12:06, said:

I don't think we need to require "aggressive" overcalls to be alerted.

I agree, if only because an "aggressive" overcall is nevertheless a natural bid. The term natural bid is well defined by the EBU.

But a take-out double is the bid defined by the EBU as the bid not requiring an alert - akin to a natural bid. Unfortunately, the definition of a take-out double is so fuzzy that any alert, or lack of alert carries no useful information.

[blackshoe]

The only information an alert should carry is "you may want to ask what this call means". The only information a non-alert should carry is "you probably don't need to worry about what this call means".

[Vampyr]

blackshoe, on 2020-December-06, 23:45, said:

The only information an alert should carry is "you may want to ask what this call means". The only information a non-alert should carry is "you probably don't need to worry about what this call means".

Not really. The important point is that a call must have at most one non-alertable (or announceable) meaning

[nige1]

blackshoe, on 2020-December-06, 23:45, said:

The only information an alert should carry is "you may want to ask what this call means". The only information a non-alert should carry is "you probably don't need to worry about what this call means".

• Manifestly, Blackshoe would write better rules than the WBF, ACBL, and EBU.
• Even better, IMO, the rules should mandate that you announce the meaning of all partner's calls, without prompting.
• Failing that you should alert all calls about which you have an understanding that opponents might not expect. Although that risks players rationalizing their obscure systems as "General Bridge Knowledge".
• The only effect of local regulation (especially system-regulation) is to encourage each jurisdiction to erect its own idiosyncratic,, sophisticated, Heath Robinson tower of Babel.

[blackshoe]

blackshoe, on 2020-December-06, 23:45, said:

The only information an alert should carry is "you may want to ask what this call means". The only information a non-alert should carry is "you probably don't need to worry about what this call means".

Vampyr, on 2020-December-07, 04:41, said:

Not really. The important point is that a call must have at most one non-alertable (or announceable) meaning

Yes, really. It is not the intention of the alert procedure to tell you what a bid means.

[mycroft]

That depends on what "meaning" means.

Currently, in the ACBL, 1♠-3♠ is not Alertable provided it isn't pre-emptive. Want to know what strength? Ask. (1♦)-2♦ is not Alertable effectively provided it doesn't show diamonds (could be any specific two-suiter, strong takeout, unspecified strong bid,...) 1♠-X-3♣ is not Alertable as long as it shows (only) clubs, no matter what the strength of the hand. 1NT-2♣ is not Alertable provided opener is going to talk about his major holding next - whether it's "inv+" as in EHAA, or "could be the start of an invitation in a minor" in old-fashioned 2/1, or "could be the only way to invite in NT", or "could contain 11 and a 5 or 6-card major" in 2-way, or "absolutely promises at least 1 4cM".

In the EBU, non-Alerted doubles frequently could mean "anything" or, later in the auction, anything.

And while some of this is wrong (and in the ACBL in the process of being corrected, while opening up new ambiguities), bridge is too wonderful a game to be able to assume that if it's not Alerted (or Alerted), you know what it means. "you probably do/don't need to ask to know" seems closer to a goal than anything else.

[Tramticket]

blackshoe, on 2020-December-06, 23:45, said:

The only information an alert should carry is "you may want to ask what this call means". The only information a non-alert should carry is "you probably don't need to worry about what this call means".

I agree that an alert says that you might want to ask what this call means. Unfortunately if the unalerted bid - the "default condition" - is ill defined, you are left with no better knowledge than when the call is unalerted. So a lack of alert also says "you may want to ask what this call means". In other words, we are no better informed, whether there is an alert or no alert.

There are some jurisdictions (e.g. Scotland), where there is no requirement to alert any double. This would be preferable to the EBU position since at least it is clear to everyone that we have no information and need to ask.

Things are worse than this though. Because similar wording is used when defining what to write on a system card, you will not even find out anything meaningful when you consult the system card.

[LBengtsson]

Its crazy X. Partner has passed, partner has passed, partner has passed! Bid the SEVEN card ♣ suit.

[avonw]

johnu, on 2020-December-02, 01:21, said:

As Avon Wilsmore noted in his book The Case Against the Blue Team, those offshape doubles worked much better when partner knows the doubler's shape.

To be fair to the Blue Team players, my opinion is that, early on in the bidding, they just knew about partner's range and shortages.

I also noted that off-shape doubles ceased once the screens went up.

AW