[Cthulhu D]

 mrdct, on 2012-June-25, 01:10, said:

I don't see why it should be up to me to carefully review my opponents' convention card to determine whether or not they are hiding some funny conventions for which I might want to prepare a defence. The whole idea of the pre-alerts section on the convention card and the pre-alerting process itself is to make sure attention is actively drawn to the unusual stuff at the start of the match. If there are no pre-alerts, I assume there is no unusual stuff in their system that I need to discuss with partner before we start.

Yes, it is ridiculous that the opponents are not punished for incorrectly filling out their convention card - they are in the same teams competition as you, and they should definitely know better. GordonTD's is the only solution that makes any sense imho.

[gnasher]

You can't discuss a defence once the auction has started (Law 73).

The opponents have broken the rules about disclosure; if you're damaged by this, the director should adjust the score (Law 40B4).

If the director determines that you conveyed UI by calling him, and the UI damaged the opponents, the director should (a) adjust the score in their favour under Law 16, then (b) adjust it back to the table result under Law 40B4 or Law 23.

It appears that the opponents have wilfully disobeyed the rules. This has inconvenienced the opponents and wasted everybody's time, and it may lead to a table result being replaced by an assigned adjusted score. That sounds like sufficient reason for a procedural penalty, regardless of what else the director does.

It also appears that the director either wilfully ignored the rules or didn't know what they were. I think you should tell his boss.

Nige1 said:

Uniform global rules with a standard system-card lay-out would remove problems of this nature..

How? The rules in use were perfectly clear. The problem was that the director didn't enforce them. The only solution to this type of problem is uniformly good directors.

Glen said:

Australia might want to align more with the WBF BS:

If they wanted to, I expect they would. I don't see any reason why they should, though.

[RMB1]

What Law or Regulation have the brown-sticker side broken? I have searched the VBA regulations and I can find no mention of brown sticker. As far as I can see, there is no requirement to attach brown stickers to the system card, and no special requirements on pre-alerting.

[But I wasn't looking at all the relevant documents, see below.]

This post has been edited by RMB1: 2012-June-25, 05:20

[Cascade]

 mrdct, on 2012-June-24, 23:00, said:

Suction was certainly on the WBF card that Bach-Cornell brought to the table, but I can't recall if it was on the front or in supplementary pages. The issue, however, was that the WBF card which had been prelodged on the championship website on which I based all of the player briefing notes on things they might need to prepare defences to was substantially different to the card they had at the table and my pairs had therefore not prepared a counter-defence to "suction" which, imho, caused some damage on one of the two hands in the match where it came up. It was interesting that nobody picked-up on the problem until early in the second round-robin, which probably says something about how closely lodged convention cards get scrutinised at that event; but when I'm NPC I always print-out two full sets of date-stamped convention cards as lodged and give those to my players before each match so they have a litle of extra time to confer on any funny stuff and don't need to do it in front of the opponents. If the opponents turn up at the table with a different convention card, as your teammates did, I don't have a lot of sympathy.

As it happens I just found the system cards that I downloaded from the 2011 APBF website at the time.

The Bach Cornell card has clear supplementary notes that include suction over short club openings. Suction though is not included on the card itself. In fact the only supplementary note was their suction defense.

[Cthulhu D]

 RMB1, on 2012-June-25, 02:04, said:

What Law or Regulation have the brown-sticker side broken? I have searched the VBA regulations and I can find no mention of brown sticker. As far as I can see, there is no requirement to attach brown stickers to the system card, and no special requirements on pre-alerting.

VBA says that the ABF regulations apply. The relevant rules are in the alert and system regs

A) Alert Regs: ABF alert regulations require that you draw attention to any unusual features of your system, such as unusual 2 level openings. The regs define 'unusal' as 'may require the opponents to prepare a defence'

B) ABF System regs: ABF system regulations require a brown sticker to be affixed, and that these openings should be noted on your card. The regs define brown sticker as 'may require the opponents to prepare a defence'

Unfortunately the regs never explictly link A & B which is dumb, but I seriously doubt attempting to claim that it's not required to alert it on the basis will fly.

[sfi]

 RMB1, on 2012-June-25, 02:04, said:

What Law or Regulation have the brown-sticker side broken? I have searched the VBA regulations and I can find no mention of brown sticker. As far as I can see, there is no requirement to attach brown stickers to the system card, and no special requirements on pre-alerting.

The regulation about pre-alerts. This is from the ABF Alert regulations:

Quote

3.1.2 This is the stage where you should draw the opponents’ attention to any unusual agreements you have which might surprise them, or to which they may need to arrange a defence. Examples: transfer preempts, unusual two level openings, canapé style bidding, very unusual doubles, unusual methods over the opponents’ 1NT or strong club openings, unusual cue bids of the opponents’ suit, etc. Pay particular attention to unusual self-alerting calls. These should appear on your system card, but should also be verbally pre-alerted.

[gnasher]

 RMB1, on 2012-June-25, 02:04, said:

What Law or Regulation have the brown-sticker side broken? I have searched the VBA regulations and I can find no mention of brown sticker. As far as I can see, there is no requirement to attach brown stickers to the system card, and no special requirements on pre-alerting.

The final sentence of paragraph 1.1 of the ABF System Regulations

Cthulhu D said:

The regs define brown sticker as 'may require the opponents to prepare a defence'

The regulations seem to be rather more specific than that. Part of the definition of a Brown-Sticker convention (paragraph 2.5) is "Any opening bid of two clubs through three spades that: could be weak and does not promise at least four cards in a known suit".

[gnasher]

 gnasher, on 2012-June-25, 05:08, said:

The final sentence of paragraph 1.1 of the ABF System Regulations

On reflection, I might be wrong about that. The VBA regulations say that the card should be an ABF card, system classifications are those of the ABF, and ABF Alerting Regulations apply. They don't actually say that ABF System Regulations apply. Is that intentional?

[sfi]

 gnasher, on 2012-June-25, 05:22, said:

On reflection, I might be wrong about that. The VBA regulations say that the card should be an ABF card, system classifications are those of the ABF, and ABF Alerting Regulations apply. They don't actually say that ABF System Regulations apply. Is that intentional?

Almost certainly not. I believe that the senior TD in Victoria also heads up the committee that writes the ABF system and alerting regulations, so that's likely to be an oversight if it doesn't say that (I couldn't find it in my 2 minute search before I gave up).

[Cthulhu D]

 gnasher, on 2012-June-25, 05:08, said:

The final sentence of paragraph 1.1 of the ABF System Regulations


The regulations seem to be rather more specific than that. Part of the definition of a Brown-Sticker convention (paragraph 2.5) is "Any opening bid of two clubs through three spades that: could be weak and does not promise at least four cards in a known suit".

Yeah there is a host of defintion - I was just getting at the question 'is it required to pre-alert brown sticker bids' and the part in common between the alert regulations and the system regulations is the may require a defence phrase.

[bluejak]

 mrdct, on 2012-June-24, 15:17, said:

As far as I can see, the regs don't deal with whether or not the TD should allow us to discuss a defense; so I was wondering if there was anything in the Laws that did.

Nothing in the Laws allows communication between partners during a hand for fairly obvious reasons.

 mrdct, on 2012-June-24, 15:17, said:

The reason I asked about the UI implications is that my RHO actually suggested at the end of the hand that my side may have used UI to get to our game as I apparently would only have called the TD if I had some values. I thought that was rubbish, and indeed a tad offensive, as if I had an absolute yarborough it probably would've been even more important to that clarify with partner how I'm going to distinguish between a weak hand and strong hand if partner doubles (e.g. would lebensohl still applied even though 2♠ is unanchored).

I believe you should have recalled the TD and told him what was said and told the TD that this remark was upsetting to you personally since it impugned your ethics. At this level I believe a DP should be automatic.

 glen, on 2012-June-24, 17:37, said:

Australia might want to align more with the WBF BS:

Why? There is no reason that the American approach is best, and the fact that the WBF have been persuaded to adopt the American approach is no reason why anywhere else should.

 mrdct, on 2012-June-25, 01:10, said:

I put this problem to one of Australia's top TDs who opined:

"I might let an unprepared pair confere if this came up in a 2 or 3-board Mitchell or Howell encounter. However in an environment involving longer matches, I would have expected any pair worth their salt to have already made themselves aware of the opponent's 2-level structure before they started the match and I would thus be much more reluctant, especially in respect to something as common as an RCO".

But you did, so the TD is wrong. It is not your responsibility to assume they have made a mistake in filling out their SC. You checked to see if there was a BS: there was not: thus you checked as far as you needed to about their Twos.

[mrdct]

 bluejak, on 2012-June-25, 13:01, said:

I believe you should have recalled the TD and told him what was said and told the TD that this remark was upsetting to you personally since it impugned your ethics. At this level I believe a DP should be automatic.

Trust me, I called the TD back within about 3 nanoseconds of RHO making his remark.

Unfortunately, however, the TD was mainly interested in getting everyone to shut-up and play-on and I foolishly conceded the high moral ground when I used an expletive towards my RHO; but I would claim I was under significant duress as if there is one thing that I can't tolerate, it's people questioning my ethics.

As it happens my partner was declaring the next hand in a partscore so with the permission of everyone at the table, I left the room to get some fresh air and make a cup of tea for myself as I was a litle bit flustered. When I returned, it appeared that RHO had misdefended and LHO then got stuck into me for my "antics" which apparently contributed to RHO's loss in concentration. So the TD was called back to the table, but he didn't do anything other than hover around the table as we played the next board in complete silence. Ironically, the 2♠ opening came up again on the next hand and we gained a big swing with them going a few more off than they needed to in a vulnerable misfit against our making partscore in the other room. Needless, to say, the remaining three boards of the match were played in icy conditions, but all pushes and we eventually won the match 21-0 and snuck into 2nd place.

[blackshoe]

 bluejak, on 2012-June-25, 13:01, said:

Why? There is no reason that the American approach is best, and the fact that the WBF have been persuaded to adopt the American approach is no reason why anywhere else should.

I don't understand this. AFAIK, the "American approach" to Brown Sticker conventions is to not use the term at all.

[mrdct]

---

Here's the actual hand. A ruling wasn't sought at the time as I was actually quite relieved to make 5♥ against the 5-0 trump break and thought there was a good chance they would be in 6♥ going down in the other room (as it happens they played in 4♥ in the other room). It seems, however, that 6NT is unbeatable with ♦ breaking 4-3 and even 6♥ could've made if I'd played for the 5-0 break initially.

So, hypothetically, if a ruling was sought on the hand would you consider adjusting to 6NT making or at least some percentage thereof?

[gnasher]

 mrdct, on 2012-June-26, 00:33, said:

So, hypothetically, if a ruling was sought on the hand would you consider adjusting to 6NT making or at least some percentage thereof?

Not on the basis of what you've told us so far. For you to get an adjusted score, there has to have been damage. The damage you're alleging is that with firm agreements you might have got to 6NT. So, tell us how you might have got there.

[mrdct]

 gnasher, on 2012-June-26, 01:03, said:

Not on the basis of what you've told us so far. For you to get an adjusted score, there has to have been damage. The damage you're alleging is that with firm agreements you might have got to 6NT. So, tell us how you might have got there.

On the actual auction at the table, west could've raised 5♥ to 6♥ and then east converts to 6NT to protect the ♣AQ knowing that all suits are double-stopped, a ♠ ruff in east's hand would be at serious risk of an overruff and with a 5-5 shape in north 6NT will probably have some extra chances. At the table, I didn't really know what partner meant by 3♠ (she later opined that she presumed we were in a GF auction and just wanted to see what I did next and thought it might be interpreted as a cue agreeing ♥) and when she converted 4♠ to 5♥ I just adopted the precautionary principle.

[gnasher]

 mrdct, on 2012-June-26, 01:33, said:

On the actual auction at the table, west could've raised 5♥ to 6♥ and then east converts to 6NT to protect the ♣AQ knowing that all suits are double-stopped, a ♠ ruff in east's hand would be at serious risk of an overruff and with a 5-5 shape in north 6NT will probably have some extra chances. At the table, I didn't really know what partner meant by 3♠ (she later opined that she presumed we were in a GF auction and just wanted to see what I did next and thought it might be interpreted as a cue agreeing ♥) and when she converted 4♠ to 5♥ I just adopted the precautionary principle.

If you'd known that 3♠ was a cue-bid for hearts, would you really have bid 4♠?

[mrdct]

 gnasher, on 2012-June-26, 01:48, said:

If you'd known that 3♠ was a cue-bid for hearts, would you really have bid 4♠?

I knew there was a possibility that 3♠ was intended as a cue agreeing ♥, so I felt that 4♠ was a bit of an each-way bet catering for partner actually having a ♠ suit or, if ♥ has been agreed, cueing my ♠K and denying 1st or 2nd control in both minors (admittedly a slight lie re ♦). Similar to my partner, I was waiting to see what she did next and when it wasn't 4NT (to which would've shown one keycard and been right whatever trumps were) or 5m, I chickened-out.

I think 6♥ was bid at about 10% of the tables in the field (all going down), but nobody bid 6NT. We were, however, in a potential position to take advantage of the extra information about north's hand and bid the superior 6NT but the murky agreementless auction made that just a little bit too hard for us. If bidding the slam would've put into 1st place and some extra prize money, I probably would've sought a ruling - but we finished 9 VPs behind 1st so it was all academic.

[gnasher]

 mrdct, on 2012-June-26, 02:26, said:

I knew there was a possibility that 3♠ was intended as a cue agreeing ♥, so I felt that 4♠ was a bit of an each-way bet catering for partner actually having a ♠ suit or, if ♥ has been agreed, cueing my ♠K and denying 1st or 2nd control in both minors (admittedly a slight lie re ♦). Similar to my partner, I was waiting to see what she did next and when it wasn't 4NT (to which would've shown one keycard and been right whatever trumps were) or 5m, I chickened-out.

You can't have it both ways. NS's infraction meant that you hadn't discussed what 3♠ meant, so you took a safety play by bidding 4♠ and then passing 5♥. Without NS's infraction, you would have discussed what 3♠ meant, so presumably you wouldn't have bid 4♠.

If you think you might have reached 6NT, give us a credible auction that you would have had with compete discussion.

[mrdct]

 gnasher, on 2012-June-26, 03:09, said:

You can't have it both ways. NS's infraction meant that you hadn't discussed what 3♠ meant, so you took a safety play by bidding 4♠ and then passing 5♥. Without NS's infraction, you would have discussed what 3♠ meant, so presumably you wouldn't have bid 4♠.

If you think you might have reached 6NT, give us a credible auction that you would have had with compete discussion.

With my regular expert partner, the auction probably would've gone as follows:

---

I freely admit, however, that in a pick-up partnership the only thing we probably would've discussed had we been pre-alerted was a range for the 2NT overcall and the applicability of lebensohl so we would only have got to slam if one of us took a bit more of an optomistic view. I'm confident, however, that my partner would've chosen 6NT over 6♥ knowing that at least three suits will be breaking badly.