[mr1303]

Is an agreement to operate disclosable?

In the context of being 30 or more down with 8 boards to play. In particular, if one partnership has agreed to play the straight pair and one pair to operate.

If so, (as I suspect) is this actually disclosed in reality?

[billw55]

Does "operate" mean psyche?

[gnasher]

I've never heard of anyone agreeing that only one pair is going to vary its style. Making any explicit agreement about it is rare, and there's rarely any need to tell the opponents - it's just assumed that the losing team will take whatever opportunities it can find to increase the variance.

Anyway all such agreements are part of the pair's system, and the consequences are disclosable when appropriate, ie in alerting, announcing or responding to questions.

If you have agreed to play down the middle in a situation where the opponents might expect the opposite, should you find a way to tell them? There's no obligation to, since you're simply continuing to play the methods on your card. But I would.

[ggwhiz]

I've been in the situation more often than I care to remember where we told the opps, naturally all explanations of our bids come with a question mark.

I always thought that was just a courtesy since the opps nodded and waved like, yeah we know and a few times reciprocated (after they buried us even more) in a way that we all had some great laughs on the way to the bar.

Making that disclosure mandatory would inhibit my entertainment factor on the way to being crushed.

[nige1]

mr1303, on 2013-April-03, 04:00, said:

Is an agreement to operate disclosable? In the context of being 30 or more down with 8 boards to play. In particular, if one partnership has agreed to play the straight pair and one pair to operate. If so, (as I suspect) is this actually disclosed in reality?

I've heard losing teams discuss this e.g. one pair overbid and the other overbid, hoping the cards favour one direction. I've also played against teams where one pair increases its "psych" rate when losing.

IMO such a strategy must be disclosed. This creates potential problems: When informed of the losing team's strategy, the opposing pair may want to go back to formulate a counter-strategy with team-mates. And then the losing team may want to readjust their strategy. And so on. Hence, perhaps, the law should outlaw explicit agreements of this nature.

[barmar]

I was operating Vugraph for one of the Fleisher-Van Prooijen tables in the Vanderbilt semi-final last month. Fleisher was down about 90 going into the last 16 boards, and all the players were joking about how all bets were off about what bids Zia and Martel's bids meant. After a few more disasters for Fleisher, I think they all knew they were just playing for fun (if it were earlier in the event they might have withdrawn after Q3). No disclosure was necessary.

But these are all highly experienced players, who know when it's appropriate to operate and don't need to be warned. In a club or sectional, many players are less knowledgeable and need more things spelled out for them.

[billw55]

barmar, on 2013-April-04, 07:45, said:

I was operating Vugraph for one of the Fleisher-Van Prooijen tables in the Vanderbilt semi-final last month. Fleisher was down about 90 going into the last 16 boards, and all the players were joking about how all bets were off about what bids Zia and Martel's bids meant. After a few more disasters for Fleisher, I think they all knew they were just playing for fun (if it were earlier in the event they might have withdrawn after Q3). No disclosure was necessary.

But these are all highly experienced players, who know when it's appropriate to operate and don't need to be warned. In a club or sectional, many players are less knowledgeable and need more things spelled out for them.

I guess none of them are worried about potential CPUs. If this sort of "operating" is so common, I would think the partnership becomes aware of what is going on, which means ... well, nobody seems to mind, so no need to go down that road.

[mycroft]

if it's Zia, or Meckwell, or (obviously a few other pairs, but I can't think of them right now), it's not *Concealed* PU - there are people who have never played out of their club that know who the operating pair is going to be :-)

[nige1]

mycroft, on 2013-April-04, 10:16, said:

if it's Zia, or Meckwell, or (obviously a few other pairs, but I can't think of them right now), it's not *Concealed* PU - there are people who have never played out of their club that know who the operating pair is going to be :-)

We've had this argument before. It's not just the rate of psyching -- It's the kind of "psychs" or "deviations" or "tactical bids" or "treatments" that a player favours. (third-in-hand openers, notrump openers and overcalls, weak twos, replies when RHO doubles, 3N replies, cue-bids, trial bids, or whatever). Frequent psychers seem to have preferences.

IMO, its a CPU not a psych If your long-term partner is better at predicting the type and pattern of your aberrant behaviour than your occasional opponent.

[mycroft]

I was answering the question of whether "an agreement that this pair will be the operating pair" is a disclosable CPU (I guess a CTU in this case). In some cases, it's not concealed because anyone who's ever been in the bar after a duplicate game knows the answer to the question - it's GBK (of a rather odd sort).

As to "what kinds of operating will they do", certainly there are issues with that as well, but if you're ever up 60 to NICKELL with one set to play, I'm guessing that's something you've spent time researching, too.

In lower cases, sure, there are issues. But this one time we were down 45 at the half, and I was operating, and my partner (who I'd played against a couple of times, but this was the first event I'd played with him, and it was a morning KO this night owl was TDing the other two sessions of) was operating. And we could catch each other. I would assume in that case that anyone in my flight could also.

[FrancesHinden]

nige1, on 2013-April-05, 01:27, said:

We've had this argument before. It's not just the rate of psyching -- It's the kind of "psychs" or "deviations" or "tactical bids" or "treatments" that a player favours. (third-in-hand openers, notrump openers and overcalls, weak twos, replies when RHO doubles, 3N replies, cue-bids, trial bids, or whatever). Frequent psychers seem to have preferences.

IMO, its a CPU not a psych If your long-term partner is better at predicting the type and pattern of your aberrant behaviour than your occasional opponent.

Very good players in this position have 'preferences' about their psyches in the same way that they have 'preferences' about how to play Ax opposite Q1098x. Some actions are simply more likely to work than others.
(Sometimes which psyches are likely to work depend on the opponents' methods)

[nige1]

mycroft, on 2013-April-05, 09:53, said:

I was answering the question of whether "an agreement that this pair will be the operating pair" is a disclosable CPU (I guess a CTU in this case). In some cases, it's not concealed because anyone who's ever been in the bar after a duplicate game knows the answer to the question - it's GBK (of a rather odd sort). As to "what kinds of operating will they do", certainly there are issues with that as well, but if you're ever up 60 to NICKELL with one set to play, I'm guessing that's something you've spent time researching, too. In lower cases, sure, there are issues. But this one time we were down 45 at the half, and I was operating, and my partner (who I'd played against a couple of times, but this was the first event I'd played with him, and it was a morning KO this night owl was TDing the other two sessions of) was operating. And we could catch each other. I would assume in that case that anyone in my flight could also.

FrancesHinden, on 2013-April-05, 15:01, said:

Very good players in this position have 'preferences' about their psyches in the same way that they have 'preferences' about how to play Ax opposite Q1098x. Some actions are simply more likely to work than others. (Sometimes which psyches are likely to work depend on the opponents' methods)

The question I addressed was about agreements to "operate" , especially team agreements, which I believe must be against the law (whether implicit or explicit) The analogy with playing suit combinations seems stretched. There is a fair consensus about optimum play of a suit-combination in a given context. (Although I accept that an anti-percentage line might be selected, in the hope of swing). Even for normal bidding, however, judgement seems less cut and dried -- or there would be fewer arguments about Weak/strong 1N, or Multi/Flannery/weak 2♦/Ekren. Also bidding panels would more often be unanimous. I guess that preferred psyching patterns are even more a matter of judgement. But I confess I've played with few habitual psychers. Anyway, thank you Mycroft and Frances: food for thought

[blackshoe]

Strangely enough, the laws speak of partnership understandings. They don't say a thing about team understandings.

[mycroft]

Which is in fact odd, because the contestant is the team, not the partnership. I'm guessing, however, that this is "corner case not thought of as important enough to deal with", not "case we choose to not regulate". Yes, I know the legal argument against that; but do you want the Laws of Duplicate Contract Bridge, or do you want the Advanced Squad Leader Rulebook?

[WellSpyder]

blackshoe, on 2013-April-09, 19:24, said:

Strangely enough, the laws speak of partnership understandings. They don't say a thing about team understandings.

But I think team understandings will generally be a special case of partnership understandings - ones that are also shared with your other pair. So they will already be covered by the laws on partnership understandings.

[blackshoe]

mycroft, on 2013-April-10, 09:25, said:

Which is in fact odd, because the contestant is the team, not the partnership. I'm guessing, however, that this is "corner case not thought of as important enough to deal with", not "case we choose to not regulate". Yes, I know the legal argument against that; but do you want the Laws of Duplicate Contract Bridge, or do you want the Advanced Squad Leader Rulebook?

Doesn't matter what I want.

WellSpyder, on 2013-April-10, 09:32, said:

But I think team understandings will generally be a special case of partnership understandings - ones that are also shared with your other pair. So they will already be covered by the laws on partnership understandings.

Interesting approach. As stated, I cannot buy it, but if you can come up with a valid legal argument that such team understandings fall under Law 40, I might. Also, I suspect such team understandings are regulable under Law 80B2(f) if not under Law 40 directly. But absent such a regulation, the law is, imo, mute on the subject.

[Mbodell]

mycroft, on 2013-April-10, 09:25, said:

Which is in fact odd, because the contestant is the team, not the partnership. I'm guessing, however, that this is "corner case not thought of as important enough to deal with", not "case we choose to not regulate". Yes, I know the legal argument against that; but do you want the Laws of Duplicate Contract Bridge, or do you want the Advanced Squad Leader Rulebook?

It's been discussed before, but while not that common, there are times when it would be very relevant to the play (or bidding) to know aspects of the opponent's team mate's system like strong club or not, weak nt or strong nt, etc. where you might need that information to semi-accurately predict what will have passed at the other table.

[blackshoe]

And which law requires the opponents to disclose this information?

[nige1]

mycroft, on 2013-April-10, 09:25, said:

Which is in fact odd, because the contestant is the team, not the partnership. I'm guessing, however, that this is "corner case not thought of as important enough to deal with", not "case we choose to not regulate". Yes, I know the legal argument against that; but do you want the Laws of Duplicate Contract Bridge, or do you want the Advanced Squad Leader Rulebook?

TFLB L40A1 said:

PARTNERSHIP UNDERSTANDINGS. Players' Systemic Agreements.
a. Partnership understandings as to the methods adopted by a partnership may be reached explicitly in discussion or implicitly through mutual experience or awareness of the players.
b. Each partnership has a duty to make available its partnership understandings to opponents before commencing play against them. The Regulating Authority specifies the manner in which this shall be done.

TFLB definitions said:

Contestant in an individual event, a player; in a pair event, two players playing as partners throughout the event; in a team event, four or more players playing as team-mates.
Opponent player of the other side; a member of the partnership to which one is opposed.

Arguably, the law does cover team "operating agreements" in a sensible way: As mycroft points out, in a team-event, the contestant is a team. Plausibly, in a team-event, a player's opponents are the players of the other side and the other side is a team. Then, unless local regulations specified otherwise, each pair might be obliged to disclose its systemic agreements to the whole opposing team before starting play. Unfortunately that line of reasoning fails because

TFLB Definitions said:

Side two players at a table who constitute a partnership against the other two players

I fear Blackshoe is right.

[aguahombre]

We either are or are not required to disclose an agreement to "operate" as a partnership --or that one of us (two) might screw around while the other has agreed not to. I think we are so obligated under the laws pertaining to partnership agreements.

One such agreement might be to be the pair who plays it straight while the pair at the other table becomes the wild card; another agreement might be just the reverse. These are partnership agreements. They seem to be covered under the laws. The fact that our teammates know the agreement is part of our partnership agreement. We don't need a special law addressing "team agreements".