From swillner at nhcc.net Mon Aug 1 03:29:44 2011 From: swillner at nhcc.net (Steve Willner) Date: Sun, 31 Jul 2011 21:29:44 -0400 Subject: [BLML] let her withdraw her card? In-Reply-To: <000001cc4e89$f6c3e0a0$e44ba1e0$@online.no> References: <000d01cc4d68$8f314490$ad93cdb0$@online.no> <4E32141B.4060104@nhcc.net> <000001cc4db7$7c32ce00$74986a00$@online.no> <4E335B18.8060701@nhcc.net> <000001cc4e89$f6c3e0a0$e44ba1e0$@online.no> Message-ID: <4E360188.70508@nhcc.net> On 7/30/2011 3:26 AM, Sven Pran wrote: > "could have known" Odd. To me that phrase specifically rejects any suggestion that intent is required. From agot at ulb.ac.be Mon Aug 1 12:49:20 2011 From: agot at ulb.ac.be (Alain Gottcheiner) Date: Mon, 01 Aug 2011 12:49:20 +0200 Subject: [BLML] let her withdraw her card? In-Reply-To: <4E360188.70508@nhcc.net> References: <000d01cc4d68$8f314490$ad93cdb0$@online.no> <4E32141B.4060104@nhcc.net> <000001cc4db7$7c32ce00$74986a00$@online.no> <4E335B18.8060701@nhcc.net> <000001cc4e89$f6c3e0a0$e44ba1e0$@online.no> <4E360188.70508@nhcc.net> Message-ID: <4E3684B0.8000908@ulb.ac.be> Le 1/08/2011 3:29, Steve Willner a ?crit : > On 7/30/2011 3:26 AM, Sven Pran wrote: >> "could have known" > Odd. To me that phrase specifically rejects any suggestion that intent > is required. AG : indeed. That's why intent is NOT required ;-) From koen.grauwels at oracle.com Mon Aug 1 12:48:38 2011 From: koen.grauwels at oracle.com (koen.grauwels at oracle.com) Date: Mon, 1 Aug 2011 03:48:38 -0700 (PDT) Subject: [BLML] Auto Reply: Re: let her withdraw her card? Message-ID: <2d26de7a-6a7a-4620-b90e-8618ed16decf@default> Hello, Thank you for your mail. I'm on Holiday until 31-Aug-11 and will be unable to respond to your mail before that date. Regards, Koen From koen.grauwels at oracle.com Mon Aug 1 12:49:13 2011 From: koen.grauwels at oracle.com (koen.grauwels at oracle.com) Date: Mon, 1 Aug 2011 03:49:13 -0700 (PDT) Subject: [BLML] Auto Reply: Auto Reply: Re: let her withdraw her card? Message-ID: <407addad-9fd9-4749-9313-d5b827f0092a@default> Hello, Thank you for your mail. I'm on Holiday until 31-Aug-11 and will be unable to respond to your mail before that date. Regards, Koen From mikeamostd at btinternet.com Mon Aug 1 14:19:39 2011 From: mikeamostd at btinternet.com (Mike Amos) Date: Mon, 1 Aug 2011 13:19:39 +0100 Subject: [BLML] let her withdraw her card? In-Reply-To: <4E360188.70508@nhcc.net> References: <000d01cc4d68$8f314490$ad93cdb0$@online.no> <4E32141B.4060104@nhcc.net> <000001cc4db7$7c32ce00$74986a00$@online.no> <4E335B18.8060701@nhcc.net><000001cc4e89$f6c3e0a0$e44ba1e0$@online.no> <4E360188.70508@nhcc.net> Message-ID: <37774FFDF6B44F909CBDBEC41244B6D0@mikePC> -----Original Message----- From: Steve Willner Sent: Monday, August 01, 2011 2:29 AM To: Bridge Laws Mailing List Subject: Re: [BLML] let her withdraw her card? On 7/30/2011 3:26 AM, Sven Pran wrote: > "could have known" Odd. To me that phrase specifically rejects any suggestion that intent is required. _______________________________________________ Blml mailing list Blml at rtflb.org http://lists.rtflb.org/mailman/listinfo/blml And for me too - I've always understood that this was precisely the Lawmakers intention - ie that Law 23 specifically excludes intent from the TDs deliberation in these matters Mike Amos From koen.grauwels at oracle.com Mon Aug 1 14:19:58 2011 From: koen.grauwels at oracle.com (koen.grauwels at oracle.com) Date: Mon, 1 Aug 2011 05:19:58 -0700 (PDT) Subject: [BLML] Auto Reply: Re: let her withdraw her card? Message-ID: <22775040-d1c4-4390-a5f8-84fed4825281@default> Hello, Thank you for your mail. I'm on Holiday until 31-Aug-11 and will be unable to respond to your mail before that date. Regards, Koen From ehaa at starpower.net Mon Aug 1 16:20:39 2011 From: ehaa at starpower.net (Eric Landau) Date: Mon, 1 Aug 2011 10:20:39 -0400 Subject: [BLML] Belconnen Bowl 2011 In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <219D737D-F8ED-44A8-BAB5-5CF85D588654@starpower.net> On Jul 20, 2011, at 9:13 PM, richard.hills at immi.gov.au wrote: > WBF Laws Committee minutes, 10th October 2008 > > 20F1 defines the manner in which, during the auction and play, a > player may request and receive an explanation of the opponents? > prior auction. At this time he is entitled to an explanation only > of calls actually made, relevant available alternative calls not > made, and any partnership understanding as to inferences from the > choice of action among the foregoing. (An "alternative" call is not > the same call with another meaning ? for example, if the reply to > an opponent is that "5D shows diamonds preference", any reply to a > further question "what would it mean if 4NT were Blackwood ?" is > given ***voluntarily*** and not as a requirement of Law 20F1.) > > Richard Hills (initial statement) > > To me it is obvious that 3S "absent the double" is "the same call > with another meaning", hence while the opponents could ask, any > answer by me would be voluntary (as indeed my full and free > disclosure at the table was voluntary). > > WEST......NORTH.....EAST......SOUTH > Nixon(1)..Hills(2)..Waters(3).Ali(4) > ---.......1C (5)....Pass......1H (6) > Pass......1S (7)....Pass......1NT(8) > Pass......2C (7)....Pass......2D (9) > Pass......2H (7)....Pass......2NT(10) > Pass......3C (7)....X (11)....3S (12) > Pass......6S........Pass......Pass > Pass > > (1) Roy Nixon is the non-playing captain of the ACT Open Team. > (2) Richard Hills is a non-captaining player of the ACT Open Team. > (3) Bernie Waters is Roy's regular partner. > (4) Hashmat Ali is Richard's regular victim (brainwashed into > playing the Symmetric Relay system, notes emailed on request). > (5) 15+ hcp, any shape > (6) 8+ hcp, 2+ controls (A = 2, K = 1), 4+ hearts > (7) relay, asking partner to describe his hand further > (8) and 4+ spades > (9) and 4+ unspecified minor > (10) 4=4=4=1 shape > (11) Bernie attempted a joke as he doubled, "I am sick of passing". > Unfortunately, this joke caused Hashmat to assume that Bernie had > indeed passed, so Hashmat did not bother glancing to his right to > observe Bernie's actual bidding box card. > (12) 3S would have been the correct call if Bernie had passed, > showing 4 controls. But once Bernie doubled 3S systemically showed > 6 controls (due to the extra step responses of Pass and Redouble). > > Richard Hills (clarifying statement) > > Consistent with Law 20F1 would be the opponents asking, "On the > auction up to the point where Hashmat bid 3S, what would Hashmat > selecting 4C instead have systemically shown?" To which, in > accordance with Law 20F1, I would have replied, "A hypothetical 4C > instead of the actual 3S would have promised 8 controls instead of > the actually promised 6 controls." > > But asking "What would 3S have shown on this auction if this > auction was not this auction, for example if East had passed > throughout, or for example if North had opened the bidding with > 1D?" is a question not in accordance with Law 20F1. > We've been here before. The obligations related to specific questions set forth in L20F1 are far more specific than those of L40A1 (b), which requires prior disclosure in full of all of the opponents' understandings in the manner specified by the RA; this would, of course, include the answer to the question in Richard's last paragraph. L40A1(b) does *not* permit the RA to relieve partnerships of this obligation, but merely gives them scope to specify the *manner* in which "this shall be done". By not providing for complete full disclosure "before commencing play", as required by L40A1(b), the only way L40A1(b) can be satisfied is by presuming that this implicitly establishes deferring specific details of this required disclosure until such time as the opponents feel the need for the information as "the manner in which this shall be done". IOW, I would argue that absent a procedure by which one supplies one's opponents with the answers to every possible such questions "before commencing play against them" (which would be patently impractical), the scope of the questions they are permitted to ask is set by L40A1(b), not by L20F1. The result of this approach, for whatever it's worth, is full disclosure as Edgar Kaplan envisioned it when he created the concept. Eric Landau 1107 Dale Drive Silver Spring MD 20910 ehaa at starpower.net From koen.grauwels at oracle.com Mon Aug 1 16:21:07 2011 From: koen.grauwels at oracle.com (koen.grauwels at oracle.com) Date: Mon, 1 Aug 2011 07:21:07 -0700 (PDT) Subject: [BLML] Auto Reply: Re: Belconnen Bowl 2011 Message-ID: Hello, Thank you for your mail. I'm on Holiday until 31-Aug-11 and will be unable to respond to your mail before that date. Regards, Koen From rfrick at rfrick.info Thu Aug 4 02:45:07 2011 From: rfrick at rfrick.info (Robert Frick) Date: Wed, 03 Aug 2011 20:45:07 -0400 Subject: [BLML] let her withdraw her card? In-Reply-To: <4E335B18.8060701@nhcc.net> References: <000d01cc4d68$8f314490$ad93cdb0$@online.no> <4E32141B.4060104@nhcc.net> <000001cc4db7$7c32ce00$74986a00$@online.no> <4E335B18.8060701@nhcc.net> Message-ID: I asked the ACBL about both hands. The answer, from a tournament director (for the second hand -- declarer calls for the 4 of spades from dummy, which doesn't exist, and defender follows suit with a spad) followed Sven: "...the player played their card before the card was played by Dummy. Per Law 46B4, declarer designated a card that was not in Dummy, so the call was void. Therefore, no card has been played from Dummy, as defined by Law 45B. This makes the Six of Spades a lead out of turn, which can be accepted by the declarer, or it becomes a major penalty card." This answer, methinks, cannot be correct. Note that this ruling above applies even if declarer intentionally called for the wrong card. Is it an infraction to call for a nonexistent card? If the law was something like "declarer plays a card from dummy by naming the suit and rank of a card from dummy", then the call for a nonexistant card could be fairly easily categorized as an irregularity (and hence infraction). The law actually doesn't say this, instead you get "When calling a card to be played from dummy, declarer should clearly state both the suit and the rank of the desired card". So it's a lot harder to call it an infraction, especially since L46B4 mentions the call of a nonexistent card as if it is a part of the procedures of the game. But we cannot say allow players to call for cards from dummy that do not exist and then profit from this. Especially if this is intentional, but even if it is not. For example, I call for the two of spades from dummy, intending to draw trumps. My RHO shows out, pitching a diamond and revealing a Q10xx offsides. I don't have the two of spades in dummy. I decide not to draw trumps. I cross to hand, take the now safe diamond finesse which otherwise would have won, then execute a trump end play. To make this work on purpose, I need my partner to stay quiet and not play a card from dummy when I call for a nonexistent card. But that is proper behavior, right? To invoke L23, the improper call has to be an irregularity (and hence an infraction). From koen.grauwels at oracle.com Thu Aug 4 02:45:38 2011 From: koen.grauwels at oracle.com (koen.grauwels at oracle.com) Date: Wed, 3 Aug 2011 17:45:38 -0700 (PDT) Subject: [BLML] Auto Reply: Re: let her withdraw her card? Message-ID: Hello, Thank you for your mail. I'm on Holiday until 31-Aug-11 and will be unable to respond to your mail before that date. Regards, Koen From blml at arcor.de Thu Aug 4 13:00:39 2011 From: blml at arcor.de (Thomas Dehn) Date: Thu, 4 Aug 2011 13:00:39 +0200 (CEST) Subject: [BLML] Belconnen Bowl 2011 [SEC=UNOFFICIAL] In-Reply-To: <4E296636.1040907@ulb.ac.be> References: <4E296636.1040907@ulb.ac.be> <1036895070.795984.1311329994288.JavaMail.ngmail@webmail07.arcor-online.net> Message-ID: <1329275522.360007.1312455639496.JavaMail.ngmail@webmail08.arcor-online.net> Alain Gottcheiner wrote: > Le 22/07/2011 12:19, Thomas Dehn a ?crit : > > > > richard.hills at immi.gov.au wrote: > >> Alain Gottcheiner > >> > >> [snip] > >> 4) advice NS, based on 30+ years of experience with relay systems, not to > >> vary their answers after a double. Rdbl is best used "to play" and Pass to > >> ask for control in the suit > >> [snip] > >> > >> Richard Hills > >> > >> 4) advise Alain, based upon my 30+ years of _success_ with relay systems, > >> to _definitely_ vary relay answers after a Double, as two (possibly vital) > >> bidding steps are gained. Redouble _by the relay captain_ is best used to > >> play (I fondly remember declaring 2Sxx holding a singleton queen, with pard > >> holding sufficient values to overcome a 6-0 trump break, therefore a score > >> of +1240) and Pass _by the relay captain_ is best used to continue the > >> relay. > > I agree with Richard up to this point - that is how I am playing > > the relays in my system. > > > > Generally, you need to have solid understandings, as a misunderstanding > > in a relay sequence can lead to total disaster. Using Pass as the next relay > > gives you two valuable extra steps of bidding space - you can ask for > > controls later. > > > > AG : IIRC the case, the doubled bid was 3H. So, if you want to check > below 3NT, you'd rather hurry. > > Here is a live case (hands approximative, was long ago) : > > AQJx Kxx > Qxx xxx > AKxx Jx > Qx AKJxx > > 1C(1) 2C(2) > 2D(3) 2NT(4) > 3C(3) 3D(5) > 3H(3) Dbl > > (1) 15+ > (2) 12-14, 4+ clubs, may have a longer suit > (3) relay > (4) 1-suited, 5, 6 or 8 cards > (5) 3325 or (322)6 or XXX8 > > Now the right bid (without the double) is 3NT, showing 3325. > According to the economy theory it might be Rdbl. > But now, how are you going to ascertain the stopper ? > > Here it's easy : East passes (no stopper), West redoubles as a relay and > they find 4S. This is a different scenario. Above, we discussed pass and redouble by the relay captain. In Alan's example, the information about the stopper can be useful, as it is provided to the relay captain. It is useful in that particular scenario because the bidding is pretty close to 3NT, but not already above 3NT. I doubt that "pass" with a stopper or control in the suit an opponent showed is efficient usage of bidding space in the bulk of other scenarios. Say 1C (strong) [1D] ??? If responder passes with any hand holding a D stopper here, opener will have little useful information about responder's hand, and RHO and well be able to get in some sort of preempt. Thus, I don't think a general rule of "pass shows a control" makes sense. You'd need an agreement under which circumstances it shows a control, and when it shows something else. Which would add some strain on memory and concentration. Thomas Arcor empfiehlt: Die TOP 1000 Surftipps zu allem, was im Internet interessant und spannend ist - sehen Sie hier: http://www.arcor.de/content/pc_technik/internet/surftipps/surftipps/ From koen.grauwels at oracle.com Thu Aug 4 13:01:03 2011 From: koen.grauwels at oracle.com (koen.grauwels at oracle.com) Date: Thu, 4 Aug 2011 04:01:03 -0700 (PDT) Subject: [BLML] Auto Reply: Re: Belconnen Bowl 2011 [SEC=UNOFFICIAL] Message-ID: <70404598-92dc-4427-8c29-5ea0d86e95ad@default> Hello, Thank you for your mail. I'm on Holiday until 31-Aug-11 and will be unable to respond to your mail before that date. Regards, Koen From grandaeval at tiscali.co.uk Thu Aug 4 21:06:51 2011 From: grandaeval at tiscali.co.uk (Grattan Endicott) Date: Thu, 4 Aug 2011 20:06:51 +0100 Subject: [BLML] Catastrophe [SEC=UNOFFICIAL] In-Reply-To: <70404598-92dc-4427-8c29-5ea0d86e95ad@default> Message-ID: grandaeval at tiscali.co.uk Skype: grattan.endicott ********************************************* "He is a giant who has many dwarfs about him". [Yiddish proverb] ********************************************* +=+ Hi all, Please note that I have suffered a PC breakdown that has required the manufacturer to restore the basic system. I have lost virtually all my stored folders. Most grievously I have lost my address book and all its contents. So I am restoring gradually as much as I can, ~ Grattan ~ +=+ From koen.grauwels at oracle.com Thu Aug 4 21:07:48 2011 From: koen.grauwels at oracle.com (koen.grauwels at oracle.com) Date: Thu, 4 Aug 2011 12:07:48 -0700 (PDT) Subject: [BLML] Auto Reply: Catastrophe [SEC=UNOFFICIAL] Message-ID: <25c84e2c-77fc-4fb9-bde9-21f8ed09f0e8@default> Hello, Thank you for your mail. I'm on Holiday until 31-Aug-11 and will be unable to respond to your mail before that date. Regards, Koen From petrus at stift-kremsmuenster.at Thu Aug 4 22:50:45 2011 From: petrus at stift-kremsmuenster.at (Petrus Schuster OSB) Date: Thu, 04 Aug 2011 22:50:45 +0200 Subject: [BLML] let her withdraw her card? In-Reply-To: References: <000d01cc4d68$8f314490$ad93cdb0$@online.no> <4E32141B.4060104@nhcc.net> <000001cc4db7$7c32ce00$74986a00$@online.no> <4E335B18.8060701@nhcc.net> Message-ID: Am 04.08.2011, 02:45 Uhr, schrieb Robert Frick : > > Is it an infraction to call for a nonexistent card? If the law was > something like "declarer plays a card from dummy by naming the suit and > rank of a card from dummy", then the call for a nonexistant card could be > fairly easily categorized as an irregularity (and hence infraction). The > law actually doesn't say this, instead you get "When calling a card to be > played from dummy, declarer should clearly state both the suit and the > rank of the desired card". So it's a lot harder to call it an infraction, > especially since L46B4 mentions the call of a nonexistent card as if it > is > a part of the procedures of the game. > I have been considering 44A "The player who leads to a trick may play any card in his hand" - but unfortunately, the "may" means "failure to do it is not wrong". Although this does not make sense in this context, we a stuck with it till "may play" is changed to "plays", thereby defining correct procedure. Let's hope for the next FLB. Regards, Petrus From koen.grauwels at oracle.com Thu Aug 4 22:51:12 2011 From: koen.grauwels at oracle.com (koen.grauwels at oracle.com) Date: Thu, 4 Aug 2011 13:51:12 -0700 (PDT) Subject: [BLML] Auto Reply: Re: let her withdraw her card? Message-ID: <14a0a0ec-a1d9-4b0a-b5de-1ec9a31c950a@default> Hello, Thank you for your mail. I'm on Holiday until 31-Aug-11 and will be unable to respond to your mail before that date. Regards, Koen From swillner at nhcc.net Fri Aug 5 04:25:27 2011 From: swillner at nhcc.net (Steve Willner) Date: Thu, 04 Aug 2011 22:25:27 -0400 Subject: [BLML] let her withdraw her card? In-Reply-To: References: <000d01cc4d68$8f314490$ad93cdb0$@online.no> <4E32141B.4060104@nhcc.net> <000001cc4db7$7c32ce00$74986a00$@online.no> <4E335B18.8060701@nhcc.net> Message-ID: <4E3B5497.1020205@nhcc.net> On 8/3/2011 8:45 PM, Robert Frick wrote: > I asked the ACBL about both hands. Unfortunately, we here in the ACBL don't get what we pay for. > "...the player played their card before the card was played by Dummy. Per > Law 46B4, declarer designated a card that was not in Dummy, so the call > was void. Therefore, no card has been > played from Dummy, as defined by Law 45B. This makes the Six of Spades a > lead out of turn, which can be accepted by the declarer, or it becomes a > major penalty card." Why a lead out of turn and not a card accidentally exposed? > This answer, methinks, cannot be correct. I'd call it incomplete, neglecting as it does L23. That's a critical omission. > Is it an infraction to call for a nonexistent card? No, but it is an irregularity. Look again at the definitions. I don't think you will find "naming a card that is not in dummy as if to play it" among the proper procedures. > To invoke L23, the improper call has to be an irregularity Yes. > (and hence an infraction). No. All infractions are irregularities, but the converse is not true. From koen.grauwels at oracle.com Fri Aug 5 04:27:08 2011 From: koen.grauwels at oracle.com (koen.grauwels at oracle.com) Date: Thu, 4 Aug 2011 19:27:08 -0700 (PDT) Subject: [BLML] Auto Reply: Re: let her withdraw her card? Message-ID: <1613f10a-f0f9-493a-b29d-df28b3124224@default> Hello, Thank you for your mail. I'm on Holiday until 31-Aug-11 and will be unable to respond to your mail before that date. Regards, Koen From svenpran at online.no Fri Aug 5 08:15:37 2011 From: svenpran at online.no (Sven Pran) Date: Fri, 5 Aug 2011 08:15:37 +0200 Subject: [BLML] let her withdraw her card? In-Reply-To: <4E3B5497.1020205@nhcc.net> References: <000d01cc4d68$8f314490$ad93cdb0$@online.no> <4E32141B.4060104@nhcc.net> <000001cc4db7$7c32ce00$74986a00$@online.no> <4E335B18.8060701@nhcc.net> <4E3B5497.1020205@nhcc.net> Message-ID: <000301cc5337$192084d0$4b618e70$@online.no> > Steve Willner > On 8/3/2011 8:45 PM, Robert Frick wrote: > > I asked the ACBL about both hands. > > Unfortunately, we here in the ACBL don't get what we pay for. > > > "...the player played their card before the card was played by Dummy. > > Per Law 46B4, declarer designated a card that was not in Dummy, so the > > call was void. Therefore, no card has been played from Dummy, as > > defined by Law 45B. This makes the Six of Spades a lead out of turn, > > which can be accepted by the declarer, or it becomes a major penalty > > card." > > Why a lead out of turn and not a card accidentally exposed? [Sven Pran] because it was deliberately played > > > This answer, methinks, cannot be correct. > > I'd call it incomplete, neglecting as it does L23. That's a critical omission. > > > Is it an infraction to call for a nonexistent card? > > No, but it is an irregularity. Look again at the definitions. I don't think you will > find "naming a card that is not in dummy as if to play it" among the proper > procedures. > > > To invoke L23, the improper call has to be an irregularity > > Yes. > > > (and hence an infraction). > > No. All infractions are irregularities, but the converse is not true. > _______________________________________________ > Blml mailing list > Blml at rtflb.org > http://lists.rtflb.org/mailman/listinfo/blml From koen.grauwels at oracle.com Fri Aug 5 08:16:10 2011 From: koen.grauwels at oracle.com (koen.grauwels at oracle.com) Date: Thu, 4 Aug 2011 23:16:10 -0700 (PDT) Subject: [BLML] Auto Reply: Re: let her withdraw her card? Message-ID: Hello, Thank you for your mail. I'm on Holiday until 31-Aug-11 and will be unable to respond to your mail before that date. Regards, Koen From agot at ulb.ac.be Fri Aug 5 11:00:00 2011 From: agot at ulb.ac.be (Alain Gottcheiner) Date: Fri, 05 Aug 2011 11:00:00 +0200 Subject: [BLML] let her withdraw her card? In-Reply-To: References: <000d01cc4d68$8f314490$ad93cdb0$@online.no> <4E32141B.4060104@nhcc.net> <000001cc4db7$7c32ce00$74986a00$@online.no> <4E335B18.8060701@nhcc.net> Message-ID: <4E3BB110.1070609@ulb.ac.be> Le 4/08/2011 2:45, Robert Frick a ?crit : > I asked the ACBL about both hands. The answer, from a tournament director > (for the second hand -- declarer calls for the 4 of spades from dummy, > which doesn't exist, and defender follows suit with a spad) followed Sven: > > "...the player played their card before the card was played by Dummy. Per > Law 46B4, declarer designated a card that was not in Dummy, so the call > was void. Therefore, no card has been > played from Dummy, as defined by Law 45B. This makes the Six of Spades a > lead out of turn, which can be accepted by the declarer, or it becomes a > major penalty card." > > This answer, methinks, cannot be correct. Note that this ruling above > applies even if declarer intentionally called for the wrong card. > > Is it an infraction to call for a nonexistent card? If the law was > something like "declarer plays a card from dummy by naming the suit and > rank of a card from dummy", then the call for a nonexistant card could be > fairly easily categorized as an irregularity (and hence infraction). AG : I agree with your feelings about the ruling and why it was wrong, but IMOBO there is no need to change the rules ; there has been a departure from normal procedure, as declarer hasn't stated the suit and rank of the card to be played. There is a line in TFLB which says that, when one names an inexistent card, one has to supply another card ; the fact that this was necessary means that calling for an inexistent card isn't a "non-action", but rather a "wrong action". Best regards Alain From agot at ulb.ac.be Fri Aug 5 11:20:38 2011 From: agot at ulb.ac.be (Alain Gottcheiner) Date: Fri, 05 Aug 2011 11:20:38 +0200 Subject: [BLML] let her withdraw her card? In-Reply-To: <4E3B5497.1020205@nhcc.net> References: <000d01cc4d68$8f314490$ad93cdb0$@online.no> <4E32141B.4060104@nhcc.net> <000001cc4db7$7c32ce00$74986a00$@online.no> <4E335B18.8060701@nhcc.net> <4E3B5497.1020205@nhcc.net> Message-ID: <4E3BB5E6.3030905@ulb.ac.be> Le 5/08/2011 4:25, Steve Willner a ?crit : > On 8/3/2011 8:45 PM, Robert Frick wrote: >> I asked the ACBL about both hands. > Unfortunately, we here in the ACBL don't get what we pay for. > >> "...the player played their card before the card was played by Dummy. Per >> Law 46B4, declarer designated a card that was not in Dummy, so the call >> was void. Therefore, no card has been >> played from Dummy, as defined by Law 45B. This makes the Six of Spades a >> lead out of turn, which can be accepted by the declarer, or it becomes a >> major penalty card." > Why a lead out of turn and not a card accidentally exposed? AG : notr accidentally. It is a card exposed due to an opponent's action. It should be treated in the same way as a call made after a misexplanation : it may be withdrawn without penalty, and it is UI to the opponent who caused it. >> This answer, methinks, cannot be correct. > I'd call it incomplete, neglecting as it does L23. That's a critical > omission. > >> Is it an infraction to call for a nonexistent card? > No, but it is an irregularity. Look again at the definitions. I don't > think you will find "naming a card that is not in dummy as if to play > it" among the proper procedures. AG : there is, however, something specific about calling cards from dummy. In my country at least, one is very laxist about this procedure. Calls like "high" (or a raised finger), "low" (or a smal raking motion), "follow", "and again" (when drawing a suit from the top) are standardized, and they are easily understood, whence one doesn't realize that they are in fact incorrect. Whence, in turn, neither are other faulty calls seen as incorrect. But all still are. Best regards Alain From rfrick at rfrick.info Fri Aug 5 19:42:32 2011 From: rfrick at rfrick.info (Robert Frick) Date: Fri, 05 Aug 2011 13:42:32 -0400 Subject: [BLML] let her withdraw her card? In-Reply-To: <4E3BB5E6.3030905@ulb.ac.be> References: <000d01cc4d68$8f314490$ad93cdb0$@online.no> <4E32141B.4060104@nhcc.net> <000001cc4db7$7c32ce00$74986a00$@online.no> <4E335B18.8060701@nhcc.net> <4E3B5497.1020205@nhcc.net> <4E3BB5E6.3030905@ulb.ac.be> Message-ID: On Fri, 05 Aug 2011 05:20:38 -0400, Alain Gottcheiner wrote: > Le 5/08/2011 4:25, Steve Willner a ?crit : >> On 8/3/2011 8:45 PM, Robert Frick wrote: >>> I asked the ACBL about both hands. >> Unfortunately, we here in the ACBL don't get what we pay for. >> >>> "...the player played their card before the card was played by Dummy. >>> Per >>> Law 46B4, declarer designated a card that was not in Dummy, so the call >>> was void. Therefore, no card has been >>> played from Dummy, as defined by Law 45B. This makes the Six of >>> Spades a >>> lead out of turn, which can be accepted by the declarer, or it becomes >>> a >>> major penalty card." >> Why a lead out of turn and not a card accidentally exposed? > AG : notr accidentally. It is a card exposed due to an opponent's > action. It should be treated in the same way as a call made after a > misexplanation : it may be withdrawn without penalty, and it is UI to > the opponent who caused it. >>> This answer, methinks, cannot be correct. >> I'd call it incomplete, neglecting as it does L23. That's a critical >> omission. >> >>> Is it an infraction to call for a nonexistent card? >> No, but it is an irregularity. Look again at the definitions. I don't >> think you will find "naming a card that is not in dummy as if to play >> it" among the proper procedures. > AG : there is, however, something specific about calling cards from > dummy. In my country at least, one is very laxist about this procedure. > Calls like "high" (or a raised finger), "low" (or a smal raking motion), > "follow", "and again" (when drawing a suit from the top) are > standardized, and they are easily understood, whence one doesn't realize > that they are in fact incorrect. Whence, in turn, neither are other > faulty calls seen as incorrect. But all still are. I think it's there, with some selective reading. "A card must be played if a player names or otherwise designates it as the card he proposes to play" L45C4(a) So the nonexistent card is "played" according to this law. Then L47D: "After an opponent's change of play, a played card may be withdrawn and returned to the hand without further rectification and another card may be substituted. (L16D and 62C2 may apply). From svenpran at online.no Sat Aug 6 01:03:06 2011 From: svenpran at online.no (Sven Pran) Date: Sat, 6 Aug 2011 01:03:06 +0200 Subject: [BLML] let her withdraw her card? In-Reply-To: References: <000d01cc4d68$8f314490$ad93cdb0$@online.no> <4E32141B.4060104@nhcc.net> <000001cc4db7$7c32ce00$74986a00$@online.no> <4E335B18.8060701@nhcc.net> <4E3B5497.1020205@nhcc.net> <4E3BB5E6.3030905@ulb.ac.be> Message-ID: <000901cc53c3$d787a160$8696e420$@online.no> > Robert Frick {...} > >>> Law 46B4, declarer designated a card that was not in Dummy, so the > >>> call was void. Therefore, no card has been played from Dummy, as > >>> defined by Law 45B. This makes the Six of Spades a lead out of > >>> turn, which can be accepted by the declarer, or it becomes a major > >>> penalty card." > >> Why a lead out of turn and not a card accidentally exposed? > > AG : notr accidentally. It is a card exposed due to an opponent's > > action. It should be treated in the same way as a call made after a > > misexplanation : it may be withdrawn without penalty, and it is UI to > > the opponent who caused it. > >>> This answer, methinks, cannot be correct. > >> I'd call it incomplete, neglecting as it does L23. That's a critical > >> omission. > >> > >>> Is it an infraction to call for a nonexistent card? > >> No, but it is an irregularity. Look again at the definitions. I > >> don't think you will find "naming a card that is not in dummy as if > >> to play it" among the proper procedures. > > AG : there is, however, something specific about calling cards from > > dummy. In my country at least, one is very laxist about this procedure. > > Calls like "high" (or a raised finger), "low" (or a smal raking > > motion), "follow", "and again" (when drawing a suit from the top) are > > standardized, and they are easily understood, whence one doesn't > > realize that they are in fact incorrect. Whence, in turn, neither are > > other faulty calls seen as incorrect. But all still are. > > I think it's there, with some selective reading. > > "A card must be played if a player names or otherwise designates it as the > card he proposes to play" L45C4(a) > > So the nonexistent card is "played" according to this law. [Sven Pran] To me the sentence "the call is void" means that no call has been made. From rfrick at rfrick.info Sat Aug 6 03:56:22 2011 From: rfrick at rfrick.info (Robert Frick) Date: Fri, 05 Aug 2011 21:56:22 -0400 Subject: [BLML] let her withdraw her card? In-Reply-To: <000901cc53c3$d787a160$8696e420$@online.no> References: <000d01cc4d68$8f314490$ad93cdb0$@online.no> <4E32141B.4060104@nhcc.net> <000001cc4db7$7c32ce00$74986a00$@online.no> <4E335B18.8060701@nhcc.net> <4E3B5497.1020205@nhcc.net> <4E3BB5E6.3030905@ulb.ac.be> <000901cc53c3$d787a160$8696e420$@online.no> Message-ID: On Fri, 05 Aug 2011 19:03:06 -0400, Sven Pran wrote: >> Robert Frick > {...} >> >>> Law 46B4, declarer designated a card that was not in Dummy, so the >> >>> call was void. Therefore, no card has been played from Dummy, as >> >>> defined by Law 45B. This makes the Six of Spades a lead out of >> >>> turn, which can be accepted by the declarer, or it becomes a major >> >>> penalty card." >> >> Why a lead out of turn and not a card accidentally exposed? >> > AG : notr accidentally. It is a card exposed due to an opponent's >> > action. It should be treated in the same way as a call made after a >> > misexplanation : it may be withdrawn without penalty, and it is UI to >> > the opponent who caused it. >> >>> This answer, methinks, cannot be correct. >> >> I'd call it incomplete, neglecting as it does L23. That's a critical >> >> omission. >> >> >> >>> Is it an infraction to call for a nonexistent card? >> >> No, but it is an irregularity. Look again at the definitions. I >> >> don't think you will find "naming a card that is not in dummy as if >> >> to play it" among the proper procedures. >> > AG : there is, however, something specific about calling cards from >> > dummy. In my country at least, one is very laxist about this >> procedure. >> > Calls like "high" (or a raised finger), "low" (or a smal raking >> > motion), "follow", "and again" (when drawing a suit from the top) are >> > standardized, and they are easily understood, whence one doesn't >> > realize that they are in fact incorrect. Whence, in turn, neither are >> > other faulty calls seen as incorrect. But all still are. >> >> I think it's there, with some selective reading. >> >> "A card must be played if a player names or otherwise designates it as >> the >> card he proposes to play" L45C4(a) >> >> So the nonexistent card is "played" according to this law. > > [Sven Pran] To me the sentence "the call is void" means that no call has > been made. to me, "the call is void" seems to clearly say there was a call. And then, that it was void. Obviously, it would work better if the phrase was "voided" instead of "void". But now I am talking about picky points in phrasing that the law-writers almost certainly did not think about. So it's a coin flip. But I think we were doing that all along. Anyway, I was being selective. I think if you read the law book less selectively, there probably are several ways to support your position. Bob F. > > _______________________________________________ > Blml mailing list > Blml at rtflb.org > http://lists.rtflb.org/mailman/listinfo/blml -- http://somepsychology.com From adam at tameware.com Sun Aug 7 16:37:49 2011 From: adam at tameware.com (Adam Wildavsky) Date: Sun, 7 Aug 2011 16:37:49 +0200 Subject: [BLML] ACBL Louisville (Spring 2011) Non-NABC+ Cases Message-ID: On Tue, Jul 19, 2011 at 1:13 AM, Adam Wildavsky wrote: > http://www.acbl.org/play/casebooks/Louisville2011.php > >> > If you'd to discuss a particular case please post a new message > >> with the case number in the Subject: line rather than replying to this > >> message. > Here are my draft comments on the Non-NABC+ cases: 1. I do not agree that the appeal had merit. This point is worth bearing in mind: "One of those two (expert consultants) said that in these situations partner rarely has trouble deciding whether to double but the decision regarding how to bid on is more complicated and likely to take more time." 2. Again, I see no merit in this appeal. How could West believe that bidding 4S could be justified after partner's hesitation? It also seems that he was arguing both that that his hand was so weak that 4H would surely make and that, given the chance, he would have set it. I learned a useful phrase from Barry Rigal's comments on the Orlando casebook: A la lanterne! 3. With no bridge reason for declarar to play differently in 2H than in 3H I agree with the panel's adjustment, NS +50 for both sides. I would never the less have found the N/S appeal without merit, since the basis for their appeal seems to have been that South should be allowed to bid 3H after partner's unmistakable break in tempo. I would further have considered a procedural penalty against N/S. There may be other ways to provide an incentive to follow the laws in the future, but this seems the most effective. 4. A tricky case. The TD and panel rulings look right to me. I agree that the appeal had merit. 5. Experienced enough to file an appeal is experienced enough to receive an AWMW. One could aregue that inexperience is more of a reason to assess an AWMW. These players are by definition in need of education, I know of no form that's more effective. As regards the ruling, I have two criticisms of the panel's method. The first is that the question to determine is not whether 4S is a logical alternative, but rather whether Pass is. The second is that we poll players for their bridge judgement, not for their knowledge of the laws or legal terms. The proper questions to ask are, after providing the player with only the authorized information from the auction, "What calls would you seriously consider? Of those, which would you choose?" 6. The panel ruling looks right to me. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://lists.rtflb.org/pipermail/blml/attachments/20110807/db26a2d2/attachment.html From koen.grauwels at oracle.com Sun Aug 7 16:38:14 2011 From: koen.grauwels at oracle.com (koen.grauwels at oracle.com) Date: Sun, 7 Aug 2011 07:38:14 -0700 (PDT) Subject: [BLML] Auto Reply: ACBL Louisville (Spring 2011) Non-NABC+ Cases Message-ID: <47ddb2e7-660c-44be-89a6-35bc99ddc6ad@default> Hello, Thank you for your mail. I'm on Holiday until 31-Aug-11 and will be unable to respond to your mail before that date. Regards, Koen From richard.hills at immi.gov.au Mon Aug 8 00:58:45 2011 From: richard.hills at immi.gov.au (richard.hills at immi.gov.au) Date: Mon, 8 Aug 2011 08:58:45 +1000 Subject: [BLML] Paul appealing [SEC=UNOFFICIAL] In-Reply-To: <4E2953D5.2080504@aol.com> Message-ID: Paul Lamford, 22nd July 2011 [snip] An expert would play North's second double as convertible values, at least that is the opinion of a few strong players I surveyed. South would still bid 5C. [snip] Richard Hills, neither an expert nor a strong player, 8th August 2011 I play North's second double as a penalty double. This "non-expert" idiosyncrasy did not prevent the Ali-Hills partnership from ranking in third place on the normalised Butler totals after the double round robin qualifying of the Aussie Interstate Open Teams, thus playing a part in gaining silver medals for us and Canberra team-mates. David Burn, neither an expert nor a strong player, 17th December 2008 [Bystry] Probably for the same reason that with that hand: S AKxxx H xxx D Kx C Kxx I would bid 4S in such auction: (1H)-1S-3H-3S but not in such auction (1H)-1S-3D(pre)-3S [DALB] You should bid 4S in neither auction: partner knew that he had a singleton heart in the first when he bid only 3S, and he knew that you would know. You are more likely to *make* 4S in the first auction than the second, but not much more likely; a 3D pre-empt will not all that often be based on a suit headed by the ace, after all. [Bystry] New Old Black Magic? [DALB] Of course. It goes by the name of "maximal double" or "transferable values" these days, but it is exactly the same evil of which Kaplan spoke. Nowadays, we overcall 1S on your example hand above and also on KJ10xxxx None QJx Axx, and rely on cheating to handle the subsequent auction. Crede expertum - I have seen them, child. David Burn London, England -------------------------------------------------------------------- Important Notice: If you have received this email by mistake, please advise the sender and delete the message and attachments immediately. This email, including attachments, may contain confidential, sensitive, legally privileged and/or copyright information. Any review, retransmission, dissemination or other use of this information by persons or entities other than the intended recipient is prohibited. DIAC respects your privacy and has obligations under the Privacy Act 1988. The official departmental privacy policy can be viewed on the department's website at www.immi.gov.au. See: http://www.immi.gov.au/functional/privacy.htm --------------------------------------------------------------------- -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://lists.rtflb.org/pipermail/blml/attachments/20110807/9d229849/attachment.html From koen.grauwels at oracle.com Mon Aug 8 00:59:45 2011 From: koen.grauwels at oracle.com (koen.grauwels at oracle.com) Date: Sun, 7 Aug 2011 15:59:45 -0700 (PDT) Subject: [BLML] Auto Reply: Re: Paul appealing [SEC=UNOFFICIAL] Message-ID: Hello, Thank you for your mail. I'm on Holiday until 31-Aug-11 and will be unable to respond to your mail before that date. Regards, Koen From richard.hills at immi.gov.au Tue Aug 9 03:19:15 2011 From: richard.hills at immi.gov.au (richard.hills at immi.gov.au) Date: Tue, 9 Aug 2011 11:19:15 +1000 Subject: [BLML] Belconnen Bowl 2011 [SEC=UNOFFICIAL] In-Reply-To: <4E293CAC.5040001@ulb.ac.be> Message-ID: Edgar Kaplan on Old Black Magic " ... the sign-off is in a flat, listless tone, and the progressive bid is in ringing, pear-shaped tones ... " Richard Hills [snip] advise Alain, based upon my 30+ years of _success_ with relay systems, to _definitely_ vary relay answers after a Double, as two (possibly vital) bidding steps are gained. Alain Gottcheiner AG : if they are so vital then one shouldn't have relayed in the first place, as one couldn't expect the double. [snip] Richard Hills It seems that I have (yet again) erred in being excessively succinct, thus causing Alain to miss my point. In my opinion, the big advantage of a relay method lies not in bidding perfect fit slams, but rather in avoiding poor slams natural bidders reach on momentum (a case in point occurred in the recent Aussie National Championships in Melbourne, when Ali-Hills had no difficulty in stopping in a 33hcp 3NT while at the other table opponents reached 6NT with the unavoidable losers of the ace and king of diamonds). But sometimes, if there is an uncontested auction, even a relay method lacks the bidding space to determine at a safe level whether a slam is good or poor. Then a serendipitous Double, donating two bidding steps, also donates 11 or 13 imps. While a lead-directing Double is particularly ineffective against a game force relay, a "transferable values" Double is particularly effective against some particularly ineffective English Appeals Committees. Scenario A South, holding little defensive values, notices North pull a "transferable values" Double from his bidding box in tempo, elects to Pass, and scores +200, avoiding the phantom save. No infraction, so the Director is not summoned and the Appeals Committee is not required. Scenario B South, holding little defensive values, notices North pull a "transferable values" Double from his bidding box veeery slooowly, elects to bid, and scores -300. The Director adjusts the score to -790, but an oh-so-clever Appeals Committee who use the dangerous(1) "transferable values" Double convention themselves restore the table score. Best wishes Richard Hills (1) Another dangerous convention, which a former partner unsuccessfully urged me to adopt, is REO signals. When one defender leads a winner, the other defender gives count by playing a pip of the appropriate parity. That is, playing 2, 4, 6, 8 or 10 with an even number, or 3, 5, 7 or 9 with an odd number. Lacking a pip of the appropriate parity, play high-low in pips of inappropriate parity to cancel the initial message. The danger in this convention is that it is almost psychologically impossible to play an inappropriate pip as quickly as an appropriate pip, thus giving partner very useful UI which resolves ambiguities of medium to high pips. -------------------------------------------------------------------- Important Notice: If you have received this email by mistake, please advise the sender and delete the message and attachments immediately. This email, including attachments, may contain confidential, sensitive, legally privileged and/or copyright information. Any review, retransmission, dissemination or other use of this information by persons or entities other than the intended recipient is prohibited. DIAC respects your privacy and has obligations under the Privacy Act 1988. The official departmental privacy policy can be viewed on the department's website at www.immi.gov.au. See: http://www.immi.gov.au/functional/privacy.htm --------------------------------------------------------------------- -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://lists.rtflb.org/pipermail/blml/attachments/20110809/e62f3d53/attachment.html From grabiner at alumni.princeton.edu Tue Aug 9 05:59:05 2011 From: grabiner at alumni.princeton.edu (David Grabiner) Date: Mon, 08 Aug 2011 23:59:05 -0400 Subject: [BLML] Belconnen Bowl 2011 [SEC=UNOFFICIAL] In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <0E3D7B1257264702AE1F4826D0DCFF4E@erdos> Richard Hills writes: >(1) Another dangerous convention, which a former partner unsuccessfully urged >me to adopt, is REO signals. When one defender leads a winner, the other >defender gives count by playing a pip of the appropriate parity. That is, >playing 2, 4, 6, 8 or 10 with an even number, or 3, 5, 7 or 9 with an odd >number. Lacking a pip of the appropriate parity, play high-low in pips of >inappropriate >parity to cancel the initial message. The danger in this convention is that it >is almost >psychologically impossible to play an inappropriate pip as quickly as an >appropriate >pip, thus giving partner very useful UI which resolves ambiguities of medium to >high pips. This is why the ACBL (and I believe many other authorities) allow only rightside-up or upside-down signaling, and no dual messages, except on a first discard. I do have the same agreement as you when I play odd-even discards; the 3 is odder than the 9, so discarding the 9 and then the 3 from the same suit is discouraging and implies that I have no even pips. From koen.grauwels at oracle.com Tue Aug 9 06:11:37 2011 From: koen.grauwels at oracle.com (koen.grauwels at oracle.com) Date: Mon, 8 Aug 2011 21:11:37 -0700 (PDT) Subject: [BLML] Auto Reply: Re: Belconnen Bowl 2011 [SEC=UNOFFICIAL] Message-ID: Hello, Thank you for your mail. I'm on Holiday until 31-Aug-11 and will be unable to respond to your mail before that date. Regards, Koen From grandaeval at tiscali.co.uk Wed Aug 10 18:42:42 2011 From: grandaeval at tiscali.co.uk (Grattan) Date: Wed, 10 Aug 2011 17:42:42 +0100 Subject: [BLML] Greater grief [SEC=UNOFFICIAL] In-Reply-To: <0E3D7B1257264702AE1F4826D0DCFF4E@erdos> Message-ID: Grattan Partner's hesitation or failure to alert or whatever suggests something. If he in fact doesn't have whatever the UI suggests, then there is no advantage gained by "using" this information. Can I nonetheless be punished? Is there a well-accepted answer to this? Just in case there isn't... One potential example, from two nights ago: E S W N 1NT P 2H(1) 3D P P 3H(2) P 4H P ? (1) transfer (2) meant as retransfer, not announced as that Suppose that West expected 3H to be announced. It wasn't. Partners failure to announce suggests that she has only has 4-card heart support, instead of the good 5-card heart suit this bid would suggest if 3H was understood as a retransfer. So the UI suggests passing 4H. West bids 4 Spades. 4S does better than 4H. We see if passing is a logical alternative, and let's say most players would consider it and 25% would actually pass. So we comfortably rule against EW when East has a 4-card suit. But supposed, as actually happened, East had AKQ10x of hearts. Now, West has simply made a good bid. Or West made a bid and got lucky. We punish West for possibly not using information which wasn't correct? (Recall that passing was a logical alternative and suggested by the UI, if incorrect information can be UI.) Examples could be numerous. From Hermandw at skynet.be Thu Aug 11 09:25:18 2011 From: Hermandw at skynet.be (Herman De Wael) Date: Thu, 11 Aug 2011 09:25:18 +0200 Subject: [BLML] Can people be punished for using incorrect UI? In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <4E4383DE.4000700@skynet.be> If I understand this case, 3H should have been announced (if it is a transfer) but it hasn't. Also, you would have us believe that East knew it was a transfer, but simply forgot to announce it. So basically, West has UI suggesting that east (might or) might not have 5 hearts, and West has used that suggestion in bidding 4S. What does the fact that East does have 5 hearts have to do with that? East could actually have thought it was natural, and later said that he knew it was a transfer all along, pointing to the 5 hearts that he (luckily) happens to have. I don't see why East's holding should alter the UI ruling. Robert Frick wrote: > Partner's hesitation or failure to alert or whatever suggests something. > If he in fact doesn't have whatever the UI suggests, then there is no > advantage gained by "using" this information. Can I nonetheless be > punished? > > Is there a well-accepted answer to this? Just in case there isn't... One > potential example, from two nights ago: > > E S W N > 1NT P 2H(1) 3D > P P 3H(2) P > 4H P ? > > (1) transfer > (2) meant as retransfer, not announced as that > > > Suppose that West expected 3H to be announced. It wasn't. Partners failure > to announce suggests that she has only has 4-card heart support, instead > of the good 5-card heart suit this bid would suggest if 3H was understood > as a retransfer. > > So the UI suggests passing 4H. West bids 4 Spades. 4S does better than 4H. > We see if passing is a logical alternative, and let's say most players > would consider it and 25% would actually pass. So we comfortably rule > against EW when East has a 4-card suit. > > But supposed, as actually happened, East had AKQ10x of hearts. Now, West > has simply made a good bid. Or West made a bid and got lucky. We punish > West for possibly not using information which wasn't correct? (Recall that > passing was a logical alternative and suggested by the UI, if incorrect > information can be UI.) > > Examples could be numerous. > _______________________________________________ > Blml mailing list > Blml at rtflb.org > http://lists.rtflb.org/mailman/listinfo/blml > > > ----- > No virus found in this message. > Checked by AVG - www.avg.com > Version: 10.0.1392 / Virus Database: 1520/3825 - Release Date: 08/10/11 > > -- Herman De Wael Wilrijk Antwerpen Belgium From agot at ulb.ac.be Thu Aug 11 13:14:43 2011 From: agot at ulb.ac.be (Alain Gottcheiner) Date: Thu, 11 Aug 2011 13:14:43 +0200 Subject: [BLML] Can people be punished for using incorrect UI? In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <4E43B9A2.6080002@ulb.ac.be> Le 11/08/2011 3:06, Robert Frick a ?crit : > Partner's hesitation or failure to alert or whatever suggests something. > If he in fact doesn't have whatever the UI suggests, then there is no > advantage gained by "using" this information. Can I nonetheless be > punished? > > Is there a well-accepted answer to this? Just in case there isn't... One > potential example, from two nights ago: > > E S W N > 1NT P 2H(1) 3D > P P 3H(2) P > 4H P ? > > (1) transfer > (2) meant as retransfer, not announced as that > > > Suppose that West expected 3H to be announced. It wasn't. Partners failure > to announce suggests that she has only has 4-card heart support, instead > of the good 5-card heart suit this bid would suggest if 3H was understood > as a retransfer. AG : this is only one posible interpretation. In my style, 3H can be rather weak if a retransfer, in which case 4H is 'impossible" and the classical case of AI matching UI. From svenpran at online.no Thu Aug 11 13:19:57 2011 From: svenpran at online.no (Sven Pran) Date: Thu, 11 Aug 2011 13:19:57 +0200 Subject: [BLML] Can people be punished for using incorrect UI? In-Reply-To: <4E43B9A2.6080002@ulb.ac.be> References: <4E43B9A2.6080002@ulb.ac.be> Message-ID: <000e01cc5818$9acf0660$d06d1320$@online.no> > Alain Gottcheiner > Emne: Re: [BLML] Can people be punished for using incorrect UI? > > Le 11/08/2011 3:06, Robert Frick a ?crit : > > Partner's hesitation or failure to alert or whatever suggests something. > > If he in fact doesn't have whatever the UI suggests, then there is no > > advantage gained by "using" this information. Can I nonetheless be > > punished? > > > > Is there a well-accepted answer to this? Just in case there isn't... > > One potential example, from two nights ago: > > > > E S W N > > 1NT P 2H(1) 3D > > P P 3H(2) P > > 4H P ? > > > > (1) transfer > > (2) meant as retransfer, not announced as that > > > > > > Suppose that West expected 3H to be announced. It wasn't. Partners > > failure to announce suggests that she has only has 4-card heart > > support, instead of the good 5-card heart suit this bid would suggest > > if 3H was understood as a retransfer. > AG : this is only one posible interpretation. In my style, 3H can be rather > weak if a retransfer, in which case 4H is 'impossible" and the classical case of > AI matching UI. [Sven Pran] Strange. I recognize what has been stated here about 3H being a retransfer. In my book the 3H bid shows that responder holds 5 spades and 4 hearts - "now you select"! From agot at ulb.ac.be Thu Aug 11 13:56:41 2011 From: agot at ulb.ac.be (Alain Gottcheiner) Date: Thu, 11 Aug 2011 13:56:41 +0200 Subject: [BLML] Can people be punished for using incorrect UI? In-Reply-To: <000e01cc5818$9acf0660$d06d1320$@online.no> References: <4E43B9A2.6080002@ulb.ac.be> <000e01cc5818$9acf0660$d06d1320$@online.no> Message-ID: <4E43C379.3020500@ulb.ac.be> Le 11/08/2011 13:19, Sven Pran a ?crit : >> Alain Gottcheiner >> Emne: Re: [BLML] Can people be punished for using incorrect UI? >> >> Le 11/08/2011 3:06, Robert Frick a ?crit : >>> Partner's hesitation or failure to alert or whatever suggests something. >>> If he in fact doesn't have whatever the UI suggests, then there is no >>> advantage gained by "using" this information. Can I nonetheless be >>> punished? >>> >>> Is there a well-accepted answer to this? Just in case there isn't... >>> One potential example, from two nights ago: >>> >>> E S W N >>> 1NT P 2H(1) 3D >>> P P 3H(2) P >>> 4H P ? >>> >>> (1) transfer >>> (2) meant as retransfer, not announced as that >>> >>> >>> Suppose that West expected 3H to be announced. It wasn't. Partners >>> failure to announce suggests that she has only has 4-card heart >>> support, instead of the good 5-card heart suit this bid would suggest >>> if 3H was understood as a retransfer. >> AG : this is only one posible interpretation. In my style, 3H can be > rather >> weak if a retransfer, in which case 4H is 'impossible" and the classical > case of >> AI matching UI. > [Sven Pran] Strange. > I recognize what has been stated here about 3H being a retransfer. > In my book the 3H bid shows that responder holds 5 spades and 4 hearts - > "now you select"! AG : of course it might be 54+, but the player intended it as retransfer and the non-alert shows that partner doesn't understand it as such. That's the problem. What the bid means in the system isn't the central point of the problem. From gampas at aol.com Thu Aug 11 14:30:57 2011 From: gampas at aol.com (PL) Date: Thu, 11 Aug 2011 13:30:57 +0100 Subject: [BLML] Paul appealing [SEC=UNOFFICIAL] In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <4E43CB81.10406@aol.com> On 07/08/2011 23:58, richard.hills at immi.gov.au wrote: > > Paul Lamford, 22nd July 2011 > > [snip] > An expert would play North's second double as convertible values, at > least that is the opinion of a few strong players I surveyed. South > would still bid 5C. > [snip] > > Richard Hills, neither an expert nor a strong player, 8th August 2011 > > I play North's second double as a penalty double. This "non-expert" > idiosyncrasy did not prevent the Ali-Hills partnership from ranking in > third place on the normalised Butler totals after the double round > robin qualifying of the Aussie Interstate Open Teams, thus playing a > part in gaining silver medals for us and Canberra team-mates. > > David Burn, neither an expert nor a strong player, 17th December 2008 > > [Bystry] > > Probably for the same reason that with that hand: > > S AKxxx > H xxx > D Kx > C Kxx > > I would bid 4S in such auction: > > (1H)-1S-3H-3S > > but not in such auction > > (1H)-1S-3D(pre)-3S > > [DALB] > > You should bid 4S in neither auction: partner knew that he had a > singleton heart in the first when he bid only 3S, and he knew that you > would know. You are more likely to *make* 4S in the first auction than > the second, but not much more likely; a 3D pre-empt will not all that > often be based on a suit headed by the ace, after all. > > [Bystry] > > New Old Black Magic? > > [DALB] > > Of course. It goes by the name of "maximal double" or "transferable > values" these days, but it is exactly the same evil of which Kaplan > spoke. Nowadays, we overcall 1S on your example hand above and also on > KJ10xxxx None QJx Axx, and rely on cheating to handle the subsequent > auction. Crede expertum - I have seen them, child. > > David Burn > London, England > > The hand again for convenience: S7 3 HA K 6 3 D A K 6 CJ 8 7 3 S K Q 10 6 5 4S A J 9 8 2 HQ 8 5H 9 7 DJ 3 DQ 10 9 4 2 CK 5C A S- H J 10 4 2 D 8 7 5 CQ 10 9 6 4 2 Board 7 : Dealer South : All vulnerable: Swiss Pairs */WestNorthEastSouth/* Pass 1SDbl4CDbl 4SDbl (1)Pass5C PassPassDbl (2)All Pass 1)N asked the meaning of 4Cbefore doubling. Told a splinter bid 2)TD called while auction still in progress, before E doubled 5C This is a different type of UI to a break of tempo and even if the Ali-Hills partnership were to play North's second double as penalties, I would expect South to bid 5C, and if South passed successfully, with both 4S and 5C failing, I would consider removing the pass if I decided the question suggested shorter clubs than normal. In the UK, where this hand was played, the 4C bid would not be alerted either if it were a fit jump (as recommended by Andrew Robson in his excellent text on Competitive Bidding) or if it were a splinter, nor for that matter if it were Gerber, Fruit Machine Swiss or any other gismo. This abysmal regulation, preventing bids over 3NT being alerted, even on the first round of the auction, creates the problem, with its associated unavoidable UI, and IMHO I think the correct regulation is that bids over 3NT should not be alerted only at the second turn to call, and only if the opponents have passed throughout. If 4C is fit, then I think it is right to play South's double as red suits, and if 4C is a splinter, I think it is right to play South's double as clubs; of course we all agree that we would bid 5C instead, but that is not really relevant; this average minus player chose to double. North therefore needs to know, but unfortunately he conveys potential UI with his question. South also needs to know, but he may have already known or assumed - we did not address that issue. But it is all irrelevant. As the AC concluded, and 23 of 23 average players I have since consulted agreed, there is no alternative to 5C by South. The comparison, made by Hills, with the other auction, where the doubler began with an overcall, is about as irrelevant as just about every other post Hills makes on here. The original TD decision was hopeless, and if he had ruled correctly and East-West had appealed, I think we might have retained their deposit. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://lists.rtflb.org/pipermail/blml/attachments/20110811/9235ba5a/attachment-0001.html From agot at ulb.ac.be Thu Aug 11 15:14:35 2011 From: agot at ulb.ac.be (Alain Gottcheiner) Date: Thu, 11 Aug 2011 15:14:35 +0200 Subject: [BLML] Paul appealing [SEC=UNOFFICIAL] In-Reply-To: <4E43CB81.10406@aol.com> References: <4E43CB81.10406@aol.com> Message-ID: <4E43D5BB.8060108@ulb.ac.be> Le 11/08/2011 14:30, PL a ?crit : > The hand again for convenience: > > S7 3 > > HA K 6 3 > > D A K 6 > > CJ 8 7 3 > > S K Q 10 6 5 4S A J 9 8 2 > > HQ 8 5H 9 7 > > DJ 3 DQ 10 9 4 2 > > CK 5C A > > S- > > H J 10 4 2 > > D 8 7 5 > > CQ 10 9 6 4 2 > > > > Board 7 : Dealer South : All vulnerable: Swiss Pairs > > */WestNorthEastSouth/* > > Pass > > 1SDbl4CDbl > > 4SDbl (1)Pass5C > > PassPassDbl (2)All Pass > > 1)N asked the meaning of 4Cbefore doubling. Told a splinter bid > > 2)TD called while auction still in progress, before E doubled 5C > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > This is a different type of UI to a break of tempo and even if the > Ali-Hills partnership were to play North's second double as penalties, > I would expect South to bid 5C, and if South passed successfully, with > both 4S and 5C failing, I would consider removing the pass if I > decided the question suggested shorter clubs than normal. In the UK, > where this hand was played, the 4C bid would not be alerted either if > it were a fit jump (as recommended by Andrew Robson in his excellent > text on Competitive Bidding) or if it were a splinter, nor for that > matter if it were Gerber, Fruit Machine Swiss or any other gismo. > This abysmal regulation, preventing bids over 3NT being alerted, even > on the first round of the auction, creates the problem, with its > associated unavoidable UI, and IMHO I think the correct regulation is > that bids over 3NT should not be alerted only at the second turn to > call, and only if the opponents have passed throughout. > > If 4C is fit, then I think it is right to play South's double as red > suits, and if 4C is a splinter, I think it is right to play South's > double as clubs; of course we all agree that we would bid 5C instead, > but that is not really relevant; this average minus player chose to > double. North therefore needs to know, but unfortunately he conveys > potential UI with his question. South also needs to know, but he may > have already known or assumed - we did not address that issue. But it > is all irrelevant. As the AC concluded, and 23 of 23 average players I > have since consulted agreed, there is no alternative to 5C by South. > The comparison, made by Hills, with the other auction, where the > doubler began with an overcall, is about as irrelevant as just about > every other post Hills makes on here. The original TD decision was > hopeless, and if he had ruled correctly and East-West had appealed, I > think we might have retained their deposit. AG : something wasn't said about the play of the hand. Making 5C isn't easy, and without seeing the EW hands 5C isn't a favorite to make - it needs HQ onside plus 25 diamonds (to make the endplay possible) plus blocking clubs. Since South was going out of +200 into a contract which would score -200 to -500 most of the time, I wouldn't call this using UI. Still another case of the deal biasing the judgment ? Best regards Alain -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://lists.rtflb.org/pipermail/blml/attachments/20110811/7d75b779/attachment.html From rfrick at rfrick.info Thu Aug 11 20:01:54 2011 From: rfrick at rfrick.info (Robert Frick) Date: Thu, 11 Aug 2011 14:01:54 -0400 Subject: [BLML] Can people be punished for using incorrect UI? In-Reply-To: <4E43C379.3020500@ulb.ac.be> References: <4E43B9A2.6080002@ulb.ac.be> <000e01cc5818$9acf0660$d06d1320$@online.no> <4E43C379.3020500@ulb.ac.be> Message-ID: On Thu, 11 Aug 2011 07:56:41 -0400, Alain Gottcheiner wrote: > Le 11/08/2011 13:19, Sven Pran a ?crit : >>> Alain Gottcheiner >>> Emne: Re: [BLML] Can people be punished for using incorrect UI? >>> >>> Le 11/08/2011 3:06, Robert Frick a ?crit : >>>> Partner's hesitation or failure to alert or whatever suggests >>>> something. >>>> If he in fact doesn't have whatever the UI suggests, then there is no >>>> advantage gained by "using" this information. Can I nonetheless be >>>> punished? >>>> >>>> Is there a well-accepted answer to this? Just in case there isn't... >>>> One potential example, from two nights ago: >>>> >>>> E S W N >>>> 1NT P 2H(1) 3D >>>> P P 3H(2) P >>>> 4H P ? >>>> >>>> (1) transfer >>>> (2) meant as retransfer, not announced as that >>>> >>>> >>>> Suppose that West expected 3H to be announced. It wasn't. Partners >>>> failure to announce suggests that she has only has 4-card heart >>>> support, instead of the good 5-card heart suit this bid would suggest >>>> if 3H was understood as a retransfer. >>> AG : this is only one posible interpretation. In my style, 3H can be >> rather >>> weak if a retransfer, in which case 4H is 'impossible" and the >>> classical >> case of >>> AI matching UI. >> [Sven Pran] Strange. >> I recognize what has been stated here about 3H being a retransfer. >> In my book the 3H bid shows that responder holds 5 spades and 4 hearts - >> "now you select"! > AG : of course it might be 54+, but the player intended it as retransfer > and the non-alert shows that partner doesn't understand it as such. > That's the problem. What the bid means in the system isn't the central > point of the problem. Or to give an extreme, suppose my partner fails to announce my transfer, I assume he just forgot, I interpret everything assuming he knew it was a transfer, he in fact just forgot to announce it, and all of his bids were assuming I had transfered. Can I be punished for using UI? (Assume all of the conditions for adjustment are present -- somehwhere in our bidding, I had a choice of two bids, one suggested by the UI, it was a logical alternative, and I chose the other bid.) Bob From svenpran at online.no Thu Aug 11 20:30:43 2011 From: svenpran at online.no (Sven Pran) Date: Thu, 11 Aug 2011 20:30:43 +0200 Subject: [BLML] Can people be punished for using incorrect UI? In-Reply-To: References: <4E43B9A2.6080002@ulb.ac.be> <000e01cc5818$9acf0660$d06d1320$@online.no> <4E43C379.3020500@ulb.ac.be> Message-ID: <001f01cc5854$c7db31b0$57919510$@online.no> > Robert Frick > > AG : of course it might be 54+, but the player intended it as > > retransfer and the non-alert shows that partner doesn't understand it as > such. > > That's the problem. What the bid means in the system isn't the central > > point of the problem. > > Or to give an extreme, suppose my partner fails to announce my transfer, I > assume he just forgot, I interpret everything assuming he knew it was a > transfer, he in fact just forgot to announce it, and all of his bids were > assuming I had transfered. > > Can I be punished for using UI? (Assume all of the conditions for adjustment > are present -- somehwhere in our bidding, I had a choice of two bids, one > suggested by the UI, it was a logical alternative, and I chose the other bid.) [Sven Pran] As partner to a player who has (in your opinion) forgotten to alert or given an unexpected alert you are supposed to continue your auction without being aware of partner's (in your opinion) error. You are using UI if you adapt your own understanding of your agreements according to the unexpected action by your partner. Opponents will be entitled to rectification for any damage if your partner's action was contrary to your agreements (misinformation from him), not if his action was correct (misbid by you) From richard.hills at immi.gov.au Fri Aug 12 01:15:29 2011 From: richard.hills at immi.gov.au (richard.hills at immi.gov.au) Date: Fri, 12 Aug 2011 09:15:29 +1000 Subject: [BLML] Paul appealing [SEC=UNOFFICIAL] In-Reply-To: <4E43D5BB.8060108@ulb.ac.be> Message-ID: Paul Lamford [snip] even if the Ali-Hills partnership were to play North's second double as penalties, I would expect South to bid 5C [snip] Richard Hills Grate expectations. As South I would pass Hashmat Ali's penalty double rather than bid 5C. In my youth I read the excellent book by Bob Ewen, "Doubles for takeout, penalties and profit". Bob pointed out the vast difference between holding a singleton trump and a void when defending 2Sx, since often leading your sole trump is required to avoid pard being entangled in a trump coup. But a trump void when pard makes a high-level double of 4S is a defensively encouraging factor, since pard could well hold an unexpected trump trick due to the bad break. Alain Gottcheiner [snip] Since South was going out of +200 into a contract which would score -200 to -500 most of the time, I wouldn't call this using UI. Still another case of the deal biasing the judgment ? Richard Hills No, still another case of a blmler failing to understand the definition of "damage" in Law 12. If a slam bid after Hesitation Blackwood has a mere 5% chance of success, but the 5% lie of the cards happens to exist, then the Director must adjust the table score of 1430 to 680. Best wishes Richard Hills Specialist Recruitment Team, Recruitment Section Aqua 5, w/s W568, ph 6223 8453 DIAC Social Club movie ticket coordinator -------------------------------------------------------------------- Important Notice: If you have received this email by mistake, please advise the sender and delete the message and attachments immediately. This email, including attachments, may contain confidential, sensitive, legally privileged and/or copyright information. Any review, retransmission, dissemination or other use of this information by persons or entities other than the intended recipient is prohibited. DIAC respects your privacy and has obligations under the Privacy Act 1988. The official departmental privacy policy can be viewed on the department's website at www.immi.gov.au. See: http://www.immi.gov.au/functional/privacy.htm --------------------------------------------------------------------- -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://lists.rtflb.org/pipermail/blml/attachments/20110811/8ad9d15c/attachment-0001.html From agot at ulb.ac.be Fri Aug 12 13:35:45 2011 From: agot at ulb.ac.be (Alain Gottcheiner) Date: Fri, 12 Aug 2011 13:35:45 +0200 Subject: [BLML] Can people be punished for using incorrect UI? In-Reply-To: <001f01cc5854$c7db31b0$57919510$@online.no> References: <4E43B9A2.6080002@ulb.ac.be> <000e01cc5818$9acf0660$d06d1320$@online.no> <4E43C379.3020500@ulb.ac.be> <001f01cc5854$c7db31b0$57919510$@online.no> Message-ID: <4E451011.5000107@ulb.ac.be> Le 11/08/2011 20:30, Sven Pran a ?crit : >> Robert Frick >>> AG : of course it might be 54+, but the player intended it as >>> retransfer and the non-alert shows that partner doesn't understand it as >> such. >>> That's the problem. What the bid means in the system isn't the central >>> point of the problem. >> Or to give an extreme, suppose my partner fails to announce my transfer, I >> assume he just forgot, I interpret everything assuming he knew it was a >> transfer, he in fact just forgot to announce it, and all of his bids were >> assuming I had transfered. >> >> Can I be punished for using UI? (Assume all of the conditions for > adjustment >> are present -- somehwhere in our bidding, I had a choice of two bids, one >> suggested by the UI, it was a logical alternative, and I chose the other > bid.) > > [Sven Pran] As partner to a player who has (in your opinion) forgotten to > alert or given an unexpected alert you are supposed to continue your auction > without being aware of partner's (in your opinion) error. > > You are using UI if you adapt your own understanding of your agreements > according to the unexpected action by your partner. AG : I'd like to correct this one. This is true if said "action" is the alert or failure to alert, or the way he explained the bid ; however, if partner's bid is unusual according to your understanding, or to pure bridge logic, you're allowed to understand that something has gone wrong. Remember the case of 1NT-2C-3NT, playing 3-step Stayman, or that of pass-1C-1H-2NT-4NT. From agot at ulb.ac.be Fri Aug 12 13:41:36 2011 From: agot at ulb.ac.be (Alain Gottcheiner) Date: Fri, 12 Aug 2011 13:41:36 +0200 Subject: [BLML] Paul appealing [SEC=UNOFFICIAL] In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <4E451170.7050502@ulb.ac.be> Le 12/08/2011 1:15, richard.hills at immi.gov.au a ?crit : > > Paul Lamford > > [snip] > even if the Ali-Hills partnership were to play North's second double > as penalties, I would expect South to bid 5C > [snip] > > Richard Hills > > Grate expectations. As South I would pass Hashmat Ali's penalty double > rather than bid 5C. In my youth I read the excellent book by Bob Ewen, > "Doubles for takeout, penalties and profit". Bob pointed out the vast > difference between holding a singleton trump and a void when defending > 2Sx, since often leading your sole trump is required to avoid pard > being entangled in a trump coup. But a trump void when pard makes a > high-level double of 4S is a defensively encouraging factor, since > pard could well hold an unexpected trump trick due to the bad break. > > Alain Gottcheiner > > [snip] > Since South was going out of +200 into a contract which would score > -200 to -500 most of the time, I wouldn't call this using UI. > > Still another case of the deal biasing the judgment ? > > Richard Hills > > No, still another case of a blmler failing to understand the > definition of "damage" in Law 12. If a slam bid after Hesitation > Blackwood has a mere 5% chance of success, but the 5% lie of the cards > happens to exist, then the Director must adjust the table score of > 1430 to 680. > AG : sorry, I can't agree. Calling the action "suggested" merely because it was successful was wrong. We have to work by steps. 1 - was the action suggested ? I claim that it can't be called so, and that the judgement of some is affected by the result, something which shouldn't be considered at this point.. 2 - is there any ensuing damage ? Irrelevant, if the answer to 1 was to the negative. In your hesitation blackwood case, you're right, because the suggestion is obvious. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://lists.rtflb.org/pipermail/blml/attachments/20110812/c7ee2ae8/attachment.html From rfrick at rfrick.info Fri Aug 12 15:26:53 2011 From: rfrick at rfrick.info (Robert Frick) Date: Fri, 12 Aug 2011 09:26:53 -0400 Subject: [BLML] Can people be punished for using incorrect UI? In-Reply-To: <001f01cc5854$c7db31b0$57919510$@online.no> References: <4E43B9A2.6080002@ulb.ac.be> <000e01cc5818$9acf0660$d06d1320$@online.no> <4E43C379.3020500@ulb.ac.be> <001f01cc5854$c7db31b0$57919510$@online.no> Message-ID: On Thu, 11 Aug 2011 14:30:43 -0400, Sven Pran wrote: >> Robert Frick >> > AG : of course it might be 54+, but the player intended it as >> > retransfer and the non-alert shows that partner doesn't understand it >> as >> such. >> > That's the problem. What the bid means in the system isn't the central >> > point of the problem. >> >> Or to give an extreme, suppose my partner fails to announce my >> transfer, I >> assume he just forgot, I interpret everything assuming he knew it was a >> transfer, he in fact just forgot to announce it, and all of his bids >> were >> assuming I had transfered. >> >> Can I be punished for using UI? (Assume all of the conditions for > adjustment >> are present -- somehwhere in our bidding, I had a choice of two bids, >> one >> suggested by the UI, it was a logical alternative, and I chose the other > bid.) > > [Sven Pran] As partner to a player who has (in your opinion) forgotten > to > alert or given an unexpected alert you are supposed to continue your > auction > without being aware of partner's (in your opinion) error. > > You are using UI if you adapt your own understanding of your agreements > according to the unexpected action by your partner. > > Opponents will be entitled to rectification for any damage if your > partner's > action was contrary to your agreements (misinformation from him), I am thinking maybe you didn't understand the question. I will try again. The auction is 1H P 2NT P 3H P ? My 2NT bid was meant as Jacoby, showing heart support and an opening hand. It should be alerted, but my partner does not alert. If my partner has understood my bid correctly, then he has 16+ points. Scenario #1 (Business as Usual). My partner forgot our convention. I realize my partner has a minimum, so I make no effort to investigate or bid slam. The opponents call the director, who determines (1) investigating/bidding slam is a logical alternative, and (2) the opponents were damaged by my failure to do so. The director changes the score to protect the opponents from my use of UI. Scenario #2 (The Twist). My partner has simply forgotten to alert. I know my partner has just forgotten to alert. I consider investigating/bidding slam, assuming my partner has 16+ points. I decide not to. This action is in line with what most of my peers would do, and it turns out to be the right decision -- the best spot is 4H. This might also be business as usual, except my opponents complain that I used UI. My actual thinking process in bidding is irrelevant, right? The director goes through the same process, getting the same answers: Investigating/bidding slam is a logical alternative, and the "UI" suggests just bidding 4H. Does the director rule against me? It seems perverse to say that the opponents could have been damaged by the use of incorrect information. But I can't see how the director would get a different ruling in the second scenario than in the first. Is something information if it is wrong? Is it still Unauthorized Information? I don't think there should be any rectification when partner has the hand that I am supposed to assume he has. Do people rule that way? From agot at ulb.ac.be Fri Aug 12 16:32:22 2011 From: agot at ulb.ac.be (Alain Gottcheiner) Date: Fri, 12 Aug 2011 16:32:22 +0200 Subject: [BLML] Can people be punished for using incorrect UI? In-Reply-To: References: <4E43B9A2.6080002@ulb.ac.be> <000e01cc5818$9acf0660$d06d1320$@online.no> <4E43C379.3020500@ulb.ac.be> <001f01cc5854$c7db31b0$57919510$@online.no> Message-ID: <4E453976.7020501@ulb.ac.be> Le 12/08/2011 15:26, Robert Frick a ?crit : > On Thu, 11 Aug 2011 14:30:43 -0400, Sven Pran wrote: > >>> Robert Frick >>>> AG : of course it might be 54+, but the player intended it as >>>> retransfer and the non-alert shows that partner doesn't understand it >>> as >>> such. >>>> That's the problem. What the bid means in the system isn't the central >>>> point of the problem. >>> Or to give an extreme, suppose my partner fails to announce my >>> transfer, I >>> assume he just forgot, I interpret everything assuming he knew it was a >>> transfer, he in fact just forgot to announce it, and all of his bids >>> were >>> assuming I had transfered. >>> >>> Can I be punished for using UI? (Assume all of the conditions for >> adjustment >>> are present -- somehwhere in our bidding, I had a choice of two bids, >>> one >>> suggested by the UI, it was a logical alternative, and I chose the other >> bid.) >> >> [Sven Pran] As partner to a player who has (in your opinion) forgotten >> to >> alert or given an unexpected alert you are supposed to continue your >> auction >> without being aware of partner's (in your opinion) error. >> >> You are using UI if you adapt your own understanding of your agreements >> according to the unexpected action by your partner. >> >> Opponents will be entitled to rectification for any damage if your >> partner's >> action was contrary to your agreements (misinformation from him), > I am thinking maybe you didn't understand the question. I will try again. > The auction is > > 1H P 2NT P > 3H P ? > > My 2NT bid was meant as Jacoby, showing heart support and an opening hand. > It should be alerted, but my partner does not alert. If my partner has > understood my bid correctly, then he has 16+ points. > > Scenario #1 (Business as Usual). My partner forgot our convention. I > realize my partner has a minimum, so I make no effort to investigate or > bid slam. The opponents call the director, who determines (1) > investigating/bidding slam is a logical alternative, and (2) the opponents > were damaged by my failure to do so. The director changes the score to > protect the opponents from my use of UI. > > Scenario #2 (The Twist). My partner has simply forgotten to alert. I know > my partner has just forgotten to alert. I consider investigating/bidding > slam, assuming my partner has 16+ points. I decide not to. This action is > in line with what most of my peers would do, and it turns out to be the > right decision -- the best spot is 4H. > > This might also be business as usual, except my opponents complain that I > used UI. My actual thinking process in bidding is irrelevant, right? The > director goes through the same process, getting the same answers: > Investigating/bidding slam is a logical alternative, and the "UI" suggests > just bidding 4H. Does the director rule against me? AG : IMNSHO this isn't the right case. When partner shows 16+, and I suppose it doesn't exclude 20+, it would be very unusual for an opening hand not to do "something". This is the classical case where 3NT is either stronger or weaker than a cue, according to partnership understanding, but 4H is more or less excluded. So, I'm ready to rule that scenario #1 is more probable than scenario #2, whence you acted on the basis of UI. > It seems perverse to say that the opponents could have been damaged by the > use of incorrect information. But I can't see how the director would get a > different ruling in the second scenario than in the first. AG : he could, in some other case where he deemed #2 much more probable than #1. > Is something information if it is wrong? Is it still Unauthorized > Information? AG : yes, but only if it has some content. Weather information is often wrong. If in fact partner's action didn't convey anything (as in : he just forgot to alert), then it is no information. But even if there were no information, you might at least be penalized (formal penalty) for letting partner's action influence you, which is acting against the rules. Score adjustment is different, of course. > I don't think there should be any rectification when partner has the hand > that I am supposed to assume he has. Do people rule that way? AG : not that I like it, but apparently the TD has to ascertain whether it's #1 or #2, tilting any uncertainty towards #1, and decide on this basis. I guess #2 will seldom be given preference, but it might happen. Best regards Alain From svenpran at online.no Fri Aug 12 17:12:08 2011 From: svenpran at online.no (Sven Pran) Date: Fri, 12 Aug 2011 17:12:08 +0200 Subject: [BLML] Can people be punished for using incorrect UI? In-Reply-To: References: <4E43B9A2.6080002@ulb.ac.be> <000e01cc5818$9acf0660$d06d1320$@online.no> <4E43C379.3020500@ulb.ac.be> <001f01cc5854$c7db31b0$57919510$@online.no> Message-ID: <000e01cc5902$35068c50$9f13a4f0$@online.no> > Robert Frick > > [Sven Pran] As partner to a player who has (in your opinion) > > forgotten to alert or given an unexpected alert you are supposed to > > continue your auction without being aware of partner's (in your > > opinion) error. > > > > You are using UI if you adapt your own understanding of your > > agreements according to the unexpected action by your partner. > > > > Opponents will be entitled to rectification for any damage if your > > partner's action was contrary to your agreements (misinformation from > > him), > > I am thinking maybe you didn't understand the question. I will try again. > The auction is > > 1H P 2NT P > 3H P ? > > My 2NT bid was meant as Jacoby, showing heart support and an opening > hand. > It should be alerted, but my partner does not alert. If my partner has > understood my bid correctly, then he has 16+ points. > > Scenario #1 (Business as Usual). My partner forgot our convention. I realize > my partner has a minimum, so I make no effort to investigate or bid slam. > The opponents call the director, who determines (1) investigating/bidding > slam is a logical alternative, and (2) the opponents were damaged by my > failure to do so. The director changes the score to protect the opponents > from my use of UI. > > Scenario #2 (The Twist). My partner has simply forgotten to alert. I know my > partner has just forgotten to alert. I consider investigating/bidding slam, > assuming my partner has 16+ points. I decide not to. This action is in line with > what most of my peers would do, and it turns out to be the right decision -- > the best spot is 4H. > > This might also be business as usual, except my opponents complain that I > used UI. My actual thinking process in bidding is irrelevant, right? The director > goes through the same process, getting the same answers: > Investigating/bidding slam is a logical alternative, and the "UI" suggests just > bidding 4H. Does the director rule against me? > > It seems perverse to say that the opponents could have been damaged by > the use of incorrect information. But I can't see how the director would get a > different ruling in the second scenario than in the first. > > Is something information if it is wrong? Is it still Unauthorized Information? > > I don't think there should be any rectification when partner has the hand that > I am supposed to assume he has. Do people rule that way? [Sven Pran] In both scenarios your opponents have received misinformation so they are entitled to redress if they can show that they might have taken other action given correct information. However I don't think this will be the case here. But whether or not your partner alerts your 2NT call and then bids 3H you are supposed to continue your auction as if he had alerted your call as required. And here is the crucial point: When you decide not to go for slam the Director must investigate if your decision COULD be based on a suspicion that your partner does not hold the 16+ HCP his bid promises according to your agreements. I think there is a strong possibility that the Director will so rule unless 6H does make (in which case opponents are of course not damaged by your choice). (I have in a similar situation indeed adjusted a result from 4H+1 to 6H-1) From swillner at nhcc.net Fri Aug 12 17:57:04 2011 From: swillner at nhcc.net (Steve Willner) Date: Fri, 12 Aug 2011 11:57:04 -0400 Subject: [BLML] Can people be punished for using incorrect UI? In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <4E454D50.9070501@nhcc.net> On 8/10/2011 9:06 PM, Robert Frick wrote: > Partner's hesitation or failure to alert or whatever suggests something. > If he in fact doesn't have whatever the UI suggests, then there is no > advantage gained by "using" this information. Can I nonetheless be > punished? The question is framed wrong. The main question is whether to give an adjusted score or not. Of course flagrant use of UI should incur punishment, but that's rare. As others have written, if a player avoids actions suggested by UI, there's no infraction, and the table result stands. What hand partner happens to hold is irrelevant. > E S W N > 1NT P 2H(1) 3D > P P 3H(2) P > 4H P ? > > (1) transfer > (2) meant as retransfer, not announced as that In the ACBL, a retransfer would be alerted, not announced. > Partners failure > to announce suggests that she has only has 4-card heart support, instead > of the good 5-card heart suit this bid would suggest if 3H was understood > as a retransfer. I'm not with you on that last. If 3H shows spades, then anything other than 3S by opener has to suggest an expectation of having a play for 4S even if responder is weak. What it shows about hearts could be anything; for some pairs, it would be a doubleton. > So the UI suggests passing 4H. It probably suggests actual length in hearts as opposed to shortness or high card concentration, so yes. However, given that without the UI opener has shown good support for spades, passing 4H will seldom be a LA. > West bids 4 Spades. So no problem unless some slam try (higher than 4S) was a LA. If that's the case, 4S was illegal. > But supposed, as actually happened, East had AKQ10x of hearts. It doesn't matter what East held unless that somehow changes your view about what the UI actually suggested. Usually it won't, but some partnerships are very good at reading the actual meaning of seemingly ambiguous UI. I doubt that's a problem here, though. The UI suggested pretty much what East had (hearts, not spades), and West "carefully avoided" taking advantage. What's the problem? Of course you also need to check whether the MI damaged the opponents, but that's pretty obvious. > I had a choice of two > bids, one suggested by the UI, it was a logical alternative, and I chose > the other bid. As long as you chose the one not suggested, the table score should stand. (At least as far as UI... there could be an adjustment for MI or in very rare cases 73B1 or some such.) > 1H P 2NT P > 3H P ? > My 2NT bid was meant as Jacoby, showing heart support and an opening hand. > It should be alerted, but my partner does not alert. If my partner has > understood my bid correctly, then he has 16+ points. I'm afraid I don't agree with Alain on this one. It seems simple enough, and I don't see that any mind reading is needed. > Scenario #2 (The Twist). My partner has simply forgotten to alert. I know > my partner has just forgotten to alert. I consider investigating/bidding > slam, assuming my partner has 16+ points. I decide not to. This action is > in line with what most of my peers would do, and it turns out to be the > right decision -- the best spot is 4H. If investigating slam is really not a LA, then there's no problem, but it's hard to imagine that's the case. If opener has 16+ and responder has 12 or 13, how can responder know that slam is impossible? > Investigating/bidding slam is a logical alternative, and the "UI" suggests > just bidding 4H. Does the director rule against me? Seems automatic. I really don't see the problem. From rfrick at rfrick.info Fri Aug 12 20:42:45 2011 From: rfrick at rfrick.info (Robert Frick) Date: Fri, 12 Aug 2011 14:42:45 -0400 Subject: [BLML] Can people be punished for using incorrect UI? In-Reply-To: <4E453976.7020501@ulb.ac.be> References: <4E43B9A2.6080002@ulb.ac.be> <000e01cc5818$9acf0660$d06d1320$@online.no> <4E43C379.3020500@ulb.ac.be> <001f01cc5854$c7db31b0$57919510$@online.no> <4E453976.7020501@ulb.ac.be> Message-ID: On Fri, 12 Aug 2011 10:32:22 -0400, Alain Gottcheiner wrote: > Le 12/08/2011 15:26, Robert Frick a ?crit : >> On Thu, 11 Aug 2011 14:30:43 -0400, Sven Pran >> wrote: >> >>>> Robert Frick >>>>> AG : of course it might be 54+, but the player intended it as >>>>> retransfer and the non-alert shows that partner doesn't understand it >>>> as >>>> such. >>>>> That's the problem. What the bid means in the system isn't the >>>>> central >>>>> point of the problem. >>>> Or to give an extreme, suppose my partner fails to announce my >>>> transfer, I >>>> assume he just forgot, I interpret everything assuming he knew it was >>>> a >>>> transfer, he in fact just forgot to announce it, and all of his bids >>>> were >>>> assuming I had transfered. >>>> >>>> Can I be punished for using UI? (Assume all of the conditions for >>> adjustment >>>> are present -- somehwhere in our bidding, I had a choice of two bids, >>>> one >>>> suggested by the UI, it was a logical alternative, and I chose the >>>> other >>> bid.) >>> >>> [Sven Pran] As partner to a player who has (in your opinion) forgotten >>> to >>> alert or given an unexpected alert you are supposed to continue your >>> auction >>> without being aware of partner's (in your opinion) error. >>> >>> You are using UI if you adapt your own understanding of your agreements >>> according to the unexpected action by your partner. >>> >>> Opponents will be entitled to rectification for any damage if your >>> partner's >>> action was contrary to your agreements (misinformation from him), >> I am thinking maybe you didn't understand the question. I will try >> again. >> The auction is >> >> 1H P 2NT P >> 3H P ? >> >> My 2NT bid was meant as Jacoby, showing heart support and an opening >> hand. >> It should be alerted, but my partner does not alert. If my partner has >> understood my bid correctly, then he has 16+ points. >> >> Scenario #1 (Business as Usual). My partner forgot our convention. I >> realize my partner has a minimum, so I make no effort to investigate or >> bid slam. The opponents call the director, who determines (1) >> investigating/bidding slam is a logical alternative, and (2) the >> opponents >> were damaged by my failure to do so. The director changes the score to >> protect the opponents from my use of UI. >> >> Scenario #2 (The Twist). My partner has simply forgotten to alert. I >> know >> my partner has just forgotten to alert. I consider investigating/bidding >> slam, assuming my partner has 16+ points. I decide not to. This action >> is >> in line with what most of my peers would do, and it turns out to be the >> right decision -- the best spot is 4H. >> >> This might also be business as usual, except my opponents complain that >> I >> used UI. My actual thinking process in bidding is irrelevant, right? The >> director goes through the same process, getting the same answers: >> Investigating/bidding slam is a logical alternative, and the "UI" >> suggests >> just bidding 4H. Does the director rule against me? > AG : IMNSHO this isn't the right case. When partner shows 16+, and I > suppose it doesn't exclude 20+, it would be very unusual for an opening > hand not to do "something". Right. Maybe the 3H bid should mean 15-17 for the sake of this example. This is the classical case where 3NT is > either stronger or weaker than a cue, according to partnership > understanding, but 4H is more or less excluded. > So, I'm ready to rule that scenario #1 is more probable than scenario > #2, whence you acted on the basis of UI. > >> It seems perverse to say that the opponents could have been damaged by >> the >> use of incorrect information. But I can't see how the director would >> get a >> different ruling in the second scenario than in the first. > AG : he could, in some other case where he deemed #2 much more probable > than #1. > >> Is something information if it is wrong? Is it still Unauthorized >> Information? > > AG : yes, but only if it has some content. Weather information is often > wrong. > If in fact partner's action didn't convey anything (as in : he just > forgot to alert), then it is no information. The problem is, the lack of alert suggests one bid over another, triggering L16B1. It actually suggests the wrong bid (in the same sense that useful information suggests the right bid), but L16B1 doesn't seem to care about that. But even if there were no > information, you might at least be penalized (formal penalty) for > letting partner's action influence you, which is acting against the > rules. Score adjustment is different, of course. >> I don't think there should be any rectification when partner has the >> hand >> that I am supposed to assume he has. Do people rule that way? > AG : not that I like it, but apparently the TD has to ascertain whether > it's #1 or #2, tilting any uncertainty towards #1, It is simple to differentiate Scenario #1 from Scenario #2 -- look at partner's hand. If partner has 15-17 HCP, it is Scenario #2 (or, at the very least, I did not have any useful UI). > and decide on this basis. > I guess #2 will seldom be given preference, but it might happen. I would guess this is fairly common and the director often is not even called. From rfrick at rfrick.info Mon Aug 15 00:04:09 2011 From: rfrick at rfrick.info (Robert Frick) Date: Sun, 14 Aug 2011 18:04:09 -0400 Subject: [BLML] Directors' Rights Message-ID: 1. Where the lawbook is wrong, it should be corrected. Rationale. When we make a ruling, we should be supported by the lawbook and be able to show people that support. Commentary. This is not a serious problem: Most people don't know about the errors; most directors know to just give the right ruling; most players would not question those rulings. This is mostly a prelude to Right #2. 2. Where is it not clear whether the lawbook is right or wrong, the ambiguity should be resolved. Rationale. In these situations, the director faces an awkward choice. He can make a probably foolish-looking ruling that follows the book, knowing that it might just an error in the lawbook and no one else is following the ruling. Or he can make a ruling that doesn't follow the lawbook. Here, the first problem is that the side ruled against can use the lawbook to support their argument that the director was wrong. The second problem is that the director might be wrong and the lawmakers might have intended their law to be followed as written and other directors might be following the law as written. 3. Players have a right to consistent rulings from directors. Directors should have the ability to be able to do that. Commentary. Some ambiguity is unavoidable; most inconsistency is caused by director error; and there are regional variations. We are talking here about avoidable ambiguities and documented inconsistencies in interpretation. -------------------------------- General Commentary #1. Of course, the lawbook itself cannot be changed until 2017. But corrections can come from any responsible lawmaking body. The WBFLC meets yearly and can correct any of these. From rfrick at rfrick.info Mon Aug 15 00:06:15 2011 From: rfrick at rfrick.info (Robert Frick) Date: Sun, 14 Aug 2011 18:06:15 -0400 Subject: [BLML] Example of obviously wrong law Message-ID: Declarer claims holding the ten of spades and the ace of clubs. Spades are trump. He states that all the trump are out. He also says his line of play is playing the ten of spades first. However, there is nothing in the lawbook about following the stated line of play. Meanwhile, all of the conditions for L70C are met -- there is an outstanding trump, declarer has clearly stated no awareness of this trump, and a trick could be lost to the trump by a normal line of play -- as we would rule if declarer had not stated a line of play, it is normal to play the ace of clubs first, and this gets ruffed. Everyone makes the right ruling (to follow the stated line of play). I doubt that many people even know about this error in the laws. If it is pointed out to them, they will find some way to read to laws to get to the correct ruling, or simply ignore the problem. They might state that the problem doesn't exist, and in a way they will be right -- there is no practical problem here and no real need to correct it. Commentary #1. There is, however, a real need to fill in the missing line about when the claim is followed. Commentary #2. As already noted, part of the rationale here is simply to point out that errors in the law do exist and part of being a director is to know when to not follow the law because it is in error. From rfrick at rfrick.info Mon Aug 15 00:11:41 2011 From: rfrick at rfrick.info (Robert Frick) Date: Sun, 14 Aug 2011 18:11:41 -0400 Subject: [BLML] Examples of Laws that might be wrong or might not In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: Example #1. Declarer revokes. The revoke is established, you are about to apply a one trick penalty when....... Declarer mentions that he previously revoked in this suit. The previous revoke was not established. I think it is not clear how to rule. I would hate to have to make a ruling in this situation. If I claim there is is revoke penalty, I am in deep trouble if declarer reads the lawbook. If I claim there is no revoke penalty, the defenders will say my ruling is absurd (and I will agree). Example #2. South pulls out a bidding card, notices that East has bid in front of her, and says "wait". In ACBL-land, the bid is not yet made and she can change her bid (perhaps with UI to partner, but that is not the issue). She now puts her bidding card on the table, facing herself so no one can see it, and thinks about what to do. The actual ACBL regulation is that a bid is irrevocable when it touches the table. So, technically, the bid is made when it touched the table, even though it was clear to everyone that she was just holding it there while she thought. At first, I thought that whoever wrote that regulation just tried to copy the lawbooks rule for when a card is played by declarer but screwed up the paraphrase. So it was an error that I was supposed to ignore. Then I could imagine the author actually making their rule this way on purpose. I wrote to the head of the ACBLLC to get clarification and did not receive an answer. From rfrick at rfrick.info Mon Aug 15 00:29:09 2011 From: rfrick at rfrick.info (Robert Frick) Date: Sun, 14 Aug 2011 18:29:09 -0400 Subject: [BLML] Example of a known ambiguity In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: When is the call of a card from dummy irrevocable? Or, put another way, what is the deadline for declarer changing his mind? (Assume this is a genuine change of mind, not merely an inadvertent designation). My understanding is that in Belgum, once declarer has said "s", the only two choice are six and seven. Declarer cannot change his mind and play the two or the king. This is reasonable, easy to apply, and my congrats to Belgium for making a decision. I asked the ACBL rulings help line, and I think Mike Flader answered that the call is irrevocable when it is finished. So "s-" can be changed to the king, but once declarer has said six, it must be the six. However, as I understand it, "six of.." is not a finished call and can be changed to the king. Which is potentially very awkward but has not proved difficult in practice, although it could get awkward once players knew this loophole. I forget which way Mike Flader went on this, but I am pretty sure another "famous authority" has said he would allow this change. Nearly 100% of the players in Long Island think that a call from dummy can be changed if it is done in the same breath. I have no idea where this idea comes from, unless it was in a long-ago lawbook. I am not sure exactly what it means. A call from dummy becomes irrevocable when declarer starts inhaling? When declarer stops exhaling? Despite the potential ambiguity, I think I could apply this in practice. It obviously allows changes in mind, but I don't think that's necessarily wrong. Commentary: If the WBFLC merely said this was an issue for local regulation, I would be happy. I could look to local regulation, which right now would simply be telling the club owner that it's up to her, or talking with the other directors and making a reasonable policy. From grandaeval at tiscali.co.uk Mon Aug 15 13:12:55 2011 From: grandaeval at tiscali.co.uk (Grattan) Date: Mon, 15 Aug 2011 12:12:55 +0100 Subject: [BLML] Example of a known ambiguity In-Reply-To: Message-ID: Grattan Message-ID: Grattan Message-ID: Grattan References: Message-ID: <8592EFA8-BEB0-48F7-9AF5-E5F368F100F6@starpower.net> On Aug 14, 2011, at 6:06 PM, Robert Frick wrote: > Declarer claims holding the ten of spades and the ace of clubs. > Spades are > trump. He states that all the trump are out. He also says his line > of play > is playing the ten of spades first. This seems like a rather artificial example, as one could read declarer's two statements as contradictory -- and had he said either one, without the other, we would know what to do. I would interpret the two statements in proximity as meaning that he's pretty sure all the trump are out, but he is even surer that his 10 is high, so he will check for lurkers. I would thus "allow" his line of play as stated. > However, there is nothing in the lawbook about following the stated > line > of play. Meanwhile, all of the conditions for L70C are met -- there > is an > outstanding trump, declarer has clearly stated no awareness of this > trump, > and a trick could be lost to the trump by a normal line of play -- > as we > would rule if declarer had not stated a line of play, it is normal > to play > the ace of clubs first, and this gets ruffed. > > Everyone makes the right ruling (to follow the stated line of play). I > doubt that many people even know about this error in the laws. If > it is > pointed out to them, they will find some way to read to laws to get > to the > correct ruling, or simply ignore the problem. They might state > that the > problem doesn't exist, and in a way they will be right -- there is no > practical problem here and no real need to correct it. > > Commentary #1. There is, however, a real need to fill in the > missing line > about when the claim is followed. > > Commentary #2. As already noted, part of the rationale here is > simply to > point out that errors in the law do exist and part of being a > director is > to know when to not follow the law because it is in error. One could reasonably take declarer's statement that he will play the trump 10 first as a "statement about that trump" notwithstanding that he wasn't aware it existed. L70C1 and L70C2 specify independent conditions, and either one could logically be met in the absense of the other. Eric Landau 1107 Dale Drive Silver Spring MD 20910 ehaa at starpower.net From ehaa at starpower.net Mon Aug 15 15:47:54 2011 From: ehaa at starpower.net (Eric Landau) Date: Mon, 15 Aug 2011 09:47:54 -0400 Subject: [BLML] Examples of Laws that might be wrong or might not In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <5F550235-6344-49A3-A56B-FBE33D124550@starpower.net> On Aug 14, 2011, at 6:11 PM, Robert Frick wrote: > Example #1. Declarer revokes. The revoke is established, you are > about to > apply a one trick penalty when....... > > Declarer mentions that he previously revoked in this suit. The > previous > revoke was not established. > > I think it is not clear how to rule. I would hate to have to make a > ruling > in this situation. If I claim there is is revoke penalty, I am in deep > trouble if declarer reads the lawbook. If I claim there is no revoke > penalty, the defenders will say my ruling is absurd (and I will > agree). By L63A, this is impossible. The previous revoke was established as soon as play continued, whether or not it was noticed. In the example, the TD simply applies the appropriate rectification for the first (previously unnoticed, but nevertheless established) revoke, and applies L64B2/L64C to the second one. Eric Landau 1107 Dale Drive Silver Spring MD 20910 ehaa at starpower.net From ehaa at starpower.net Mon Aug 15 16:21:35 2011 From: ehaa at starpower.net (Eric Landau) Date: Mon, 15 Aug 2011 10:21:35 -0400 Subject: [BLML] Example of a known ambiguity In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <33DC72DA-EE3F-4D65-B8DE-5A22934318EA@starpower.net> On Aug 14, 2011, at 6:29 PM, Robert Frick wrote: > When is the call of a card from dummy irrevocable? Or, put another > way, > what is the deadline for declarer changing his mind? (Assume this is a > genuine change of mind, not merely an inadvertent designation). > > My understanding is that in Belgum, once declarer has said "s", the > only > two choice are six and seven. Declarer cannot change his mind and > play the > two or the king. This is reasonable, easy to apply, and my congrats to > Belgium for making a decision. > > I asked the ACBL rulings help line, and I think Mike Flader > answered that > the call is irrevocable when it is finished. So "s-" can be changed > to the > king, but once declarer has said six, it must be the six. > > However, as I understand it, "six of.." is not a finished call and > can be > changed to the king. Which is potentially very awkward but has not > proved > difficult in practice, although it could get awkward once players knew > this loophole. I forget which way Mike Flader went on this, but I am > pretty sure another "famous authority" has said he would allow this > change. > > Nearly 100% of the players in Long Island think that a call from > dummy can > be changed if it is done in the same breath. I have no idea where this > idea comes from, unless it was in a long-ago lawbook. I am not sure > exactly what it means. A call from dummy becomes irrevocable when > declarer > starts inhaling? When declarer stops exhaling? Despite the potential > ambiguity, I think I could apply this in practice. It obviously allows > changes in mind, but I don't think that's necessarily wrong. Under the 1963 FLB, a call from dummy could be changed if it was done "without pause." [period]. The ACBL (and perhaps others) interpreted "without pause" as synonymous with "in the same breath", and the phrase gained widespread currency. The WBF, however, didn't like this interpretation, and in the 1975 FLB "clarified" it by changing "without pause" to "without pause for thought". So nearly 100% of the players in[*] Long Island are merely 36 years behind the laws. This is no more than we should expect, given that neither the promulgators (the WBF) nor the enforcers (the ACBL, and perhaps others) of our laws see fit to make any attempt to communicate changes in those laws to mere players. [*] OT. Lest someone think that both Bob and I have made grammatical errors here (using "in" rather than "on"), the term "Long Island" is ambiguous to New York City area residents; it is both an island and an area consisting of two counties on the island. The island also contains two boroughs of New York City, so one can, literally, be "on" the island and in the city simultaneously. But any New York City area resident who describes himself as "from" or "going to" or "in" Long Island is referring specifically only to those parts of the island which lie outside the city of New York. Eric Landau 1107 Dale Drive Silver Spring MD 20910 ehaa at starpower.net From rfrick at rfrick.info Mon Aug 15 17:54:43 2011 From: rfrick at rfrick.info (Robert Frick) Date: Mon, 15 Aug 2011 11:54:43 -0400 Subject: [BLML] Examples of Laws that might be wrong or might not In-Reply-To: <5F550235-6344-49A3-A56B-FBE33D124550@starpower.net> References: <5F550235-6344-49A3-A56B-FBE33D124550@starpower.net> Message-ID: On Mon, 15 Aug 2011 09:47:54 -0400, Eric Landau wrote: > On Aug 14, 2011, at 6:11 PM, Robert Frick wrote: > >> Example #1. Declarer revokes. The revoke is established, you are >> about to >> apply a one trick penalty when....... >> >> Declarer mentions that he previously revoked in this suit. The >> previous >> revoke was not established. >> >> I think it is not clear how to rule. I would hate to have to make a >> ruling >> in this situation. If I claim there is is revoke penalty, I am in deep >> trouble if declarer reads the lawbook. If I claim there is no revoke >> penalty, the defenders will say my ruling is absurd (and I will >> agree). > > By L63A, this is impossible. The previous revoke was established as > soon as play continued, whether or not it was noticed. In the > example, the TD simply applies the appropriate rectification for the > first (previously unnoticed, but nevertheless established) revoke, > and applies L64B2/L64C to the second one. Sorry to be unclear. Declarer made the first revoke, immediately noticed the problem, and immediately corrected it. So it was never established. From Hermandw at skynet.be Mon Aug 15 18:55:25 2011 From: Hermandw at skynet.be (Herman De Wael) Date: Mon, 15 Aug 2011 18:55:25 +0200 Subject: [BLML] Examples of Laws that might be wrong or might not In-Reply-To: References: <5F550235-6344-49A3-A56B-FBE33D124550@starpower.net> Message-ID: <4E494F7D.1000204@skynet.be> This is still unclear, but I think the problem is a typo - it must be a defender who revokes after the declarer did. Indeed, it is possible for the second revoke to be established while the first one is not yet. Like this: Dummy plays diamonds, and declarer ruffs. Defender overrruffs and plays a diamond. The defensive revoke is now established, but declarer's one is not yet. Since declarer can (must) now change his card, so can (and therefore must) defender. And defender's revoke, although established, will be changed, and the revoke card does not even become a penalty card! Robert Frick wrote: > On Mon, 15 Aug 2011 09:47:54 -0400, Eric Landau wrote: > >> On Aug 14, 2011, at 6:11 PM, Robert Frick wrote: >> >>> Example #1. Declarer revokes. The revoke is established, you are >>> about to >>> apply a one trick penalty when....... >>> >>> Declarer mentions that he previously revoked in this suit. The >>> previous >>> revoke was not established. >>> >>> I think it is not clear how to rule. I would hate to have to make a >>> ruling >>> in this situation. If I claim there is is revoke penalty, I am in deep >>> trouble if declarer reads the lawbook. If I claim there is no revoke >>> penalty, the defenders will say my ruling is absurd (and I will >>> agree). >> >> By L63A, this is impossible. The previous revoke was established as >> soon as play continued, whether or not it was noticed. In the >> example, the TD simply applies the appropriate rectification for the >> first (previously unnoticed, but nevertheless established) revoke, >> and applies L64B2/L64C to the second one. > > Sorry to be unclear. Declarer made the first revoke, immediately noticed > the problem, and immediately corrected it. So it was never established. > _______________________________________________ > Blml mailing list > Blml at rtflb.org > http://lists.rtflb.org/mailman/listinfo/blml > > > ----- > No virus found in this message. > Checked by AVG - www.avg.com > Version: 10.0.1392 / Virus Database: 1520/3834 - Release Date: 08/14/11 > > -- Herman De Wael Wilrijk Antwerpen Belgium From petereidt at t-online.de Mon Aug 15 19:29:13 2011 From: petereidt at t-online.de (Peter Eidt) Date: Mon, 15 Aug 2011 19:29:13 +0200 Subject: [BLML] =?utf-8?q?Examples_of_Laws_that_might_be_wrong_or_might_no?= =?utf-8?q?t?= In-Reply-To: <4E494F7D.1000204@skynet.be> References: <4E494F7D.1000204@skynet.be> Message-ID: <1Qt0yP-0AgQoi0@fwd00.aul.t-online.de> From: Herman De Wael > This is still unclear, but I think the problem is a typo - it must be > a defender who revokes after the declarer did. No, Herman, I'm very sure it was not a typo. Mr. Frick wants to make us believe, that Law 64 B2 "There is no rectification as in A following an established revoke: [...] 2. if it is a subsequent revoke in the same suit by the same player. Law64C may apply." applies to a scenario, where declarer first made a revoke - that was not established and therefore corrected and did not leed to any rectification tricks - and then afterwards made another revoke in the same suit, which was established this time. As Law 64 B2 only refers to the question whether the 2nd revoke was established and not to the question whether the 1st revoke also was established, Mr. Frick claims that the Laws suggest the application of this special Law in this scenario ......... > Indeed, it is possible for the second revoke to be established while > the first one is not yet. > > Like this: > Dummy plays diamonds, and declarer ruffs. Defender overrruffs and > plays a diamond. The defensive revoke is now established, but > declarer's one is not yet. > > Since declarer can (must) now change his card, so can (and therefore > must) defender. And defender's revoke, although established, will be > changed, and the revoke card does not even become a penalty card! > > Robert Frick wrote: > > > On Mon, 15 Aug 2011 09:47:54 -0400, Eric Landau > > wrote: > > > >> On Aug 14, 2011, at 6:11 PM, Robert Frick wrote: > >> > >>> Example #1. Declarer revokes. The revoke is established, you are > >>> about to > >>> apply a one trick penalty when....... > >>> > >>> Declarer mentions that he previously revoked in this suit. The >>> > previous > >>> revoke was not established. > >>> > >>> I think it is not clear how to rule. I would hate to have to make > a >>> ruling > >>> in this situation. If I claim there is is revoke penalty, I am in > deep >>> trouble if declarer reads the lawbook. If I claim there is no > revoke >>> penalty, the defenders will say my ruling is absurd (and I > will >>> agree). > >> > >> By L63A, this is impossible. The previous revoke was established > as >> soon as play continued, whether or not it was noticed. In the > >> example, the TD simply applies the appropriate rectification for > the >> first (previously unnoticed, but nevertheless established) > revoke, >> and applies L64B2/L64C to the second one. > > > > > Sorry to be unclear. Declarer made the first revoke, immediately > > noticed the problem, and immediately corrected it. So it was never > > established. From rfrick at rfrick.info Mon Aug 15 20:07:39 2011 From: rfrick at rfrick.info (Robert Frick) Date: Mon, 15 Aug 2011 14:07:39 -0400 Subject: [BLML] Example of obviously wrong law In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: On Mon, 15 Aug 2011 07:27:30 -0400, Grattan wrote: > > > Grattan Skype: grattan.endicott > ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ > "A great deal of harm is being done > in the modern world by belief in the > virtuousness of work". > [Bertrand Russell] > ****************************************** > > +=+ There is an error in Robert's statement > below. Declarer's statement under Law 68C > is a statement of "the order in which cards > *will* be played" (sic). If this happens to > pick up a lurking trump of which declarer > is not aware declarer has been prudent in > stating his play and so be it. But it is common knowledge that maybe they won't be played in that order. Doesn't L70C have precedence by the principle of specificity? Plus they can't be played because play stops, but that is maybe a technicality. To me, to clarify the general point, I read this as declarer stating his intention as to the order in which his cards should be played. I did not and do not see anything where the director, adjudicating the claim, in any way uses the clarification statement. (The only instruction is to have declarer repeat it.) And then to return to my other points, there certainly is no statement that director is bound by the claiming statement (which furthermore many people do not think is true). > ~ Grattan ~ +=+ > .......................................... > > -----Original Message----- > From: blml-bounces at rtflb.org > [mailto:blml-bounces at rtflb.org] > On Behalf Of Robert Frick > Sent: 14 August 2011 23:06 > To: Bridge Laws Mailing List > Subject: [BLML] Example of obviously wrong law > > Declarer claims holding the ten of spades and > the ace of clubs. Spades are trump. He states > that all the trump are out. He also says his > line of play is playing the ten of spades first. > > .......................omissis.................. > > _______________________________________________ > Blml mailing list > Blml at rtflb.org > http://lists.rtflb.org/mailman/listinfo/blml -- http://somepsychology.com From ehaa at starpower.net Mon Aug 15 22:24:19 2011 From: ehaa at starpower.net (Eric Landau) Date: Mon, 15 Aug 2011 16:24:19 -0400 Subject: [BLML] Examples of Laws that might be wrong or might not In-Reply-To: References: <5F550235-6344-49A3-A56B-FBE33D124550@starpower.net> Message-ID: <37D06FE6-04A2-4D3A-B60B-601E0A7D678F@starpower.net> On Aug 15, 2011, at 11:54 AM, Robert Frick wrote: > On Mon, 15 Aug 2011 09:47:54 -0400, Eric Landau > wrote: > >> On Aug 14, 2011, at 6:11 PM, Robert Frick wrote: >> >>> Example #1. Declarer revokes. The revoke is established, you are >>> about to >>> apply a one trick penalty when....... >>> >>> Declarer mentions that he previously revoked in this suit. The >>> previous >>> revoke was not established. >>> >>> I think it is not clear how to rule. I would hate to have to make a >>> ruling >>> in this situation. If I claim there is is revoke penalty, I am in >>> deep >>> trouble if declarer reads the lawbook. If I claim there is no revoke >>> penalty, the defenders will say my ruling is absurd (and I will >>> agree). >> >> By L63A, this is impossible. The previous revoke was established as >> soon as play continued, whether or not it was noticed. In the >> example, the TD simply applies the appropriate rectification for the >> first (previously unnoticed, but nevertheless established) revoke, >> and applies L64B2/L64C to the second one. > > Sorry to be unclear. Declarer made the first revoke, immediately > noticed > the problem, and immediately corrected it. So it was never > established. In that case, L64B2 simply doesn't apply. "There is no rectification... following an *established* revoke..." [L64B, emphasis mine]. Eric Landau 1107 Dale Drive Silver Spring MD 20910 ehaa at starpower.net From adam at irvine.com Mon Aug 15 22:24:27 2011 From: adam at irvine.com (Adam Beneschan) Date: Mon, 15 Aug 2011 13:24:27 -0700 Subject: [BLML] Example of obviously wrong law In-Reply-To: Your message of "Mon, 15 Aug 2011 14:07:39 EDT." Message-ID: <20110815202430.A1F63A8C85A@mailhub.irvine.com> Robert wrote: > On Mon, 15 Aug 2011 07:27:30 -0400, Grattan > wrote: > > > > > > > Grattan > Skype: grattan.endicott > > ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ > > "A great deal of harm is being done > > in the modern world by belief in the > > virtuousness of work". > > [Bertrand Russell] > > ****************************************** > > > > +=+ There is an error in Robert's statement > > below. Declarer's statement under Law 68C > > is a statement of "the order in which cards > > *will* be played" (sic). If this happens to > > pick up a lurking trump of which declarer > > is not aware declarer has been prudent in > > stating his play and so be it. > > But it is common knowledge that maybe they won't be played in that order. > Doesn't L70C have precedence by the principle of specificity? The prime directive, when it comes to claims, is in L70A: "In ruling on a contested claim or concession, the Director adjudicates the result of the board as equitably as possible to both sides, but any doubtful point as to a claim shall be resolved against the claimer." This means that the Director determines what the result would have been had the board been played out, but if there's any point at which we're not sure what would have happened, we rule against the claimer. But here, we *are* sure that declarer would have played the trump first, since he said so in his statement. So to award a result that could have occurred only if declarer had not followed his own statement would be inequitable and thus cannot be right. The phrasing (in particular the last phrase of L70A, "The Director proceeds as follows") makes it clear that L70C is to be applied in the service of this purpose in L70A, and thus L70C cannot take precedence over L70A. I'd agree that this could have been expressed more precisely in the Laws, but I disagree that the law is in error or "obviously wrong". It's just a tiny bit sloppy. -- Adam From gordonrainsford at btinternet.com Mon Aug 15 22:24:14 2011 From: gordonrainsford at btinternet.com (Gordon Rainsford) Date: Mon, 15 Aug 2011 21:24:14 +0100 Subject: [BLML] Directors' Rights In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: On 14 Aug 2011, at 23:04, "Robert Frick" wrote: > General Commentary #1. Of course, the lawbook itself cannot be changed until 2011 Cannot? Gordon Rainsford From larry at charmschool.orangehome.co.uk Mon Aug 15 22:35:38 2011 From: larry at charmschool.orangehome.co.uk (Larry) Date: Mon, 15 Aug 2011 21:35:38 +0100 Subject: [BLML] Directors' Rights References: Message-ID: <31AFA021433C446AAB801447AFADAE81@changeme1> Hurry, hurry...4 months left ! > > > > On 14 Aug 2011, at 23:04, "Robert Frick" wrote: > >> General Commentary #1. Of course, the lawbook itself cannot be changed >> until 2011 > > Cannot? > > Gordon Rainsford > > _______________________________________________ > Blml mailing list > Blml at rtflb.org > http://lists.rtflb.org/mailman/listinfo/blml > > > > ----- > No virus found in this message. > Checked by AVG - www.avg.com > Version: 10.0.1392 / Virus Database: 1520/3835 - Release Date: 08/15/11 > From grabiner at alumni.princeton.edu Tue Aug 16 01:40:45 2011 From: grabiner at alumni.princeton.edu (David Grabiner) Date: Mon, 15 Aug 2011 19:40:45 -0400 Subject: [BLML] ACBL Louisville (Spring 2011) Non-NABC+ Case 3: adjusted score changed in favor of the NOS In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <145FAF3AE75C4AE387D382C541C506A7@erdos> Adam Wildavsky writes (typo corrected): > 3. With no bridge reason for declarar to play differently in 2S than in 3S I > agree > with the panel's adjustment, NS +50 for both sides. I would never the less > have > found the N/S appeal without merit, since the basis for their appeal seems to > have > been that South should be allowed to bid 3H after partner's unmistakable break > in > tempo. I would further have considered a procedural penalty against N/S. There > may > be other ways to provide an incentive to follow the laws in the future, but > this seems > the most effective. The text of the appeal doesn't say that. A reviewer did a poll to confirm that passing by South was a LA to his actual 3H bid, but N-S didn't claim that in the appeal. "The appealing side presented the argument that declarer had made a poor play in 3S." And given that N-S made this argument, their appeal must have merit; the TD ruled -110 and there is a reasonable bridge argument that N-S were entitled to +50 under the Laws. Even if the Panel had denied that adjustment, I wouldn't rule an appeal without merit. From rfrick at rfrick.info Tue Aug 16 02:35:49 2011 From: rfrick at rfrick.info (Robert Frick) Date: Mon, 15 Aug 2011 20:35:49 -0400 Subject: [BLML] Example of obviously wrong law In-Reply-To: <20110815202430.A1F63A8C85A@mailhub.irvine.com> References: <20110815202430.A1F63A8C85A@mailhub.irvine.com> Message-ID: On Mon, 15 Aug 2011 16:24:27 -0400, Adam Beneschan wrote: > > Robert wrote: > >> On Mon, 15 Aug 2011 07:27:30 -0400, Grattan >> wrote: >> >> > >> > >> > Grattan> > Skype: grattan.endicott >> > ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ >> > "A great deal of harm is being done >> > in the modern world by belief in the >> > virtuousness of work". >> > [Bertrand Russell] >> > ****************************************** >> > >> > +=+ There is an error in Robert's statement >> > below. Declarer's statement under Law 68C >> > is a statement of "the order in which cards >> > *will* be played" (sic). If this happens to >> > pick up a lurking trump of which declarer >> > is not aware declarer has been prudent in >> > stating his play and so be it. >> >> But it is common knowledge that maybe they won't be played in that >> order. >> Doesn't L70C have precedence by the principle of specificity? > > The prime directive, when it comes to claims, is in L70A: "In ruling > on a contested claim or concession, the Director adjudicates the > result of the board as equitably as possible to both sides, Yes, but what you say is not true. My impression is that equity is a throwaway line that does not receive much attention. In any case, it does not doubt to be abandoned. Example #1. Declarer claims, conceding us one trick. We put our hands back in the board, then realize that there is a double dummy defense to give us two tricks. We freely admit that there is no chance we would have executed this defense at the table. Literally none. So, on one hand, we have equity -- without the claim she would have lost one trick. This could be the ruling. Against that, we have....???? I don't know. Tradition I guess. Tradition won, at least once -- Mike Flader published the answer that we get our double dummy defense for down 2. So equity doesn't win out even against tradition. Example #2. Declarer claims. Defender is on lead. If defender leads a club, his partner gets a ruff. Everyone shows their hands, we discuss this, then the defender leads a heart. How do you rule? Again, it looks likely that the result, had declarer not claimed, would be getting the rest of the tricks. I believe the stock answer, however, is that the defense gets one trick. Example #3. Declarer claims. He has all trump in his hand. He states he is leading a club from dummy, ruffing in hand, and then drawing trump. Unfortunately for him, leading a club gives the player behind him a trump promotion. However, he is in hand. How do you rule? It is very clear what would have happened without the claim, right? BTW, equity is not defined. I think we are using it here to mean "the result that would have happened without the claim". So, from my perspective, you are using "equity" now, but not at any other time. > but any > doubtful point as to a claim shall be resolved against the claimer." > This means that the Director determines what the result would have > been had the board been played out, but if there's any point at which > we're not sure what would have happened, we rule against the claimer. > But here, we *are* sure that declarer would have played the trump > first, since he said so in his statement. So to award a result that > could have occurred only if declarer had not followed his own > statement would be inequitable and thus cannot be right. Yes, this is cogent, convincing argument. It is also lawbook-free. > The phrasing > (in particular the last phrase of L70A, "The Director proceeds as > follows") makes it clear that L70C is to be applied in the service of > this purpose in L70A, and thus L70C cannot take precedence over L70A. The sentence you refer to suggests that we are not going to receive a description of how the director adjudicates a contested claim. It leaves out the part about following the claiming statement. > > I'd agree that this could have been expressed more precisely in the > Laws, but I disagree that the law is in error or "obviously wrong". > It's just a tiny bit sloppy. Well, I agree too that leaving out "The claiming statement is followed" is just a little sloppy. But that isn't the missing sentence, and people disagree about what the missing sentence is. That goes beyond merely sloppy. > > -- Adam If L70C cannot take precedence over L70A, can L70D take precedence? From rfrick at rfrick.info Tue Aug 16 02:40:16 2011 From: rfrick at rfrick.info (Robert Frick) Date: Mon, 15 Aug 2011 20:40:16 -0400 Subject: [BLML] Examples of Laws that might be wrong or might not In-Reply-To: <37D06FE6-04A2-4D3A-B60B-601E0A7D678F@starpower.net> References: <5F550235-6344-49A3-A56B-FBE33D124550@starpower.net> <37D06FE6-04A2-4D3A-B60B-601E0A7D678F@starpower.net> Message-ID: On Mon, 15 Aug 2011 16:24:19 -0400, Eric Landau wrote: > On Aug 15, 2011, at 11:54 AM, Robert Frick wrote: > >> On Mon, 15 Aug 2011 09:47:54 -0400, Eric Landau >> wrote: >> >>> On Aug 14, 2011, at 6:11 PM, Robert Frick wrote: >>> >>>> Example #1. Declarer revokes. The revoke is established, you are >>>> about to >>>> apply a one trick penalty when....... >>>> >>>> Declarer mentions that he previously revoked in this suit. The >>>> previous >>>> revoke was not established. >>>> >>>> I think it is not clear how to rule. I would hate to have to make a >>>> ruling >>>> in this situation. If I claim there is is revoke penalty, I am in >>>> deep >>>> trouble if declarer reads the lawbook. If I claim there is no revoke >>>> penalty, the defenders will say my ruling is absurd (and I will >>>> agree). >>> >>> By L63A, this is impossible. The previous revoke was established as >>> soon as play continued, whether or not it was noticed. In the >>> example, the TD simply applies the appropriate rectification for the >>> first (previously unnoticed, but nevertheless established) revoke, >>> and applies L64B2/L64C to the second one. >> >> Sorry to be unclear. Declarer made the first revoke, immediately >> noticed >> the problem, and immediately corrected it. So it was never >> established. > > In that case, L64B2 simply doesn't apply. "There is no > rectification... following an *established* revoke..." [L64B, > emphasis mine]. Declarer's second revoke in the same suit was established. Only the first one was not. From rfrick at rfrick.info Tue Aug 16 02:54:24 2011 From: rfrick at rfrick.info (Robert Frick) Date: Mon, 15 Aug 2011 20:54:24 -0400 Subject: [BLML] Examples of Laws that might be wrong or might not In-Reply-To: <1Qt0yP-0AgQoi0@fwd00.aul.t-online.de> References: <4E494F7D.1000204@skynet.be> <1Qt0yP-0AgQoi0@fwd00.aul.t-online.de> Message-ID: On Mon, 15 Aug 2011 13:29:13 -0400, Peter Eidt wrote: > From: Herman De Wael >> This is still unclear, but I think the problem is a typo - it must be >> a defender who revokes after the declarer did. > > No, Herman, > I'm very sure it was not a typo. > > Mr. Frick wants to make us believe, that Law 64 B2 > "There is no rectification as in A following an established revoke: > [...] > 2. if it is a subsequent revoke in the same suit by the same player. > Law64C may apply." > > applies to a scenario, where declarer first made a revoke > - that was not established and therefore corrected and did > not leed to any rectification tricks - and then afterwards made > another revoke in the same suit, which was established this > time. > As Law 64 B2 only refers to the question whether the 2nd revoke > was established and not to the question whether the 1st revoke > also was established, Mr. Frick claims that the Laws suggest > the application of this special Law in this scenario ......... > Well, I am not making any suggestion has to how the law should actually be applied. The law could mean 1. "There is no rectification as in A above for an established revoke if there was a previous revoke in the same suit by the same player." or 2. "There is no rectification as in A above for an established revoke if there was a previous established revoke in the same suit by the same player." #1 seems ridiculous, but you never know about these things. So there is ambiguity. If #2 is correct, there is a serious problem: A director should be able to show players the lawbook and have the lawbook support the director's correct ruling. Another serious problem is that a straightforward reading of the law should be correct. I don't think anyone is arguing that is true, because #1 is the straightforward reading. From yuen.sebastian at gmail.com Tue Aug 16 05:12:43 2011 From: yuen.sebastian at gmail.com (Sebastian) Date: Tue, 16 Aug 2011 13:12:43 +1000 Subject: [BLML] Examples of Laws that might be wrong or might not In-Reply-To: References: <4E494F7D.1000204@skynet.be> <1Qt0yP-0AgQoi0@fwd00.aul.t-online.de> Message-ID: On 16 August 2011 10:54, Robert Frick wrote: > > Well, I am not making any suggestion has to how the law should actually be > applied. The law could mean > > 1. "There is no rectification as in A above for an established revoke if > there was a previous revoke in the same suit by the same player." > > or > > 2. "There is no rectification as in A above for an established revoke if > there was a previous established revoke in the same suit by the same > player." > #1 seems to me to be, as Robert suggests, the straightforward reading. This came up recently on another forum in relation to a different clause of 64B ("both sides have revoked on the same board"); those interested can find it at http://www.bridgebase.com/forums/topic/46987-established-revoke-followed-by-subsequent-opposing-revoke/. Regards, Sebastian. From grandaeval at tiscali.co.uk Tue Aug 16 10:50:42 2011 From: grandaeval at tiscali.co.uk (Grattan) Date: Tue, 16 Aug 2011 09:50:42 +0100 Subject: [BLML] Directors' Rights In-Reply-To: Message-ID: <82B0CD8B1FAC42138FAE0D4E970C29C8@Annette> Grattan wrote: > General Commentary #1. Of course, the lawbook itself cannot be changed until 2011 Cannot? Gordon Rainsford _______________________________________________ Blml mailing list Blml at rtflb.org http://lists.rtflb.org/mailman/listinfo/blml From ziffbridge at t-online.de Tue Aug 16 11:26:15 2011 From: ziffbridge at t-online.de (Matthias Berghaus) Date: Tue, 16 Aug 2011 11:26:15 +0200 Subject: [BLML] Directors' Rights In-Reply-To: <82B0CD8B1FAC42138FAE0D4E970C29C8@Annette> References: <82B0CD8B1FAC42138FAE0D4E970C29C8@Annette> Message-ID: <4E4A37B7.3000906@t-online.de> Am 16.08.2011 10:50, schrieb Grattan: > > > Grattan Skype: grattan.endicott > ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ > "A great deal of harm is being done > in the modern world by belief in the > virtuousness of work". > [Bertrand Russell] > ****************************************** > > +=+ To change a law by an online procedure > would require a proposal to be emailed to > the members of the WBF Laws Committee and > (a) receive and circulate for consideration > amendments if any, (b) then receive affirmative > votes from a majority of the committee for one > of the possible texts, (c) submit to and obtain > ratification of the Management Committee in > behalf of the Executive Council. Subject, of > course, to confirming my recollection that the > By-Laws do not require us to make our decisions > "in a meeting". > Now, I wonder how long this would take? > ~ Grattan ~ +=+ > 10 years? Best regards Matthias From bmeadows666 at gmail.com Tue Aug 16 12:12:09 2011 From: bmeadows666 at gmail.com (Brian) Date: Tue, 16 Aug 2011 06:12:09 -0400 Subject: [BLML] Directors' Rights In-Reply-To: <82B0CD8B1FAC42138FAE0D4E970C29C8@Annette> References: <82B0CD8B1FAC42138FAE0D4E970C29C8@Annette> Message-ID: <4E4A4279.2030108@gmail.com> On 08/16/2011 04:50 AM, Grattan wrote: > > > > +=+ To change a law by an online procedure > would require a proposal to be emailed to > the members of the WBF Laws Committee and > (a) receive and circulate for consideration > amendments if any, (b) then receive affirmative > votes from a majority of the committee for one > of the possible texts, (c) submit to and obtain > ratification of the Management Committee in > behalf of the Executive Council. Subject, of > course, to confirming my recollection that the > By-Laws do not require us to make our decisions > "in a meeting". > Now, I wonder how long this would take? Far longer than it ought to take, that's for certain. Brian. From ehaa at starpower.net Tue Aug 16 15:21:22 2011 From: ehaa at starpower.net (Eric Landau) Date: Tue, 16 Aug 2011 09:21:22 -0400 Subject: [BLML] Examples of Laws that might be wrong or might not In-Reply-To: References: <5F550235-6344-49A3-A56B-FBE33D124550@starpower.net> <37D06FE6-04A2-4D3A-B60B-601E0A7D678F@starpower.net> Message-ID: On Aug 15, 2011, at 8:40 PM, Robert Frick wrote: > On Mon, 15 Aug 2011 16:24:19 -0400, Eric Landau > wrote: > >> On Aug 15, 2011, at 11:54 AM, Robert Frick wrote: >> >>> Sorry to be unclear. Declarer made the first revoke, immediately >>> noticed >>> the problem, and immediately corrected it. So it was never >>> established. >> >> In that case, L64B2 simply doesn't apply. "There is no >> rectification... following an *established* revoke..." [L64B, >> emphasis mine]. > > Declarer's second revoke in the same suit was established. Only the > first > one was not. L64B2, read in full, refers to two separate revokes. "There is no rectification as in A above following an *established* revoke if *it* [the revoke being adjudicated] is a *subsequent* revoke in the same suit by the same player." Here we have a "subsequent" revoke which did *not* "follow[] an established revoke", so L64B2 does not apply. Eric Landau 1107 Dale Drive Silver Spring MD 20910 ehaa at starpower.net From axman22 at hotmail.com Tue Aug 16 21:55:01 2011 From: axman22 at hotmail.com (Roger Pewick) Date: Tue, 16 Aug 2011 14:55:01 -0500 Subject: [BLML] Examples of Laws that might be wrong or might not In-Reply-To: References: , <5F550235-6344-49A3-A56B-FBE33D124550@starpower.net>, , <37D06FE6-04A2-4D3A-B60B-601E0A7D678F@starpower.net>, , Message-ID: > From: ehaa at starpower.net > Date: Tue, 16 Aug 2011 09:21:22 -0400 > To: blml at rtflb.org > Subject: Re: [BLML] Examples of Laws that might be wrong or might not > > On Aug 15, 2011, at 8:40 PM, Robert Frick wrote: > > > On Mon, 15 Aug 2011 16:24:19 -0400, Eric Landau > > wrote: > > > >> On Aug 15, 2011, at 11:54 AM, Robert Frick wrote: > >> > >>> Sorry to be unclear. Declarer made the first revoke, immediately > >>> noticed > >>> the problem, and immediately corrected it. So it was never > >>> established. > >> > >> In that case, L64B2 simply doesn't apply. "There is no > >> rectification... following an *established* revoke..." [L64B, > >> emphasis mine]. > > > > Declarer's second revoke in the same suit was established. Only the > > first > > one was not. > > L64B2, read in full, refers to two separate revokes. "There is no > rectification as in A above following an *established* revoke if *it* > [the revoke being adjudicated] is a *subsequent* revoke in the same > suit by the same player." Here we have a "subsequent" revoke which > did *not* "follow[] an established revoke", so L64B2 does not apply. > > > Eric Landau > 1107 Dale Drive > Silver Spring MD 20910 > ehaa at starpower.net I suspect that this would be true if the law provides that the trick transfer had taken place prior to subsequent revokes; however, the law provides the very opposite: all trick transfer takes place at the end of the hand such that when a condition listed by L64B occurs, all matter of trick transfer thereby becomes mute. L64B, read in full. regards roger pewick -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://lists.rtflb.org/pipermail/blml/attachments/20110816/3a9353c9/attachment.html From petereidt at t-online.de Wed Aug 17 12:29:43 2011 From: petereidt at t-online.de (Peter Eidt) Date: Wed, 17 Aug 2011 12:29:43 +0200 Subject: [BLML] Law 51 A? Message-ID: <1QtdNY-18CQ6a0@fwd05.aul.t-online.de> Law 52 B2b: "When a defender has penalty cards in more than one suit and his partner is to lead, declarer may prohibit* the defender?s partner from leading one or more of such suits; the defender then picks up every penalty card in every suit prohibited by declarer and makes any legal play to the trick. The prohibition continues until the player loses the lead." The scenario: West has 13 penalty tricks (for whatever reason). North is declarer and East is on lead. TD is at the table and explains the law. Declarer forbids Spades, Hearts and Diamonds, so West picks up all cards but his 4 cards in Club . East leads a (small) Club. Does _any legal play_ in Law 52 B2b means that West may choose the Club to be played or are we still within Law 51 A, which means that declarer chooses the card? Kind regards, Peter From jfchevalier at ffbridge.net Wed Aug 17 13:33:32 2011 From: jfchevalier at ffbridge.net (=?UTF-8?B?SmVhbi1GcmFuw6dvaXMgQ2hldmFsaWVy?=) Date: Wed, 17 Aug 2011 13:33:32 +0200 Subject: [BLML] Law 51 A? In-Reply-To: <1QtdNY-18CQ6a0@fwd05.aul.t-online.de> References: <1QtdNY-18CQ6a0@fwd05.aul.t-online.de> Message-ID: <4E4BA70C.70704@ffbridge.net> An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://lists.rtflb.org/pipermail/blml/attachments/20110817/56ad67ad/attachment.html From ehaa at starpower.net Wed Aug 17 14:59:58 2011 From: ehaa at starpower.net (Eric Landau) Date: Wed, 17 Aug 2011 08:59:58 -0400 Subject: [BLML] Law 51 A? In-Reply-To: <1QtdNY-18CQ6a0@fwd05.aul.t-online.de> References: <1QtdNY-18CQ6a0@fwd05.aul.t-online.de> Message-ID: On Aug 17, 2011, at 6:29 AM, Peter Eidt wrote: > Law 52 B2b: > "When a defender has penalty cards in more than one suit and his > partner is to lead, declarer may prohibit* the defender?s partner from > leading one or more of such suits; the defender then picks up every > penalty card in every suit prohibited by declarer and makes any > legal play > to the trick. The prohibition continues until the player loses the > lead." > > The scenario: > West has 13 penalty tricks (for whatever reason). > North is declarer and East is on lead. > TD is at the table and explains the law. > > Declarer forbids Spades, Hearts and Diamonds, so > West picks up all cards but his 4 cards in Club . > East leads a (small) Club. > > Does _any legal play_ in Law 52 B2b means that West may choose > the Club to be played or are we still within Law 51 A, which means > that declarer chooses the card? Declarer may choose the card. L51B applies when East is on lead, and permits declarer to constrain East's actions. While it may affect West's penalty cards, it does not constrain his actions beyond his usual obligations regarding disposing of any remaining penalty cards. L51A applies subsequently, when it is West's turn to play. It is not affected by the fact that L51B may have constrained East's play half a trick ago. Eric Landau 1107 Dale Drive Silver Spring MD 20910 ehaa at starpower.net From Hermandw at skynet.be Wed Aug 17 15:29:16 2011 From: Hermandw at skynet.be (Herman De Wael) Date: Wed, 17 Aug 2011 15:29:16 +0200 Subject: [BLML] Law 51 A? In-Reply-To: References: <1QtdNY-18CQ6a0@fwd05.aul.t-online.de> Message-ID: <4E4BC22C.9040900@skynet.be> Yes, I agree with this. Look at it with a different choice: declarer bans only spades, defender van choose which of the three suits to lead, but declarer can then choose the particular card of that suit to contribute from the penalty cards. Eric Landau wrote: > On Aug 17, 2011, at 6:29 AM, Peter Eidt wrote: > >> Law 52 B2b: >> "When a defender has penalty cards in more than one suit and his >> partner is to lead, declarer may prohibit* the defender?s partner from > >> leading one or more of such suits; the defender then picks up every >> penalty card in every suit prohibited by declarer and makes any >> legal play >> to the trick. The prohibition continues until the player loses the >> lead." >> >> The scenario: >> West has 13 penalty tricks (for whatever reason). >> North is declarer and East is on lead. >> TD is at the table and explains the law. >> >> Declarer forbids Spades, Hearts and Diamonds, so >> West picks up all cards but his 4 cards in Club . >> East leads a (small) Club. >> >> Does _any legal play_ in Law 52 B2b means that West may choose >> the Club to be played or are we still within Law 51 A, which means >> that declarer chooses the card? > > Declarer may choose the card. L51B applies when East is on lead, and > permits declarer to constrain East's actions. While it may affect > West's penalty cards, it does not constrain his actions beyond his > usual obligations regarding disposing of any remaining penalty > cards. L51A applies subsequently, when it is West's turn to play. > It is not affected by the fact that L51B may have constrained East's > play half a trick ago. > > > Eric Landau > 1107 Dale Drive > Silver Spring MD 20910 > ehaa at starpower.net > > _______________________________________________ > Blml mailing list > Blml at rtflb.org > http://lists.rtflb.org/mailman/listinfo/blml > > > ----- > No virus found in this message. > Checked by AVG - www.avg.com > Version: 10.0.1392 / Virus Database: 1520/3839 - Release Date: 08/16/11 > > > -- Herman De Wael Wilrijk Antwerpen Belgium From vip at centrum.is Thu Aug 18 00:54:55 2011 From: vip at centrum.is (=?utf-8?Q?Vigf=C3=BAs_P=C3=A1lsson?=) Date: Wed, 17 Aug 2011 22:54:55 +0000 (GMT) Subject: [BLML] Law 70.C.2 In-Reply-To: <898709366.12530511313621497731.JavaMail.root@z-mbox-01.simnet.is> Message-ID: <768177546.12530831313621695468.JavaMail.root@z-mbox-01.simnet.is> is written... "it is at all likely that claimer at the time of his claim was unaware that a trump remained in an opponent?s hand, and" What does "AT ALL LIKELY" mean ? I translated this law to Icelandic, and I am not satisfied with my translation. For me, this means... If it is good possibility that claimer is not aware of a missing trump, etc... then I applay this law. What is a good possibility ? In my opinion = 50%+ ( and then how do we find out it is 50% + :) ) I have had to apply this law once, and when I did, I was pretty sure after having asked declarer, he had defenetly forgot about about the last missing trump. (in that case, my opinion 90%+) Greetings from Iceland Vigfus Palsson From richard.hills at immi.gov.au Thu Aug 18 03:57:42 2011 From: richard.hills at immi.gov.au (richard.hills at immi.gov.au) Date: Thu, 18 Aug 2011 11:57:42 +1000 Subject: [BLML] Law 70.C.2 [SEC=UNOFFICIAL] In-Reply-To: <768177546.12530831313621695468.JavaMail.root@z-mbox-01.simnet.is> Message-ID: Vigfus Palsson is written... "it is at all likely that claimer at the time of his claim was unaware that a trump remained in an opponent?s hand, and" What does "AT ALL LIKELY" mean ? I translated this law to Icelandic, and I am not satisfied with my translation. For me, this means... If it is good possibility that claimer is not aware of a missing trump, etc... then I apply this law. What is a good possibility ? In my opinion = 50%+ ( and then how do we find out it is 50% + :) ) I have had to apply this law once, and when I did, I was pretty sure after having asked declarer, he had definitely forgot about the last missing trump. (in that case, my opinion 90%+) Greetings from Iceland Richard Hills Welcome to blml Vigfus. Do you have any cats? The key to translating "at all likely" can be found in Law 70A -> " ... any doubtful point as to a claim shall be resolved against the claimer ... " Law 70C2 is currently written from the point of view of the opponents of the claimer -> When a trump remains in one of the opponents? hands, the Director shall award a trick or tricks to the opponents if: C1, and it is at all likely that claimer at the time of his claim was unaware that a trump remained in an opponent?s hand, and C3. But a mirror-image of Law 70C2 could be written from the point of view of the claimer, making this Law more obviously consistent with the word "doubtful" in Law 70A. Mirror-image Law 70C2 -> When a trump remains in one of the opponents? hands, the Director shall award a trick or tricks to the claimer if: C1, and/or it is beyond reasonable doubt that claimer at the time of his claim was fully aware that a trump remained in an opponent?s hand, and/or C3. And the Law 70C2 criterion "beyond reasonable doubt" is a much higher standard than the Law 85A "balance of probabilities" (50%+). Vigfus Palsson What is a good possibility ? In my opinion = 50%+ ( and then how do we find out it is 50% + :) ) Richard Hills For (non-claim) Law 85A disputed facts the first priority of the Director is to stop the players talking all at once and then collect all available evidence of what the problem is through orderly questions and answers. If the ruling can sensibly be deferred, the Director should do so, especially if the Director can gather further evidence away from the table (for example, by consulting a hand record or by polling kibitzing peers). The Director then weighs that evidence, thus coming to an informed judgement as to where the 50%+ balance of probabilities lies. As a backup to the Director's judgement an Appeals Committee can be convened upon the request of either side (on one occasion I nearly summoned an Appeals Committee because the Director's ruling was too favourable to my side, but fortunately this waste of time was not necessary as the Director reconsidered his initial erroneous ruling). Best wishes Richard Hills Specialist Recruitment Team, Recruitment Section Aqua 5, w/s W568, ph 6223 8453 DIAC Social Club movie ticket coordinator -------------------------------------------------------------------- Important Notice: If you have received this email by mistake, please advise the sender and delete the message and attachments immediately. This email, including attachments, may contain confidential, sensitive, legally privileged and/or copyright information. Any review, retransmission, dissemination or other use of this information by persons or entities other than the intended recipient is prohibited. DIAC respects your privacy and has obligations under the Privacy Act 1988. The official departmental privacy policy can be viewed on the department's website at www.immi.gov.au. See: http://www.immi.gov.au/functional/privacy.htm --------------------------------------------------------------------- -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://lists.rtflb.org/pipermail/blml/attachments/20110818/1cd3145e/attachment-0001.html From richard.hills at immi.gov.au Thu Aug 18 04:42:18 2011 From: richard.hills at immi.gov.au (richard.hills at immi.gov.au) Date: Thu, 18 Aug 2011 12:42:18 +1000 Subject: [BLML] Paul appealing [SEC=UNOFFICIAL] In-Reply-To: <4E43D5BB.8060108@ulb.ac.be> Message-ID: Paul Lamford [snip] The original TD decision was hopeless, and if he had ruled correctly and East-West had appealed, I think we might have retained their deposit. Richard Hills Perhaps poorly judged, but in my opinion not hopeless. EBU White Book clause 16.11 Law 16B: Unauthorised information from partner [WBFLC] A question about the meaning of a call (even of an alerted call) may provide unauthorised information to partner. For example, suppose a Stayman 2C response to 1NT is alerted in accordance with the regulations for the tournament and a player then asks its meaning. A partner of the enquirer who subsequently leads a club against an ensuing 3NT may well be called upon to demonstrate that he has a hand from which very few players would choose an opening lead in a different suit. The point is that it is not safe to assume that a question provides no unauthorised information just because it is about an alerted call. [WBFLC minutes 2001-10-30#8] Richard Hills Clause 16.11 advises that a question about Stayman demonstrably suggests length and strength in clubs, so perhaps the Director reasoned that a question about a 4C splinter bid also demonstrably suggests length and strength in clubs. This reasoning would be correct at the Canberra Bridge Club, where both Stayman and splinter bids are in universal use. But in a run-of-the-mill EBU tournament there are three different and popular meanings for 4C -- a splinter bid, the Gerber ace-ask, and the Swiss convention. Therefore there may well have been a bridge reason for the question, reducing the Director's ruling from an obvious application of clause 16.11 to a borderline (but in my opinion still justifiable) ruling. Hence I do not agree with "retained the deposit" had the Director ruled the other way. Alain Gottcheiner [snip] 1 - was the action suggested ? I claim that it can't be called so, and that the judgement of some is affected by the result, something which shouldn't be considered at this point. [snip] Richard Hills Yes, in general it is well known that -> a) People are biased in their decisions if they gain additional but irrelevant information, and b) People vociferously defend their own pet ideas or judgements But both of these points apply as much to Paul or Alain as they do to me. Ultimately the question at the heart of the stem case of this thread is not a matter of interpreting Law, but rather a matter of judgement. So we will have to agree to disagree. Alain Gottcheiner [snip] In your hesitation blackwood case, you're right, because the suggestion is obvious. Richard Hills Now this _is_ a matter of Law. The word "obvious" does not appear in Law 16B1(a). Rather the word is "demonstrably", and these two words are _not_ synonyms. If one starts with Euclid's axioms one can "demonstrate" the Pythagorean Theorem, but it is not "obvious" that the squaw on the hippopotamus equals the sons of the squaws on the other two hides. Best wishes Richard Hills Specialist Recruitment Team, Recruitment Section Aqua 5, w/s W568, ph 6223 8453 DIAC Social Club movie ticket coordinator -------------------------------------------------------------------- Important Notice: If you have received this email by mistake, please advise the sender and delete the message and attachments immediately. This email, including attachments, may contain confidential, sensitive, legally privileged and/or copyright information. Any review, retransmission, dissemination or other use of this information by persons or entities other than the intended recipient is prohibited. DIAC respects your privacy and has obligations under the Privacy Act 1988. The official departmental privacy policy can be viewed on the department's website at www.immi.gov.au. See: http://www.immi.gov.au/functional/privacy.htm --------------------------------------------------------------------- -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://lists.rtflb.org/pipermail/blml/attachments/20110818/193e0885/attachment.html From richard.hills at immi.gov.au Thu Aug 18 07:34:55 2011 From: richard.hills at immi.gov.au (richard.hills at immi.gov.au) Date: Thu, 18 Aug 2011 15:34:55 +1000 Subject: [BLML] Law 51 A? [SEC=UNOFFICIAL] In-Reply-To: <1QtdNY-18CQ6a0@fwd05.aul.t-online.de> Message-ID: Peter Eidt [snip] Does _any legal play_ in Law 51 B2b means that West may choose the Club to be played or are we still within Law 51 A, which means that declarer chooses the card? Richard Hills The wording in Law 51B2(b) is "any _legal_ play". A defender's failure to play a penalty card selected by the declarer is defined by Law 61A as a revoke, hence is _not_ a "legal play". A simpler way of arriving at the same conclusion comes from -> Eric Landau [snip] L51A applies subsequently, when it is West's turn to play. It is not affected by the fact that L51B may have constrained East's play half a trick ago. Richard Hills On the other hand, my personal opinion is that the 2019 version of Law 49 should read thusly -> Hypothetical 2019 Law 49 - Exposure of a Defender?s Cards Except in the normal course of play or application of law (see for example Law 47E), when a defender?s card is in a position in which the defender's partner could possibly see its face, or when a defender names a card as being in that defender's hand, each such card is withdrawn. Law 16D usually applies; but see the footnote to Law 68 when a defender has made a statement concerning an uncompleted trick currently in progress, and see Law 68B2 when partner objects to a defender?s concession. Consequently the hypothetical 2019 Laws 50 to 52 would be deleted. According to my (possibly incorrect) recollection, the WBF Chief Director who was the Greatest Of All Time was and maybe is supportive of mechanical revoke and penalty card rectifications. His argument was that it is the fault of the offending player for having a lapse in concentration. My argument is that penalty card rectifications are wildly variable and arbitrary, sometimes giving no advantage to the non-offending side, sometimes giving a ridiculously large windfall to the non-offending side, while an alternative Law 16D rectification would more often make the punish ment fit the crime. W.S. Gilbert, The Mikado My object all sublime I shall achieve in time-- To let the punishment fit the crime-- The punishment fit the crime; And make each prisoner pent Unwillingly represent A source of innocent merriment! Of innocent merriment! The bridge expert who any one catches, His doom's extremely hard-- He's made to dwell-- By the TD's bell With a pard who pulls the wrong card. And there he plays extravagant matches In heatless village halls On a cloth untrue With a twisted cue And elliptical bidding calls! -------------------------------------------------------------------- Important Notice: If you have received this email by mistake, please advise the sender and delete the message and attachments immediately. This email, including attachments, may contain confidential, sensitive, legally privileged and/or copyright information. Any review, retransmission, dissemination or other use of this information by persons or entities other than the intended recipient is prohibited. DIAC respects your privacy and has obligations under the Privacy Act 1988. The official departmental privacy policy can be viewed on the department's website at www.immi.gov.au. See: http://www.immi.gov.au/functional/privacy.htm --------------------------------------------------------------------- -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://lists.rtflb.org/pipermail/blml/attachments/20110818/1f8bd800/attachment.html From grandaeval at tiscali.co.uk Thu Aug 18 10:30:51 2011 From: grandaeval at tiscali.co.uk (Grattan) Date: Thu, 18 Aug 2011 09:30:51 +0100 Subject: [BLML] Law 70.C.2 [SEC=UNOFFICIAL] In-Reply-To: Message-ID: Grattan References: Message-ID: <1QuBhD-07HFFw0@fwd13.t-online.de> > Message: 2 > Date: Thu, 18 Aug 2011 15:34:55 +1000 > From: mailto:richard.hills at immi.gov.au > Subject: Re: [BLML] Law 51 A? [SEC=UNOFFICIAL] > To: "Bridge Laws Mailing List" > Message-ID: > > > Content-Type: text/plain; charset="utf-8" > > Peter Eidt > > [snip] > Does _any legal play_ in Law 51 B2b means that West may choose the Club to > be played or are we still within Law 51 A, which means that declarer > chooses the card? > > Richard Hills > > The wording in Law 51B2(b) is "any _legal_ play". A defender's failure to > play a penalty card selected by the declarer is defined by Law 61A as a > revoke, hence is _not_ a "legal play". Henning Bohnsack This wording "and makes any_legal_play to the trick" does not pave the way for declarer to select the card to be played by offender. It is exactly this wording which makes (me as) a reader believe, offender is in charge to make up his mind which card to play and, accordingly, make a play. Your interpretation that declarer selects a card means, that offender i s n o t in charge of any decision of his own and hence d o e s n o t make a play. To have a comprehensive wording, you ought to at least add a footnote, saying "?51 A. still applies." > > A simpler way of arriving at the same conclusion comes from -> > > Eric Landau > > [snip] > L51A applies subsequently, when it is West's turn to play. It is not > affected by the fact that L51B may have constrained East's play half a > trick ago. Henning Bohnsack This may be according to the "spirit" of the rules, but: "A applies subsequently after B has been applied" does neither work with logic nor runs the alphabet that way. If penalty cards survive 2019, pls don't forget that "51 A still applies" -footnote. > Richard Hills > > On the other hand, my personal opinion is that the 2019 version of Law 49 > should read thusly -> > > Hypothetical 2019 Law 49 - Exposure of a Defender?s Cards > > Except in the normal course of play or application of law (see for example > Law 47E), when a defender?s card is in a position in which the defender's > partner could possibly see its face, or when a defender names a card as > being in that defender's hand, each such card is withdrawn. Law 16D usually > applies; but see the footnote to Law 68 when a defender has made a > statement concerning an uncompleted trick currently in progress, and see > Law 68B2 when partner objects to a defender?s concession. > > Consequently the hypothetical 2019 Laws 50 to 52 would be deleted. > > According to my (possibly incorrect) recollection, the WBF Chief Director > who was the Greatest Of All Time was and maybe is supportive of mechanical > revoke and penalty card rectifications. His argument was that it is the > fault of the offending player for having a lapse in concentration. My > argument is that penalty card rectifications are wildly variable and > arbitrary, sometimes giving no advantage to the non-offending side, > sometimes giving a ridiculously large windfall to the non-offending side, > while an alternative Law 16D rectification would more often make the punish > ment fit the crime. > > W.S. Gilbert, The Mikado > > My object all sublime > I shall achieve in time-- > To let the punishment fit the crime-- > The punishment fit the crime; > And make each prisoner pent > Unwillingly represent > A source of innocent merriment! > Of innocent merriment! > > The bridge expert who any one catches, > His doom's extremely hard-- > He's made to dwell-- > By the TD's bell > With a pard who pulls the wrong card. > > And there he plays extravagant matches > In heatless village halls > On a cloth untrue > With a twisted cue > And elliptical bidding calls! > > -------------------------------------------------------------------- > Important Notice: If you have received this email by mistake, please advise > the sender and delete the message and attachments immediately. This email, > including attachments, may contain confidential, sensitive, legally privileged > and/or copyright information. Any review, retransmission, dissemination > or other use of this information by persons or entities other than the > intended recipient is prohibited. DIAC respects your privacy and has > obligations under the Privacy Act 1988. The official departmental privacy > policy can be viewed on the department's website at www.immi.gov.au. See: > http://www.immi.gov.au/functional/privacy.htm > > > --------------------------------------------------------------------- > > -------------- next part -------------- > An HTML attachment was scrubbed... > URL: http://lists.rtflb.org/pipermail/blml/attachments/20110818/1f8bd800/attachment-0001.html > > ------------------------------ > > Message: 3 > Date: Thu, 18 Aug 2011 09:30:51 +0100 > From: "Grattan" > Subject: Re: [BLML] Law 70.C.2 [SEC=UNOFFICIAL] > To: "'Bridge Laws Mailing List'" > Message-ID: > Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" > > > > > > Grattan > Skype: grattan.endicott > > ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ > > "A great deal of harm is being done > > in the modern world by belief in the > > virtuousness of work". > > [Bertrand Russell] > > ****************************************** > > +=+ The Director should deem something "at all > > likely" if he is of the opinion there is a reasonable > > possibility such was the case. The probability is > > not so remote as to make it unlikely in his mind. > > We are talking, perhaps, of something like an 18% > > probability or more in his judgement. Others may > > put the level slightly lower. > > 'At all' means 'to some extent' and the question > > for the Director is whether he recognizes that such a > > possibility exists in realistic terms. Others will set the > > level somewhat lower than 18%; it is a matter to be > > judged. > > ~ Grattan ~ +=+ > > ........................... > > > > > From: mailto:blml-bounces at rtflb.org [mailto:blml-bounces at rtflb.org] > > On Behalf Of mailto:richard.hills at immi.gov.au > Sent: 18 August 2011 02:58 > To: Bridge Laws Mailing List > Subject: Re: [BLML] Law 70.C.2 [SEC=UNOFFICIAL] > > > > Vigfus Palsson > > is written... > "it is at all likely that claimer at the time of his claim > > was unaware that a trump remained in an opponent's > > hand, and" > > What does "AT ALL LIKELY" mean ? I translated > > this law to Icelandic, and I am not satisfied with my translation. > > ------------------------------------------------- > > -------------- next part -------------- > An HTML attachment was scrubbed... > URL: http://lists.rtflb.org/pipermail/blml/attachments/20110818/dd71a883/attachment.html > > ------------------------------ > > _______________________________________________ > Blml mailing list > mailto:Blml at rtflb.org > http://lists.rtflb.org/mailman/listinfo/blml > > > End of Blml Digest, Vol 29, Issue 20 > ************************************ > -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://lists.rtflb.org/pipermail/blml/attachments/20110818/eb8a732e/attachment.html From rfrick at rfrick.info Fri Aug 19 02:10:26 2011 From: rfrick at rfrick.info (Robert Frick) Date: Thu, 18 Aug 2011 20:10:26 -0400 Subject: [BLML] Directors' Rights In-Reply-To: <82B0CD8B1FAC42138FAE0D4E970C29C8@Annette> References: <82B0CD8B1FAC42138FAE0D4E970C29C8@Annette> Message-ID: On Tue, 16 Aug 2011 04:50:42 -0400, Grattan wrote: > > > Grattan Skype: grattan.endicott > ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ > "A great deal of harm is being done > in the modern world by belief in the > virtuousness of work". > [Bertrand Russell] > ****************************************** > > +=+ To change a law by an online procedure > would require a proposal to be emailed to > the members of the WBF Laws Committee and > (a) receive and circulate for consideration > amendments if any, (b) then receive affirmative > votes from a majority of the committee for one > of the possible texts, (c) submit to and obtain > ratification of the Management Committee in > behalf of the Executive Council. Subject, of > course, to confirming my recollection that the > By-Laws do not require us to make our decisions > "in a meeting". > Now, I wonder how long this would take? Should proposals be batched in a group or suggested on by one? From swillner at nhcc.net Fri Aug 19 03:33:02 2011 From: swillner at nhcc.net (Steve Willner) Date: Thu, 18 Aug 2011 21:33:02 -0400 Subject: [BLML] Law 70.C.2 In-Reply-To: <768177546.12530831313621695468.JavaMail.root@z-mbox-01.simnet.is> References: <768177546.12530831313621695468.JavaMail.root@z-mbox-01.simnet.is> Message-ID: <4E4DBD4E.9040607@nhcc.net> On 8/17/2011 6:54 PM, Vigf?s P?lsson wrote: > "it is at all likely that claimer at the time of his claim was unaware that a > trump remained in an opponent's hand > > What does "AT ALL LIKELY" mean ? It's a fuzzy phrase to express a probability judgment. It's something lower than "likely" but higher than "possible." Compare "at all probable" in L12C1e(ii); I think the meanings are the same. Grattan's estimate of perhaps 20% is in range. The ACBL LC once defined "at all probable" as one chance in six, but they've since rescinded that and now offer no quantification so far as I am aware. Kaplan had several examples in his _Appeals Committee_ booklets. I don't know whether the booklets are still available. There's a lot in them that has been made obsolete by subsequent Laws revisions, but I don't think this part has changed. I think the real problem is that a probabilistic judgment isn't called for. A better question would be whether there's _reason to believe_ claimer was aware of outstanding trumps. If declarer starts with 8 trumps, sees both defenders follow to one round, and then claims, there's good reason to believe he is aware that some trumps might be out. On the other hand, a declarer who draws two rounds, plays on some other suits, and then claims gives the Director no reason to think he knows there's a trump or two still out unless he makes a statement. I think some RAs probably offer official guidance that applies within their jurisdiction, and also I think different customs prevail in different jurisdictions. In my experience, the ACBL generally takes a fairly hard line against claimers when there are trumps outstanding, but I gather other jurisdictions are more lenient. From swillner at nhcc.net Fri Aug 19 03:44:54 2011 From: swillner at nhcc.net (Steve Willner) Date: Thu, 18 Aug 2011 21:44:54 -0400 Subject: [BLML] Law 51 A? In-Reply-To: <4E4BC22C.9040900@skynet.be> References: <1QtdNY-18CQ6a0@fwd05.aul.t-online.de> <4E4BC22C.9040900@skynet.be> Message-ID: <4E4DC016.4000302@nhcc.net> When there were penalty cards in only one suit, L51B1b applies, and there's no problem. The defender on lead has been prohibited from leading (say) spades, and all the spade penalty cards are picked up. Normally the lead is some other suit, and any legal card can be played. In rare cases, leader has only spades, and again the player with the penalty cards can play anything. On 8/17/2011 9:29 AM, Herman De Wael wrote: > Look at it with a different choice: declarer bans only spades, defender > can choose which of the three suits to lead, but declarer can then > choose the particular card of that suit to contribute from the penalty > cards. I expect that's the Law writers intended that with L51B2b, but it's not so clear. The actual words are "the defender then picks up every penalty card in every suit prohibited by declarer" -- say spades in Herman's example, leaving heart penalty cards on the table -- "and makes any legal play to the trick." Let's say a heart is led. I guess Herman and others are interpreting "any legal play" as limited by L51A, i.e., only the card chosen by declarer is a legal play, but a cross reference would have made that clearer. From swillner at nhcc.net Fri Aug 19 03:50:22 2011 From: swillner at nhcc.net (Steve Willner) Date: Thu, 18 Aug 2011 21:50:22 -0400 Subject: [BLML] Examples of Laws that might be wrong or might not In-Reply-To: References: <5F550235-6344-49A3-A56B-FBE33D124550@starpower.net> <37D06FE6-04A2-4D3A-B60B-601E0A7D678F@starpower.net> Message-ID: <4E4DC15E.6040009@nhcc.net> [A corrected revoke followed by an established revoke by the same player in the same suit...] On 8/16/2011 9:21 AM, Eric Landau wrote: > L64B2, read in full, refers to two separate revokes. "There is no > rectification as in A above following an *established* revoke if *it* > [the revoke being adjudicated] is a *subsequent* revoke in the same > suit by the same player." Exactly. > Here we have a "subsequent" revoke which > did *not* "follow[] an established revoke", so L64B2 does not apply. The second revoke was established, and it was subsequent to the first revoke. The problem is that there is no requirement that the _first_ revoke has to have been established, though I'm sure that's what was intended. You can get around this by assuming that the first revoke no longer exists after it was corrected (or is canceled or words to that effect), but I don't see anything in the Laws text that actually says that. From richard.hills at immi.gov.au Fri Aug 19 05:54:40 2011 From: richard.hills at immi.gov.au (richard.hills at immi.gov.au) Date: Fri, 19 Aug 2011 13:54:40 +1000 Subject: [BLML] Examples of Laws that might be wrong or might not [SEC=UNOFFICIAL] In-Reply-To: <4E4DC15E.6040009@nhcc.net> Message-ID: Grattan Endicott +=+ I do not believe a revoke is a revoke after it has been corrected. At that stage it has become what was an attempted revoke. 'To correct' is 'to put right'. What is right is not wrong. ~ Grattan ~ +=+ Steve Willner [snip] You can get around this by assuming that the first revoke no longer exists after it was corrected (or is cancelled or words to that effect), but I don't see anything in the Laws text that actually says that. Something in the Laws text, the Definitions Withdrawn ? actions said to be ?withdrawn? include actions that are ?cancelled? and cards that are ?retracted?. Richard Hills A non-established revoke either later transmogrifies to an established revoke, or later transmogrifies to a corrected revoke. A corrected revoke necessarily requires a retracted revoke card, so hence is a withdrawn action. Ergo, "demonstrably" proven (not "obviously" suggested), Pythagoras -------------------------------------------------------------------- Important Notice: If you have received this email by mistake, please advise the sender and delete the message and attachments immediately. This email, including attachments, may contain confidential, sensitive, legally privileged and/or copyright information. Any review, retransmission, dissemination or other use of this information by persons or entities other than the intended recipient is prohibited. DIAC respects your privacy and has obligations under the Privacy Act 1988. The official departmental privacy policy can be viewed on the department's website at www.immi.gov.au. See: http://www.immi.gov.au/functional/privacy.htm --------------------------------------------------------------------- -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://lists.rtflb.org/pipermail/blml/attachments/20110819/e1ce8d0a/attachment.html From jsmillership at btinternet.com Fri Aug 19 11:44:00 2011 From: jsmillership at btinternet.com (Sandie Millership) Date: Fri, 19 Aug 2011 10:44:00 +0100 Subject: [BLML] Inattention Message-ID: <7B7BD1AA-AFBC-4E10-939F-0E02858A7490@btinternet.com> I was defending a 4 spade contract and held Q,J doubleton in spades. Declarer ruffed the opening C lead and called for a spade from dummy ( dummy held A,K,xx). Dummy played a small spade. Slightly bemused, I played my J and all followed. I started to lead a diamond ( my partner had bid those) when declarer called for " another large spade" from dummy. He then realised both the A & K were still there and said he had called for a large spade on the previous trick. How would you rule? Sandie Millership Sent from my iPad From petereidt at t-online.de Fri Aug 19 12:02:12 2011 From: petereidt at t-online.de (Peter Eidt) Date: Fri, 19 Aug 2011 12:02:12 +0200 Subject: [BLML] =?utf-8?q?Inattention?= In-Reply-To: <7B7BD1AA-AFBC-4E10-939F-0E02858A7490@btinternet.com> References: <7B7BD1AA-AFBC-4E10-939F-0E02858A7490@btinternet.com> Message-ID: <1QuLu0-0I1Wl60@fwd25.aul.t-online.de> Von: Sandie Millership > I was defending a 4 spade contract and held Q,J doubleton in spades. > Declarer ruffed the opening C lead and called for a spade from dummy ( > dummy held A,K,xx). Dummy played a small spade. Slightly bemused, I > played my J and all followed. I started to lead a diamond ( my partner > had bid those) when declarer called for " another large spade" from > dummy. He then realised both the A & K were still there and said he > had called for a large spade on the previous trick. > > How would you rule? It depends on the facts I can establish at the table. Assuming you gave us all the facts, declarer called for a "spade". This may have been an unintended designation as Law 45 C4b mentions it, and then after dummy laid the small spade in front of him, it is too late to change that designation. On the other hand it could be that declarer's intention was incontrovertible that he wanted to play a high / large spade. In that case Law 46 B "allows" declarer to change that card. Whether it really was incontrovertible is the task of the TD (me) at the table, taking body language etc into account. From vip at centrum.is Fri Aug 19 12:01:56 2011 From: vip at centrum.is (=?utf-8?Q?Vigf=C3=BAs_P=C3=A1lsson?=) Date: Fri, 19 Aug 2011 10:01:56 +0000 (GMT) Subject: [BLML] Inattention In-Reply-To: <1524947401.12700571313748083089.JavaMail.root@z-mbox-01.simnet.is> Message-ID: <1362902637.12700691313748116619.JavaMail.root@z-mbox-01.simnet.is> 46B2 is clear about the lovest card in the suit. But we have to consider the foreword of 46B. As you describe the happening, I would rule that low spade is played at trick 2. Law 46B2 Vigfus Palsson ----- Upprunalegt skeyti ----- Fr?: "Sandie Millership" Til: blml at rtflb.org Sent: F?studagur, 19. ?g?st, 2011 09:44:00 GMT +00:00 Monrovia Efni: [BLML] Inattention I was defending a 4 spade contract and held Q,J doubleton in spades. Declarer ruffed the opening C lead and called for a spade from dummy ( dummy held A,K,xx). Dummy played a small spade. Slightly bemused, I played my J and all followed. I started to lead a diamond ( my partner had bid those) when declarer called for " another large spade" from dummy. He then realised both the A & K were still there and said he had called for a large spade on the previous trick. How would you rule? Sandie Millership Sent from my iPad _______________________________________________ Blml mailing list Blml at rtflb.org http://lists.rtflb.org/mailman/listinfo/blml From anne.jones1 at ntlworld.com Fri Aug 19 12:13:22 2011 From: anne.jones1 at ntlworld.com (Anne Jones) Date: Fri, 19 Aug 2011 11:13:22 +0100 Subject: [BLML] Inattention References: <7B7BD1AA-AFBC-4E10-939F-0E02858A7490@btinternet.com> Message-ID: Dummy heard "a spade" you heard "a spade" I rule your J wins the trick. Anne ----- Original Message ----- From: "Sandie Millership" To: Sent: Friday, August 19, 2011 10:44 AM Subject: [BLML] Inattention >I was defending a 4 spade contract and held Q,J doubleton in spades. >Declarer ruffed the opening C lead and called for a spade from dummy ( >dummy held A,K,xx). Dummy played a small spade. Slightly bemused, I played >my J and all followed. I started to lead a diamond ( my partner had bid >those) when declarer called for " another large spade" from dummy. He then >realised both the A & K were still there and said he had called for a large >spade on the previous trick. > > How would you rule? > > Sandie Millership > > Sent from my iPad > _______________________________________________ > Blml mailing list > Blml at rtflb.org > http://lists.rtflb.org/mailman/listinfo/blml From agot at ulb.ac.be Fri Aug 19 12:14:18 2011 From: agot at ulb.ac.be (Alain Gottcheiner) Date: Fri, 19 Aug 2011 12:14:18 +0200 Subject: [BLML] Inattention In-Reply-To: <7B7BD1AA-AFBC-4E10-939F-0E02858A7490@btinternet.com> References: <7B7BD1AA-AFBC-4E10-939F-0E02858A7490@btinternet.com> Message-ID: <4E4E377A.5090902@ulb.ac.be> Le 19/08/2011 11:44, Sandie Millership a ?crit : > I was defending a 4 spade contract and held Q,J doubleton in spades. Declarer ruffed the opening C lead and called for a spade from dummy ( dummy held A,K,xx). Dummy played a small spade. Slightly bemused, I played my J and all followed. I started to lead a diamond ( my partner had bid those) when declarer called for " another large spade" from dummy. He then realised both the A& K were still there and said he had called for a large spade on the previous trick. > > How would you rule? > This is a matter of evidence, and it won't be easy to find. If declarer held 10 spades between both hands, I might well judge that his intention was "incontrovertibly" to play a high spade. But in most cases, if he in fact called "a spade", then he is deemed to have played a low one. Especially as "a large spade" is neither a standard way to nominate a card nor a standard shortcut. Apparently, dummy too heard "a spade", which is IMHO strong enough evidence. Best regards Alain From ehaa at starpower.net Fri Aug 19 15:34:08 2011 From: ehaa at starpower.net (Eric Landau) Date: Fri, 19 Aug 2011 09:34:08 -0400 Subject: [BLML] Inattention In-Reply-To: <7B7BD1AA-AFBC-4E10-939F-0E02858A7490@btinternet.com> References: <7B7BD1AA-AFBC-4E10-939F-0E02858A7490@btinternet.com> Message-ID: On Aug 19, 2011, at 5:44 AM, Sandie Millership wrote: > I was defending a 4 spade contract and held Q,J doubleton in > spades. Declarer ruffed the opening C lead and called for a spade > from dummy ( dummy held A,K,xx). Dummy played a small spade. > Slightly bemused, I played my J and all followed. I started to lead > a diamond ( my partner had bid those) when declarer called for " > another large spade" from dummy. He then realised both the A & K > were still there and said he had called for a large spade on the > previous trick. > > How would you rule? I would find that declarer did not explicitly specify a high spade, based on the three-to-one vote at the table. I would accept declarer's statement that he intended to call for a high one, and mis- called. That situation ("unintended designation" of a card to be played) is covered by L45C4(b) (per L47C for a call from dummy), which does not allow the called card to be corrected at this point. To be allowed to go back and play a high spade, declarer would, at minimum, have had to have spoken up before he followed to the trick. Eric Landau 1107 Dale Drive Silver Spring MD 20910 ehaa at starpower.net From Hermandw at skynet.be Fri Aug 19 18:24:23 2011 From: Hermandw at skynet.be (Herman De Wael) Date: Fri, 19 Aug 2011 18:24:23 +0200 Subject: [BLML] Inattention In-Reply-To: References: <7B7BD1AA-AFBC-4E10-939F-0E02858A7490@btinternet.com> Message-ID: <4E4E8E37.4050800@skynet.be> Eric Landau wrote: > On Aug 19, 2011, at 5:44 AM, Sandie Millership wrote: > > To be allowed to go back and play a high spade, declarer would, at > minimum, have had to have spoken up before he followed to the trick. > No, that part is not true. He needs to have spoken up as soon as he noticed the low spade was played. Which, as the story goes, he apparently did. The only point is whether he incontrovertibly wanted to play a high spade. There are many cases where this can be accepted, like the one Alain mentioned, with declarin side having 10 of them. -- Herman De Wael Wilrijk Antwerpen Belgium From grabiner at alumni.princeton.edu Sat Aug 20 01:56:45 2011 From: grabiner at alumni.princeton.edu (David Grabiner) Date: Fri, 19 Aug 2011 19:56:45 -0400 Subject: [BLML] Inattention In-Reply-To: <7B7BD1AA-AFBC-4E10-939F-0E02858A7490@btinternet.com> References: <7B7BD1AA-AFBC-4E10-939F-0E02858A7490@btinternet.com> Message-ID: <4051171470D64F5290DE7219979D0901@erdos> If I rule that declarer's intention was incontrovertible, then I would also rule that you can retract your play without penalty, and that the retracted card is UI to the declarer. (Even if you play the same card, the fact that you played the retracted card on a different lead is UI.) In particular, if declarer has T9xxx in hand, then it is not a rational play to play a low spade, and I might allow the SA lead to stand. However, declarer could then return to hand and run the ST, finessing against partner's potential queen. If declarer had led out the SA, you would be equally likely to play the SQ or SJ under it, so it would be almost 2-1 that partner has the SQ. But when declarer led low, you would win the SJ in order to help partner count the hand, so the QJ doubleton is more likely than stiff jack. This is UI to declarer, so I would rule in this situation that he is allowed to play the SA but must lose a subsequent finesse to the SQ if taking the spade finesse is a logical alternative play. ----- Original Message ----- From: "Sandie Millership" To: Sent: Friday, August 19, 2011 5:44 AM Subject: [BLML] Inattention >I was defending a 4 spade contract and held Q,J doubleton in spades. Declarer >ruffed the opening C lead and called for a spade from dummy ( dummy held >A,K,xx). Dummy played a small spade. Slightly bemused, I played my J and all >followed. I started to lead a diamond ( my partner had bid those) when declarer >called for " another large spade" from dummy. He then realised both the A & K >were still there and said he had called for a large spade on the previous >trick. > > How would you rule? > > Sandie Millership > > Sent from my iPad > _______________________________________________ > Blml mailing list > Blml at rtflb.org > http://lists.rtflb.org/mailman/listinfo/blml > From grandaeval at tiscali.co.uk Sat Aug 20 02:16:39 2011 From: grandaeval at tiscali.co.uk (Grattan) Date: Sat, 20 Aug 2011 01:16:39 +0100 Subject: [BLML] Directors' Rights In-Reply-To: Message-ID: Grattan wrote: > > > Grattan Skype: grattan.endicott > ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ > "A great deal of harm is being done > in the modern world by belief in the > virtuousness of work". > [Bertrand Russell] > ****************************************** > > +=+ To change a law by an online procedure > would require a proposal to be emailed to > the members of the WBF Laws Committee and > (a) receive and circulate for consideration > amendments if any, (b) then receive affirmative > votes from a majority of the committee for one > of the possible texts, (c) submit to and obtain > ratification of the Management Committee in > behalf of the Executive Council. Subject, of > course, to confirming my recollection that the > By-Laws do not require us to make our decisions > "in a meeting". > Now, I wonder how long this would take? Should proposals be batched in a group or suggested on by one? .............................................. +=+ In my expectation the committee would only follow this procedure if it were presented as a matter of urgent necessity. As. for example, if the President were to ask us to do something about it quickly. I do not envisage this as anything more than a wholly exceptional procedure so that multiple subjects is not a relevant question. ~ Grattan ~ +=+ From vip at centrum.is Sat Aug 20 02:59:26 2011 From: vip at centrum.is (=?utf-8?Q?Vigf=C3=BAs_P=C3=A1lsson?=) Date: Sat, 20 Aug 2011 00:59:26 +0000 (GMT) Subject: [BLML] Law 70.C.2 [SEC=UNOFFICIAL] In-Reply-To: <796539529.12792731313801913964.JavaMail.root@z-mbox-01.simnet.is> Message-ID: <1078517732.12792751313801966029.JavaMail.root@z-mbox-01.simnet.is> Thank you both for your reply. Now I have better understanding of the purpose of this law. But there is one problem... For us, the "None English speaking people", This law is not clear enough in understanding or applying. Can we, for the 2017 issue of the Bridge Laws, rewrite this law, so there will be less confution :) Vigfus Palsson Grattan< grandaeval at tiscali.co.uk Skype: grattan.endicott ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ "A great deal of harm is being done in the modern world by belief in the virtuousness of work". ?????????????????????? [Bertrand Russell] ****************************************** +=+ The Director should deem something ?at all likely? if he is of the opinion there is a reasonable possibility such was the case. The probability is not so remote as to make it unlikely in his mind. We are talking, perhaps, of something like an 18% probability or more in his judgement. Others may put the level slightly lower. ? ??????? ?At all? means ?to some extent? and the question for the Director is whether he recognizes that such a possibility exists in realistic terms.? Others will set the level somewhat lower than 18%; it is a matter to be judged. ???????????????????????????????? ~ Grattan ~??? +=+ ??????????????????????????. ? ??????????????? From: blml-bounces at rtflb.org [mailto:blml-bounces at rtflb.org] On Behalf Of richard.hills at immi.gov.au Sent: 18 August 2011 02:58 To: Bridge Laws Mailing List Subject: Re: [BLML] Law 70.C.2 [SEC=UNOFFICIAL] ? Vigfus Palsson is written... "it is at all likely that claimer at the time of his claim was unaware that a trump remained in an opponent?s hand, and" What does "AT ALL LIKELY" mean ? I translated this law to Icelandic, and I am not satisfied with my translation. ?------------------------------------------------- _______________________________________________ Blml mailing list Blml at rtflb.org http://lists.rtflb.org/mailman/listinfo/blml From vip at centrum.is Sat Aug 20 03:11:57 2011 From: vip at centrum.is (=?utf-8?Q?Vigf=C3=BAs_P=C3=A1lsson?=) Date: Sat, 20 Aug 2011 01:11:57 +0000 (GMT) Subject: [BLML] Law 12.C.1.b In-Reply-To: <316537895.12793011313802597271.JavaMail.root@z-mbox-01.simnet.is> Message-ID: <372711553.12793031313802717596.JavaMail.root@z-mbox-01.simnet.is> I have a problem here. In Icelandic, the translation of IRREGULARITY and INFRACTION is almost the same. But in law 12.C,1.b it is written. If, subsequent to the irregularity, the non-offending side has contributed to its own damage by a serious error (unrelated to the infraction) First there is written about IRREGULARITY, but then it is written what to do if damage is unrelated to the INFRACTION. In the Icelandic translation, I used the same word here, but is here a mistake in writing the laws, or is it done by purpose ? Greetings Vigfus Palsson From adam at irvine.com Sat Aug 20 03:20:04 2011 From: adam at irvine.com (Adam Beneschan) Date: Fri, 19 Aug 2011 18:20:04 -0700 Subject: [BLML] Law 12.C.1.b In-Reply-To: Your message of "Sat, 20 Aug 2011 01:11:57 -0000." <372711553.12793031313802717596.JavaMail.root@z-mbox-01.simnet.is> Message-ID: <20110820012009.8AC6CA8C85A@mailhub.irvine.com> Vigfus wrote: > I have a problem here. > In Icelandic, the translation of IRREGULARITY and INFRACTION is > almost the same. > > But in law 12.C,1.b it is written. > > If, subsequent to the irregularity, the non-offending side has > contributed to its own damage by a serious error (unrelated to the > infraction) > > First there is written about IRREGULARITY, but then it is written > what to do if damage is unrelated to the INFRACTION. > > In the Icelandic translation, I used the same word here, but is > here a mistake > in writing the laws, or is it done by purpose ? The Definitions defines the two terms: Infraction --- a player's breach of Law or of Lawful regulation. Irregularity --- a deviation from correct procedure inclusive of, but not limited to, those which involve an infraction by a player. So an infraction means breaking a rule. Every infraction is an irregularity, but there are irregularities that are *not* infractions (breaking a rule). However, I'll have to leave it to others to give examples of irregularities that are not infractions. Hopefully, with some examples, that will help you come up with a more accurate translation. -- Adam From grabiner at alumni.princeton.edu Sat Aug 20 04:38:02 2011 From: grabiner at alumni.princeton.edu (David Grabiner) Date: Fri, 19 Aug 2011 22:38:02 -0400 Subject: [BLML] Law 12.C.1.b In-Reply-To: <20110820012009.8AC6CA8C85A@mailhub.irvine.com> References: <20110820012009.8AC6CA8C85A@mailhub.irvine.com> Message-ID: <422A1427D38244C8B7D3AFABF167385A@erdos> "Adam Beneschan" wrote: > > Vigfus wrote: >> In the Icelandic translation, I used the same word here, but is >> here a mistake >> in writing the laws, or is it done by purpose ? > > The Definitions defines the two terms: > > Infraction --- a player's breach of Law or of Lawful regulation. > > Irregularity --- a deviation from correct procedure inclusive of, but > not limited to, those which involve an infraction by a player. > > So an infraction means breaking a rule. Every infraction is an > irregularity, but there are irregularities that are *not* > infractions (breaking a rule). However, I'll have to leave it to > others to give examples of irregularities that are not infractions. > Hopefully, with some examples, that will help you come up with a more > accurate translation. An irregularity need not be committed by a player. For example, a player might receive unathorized information about a board from a third party, or a board might be fouled, or the stickers might fall off Board 34 so that it appears to be marked as neither side vulnerable (rather than N-S vulnerable), or the director may direct a pair to the wrong table, or the director may rule an incorrect penalty. And an irregularity need not even involve anyone doing anything wrong. In one tournament, I was making boards in Flight B when the director asked whether a pair from Flight B would like to move to Flight A to remove a half table in both flights. My pair moved up, but we were seated at a table due to play the boards we had just made. From svenpran at online.no Sat Aug 20 09:46:50 2011 From: svenpran at online.no (Sven Pran) Date: Sat, 20 Aug 2011 09:46:50 +0200 Subject: [BLML] Law 12.C.1.b In-Reply-To: <372711553.12793031313802717596.JavaMail.root@z-mbox-01.simnet.is> References: <316537895.12793011313802597271.JavaMail.root@z-mbox-01.simnet.is> <372711553.12793031313802717596.JavaMail.root@z-mbox-01.simnet.is> Message-ID: <000001cc5f0d$52b3a420$f81aec60$@online.no> > Vigf?s P?lsson > I have a problem here. > In Icelandic, the translation of IRREGULARITY and INFRACTION is almost the > same. [Sven Pran] In the Norwegian laws we use the translations: "Regelbrudd" for Infraction and "Uregelmessighet" for Irregularity. I trust your knowledge of Nordic languages is sufficient so that this might help? As other have already noted: An infraction is always also an irregularity but an irregularity is not necessarily an infraction. regards From rfrick at rfrick.info Sun Aug 21 04:28:02 2011 From: rfrick at rfrick.info (Robert Frick) Date: Sat, 20 Aug 2011 22:28:02 -0400 Subject: [BLML] Directors' Rights In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: On Fri, 19 Aug 2011 20:16:39 -0400, Grattan wrote: > > > Grattan Skype: grattan.endicott > ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ > "A great deal of harm is being done > in the modern world by belief in the > virtuousness of work". > [Bertrand Russell] > ****************************************** > > -----Original Message----- > From: blml-bounces at rtflb.org [mailto:blml-bounces at rtflb.org] On Behalf > Of Robert Frick > Sent: 19 August 2011 01:10 > To: Bridge Laws Mailing List > Subject: Re: [BLML] Directors' Rights > > On Tue, 16 Aug 2011 04:50:42 -0400, Grattan > wrote: > >> >> >> Grattan> Skype: grattan.endicott >> ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ >> "A great deal of harm is being done >> in the modern world by belief in the >> virtuousness of work". >> [Bertrand Russell] >> ****************************************** >> >> +=+ To change a law by an online procedure >> would require a proposal to be emailed to >> the members of the WBF Laws Committee and >> (a) receive and circulate for consideration >> amendments if any, (b) then receive affirmative >> votes from a majority of the committee for one >> of the possible texts, (c) submit to and obtain >> ratification of the Management Committee in >> behalf of the Executive Council. Subject, of >> course, to confirming my recollection that the >> By-Laws do not require us to make our decisions >> "in a meeting". >> Now, I wonder how long this would take? > > Should proposals be batched in a group or > suggested on by one? > .............................................. > +=+ In my expectation the committee would only > follow this procedure if it were presented as > a matter of urgent necessity. As. for example, > if the President were to ask us to do something > about it quickly. > I do not envisage this as anything more than > a wholly exceptional procedure so that multiple > subjects is not a relevant question. > ~ Grattan ~ +=+ > I am guessing that the bridge laws never have urgent necessity. Or, if I imagine what would be an urgent necessity, no one treats them as that. And it would be odd to have such a slow procedure constructed to handle urgent situations. Meanwhile, isn't this a much better procedure than the the current one? It seems to allow careful thought and consideration to changes in the laws. Why not use it anyway? From ehaa at starpower.net Sun Aug 21 18:59:36 2011 From: ehaa at starpower.net (Eric Landau) Date: Sun, 21 Aug 2011 12:59:36 -0400 Subject: [BLML] Law 12.C.1.b In-Reply-To: <20110820012009.8AC6CA8C85A@mailhub.irvine.com> References: <20110820012009.8AC6CA8C85A@mailhub.irvine.com> Message-ID: On Aug 19, 2011, at 9:20 PM, Adam Beneschan wrote: > Vigfus wrote: > >> I have a problem here. >> In Icelandic, the translation of IRREGULARITY and INFRACTION is >> almost the same. >> >> But in law 12.C,1.b it is written. >> >> If, subsequent to the irregularity, the non-offending side has >> contributed to its own damage by a serious error (unrelated to the >> infraction) >> >> First there is written about IRREGULARITY, but then it is written >> what to do if damage is unrelated to the INFRACTION. >> >> In the Icelandic translation, I used the same word here, but is >> here a mistake >> in writing the laws, or is it done by purpose ? > > The Definitions defines the two terms: > > Infraction --- a player's breach of Law or of Lawful regulation. > > Irregularity --- a deviation from correct procedure inclusive of, but > not limited to, those which involve an infraction by a player. > > So an infraction means breaking a rule. Every infraction is an > irregularity, but there are irregularities that are *not* > infractions (breaking a rule). However, I'll have to leave it to > others to give examples of irregularities that are not infractions. > Hopefully, with some examples, that will help you come up with a more > accurate translation. You lead small from hand towards the KQx in dummy, LHO plays small and you put up an honor. RHO thinks for 20 seconds, then plays small. If he has the ace, he has committed an irregularity, which is not an infraction, but may constrain his partner's future actions, per L16B. If he doesn't have the ace, it's an infraction, per L73B2, subject to score adjustment and potential disciplinary penalty. Eric Landau 1107 Dale Drive Silver Spring MD 20910 ehaa at starpower.net From rfrick at rfrick.info Sun Aug 21 19:44:17 2011 From: rfrick at rfrick.info (Robert Frick) Date: Sun, 21 Aug 2011 13:44:17 -0400 Subject: [BLML] L70 Message-ID: This is my best attempt to clarify L70's implicit "The stated line of play should be followed until..." The brackets ([]) refer to a known point of disagreement. To me, the question is whether L70E applies to the stated line of play. ----------------------------------- The claimer's indicated line of play should be followed until: 1. It "goes off the track": A trick is unexpectedly won by the the opponents; a trick is unexpectedly won in the wrong hand; opponents play an unexpected card obviously derailing the claimer's plan. 2. It specifies an infraction (a revoke or lead from the wrong hand). 3. The correction of an unestablished revoke after the claim suggests a change in the play. [4. In the course of the stated play, claimer would receive obvious information clearly suggesting a different line of play.] When the indicated line of play cannot be followed (for the above reasons or because it is ambiguous, but not Reason #3) Laws 70C and 70D [and 70E] apply. ----------------------- Commentary/Rationale 1. Suppose a player claims with a high trump and an outside ace, states that no trump are out, states that it makes no difference in which order the cards are played, but adds that he will play the trump first. If there is a trump out, all the conditions are met for losing a trick via L70C -- we do not let him play the trump first even though he said he would. Meanwhile, nothing in the laws says that claimer's stated line of play is followed. Probably no one would actually follow the law on this point. But the law still should be changed so that it is correct. 2. Declarer claims, saying he will place the ace of hearts (from A2) then lead a heart to the K of hearts (The dummy starts with KQJ93) and run the hearts. Had declarer played out the hand, he would have observed RHO showing out on hearts, allowing a safe heart finesse on the second round. IMO, there is a lot to be said for not allowing the finesse. The finesse is justified by L70E, but it is odd to have L70E apply to the clearly indicated line of play when L70C and L70D do not. Should the director be noticing for claimer that a player has showed out and that the finesse is now safe. But some people think the finesse should be allowed. I don't particularly care which is selected, but I would like this clarified. In the same category, declarer thinks his hearts are good and plans on pitching his queen of diamonds. In fact, RHO is squeezed and has to jettison the king of diamonds, making the queen good. Do we allow declarer to pitch a heart and keep the now-good king of diamonds? 3. Declarer says he is running the clubs on the board to take the remaining trick. If RHO trumps, or has a higher club, do we let declarer respond to this new information? In a way, the hand goes "off the tracks" when the expected winner is seen not to be a winner. I am guessing we allow declarer to overtrump, hence the phrase "opponents play an unexpected card obviously derailing the claimer's plan". 4. "It specifies an infraction (a revoke or lead from the wrong hand)." This is from a WBFLC minute. The correction of a lead from the wrong hand does not seem very popular, especially when the claim starts this way. 5. "The correction of an unestablished revoke after the claim suggests a change in the play." This is the best sense the bridge laws mailing list could make of the last WBFLC minute on this topic. The claimer may change the started line of play to reflect new information arising from the correction of the irregularity, but not using information arising from the dispute of the claim (e.g., that a trump is out). From rfrick at rfrick.info Sun Aug 21 19:45:56 2011 From: rfrick at rfrick.info (Robert Frick) Date: Sun, 21 Aug 2011 13:45:56 -0400 Subject: [BLML] L64B Message-ID: PRELUDE: Declarer revokes in a suit, then corrects his revoke before it becomes established. Declarer later revokes again in the same suit. This becomes an established revoke. (There is no effect on play. Is there a 1 trick penalty? Most people think yes, the unestablished revoke does not protect declarer. The laws say the opposite. Law 64B(2). "If the same player previously made an established revoke in the same suit. Law 64C may apply. Law 64B(7) when both sides have revoked on the same board (and both revokes would otherwise be eligible for an L64A correction) --------------------------------------------- COMMENTS 1. The laws are, PRESUMABLY, wrong. If they are right, I request a WBFLC clarification; most people, including people who should know, think the law is wrong and the above is the correct interpretation. 2. Problems with leaving the law the way it is include that directors or committees can become uncertain as to the correct ruling or even make the wrong ruling. If the director makes the right ruling, he cannot use the lawbook as support for his ruling. (It should be a basic right of directors that the lawbook supports their lawful rulings.) 3. The clarification of L64B7 is written in an awkward way to cover both unestablished revokes and revokes on the 12th trick. This seems likely to be what the laws intended. From richard.hills at immi.gov.au Sun Aug 21 23:59:54 2011 From: richard.hills at immi.gov.au (richard.hills at immi.gov.au) Date: Mon, 22 Aug 2011 07:59:54 +1000 Subject: [BLML] Law 12.C.1.b [SEC=UNOFFICIAL] In-Reply-To: Message-ID: Douglas Adams Human beings, who are unique in having the ability to learn from the experience of others, are also remarkable for their apparent disinclination to do so. Eric Landau You lead small from hand towards the KQx in dummy, LHO plays small and you put up an honor. RHO thinks for 20 seconds, then plays small. If he has the ace, he has committed an irregularity, which is not an infraction, but may constrain his partner's future actions, per L16B. [snip] Richard Hills A very interesting example from Eric. There is a universal consensus on interpreting the Definitions' definitions of "irregularity" and "infraction" in these two ways -> 1) An infraction committed by a player is necessarily an irregularity. 2) An irregularity is not necessarily an infraction. But it is obvious that Eric does not support my further interpretation -> 3) An irregularity committed by a player is necessarily an infraction. For what it is worth, in Eric's example I would argue that neither an irregularity nor an infraction have yet occurred. To repeat my favourite saying of WBF Chief Director Max Bavin, "Bridge is a thinking game". Thus I would argue that having a bridge reason for restricting pard's future Law 16B logical alternatives is fully consistent with -> Law 72A - General Principles - Observance of Laws Duplicate bridge tournaments should be played in strict accordance with the Laws. The chief object is to obtain a higher score than other contestants whilst complying with the lawful procedures and ethical standards set out in these laws. Best wishes, Richard Hills Specialist Recruitment Team, Recruitment Section Aqua 5, w/s W568, ph 6223 8453 DIAC Social Club movie ticket coordinator -------------------------------------------------------------------- Important Notice: If you have received this email by mistake, please advise the sender and delete the message and attachments immediately. This email, including attachments, may contain confidential, sensitive, legally privileged and/or copyright information. Any review, retransmission, dissemination or other use of this information by persons or entities other than the intended recipient is prohibited. DIAC respects your privacy and has obligations under the Privacy Act 1988. The official departmental privacy policy can be viewed on the department's website at www.immi.gov.au. See: http://www.immi.gov.au/functional/privacy.htm --------------------------------------------------------------------- -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://lists.rtflb.org/pipermail/blml/attachments/20110821/1fbbf23d/attachment.html From richard.hills at immi.gov.au Mon Aug 22 00:37:30 2011 From: richard.hills at immi.gov.au (richard.hills at immi.gov.au) Date: Mon, 22 Aug 2011 08:37:30 +1000 Subject: [BLML] Inattention [SEC=UNOFFICIAL] In-Reply-To: <4E4E8E37.4050800@skynet.be> Message-ID: Ralph Waldo Emerson All the thoughts of a turtle are turtle. Eric Landau [snip] To be allowed to go back and play a high spade, declarer would, at minimum, have had to have spoken up before he followed to the trick. Herman De Wael No, that part is not true. He needs to have spoken up as soon as he noticed the low spade was played. Which, as the story goes, he apparently did. [snip] Richard Hills No, that part is not true. Herman is demonstrably wrong and Eric is demonstrably correct. Whether or not declarer calling a low spade from dummy was corrected without pause for thought, there is a time limit imposed. A Law 25A correction of an unintended call must be done BEFORE partner subsequently calls. Likewise, a Law 47C / Law 45C4(b) correction of an unintended card must be done BEFORE partner plays. And declarer is dummy's partner. Quibble: In an old thread about another cardplay Law some years ago, a fourth blmler argued that because declarer played dummy's cards therefore declarer did not have a partner for cardplay purposes. Best wishes, Richard Hills Specialist Recruitment Team, Recruitment Section Aqua 5, w/s W568, ph 6223 8453 DIAC Social Club movie ticket coordinator -------------------------------------------------------------------- Important Notice: If you have received this email by mistake, please advise the sender and delete the message and attachments immediately. This email, including attachments, may contain confidential, sensitive, legally privileged and/or copyright information. Any review, retransmission, dissemination or other use of this information by persons or entities other than the intended recipient is prohibited. DIAC respects your privacy and has obligations under the Privacy Act 1988. The official departmental privacy policy can be viewed on the department's website at www.immi.gov.au. See: http://www.immi.gov.au/functional/privacy.htm --------------------------------------------------------------------- -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://lists.rtflb.org/pipermail/blml/attachments/20110821/f9c4231b/attachment-0001.html From richard.hills at immi.gov.au Mon Aug 22 02:06:03 2011 From: richard.hills at immi.gov.au (richard.hills at immi.gov.au) Date: Mon, 22 Aug 2011 10:06:03 +1000 Subject: [BLML] Law 45D [SEC=UNOFFICIAL] Message-ID: Law 45D - Card Misplayed by Dummy If dummy places in the played position a card that declarer did not name, the card must be withdrawn if attention is drawn to it before each side has played to the next trick, and a defender may withdraw and return to his hand a card played after the error but before attention was drawn to it; if declarer?s RHO changes his play, declarer may withdraw a card he had subsequently played to that trick. (See Law 16D.) In the parallel "Inattention" thread, a key point is whether declarer unintentionally called for a card from dummy (in which case declarer is doomed to despondency by having followed to dummy's card), or whether "declarer's different intention is incontrovertible" (Law 46B) thus causing Law 45D to apply. Suppose we modify the original "Inattention" case to a hypothetical case where -> (a) declarer named, "a low trump", but simultaneously, (b) declarer pointed to dummy's ace of trumps, and furthermore, (c) playing the ace of trumps was the only logical alternative. If in this hypothetical case dummy then played the low trump that declarer did name, dummy has acted consistently with the actual words of Law 45D. But I would argue that the actual words of Law 45D are over-ruled by the Law 46B "incontrovertible", hence dummy has in this hypothetical case now infracted Law 45D. The Definitions state that the Law 25A / Law 45C4(b) word "unintended" should be defined as "involuntary; not under control of the will; not the intention of the player at the moment of his action". Pocket Oxford Dictionary incontrovertible, a. Indisputable It seems to me that a higher standard of evidence is required for the Director to rule "incontrovertible", and a lower standard of evidence is required for the Director to rule "unintended". My personal rule of thumb as a Director would be to define incontrovertible as "obvious to the other three players at the table" and to define unintended as "obvious in the mind of declarer". Best wishes, Richard Hills Specialist Recruitment Team, Recruitment Section Aqua 5, w/s W568, ph 6223 8453 DIAC Social Club movie ticket coordinator -------------------------------------------------------------------- Important Notice: If you have received this email by mistake, please advise the sender and delete the message and attachments immediately. This email, including attachments, may contain confidential, sensitive, legally privileged and/or copyright information. Any review, retransmission, dissemination or other use of this information by persons or entities other than the intended recipient is prohibited. DIAC respects your privacy and has obligations under the Privacy Act 1988. The official departmental privacy policy can be viewed on the department's website at www.immi.gov.au. See: http://www.immi.gov.au/functional/privacy.htm --------------------------------------------------------------------- -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://lists.rtflb.org/pipermail/blml/attachments/20110822/03bcb927/attachment.html From harald.skjaran at gmail.com Mon Aug 22 07:59:34 2011 From: harald.skjaran at gmail.com (=?UTF-8?Q?Harald_Skj=C3=A6ran?=) Date: Mon, 22 Aug 2011 07:59:34 +0200 Subject: [BLML] L64B In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: 2011/8/21 Robert Frick : > PRELUDE: Declarer revokes in a suit, then corrects his revoke before it > becomes established. Declarer later revokes again in the same suit. This > becomes an established revoke. (There is no effect on play. Is there a 1 > trick penalty? Most people think yes, the unestablished revoke does not > protect declarer. The laws say the opposite. You're wrong. The laws say no such thing. What's a revoke? Please read the definition of a revoke i L61A. When an unestablished revoke has been corrected, you've followed suit. Ergo, there's no revoke (anymore). It's desireable to correct errors or holes in the laws, but there's no need to go on about non-existing ones. > > > Law 64B(2). "If the same player previously made an established revoke in > the same suit. Law 64C may apply. > > Law 64B(7) when both sides have revoked on the same board (and both > revokes would otherwise be eligible for an L64A correction) > > > --------------------------------------------- > COMMENTS > > 1. The laws are, PRESUMABLY, wrong. If they are right, I request a WBFLC > clarification; most people, including people who should know, think the > law is wrong and the above is the correct interpretation. See above. > > 2. Problems with leaving the law the way it is include that directors or > committees can become uncertain as to the correct ruling or even make the > wrong ruling. If the director makes the right ruling, he cannot use the > lawbook as support for his ruling. (It should be a basic right of > directors that the lawbook supports their lawful rulings.) > > 3. The clarification of L64B7 is written in an awkward way to cover both > unestablished revokes and revokes on the 12th trick. This seems likely to > be what the laws intended. L64B7 is clear an unambigous. > _______________________________________________ > Blml mailing list > Blml at rtflb.org > http://lists.rtflb.org/mailman/listinfo/blml > -- Kind regards, Harald Skj?ran From koen.grauwels at oracle.com Mon Aug 22 07:59:56 2011 From: koen.grauwels at oracle.com (koen.grauwels at oracle.com) Date: Sun, 21 Aug 2011 22:59:56 -0700 (PDT) Subject: [BLML] Auto Reply: Re: L64B Message-ID: Hello, Thank you for your mail. I'm on Holiday until 31-Aug-11 and will be unable to respond to your mail before that date. Regards, Koen From hermandw2610 at gmail.com Mon Aug 22 09:22:43 2011 From: hermandw2610 at gmail.com (Herman De Wael) Date: Mon, 22 Aug 2011 09:22:43 +0200 Subject: [BLML] Law 45D [SEC=UNOFFICIAL] In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: richard.hills at immi.gov.au wrote: > > Eric Landau > > [snip] > To be allowed to go back and play a high spade, declarer would, at > minimum, have had to have spoken up before he followed to the trick. > > Herman De Wael > > No, that part is not true. He needs to have spoken up as soon as he > noticed the low spade was played. Which, as the story goes, he > apparently did. > [snip] > > Richard Hills > > No, that part is not true. Herman is demonstrably wrong and Eric is > demonstrably correct. Whether or not declarer calling a low spade from > dummy was corrected without pause for thought, there is a time limit > imposed. A Law 25A correction of an unintended call must be done BEFORE > partner subsequently calls. Likewise, a Law 47C / Law 45C4(b) correction > of an unintended card must be done BEFORE partner plays. And declarer is > dummy's partner. > Poppycock. L25A does not apply to cards being played. To insist that it does goes against hte reason for L25A being the way it is. Before 1987, L25A did not have the time limit it now has. which meant I once changed an inadvertent call after dummy had come down. Which obviously leads to more problems than are solved, hence the time limit imposed after 1987. L47 explicitely allows declarer to change his card if his RHO changes his, which must mean that he can change dummy's card even after he has played his. Herman (sent from the World Junior Congress in Opatija, Croatia) From koen.grauwels at oracle.com Mon Aug 22 09:23:56 2011 From: koen.grauwels at oracle.com (koen.grauwels at oracle.com) Date: Mon, 22 Aug 2011 00:23:56 -0700 (PDT) Subject: [BLML] Auto Reply: Re: Law 45D [SEC=UNOFFICIAL] Message-ID: Hello, Thank you for your mail. I'm on Holiday until 31-Aug-11 and will be unable to respond to your mail before that date. Regards, Koen From grandaeval at tiscali.co.uk Mon Aug 22 12:38:32 2011 From: grandaeval at tiscali.co.uk (Grattan) Date: Mon, 22 Aug 2011 11:38:32 +0100 Subject: [BLML] Law 45D [SEC=UNOFFICIAL] In-Reply-To: Message-ID: <133717E46A3D491186EA358E826D30B4@Annette> Grattan > Eric Landau > > [snip] > To be allowed to go back and play a high spade, declarer would, at > minimum, have had to have spoken up before he followed to the trick. > > Herman De Wael > > No, that part is not true. He needs to have spoken up as soon as he > noticed the low spade was played. Which, as the story goes, he > apparently did. > [snip] > > Richard Hills > > No, that part is not true. Herman is demonstrably wrong and Eric is > demonstrably correct. Whether or not declarer calling a low spade from > dummy was corrected without pause for thought, there is a time limit > imposed. A Law 25A correction of an unintended call must be done BEFORE > partner subsequently calls. Likewise, a Law 47C / Law 45C4(b) correction > of an unintended card must be done BEFORE partner plays. And declarer is > dummy's partner. > Poppycock. L25A does not apply to cards being played. To insist that it does goes against hte reason for L25A being the way it is. Before 1987, L25A did not have the time limit it now has. which meant I once changed an inadvertent call after dummy had come down. Which obviously leads to more problems than are solved, hence the time limit imposed after 1987. L47 explicitely allows declarer to change his card if his RHO changes his, which must mean that he can change dummy's card even after he has played his. Herman (sent from the World Junior Congress in Opatija, Croatia) _______________________________________________ Blml mailing list Blml at rtflb.org http://lists.rtflb.org/mailman/listinfo/blml From agot at ulb.ac.be Mon Aug 22 13:35:17 2011 From: agot at ulb.ac.be (Alain Gottcheiner) Date: Mon, 22 Aug 2011 13:35:17 +0200 Subject: [BLML] Inattention [SEC=UNOFFICIAL] In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <4E523EF5.9030508@ulb.ac.be> Le 22/08/2011 0:37, richard.hills at immi.gov.au a ?crit : > > Ralph Waldo Emerson > > All the thoughts of a turtle are turtle. > > Eric Landau > > [snip] > To be allowed to go back and play a high spade, declarer would, at > minimum, have had to have spoken up before he followed to the trick. > > Herman De Wael > > No, that part is not true. He needs to have spoken up as soon as he > noticed the low spade was played. Which, as the story goes, he > apparently did. > [snip] > > Richard Hills > > No, that part is not true. Herman is demonstrably wrong and Eric is > demonstrably correct. Whether or not declarer calling a low spade from > dummy was corrected without pause for thought, there is a time limit > imposed. A Law 25A correction of an unintended call must be done > BEFORE partner subsequently calls. Likewise, a Law 47C / Law 45C4(b) > correction of an unintended card must be done BEFORE partner plays. > And declarer is dummy's partner. > AG : I beg to differ. As the card was played from dummy, the partner who must not have played thereafter is declarer. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://lists.rtflb.org/pipermail/blml/attachments/20110822/02cb036b/attachment.html From petereidt at t-online.de Mon Aug 22 14:26:47 2011 From: petereidt at t-online.de (Peter Eidt) Date: Mon, 22 Aug 2011 14:26:47 +0200 Subject: [BLML] =?utf-8?q?Inattention_=5BSEC=3DUNOFFICIAL=5D?= In-Reply-To: <4E523EF5.9030508@ulb.ac.be> References: <4E523EF5.9030508@ulb.ac.be> Message-ID: <1QvTaZ-1bM9ce0@fwd07.aul.t-online.de> > Eric Landau > > [snip] > To be allowed to go back and play a high spade, > declarer would, at minimum, have had to have spoken up > before he followed to the trick. > > Herman De Wael > > No, that part is not true. He needs to have spoken up as > soon as he noticed the low spade was played. Which, as the > story goes, he apparently did. > [snip] > > Richard Hills > > No, that part is not true. Herman is demonstrably > wrong and Eric is demonstrably correct. Whether or not > declarer calling a low spade from dummy was corrected > without pause for thought, there is a time limit imposed. A > Law 25A correction of an unintended call must be done BEFORE > partner subsequently calls. Likewise, a Law 47C / Law > 45C4(b) correction of an unintended card must be done BEFORE > partner plays. And declarer is dummy's partner. > > AG : I beg to differ. As the card was played from dummy, the > partner who must not have played thereafter is declarer. Peter Eidt I beg to disagree. Law 45 C4b: "Until his partner has played a card a player may change an unintended designation if he does so without pause for thought. [...]" For the purpose of declarer designating a card from dummy "his" and "a player" and "he" refers to declarer, while "his partner" refers to dummy. So, in the moment dummy takes the designated card and puts it into a played position the time limit for changing that (designated) card is expired. From agot at ulb.ac.be Mon Aug 22 14:44:14 2011 From: agot at ulb.ac.be (Alain Gottcheiner) Date: Mon, 22 Aug 2011 14:44:14 +0200 Subject: [BLML] Inattention [SEC=UNOFFICIAL] In-Reply-To: <1QvTaZ-1bM9ce0@fwd07.aul.t-online.de> References: <4E523EF5.9030508@ulb.ac.be> <1QvTaZ-1bM9ce0@fwd07.aul.t-online.de> Message-ID: <4E524F1E.8020009@ulb.ac.be> Le 22/08/2011 14:26, Peter Eidt a ?crit : >> Eric Landau >> >> [snip] >> To be allowed to go back and play a high spade, >> declarer would, at minimum, have had to have spoken up >> before he followed to the trick. >> >> Herman De Wael >> >> No, that part is not true. He needs to have spoken up as >> soon as he noticed the low spade was played. Which, as the >> story goes, he apparently did. >> [snip] >> >> Richard Hills >> >> No, that part is not true. Herman is demonstrably >> wrong and Eric is demonstrably correct. Whether or not >> declarer calling a low spade from dummy was corrected >> without pause for thought, there is a time limit imposed. A >> Law 25A correction of an unintended call must be done BEFORE >> partner subsequently calls. Likewise, a Law 47C / Law >> 45C4(b) correction of an unintended card must be done BEFORE >> partner plays. And declarer is dummy's partner. >> >> AG : I beg to differ. As the card was played from dummy, the >> partner who must not have played thereafter is declarer. > Peter Eidt > > I beg to disagree. > > Law 45 C4b: > "Until his partner has played a card a player may change an > unintended designation if he does so without pause for thought. > [...]" > > For the purpose of declarer designating a card from > dummy "his" and "a player" and "he" refers to declarer, > while "his partner" refers to dummy. > > So, in the moment dummy takes the designated card > and puts it into a played position the time limit for changing > that (designated) card is expired. > AG : correction of an unintended card happens after it has been played, else there would be no correction needed. And the limit for doing so when dummy is concerned is when he played the card. Is there a paradox or am I just plain dumb ? From petereidt at t-online.de Mon Aug 22 14:51:28 2011 From: petereidt at t-online.de (Peter Eidt) Date: Mon, 22 Aug 2011 14:51:28 +0200 Subject: [BLML] =?utf-8?q?Inattention_=5BSEC=3DUNOFFICIAL=5D?= In-Reply-To: <4E524F1E.8020009@ulb.ac.be> References: <4E524F1E.8020009@ulb.ac.be> Message-ID: <1QvTyS-1ydXKy0@fwd20.aul.t-online.de> > Le 22/08/2011 14:26, Peter Eidt a ?crit : > >> Eric Landau > >> > >> [snip] > >> To be allowed to go back and play a high spade, > >> declarer would, at minimum, have had to have spoken up >> > before he followed to the trick. > >> > >> Herman De Wael > >> > >> No, that part is not true. He needs to have spoken up as > >> soon as he noticed the low spade was played. Which, as > the >> story goes, he apparently did. > >> [snip] > >> > >> Richard Hills > >> > >> No, that part is not true. Herman is demonstrably > >> wrong and Eric is demonstrably correct. Whether or not >> > declarer calling a low spade from dummy was corrected >> > without pause for thought, there is a time limit imposed. A > >> Law 25A correction of an unintended call must be done > BEFORE >> partner subsequently calls. Likewise, a Law 47C / > Law >> 45C4(b) correction of an unintended card must be done > BEFORE >> partner plays. And declarer is dummy's partner. > >> > >> AG : I beg to differ. As the card was played from dummy, the >> > partner who must not have played thereafter is declarer. > > > Peter Eidt > > > > I beg to disagree. > > > > Law 45 C4b: > > "Until his partner has played a card a player may change an > > unintended designation if he does so without pause for thought. > > [...]" > > > > For the purpose of declarer designating a card from > > dummy "his" and "a player" and "he" refers to declarer, > > while "his partner" refers to dummy. > > > > So, in the moment dummy takes the designated card > > and puts it into a played position the time limit for changing > > that (designated) card is expired. > > > AG : correction of an unintended card happens after it has been > played, else there would be no correction needed. > And the limit for doing so when dummy is concerned is when he played > the card. > Is there a paradox or am I just plain dumb ? Peter Eidt Sorry again, but here we do not deal with the correction of an unintended _played_ card but with the correction of an unintended _designation_ of a card (to be played) and that's not the same and does not need a played card (in fact it even does not "work" legally with a played card). From svenpran at online.no Mon Aug 22 15:34:50 2011 From: svenpran at online.no (Sven Pran) Date: Mon, 22 Aug 2011 15:34:50 +0200 Subject: [BLML] Inattention [SEC=UNOFFICIAL] In-Reply-To: References: <4E4E8E37.4050800@skynet.be> Message-ID: <002901cc60d0$45cb30b0$d1619210$@online.no> Some time ago I could read: No, that part is not true. Herman is demonstrably wrong and Eric is demonstrably correct. Whether or not declarer calling a low spade from dummy was corrected without pause for thought, there is a time limit imposed. A Law 25A correction of an unintended call must be done BEFORE partner subsequently calls. Likewise, a Law 47C / Law 45C4(b) correction of an unintended card must be done BEFORE partner plays. And declarer is dummy's partner. And the following developments of this thread makes me believe that three different law situations are mixed together in a mess: 1: Law 25A handles unintended calls and has no relevance whatsoever with the play of cards 2: Law 45D handles the situation when Dummy has placed in the played position a card that Declarer did not name. Such illegal play must be withdrawn if attention is drawn to it before each side has played to the next trick. And finally the situation we have here: 3: Law 47C and Law 45C4(b) handles the situation when Declarer wants to change an unintended designation. Such change may not be made after partner (i.e. Declarer) has subsequently played a card. From petereidt at t-online.de Mon Aug 22 15:40:08 2011 From: petereidt at t-online.de (Peter Eidt) Date: Mon, 22 Aug 2011 15:40:08 +0200 Subject: [BLML] =?utf-8?q?Inattention_=5BSEC=3DUNOFFICIAL=5D?= In-Reply-To: <002901cc60d0$45cb30b0$d1619210$@online.no> References: <002901cc60d0$45cb30b0$d1619210$@online.no> Message-ID: <1QvUjY-1slSaG0@fwd14.aul.t-online.de> Von: "Sven Pran" [snip] > And finally the situation we have here: > 3: Law 47C and Law 45C4(b) handles the situation when Declarer wants > to change an unintended designation. Such change may not be made after > partner (i.e. Declarer) has subsequently played a card. No. The designating person is declarer and his partner is dummy. We (the EBL TDs) were told so, i think, in San Remo 2010. From harald.skjaran at gmail.com Mon Aug 22 17:00:41 2011 From: harald.skjaran at gmail.com (=?UTF-8?Q?Harald_Skj=C3=A6ran?=) Date: Mon, 22 Aug 2011 17:00:41 +0200 Subject: [BLML] Inattention [SEC=UNOFFICIAL] In-Reply-To: <1QvUjY-1slSaG0@fwd14.aul.t-online.de> References: <002901cc60d0$45cb30b0$d1619210$@online.no> <1QvUjY-1slSaG0@fwd14.aul.t-online.de> Message-ID: mandag 22. august 2011 skrev Peter Eidt f?lgende: > Von: "Sven Pran" > [snip] > >> And finally the situation we have here: >> 3: Law 47C and Law 45C4(b) handles the situation when Declarer wants >> to change an unintended designation. Such change may not be made after >> partner (i.e. Declarer) has subsequently played a card. > > No. The designating person is declarer and his partner is dummy. > > We (the EBL TDs) were told so, i think, in San Remo 2010. "His partner" in L45C4b refers to the partner of the hand playing the card. Declarer is the designating player, dummy is the hand making the play and declarer is his partner. > > > _______________________________________________ > Blml mailing list > Blml at rtflb.org > http://lists.rtflb.org/mailman/listinfo/blml > -- Kind regards, Harald Skj?ran -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://lists.rtflb.org/pipermail/blml/attachments/20110822/0806dd57/attachment.html From swillner at nhcc.net Mon Aug 22 17:10:28 2011 From: swillner at nhcc.net (Steve Willner) Date: Mon, 22 Aug 2011 11:10:28 -0400 Subject: [BLML] L64B In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <4E527164.7070707@nhcc.net> On 8/22/2011 1:59 AM, Harald Skj?ran wrote: > What's a revoke? > Please read the definition of a revoke i L61A. Good idea. For present purposes, it says any failure to follow suit when possible constitutes a revoke. (Actually, the "when possible" is more obscure than it probably ought to be. It isn't explicitly stated but only indirectly implied by L44C/D.) > When an unestablished revoke has been corrected, you've followed suit. > Ergo, there's no revoke (anymore). Unfortunately, L61A doesn't actually say that as far as I can tell. The initial failure to follow suit _is_ a revoke. One can _interpret_ L61A as meaning the revoke no longer exists after it's corrected, as Grattan and (I think) others have written, but I don't think that interpretation is obvious in the actual words. From richard.hills at immi.gov.au Tue Aug 23 00:16:54 2011 From: richard.hills at immi.gov.au (richard.hills at immi.gov.au) Date: Tue, 23 Aug 2011 08:16:54 +1000 Subject: [BLML] Inattention [SEC=UNOFFICIAL] In-Reply-To: <002901cc60d0$45cb30b0$d1619210$@online.no> Message-ID: Pocket Oxford Dictionary mnemonic (n-), a. Of, designed to aid, the memory. Sven Pran [snip] 1: Law 25A handles unintended calls and has no relevance whatsoever with the play of cards [snip] Richard HiIls I fully agree with Sven that Law 25A has no _relevance_ to an unintended designation of a card. My intent was merely to observe a useful _mnemonic_ to assist Directors in correctly applying the two Laws which use the word "unintended". a) An unintended call may not be corrected after partner has called. b) An unintended designation of a card may not be corrected after partner has played. Best wishes, Richard Hills Specialist Recruitment Team, Recruitment Section Aqua 5, w/s W568, ph 6223 8453 DIAC Social Club movie ticket coordinator -------------------------------------------------------------------- Important Notice: If you have received this email by mistake, please advise the sender and delete the message and attachments immediately. This email, including attachments, may contain confidential, sensitive, legally privileged and/or copyright information. Any review, retransmission, dissemination or other use of this information by persons or entities other than the intended recipient is prohibited. DIAC respects your privacy and has obligations under the Privacy Act 1988. The official departmental privacy policy can be viewed on the department's website at www.immi.gov.au. See: http://www.immi.gov.au/functional/privacy.htm --------------------------------------------------------------------- -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://lists.rtflb.org/pipermail/blml/attachments/20110822/f6c5ea9e/attachment.html From richard.hills at immi.gov.au Tue Aug 23 00:39:56 2011 From: richard.hills at immi.gov.au (richard.hills at immi.gov.au) Date: Tue, 23 Aug 2011 08:39:56 +1000 Subject: [BLML] Inattention [SEC=UNOFFICIAL] In-Reply-To: Message-ID: Sven Pran [snip] And finally the situation we have here: 3: Law 47C and Law 45C4(b) handles the situation when Declarer wants to change an unintended designation. Such change may not be made after partner (i.e. Declarer) has subsequently played a card. Peter Eidt No. The designating person is declarer and his partner is dummy. We (the EBL TDs) were told so, I think, in San Remo 2010. Grattan Endicott (2003) And cite the inconsistencies of exegeses scarce uniform: Harald Skj?ran "His partner" in L45C4b refers to the partner of the hand playing the card. Declarer is the designating player, dummy is the hand making the play and declarer is his partner. Richard Hills A hypothetical case -> Trick 3: Dummy is fourth to play and declarer unintentionally designates the ace instead of the intended queen (both cards would win the trick). Trick 4: Declarer intentionally designates a card from a different suit, and declarer's RHO follows to the trick. Now declarer, without pause for thought, summons the Director and requests that dummy's queen be played to the previous trick. How would you rule? Best wishes, Richard Hills Specialist Recruitment Team, Recruitment Section Aqua 5, w/s W568, ph 6223 8453 DIAC Social Club movie ticket coordinator -------------------------------------------------------------------- Important Notice: If you have received this email by mistake, please advise the sender and delete the message and attachments immediately. This email, including attachments, may contain confidential, sensitive, legally privileged and/or copyright information. Any review, retransmission, dissemination or other use of this information by persons or entities other than the intended recipient is prohibited. DIAC respects your privacy and has obligations under the Privacy Act 1988. The official departmental privacy policy can be viewed on the department's website at www.immi.gov.au. See: http://www.immi.gov.au/functional/privacy.htm --------------------------------------------------------------------- -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://lists.rtflb.org/pipermail/blml/attachments/20110822/800fd3fd/attachment.html From rfrick at rfrick.info Tue Aug 23 03:20:51 2011 From: rfrick at rfrick.info (Robert Frick) Date: Mon, 22 Aug 2011 21:20:51 -0400 Subject: [BLML] L64B In-Reply-To: <4E527164.7070707@nhcc.net> References: <4E527164.7070707@nhcc.net> Message-ID: On Mon, 22 Aug 2011 11:10:28 -0400, Steve Willner wrote: > On 8/22/2011 1:59 AM, Harald Skj?ran wrote: >> What's a revoke? >> Please read the definition of a revoke i L61A. > > Good idea. For present purposes, it says any failure to follow suit > when possible constitutes a revoke. (Actually, the "when possible" is > more obscure than it probably ought to be. It isn't explicitly stated > but only indirectly implied by L44C/D.) > >> When an unestablished revoke has been corrected, you've followed suit. >> Ergo, there's no revoke (anymore). > > Unfortunately, L61A doesn't actually say that as far as I can tell. The > initial failure to follow suit _is_ a revoke. One can _interpret_ L61A > as meaning the revoke no longer exists after it's corrected, as Grattan > and (I think) others have written, but I don't think that interpretation > is obvious in the actual words. If there was an insufficient bid, and it was corrected, you could in theory ask if the insufficient bid *still exists*. But aren't you stepping into philosophical quicksand? Even if it is not corrected, does it still exist? It boggles my mind to try to answer. I guess it is still sitting in Plato's heaven? Next. Does anyone talk this way? Instead, we say there *was* an insufficient bid (corrected or not). For exactly the same reason, everyone calls a corrected revoke a revoke and says it happened -- players, directors, the lawbook. Even Grattan, when he claimed it was not a revoke, called it a revoke. ("I do not believe a revoke is a revoke after it has been corrected.") The lawbook: "Each member of the non-offending side may withdraw and return to his hand any card he may have played *after the revoke* but before attention was draw to it." The question for L64B seems to be whether there *was* a previous revoke. This is implied by it's reference to previous and subsequent. I guess I am trying to say that, once we are talking about whether a corrected revoke still exists, we are not doing a plain ruling. And Harald believes that the law, as written, does cause any confusion or argument? Again, I was not sure of the "correct" ruling until Grattan told me what was intended. Obviously it was a mistake, in my mind, but sometimes everyone goes with the mistake. From richard.hills at immi.gov.au Tue Aug 23 05:21:18 2011 From: richard.hills at immi.gov.au (richard.hills at immi.gov.au) Date: Tue, 23 Aug 2011 13:21:18 +1000 Subject: [BLML] L64B [SEC=UNOFFICIAL] In-Reply-To: Message-ID: Poul Anderson, New Scientist 1969 I have yet to see any problem, however complicated, which, when you looked at it in the right way, did not become more complicated. Robert Frick (out of context quote) ... But aren't you stepping into philosophical quicksand? Even if it is not corrected, does it still exist? It boggles my mind to try to answer. I guess it is still sitting in Plato's heaven? ... Grattan Endicott (out of context quote) ... I concede that the Drafting Committee was sloppy in repeating the 1997 text without the appropriate substitution of ... Richard Hills ... one of these three phrases: a) non-established revoke, or b) established revoke, or c) corrected revoke to replace the sloppy vanilla word "revoke". This sloppy vanilla word "revoke" is sometimes slightly ambiguous (for ordinary TDs), or frequently very ambiguous (for philosophical Platonic TDs). Best wishes, Richard Hills Specialist Recruitment Team, Recruitment Section Aqua 5, w/s W568, ph 6223 8453 DIAC Social Club movie ticket coordinator -------------------------------------------------------------------- Important Notice: If you have received this email by mistake, please advise the sender and delete the message and attachments immediately. This email, including attachments, may contain confidential, sensitive, legally privileged and/or copyright information. Any review, retransmission, dissemination or other use of this information by persons or entities other than the intended recipient is prohibited. DIAC respects your privacy and has obligations under the Privacy Act 1988. The official departmental privacy policy can be viewed on the department's website at www.immi.gov.au. See: http://www.immi.gov.au/functional/privacy.htm --------------------------------------------------------------------- -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://lists.rtflb.org/pipermail/blml/attachments/20110823/208bfeab/attachment-0001.html From nigelguthrie at yahoo.co.uk Tue Aug 23 05:51:40 2011 From: nigelguthrie at yahoo.co.uk (Nigel Guthrie) Date: Tue, 23 Aug 2011 04:51:40 +0100 Subject: [BLML] Examples of Laws that might be wrong or might not In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: Robert gives examples where he thinks the law fails to represent the law-makers intentions. Many lawyers and English speakers would agree with Robert. In consequence, intelligent directors, conscientiously reluctant to allow common-sense to overturn written law, will rule in a way that players will regard as unfair. Arguably, perhaps, the law is just unclear rather than wrong, but sloppy law results also in bad rulings and a perception of unfairness. There are many such examples of this, in other discussion groups. It is futile to belatedly publish corrections in some obscure minute, of which, few directors and fewer players are aware. For the handful of players, privy to their content, such minutes are of little practical help because they need to be read in conjunction with relevant laws and require considerable effort in collation and interpretation. IMO Bridge would be a more attractive game if the the laws of Bridge were radically simplified and unified.. Most directors disagree and think changes (if any) should be minor and at least 10 years apart. Nevertheless It is hard to understand what objection law-makers can have to the immediate correction of obvious ambiguities and blatant errors, immediately, in place, in the law book, itself -- with no prevarication or procrastination. Law-makers don't even need to get it right first time. They can keep correcting until the on-line law-book begins to make more sense to ordinary readers. From koen.grauwels at oracle.com Tue Aug 23 05:51:16 2011 From: koen.grauwels at oracle.com (koen.grauwels at oracle.com) Date: Mon, 22 Aug 2011 20:51:16 -0700 (PDT) Subject: [BLML] Auto Reply: Re: Examples of Laws that might be wrong or might not Message-ID: <1fe7011a-cd63-4827-a541-b70c4a13cb27@default> Hello, Thank you for your mail. I'm on Holiday until 31-Aug-11 and will be unable to respond to your mail before that date. Regards, Koen From agot at ulb.ac.be Tue Aug 23 09:35:05 2011 From: agot at ulb.ac.be (Alain Gottcheiner) Date: Tue, 23 Aug 2011 09:35:05 +0200 Subject: [BLML] L64B In-Reply-To: <4E527164.7070707@nhcc.net> References: <4E527164.7070707@nhcc.net> Message-ID: <4E535829.8070507@ulb.ac.be> Le 22/08/2011 17:10, Steve Willner a ?crit : > On 8/22/2011 1:59 AM, Harald Skj?ran wrote: >> What's a revoke? >> Please read the definition of a revoke i L61A. > Good idea. For present purposes, it says any failure to follow suit > when possible constitutes a revoke. (Actually, the "when possible" is > more obscure than it probably ought to be. It isn't explicitly stated > but only indirectly implied by L44C/D.) > >> When an unestablished revoke has been corrected, you've followed suit. >> Ergo, there's no revoke (anymore). > Unfortunately, L61A doesn't actually say that as far as I can tell. The > initial failure to follow suit _is_ a revoke. One can _interpret_ L61A > as meaning the revoke no longer exists after it's corrected, as Grattan > and (I think) others have written, but I don't think that interpretation > is obvious in the actual words. > AG : If you write a word erroneously, and correct it, is it still erroneously written ? I'd say no. From grandaeval at tiscali.co.uk Tue Aug 23 11:20:27 2011 From: grandaeval at tiscali.co.uk (Grattan) Date: Tue, 23 Aug 2011 10:20:27 +0100 Subject: [BLML] L64B In-Reply-To: <4E535829.8070507@ulb.ac.be> Message-ID: <845609B664604F298B481961E860CD95@Annette> Grattan AG : If you write a word erroneously, and correct it, is it still erroneously written ? I'd say no. From grandaeval at tiscali.co.uk Tue Aug 23 11:33:21 2011 From: grandaeval at tiscali.co.uk (Grattan) Date: Tue, 23 Aug 2011 10:33:21 +0100 Subject: [BLML] L64B In-Reply-To: Message-ID: <3652E1555E2F4CF089D28AE2F80E9870@Annette> Grattan If there was an insufficient bid, and it was corrected, you could in theory ask if the insufficient bid *still exists*. But aren't you stepping into philosophical quicksand? Even if it is not corrected, does it still exist? It boggles my mind to try to answer. I guess it is still sitting in Plato's heaven? I guess I am trying to say that, once we are talking about whether a corrected revoke still exists, we are not doing a plain ruling. And Harald believes that the law, as written, does cause any confusion or argument? Again, I was not sure of the "correct" ruling until Grattan told me what was intended. Obviously it was a mistake, in my mind, but sometimes everyone goes with the mistake. +=+ I have an inclination to seal any pinhole that turns up in the text of the laws. I tend to feel this is helpful to some who do not have English as their first language. English is a difficult language because of its inflections. The majority of the committee on balance are disinclined to seek absolute perfection where directors have found no difficulty in applying the law as intended. ~ Grattan ~ +=+ -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://lists.rtflb.org/pipermail/blml/attachments/20110823/0da85de8/attachment.html From petereidt at t-online.de Tue Aug 23 13:40:52 2011 From: petereidt at t-online.de (Peter Eidt) Date: Tue, 23 Aug 2011 13:40:52 +0200 Subject: [BLML] =?utf-8?q?Inattention_=5BSEC=3DUNOFFICIAL=5D?= In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <1QvpLg-0RB5hg0@fwd21.aul.t-online.de> Hi scandinavians ;-) here 2 proofs for my view ... 1. From the (inofficial) commentary to the 2007 Laws by Ton Kooijman (see last sentence): Law 45 The word ?designat-es/ion? in C4 is used to distinguish the play of a card as described in A and B (second sentence) from playing it in another way. A card manually played by declarer from dummy or by a defender cannot be replaced if it is a legal card. Only in the case of a card played in another way, by naming it for example, it is possible to change it. This law states that such designation needs to be unintended and that the player already knew which card he wanted to play, at that moment. Moreover, partner (in practice we are talking about dummy) may not have already put a card in the played position. 2. Exercises during the EBL TDs Course in San Remo February 2010, Nr. 24 (shortened) [the hand for this immaterial], East is declarer in 2 S In Trick 8 a) being in dummy declarer calls for a spade, dummy touches spade 2, and immediately corrects this by saying: 'diamond of course'. TD! b) being in dummy declarer calls for a spade, North small and the spade 5 himself. When South plays the winning 6 declarer screams 'what happened ?' and watches the spade 2 played from dummy. 'I asked for a diamond!'. TD! The official answers were: @ a) Law 45 C4 applies. Here a confession is needed: the idea writing this law was to adopt the approach given in Law 25 A during the bidding. But the first sentence does not have that effect. What does: "until his partner has played a card a player may change ..." mean for a card in dummy designated by declarer? Dummy does not play a card, does he? Still the interpretation given by the [WBF] LC is that as soon as dummy has put a card in the played position after an unintended designation by declarer the designated card stands. [the oiginal part not related to my point omitted] @ b) No need to decide whether the designation was intended or not, the spade 2 can't be changed anymore. [this part of the question does not touch the crucial point] -----Original-Nachricht----- > Von: Harald Skj?ran > mandag 22. august 2011 skrev Peter Eidt > f?lgende: > > Von: "Sven Pran" > > [snip] > > > >> And finally the situation we have here: > >> 3: Law 47C and Law 45C4(b) handles the situation when Declarer > wants > >> to change an unintended designation. Such change may not be made > after > >> partner (i.e. Declarer) has subsequently played a card. > > > > No. The designating person is declarer and his partner is dummy. > > > > We (the EBL TDs) were told so, i think, in San Remo 2010. > > "His partner" in L45C4b refers to the partner of the hand playing the > card. Declarer is the designating player, dummy is the hand making the > play and declarer is his partner. From harald.skjaran at gmail.com Tue Aug 23 14:07:47 2011 From: harald.skjaran at gmail.com (=?UTF-8?Q?Harald_Skj=C3=A6ran?=) Date: Tue, 23 Aug 2011 14:07:47 +0200 Subject: [BLML] Inattention [SEC=UNOFFICIAL] In-Reply-To: <1QvpLg-0RB5hg0@fwd21.aul.t-online.de> References: <1QvpLg-0RB5hg0@fwd21.aul.t-online.de> Message-ID: 2011/8/23 Peter Eidt : > Hi scandinavians ;-) > > here 2 proofs for my view ... > > 1. From the (inofficial) commentary to the 2007 Laws > by Ton Kooijman (see last sentence): > Law 45 > The word ?designat-es/ion? in C4 is used to distinguish > the play of a card as described in A and B (second > sentence) from playing it in another way. A card > manually played by declarer from dummy or > by a defender cannot be replaced if it is a legal card. > Only in the case of a card played in another way, > by naming it for example, it is possible to change it. > This law states that such designation needs to be > unintended and that the player already knew which > card he wanted to play, at that moment. Moreover, > partner (in practice we are talking about dummy) > may not have already put a card in the played position. > > 2. Exercises during the EBL TDs Course in San Remo > February 2010, Nr. 24 (shortened) > [the hand for this immaterial], East is declarer in 2 S > In Trick 8 > a) being in dummy declarer calls for a spade, dummy > touches spade 2, and immediately corrects this by > saying: 'diamond of course'. TD! > b) being in dummy declarer calls for a spade, North > small and the spade 5 himself. When South plays the > winning 6 declarer screams 'what happened ?' and > watches the spade 2 played from dummy. 'I asked > for a diamond!'. TD! > > The official answers were: > @ a) Law 45 C4 applies. Here a confession is needed: > the idea writing this law was to adopt the approach > given in Law 25 A during the bidding. But the first > sentence does not have that effect. What does: "until > his partner has played a card a player may change ..." > mean for a card in dummy designated by declarer? > Dummy does not play a card, does he? Still the > interpretation given by the [WBF] LC is that as soon > as dummy has put a card in the played position after > an unintended designation by declarer the designated > card stands. [the oiginal part not related to my point omitted] > @ b) No need to decide whether the designation was > intended or not, the spade 2 can't be changed anymore. > [this part of the question does not touch the crucial point] > > I have no problem with this interpretation by the WBF LC, except that it's definitely not what's written in the laws. This law needs rewriting. It seems like the powers in charge is aware of the problem. This means that L45C4 works differently for the two sides. If I, as a defender, makes an inadvertent designation of a card I'm going to play (it does happen that a defender designates a card instead of playing it), this can be changed after declarer makes a play (from hand or dummy), but before partner plays a card. But if it's an inadvertent designation from declarer, this isn't the case if it's a card to be played from dummy. It's not clear for me what happens if declarer makes an inadvertent designation of a card to be played from his hand. Until now I'd have said this could be changed until a card is played from dummy. Now I'm not sure anymore. > > -----Original-Nachricht----- >> Von: Harald Skj?ran >> mandag 22. august 2011 skrev Peter Eidt >> f?lgende: >> > Von: "Sven Pran" >> ?> [snip] >> > >> >> And finally the situation we have here: >> >> 3: Law 47C and Law 45C4(b) handles the situation when Declarer >> wants >> >> to change an unintended designation. Such change may not be made >> after >> ?>> partner (i.e. Declarer) has subsequently played a card. >> > >> > No. The designating person is declarer and his partner is dummy. >> > >> > We (the EBL TDs) were told so, i think, in San Remo 2010. >> >> "His partner" in L45C4b refers to the partner of the hand playing the >> card. Declarer is the designating player, dummy is the hand making the >> play and declarer is his partner. > > > > > _______________________________________________ > Blml mailing list > Blml at rtflb.org > http://lists.rtflb.org/mailman/listinfo/blml > -- Kind regards, Harald Skj?ran From agot at ulb.ac.be Tue Aug 23 14:10:43 2011 From: agot at ulb.ac.be (Alain Gottcheiner) Date: Tue, 23 Aug 2011 14:10:43 +0200 Subject: [BLML] Inattention [SEC=UNOFFICIAL] In-Reply-To: <1QvpLg-0RB5hg0@fwd21.aul.t-online.de> References: <1QvpLg-0RB5hg0@fwd21.aul.t-online.de> Message-ID: <4E5398C3.1060809@ulb.ac.be> Le 23/08/2011 13:40, Peter Eidt a ?crit : > Hi scandinavians ;-) > > here 2 proofs for my view ... > > 1. From the (inofficial) commentary to the 2007 Laws > by Ton Kooijman (see last sentence): > Law 45 > The word ?designat-es/ion? in C4 is used to distinguish > the play of a card as described in A and B (second > sentence) from playing it in another way. A card > manually played by declarer from dummy or > by a defender cannot be replaced if it is a legal card. > Only in the case of a card played in another way, > by naming it for example, it is possible to change it. > This law states that such designation needs to be > unintended and that the player already knew which > card he wanted to play, at that moment. Moreover, > partner (in practice we are talking about dummy) > may not have already put a card in the played position. > > 2. Exercises during the EBL TDs Course in San Remo > February 2010, Nr. 24 (shortened) > [the hand for this immaterial], East is declarer in 2 S > In Trick 8 > a) being in dummy declarer calls for a spade, dummy > touches spade 2, and immediately corrects this by > saying: 'diamond of course'. TD! > b) being in dummy declarer calls for a spade, North > small and the spade 5 himself. When South plays the > winning 6 declarer screams 'what happened ?' and > watches the spade 2 played from dummy. 'I asked > for a diamond!'. TD! > > The official answers were: > @ a) Law 45 C4 applies. Here a confession is needed: > the idea writing this law was to adopt the approach > given in Law 25 A during the bidding. But the first > sentence does not have that effect. What does: "until > his partner has played a card a player may change ..." > mean for a card in dummy designated by declarer? > Dummy does not play a card, does he? Still the > interpretation given by the [WBF] LC is that as soon > as dummy has put a card in the played position after > an unintended designation by declarer the designated > card stands. [the oiginal part not related to my point omitted] > @ b) So it's right. Now, why it's wrong. It induces dummy to wait before placing the card when the designation seems absurd, creating a mute recall. I'd feel better if this was without object. From rfrick at rfrick.info Tue Aug 23 15:34:57 2011 From: rfrick at rfrick.info (Robert Frick) Date: Tue, 23 Aug 2011 09:34:57 -0400 Subject: [BLML] L64B In-Reply-To: <845609B664604F298B481961E860CD95@Annette> References: <845609B664604F298B481961E860CD95@Annette> Message-ID: You are called to the table. Declarer revoked at trick two, playing a heart on diamonds. One trick penalty for that. Declarer later failed to follow suit, again in diamonds. Declarer had a diamond. The extra diamond is put on this trick, it is deemed to have been a revoke. Is there another one trick penalty? Or is this the second revoke in the same suit by the same player? (It had no effect on play, so there is no adjustment for equity.) From rfrick at rfrick.info Tue Aug 23 15:38:26 2011 From: rfrick at rfrick.info (Robert Frick) Date: Tue, 23 Aug 2011 09:38:26 -0400 Subject: [BLML] L64B In-Reply-To: References: <845609B664604F298B481961E860CD95@Annette> Message-ID: On Tue, 23 Aug 2011 09:34:57 -0400, Robert Frick wrote: > You are called to the table. Declarer revoked at trick two, playing a > heart on diamonds. One trick penalty for that. Declarer later failed to > follow suit, again in diamonds. Declarer had a diamond. The extra diamond > is put on this trick, it is deemed to have been a revoke. Is there > another > one trick penalty? Or is this the second revoke in the same suit by the > same player? (It had no effect on play, so there is no adjustment for > equity.) If people want to say "This is a situation not covered by the laws, director should try to make an equitable ruling, whatever the director decides is right" -- I like that answer. It's a fair answer. I think that there is a lawful answer, but I admit that there are good arguments against my answer. From nigelguthrie at yahoo.co.uk Tue Aug 23 16:54:36 2011 From: nigelguthrie at yahoo.co.uk (Nigel Guthrie) Date: Tue, 23 Aug 2011 15:54:36 +0100 Subject: [BLML] L64B In-Reply-To: <845609B664604F298B481961E860CD95@Annette> References: <845609B664604F298B481961E860CD95@Annette> Message-ID: <6BDEACAFB2F945B39975086C861FB8B1@G3> [AG] If you write a word erroneously, and correct it, is it still erroneously written ? I'd say no. [Nigel] But, IMO, if you wrote a *word*, it was still a *word*. Although now corrected to another *word*. [Grattan] IMO. This thread is about angels dancing on the point of a pin. [Nigel] Agree. Argument about what murky law means is pointless -- the angels on the WBFLC should just clarify the law book. From gordonrainsford at btinternet.com Tue Aug 23 16:59:55 2011 From: gordonrainsford at btinternet.com (Gordon Rainsford) Date: Tue, 23 Aug 2011 15:59:55 +0100 Subject: [BLML] L64B In-Reply-To: <845609B664604F298B481961E860CD95@Annette> References: <845609B664604F298B481961E860CD95@Annette> Message-ID: <4E53C06B.6080005@btinternet.com> This thread is about angels dancing on the point of a pin. ~ Grattan ~ ................................................ What better place for it to take place? Gordon Rainsford From larry at charmschool.orangehome.co.uk Tue Aug 23 17:31:56 2011 From: larry at charmschool.orangehome.co.uk (Larry) Date: Tue, 23 Aug 2011 16:31:56 +0100 Subject: [BLML] L64B References: <845609B664604F298B481961E860CD95@Annette> <4E53C06B.6080005@btinternet.com> Message-ID: I could suggest a few good places for the pin... L > This thread is about angels dancing on the point > of a pin. ~ Grattan ~ > ................................................ > > What better place for it to take place? > > Gordon Rainsford From rfrick at rfrick.info Tue Aug 23 18:57:48 2011 From: rfrick at rfrick.info (Robert Frick) Date: Tue, 23 Aug 2011 12:57:48 -0400 Subject: [BLML] L64B In-Reply-To: <3652E1555E2F4CF089D28AE2F80E9870@Annette> References: <3652E1555E2F4CF089D28AE2F80E9870@Annette> Message-ID: On Tue, 23 Aug 2011 05:33:21 -0400, Grattan wrote: > > > Grattan > Skype: grattan.endicott > > ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ > > "Now and then there is a person born > > Who is so unlucky that he runs into accidents > > Which started out to happen to somebody else. > > [Don Marquis] > > ***************************************************** > > > -----Original Message----- > From: blml-bounces at rtflb.org > > [mailto:blml-bounces at rtflb.org] On Behalf Of Robert Frick > Sent: 23 August 2011 02:21 > To: Bridge Laws Mailing List > Subject: Re: [BLML] L64B > > >> > > If there was an insufficient bid, and it was corrected, you could in > > theory ask if the insufficient bid *still exists*. But aren't you > stepping > > into philosophical quicksand? Even if it is not corrected, does it still > > > exist? It boggles my mind to try to answer. I guess it is still sitting > in > > Plato's heaven? > > > > I guess I am trying to say that, once we are talking about whether a > > corrected revoke still exists, we are not doing a plain ruling. > > > And Harald believes that the law, as written, does cause any confusion > or > > argument? Again, I was not sure of the "correct" ruling until Grattan > told > > me what was intended. Obviously it was a mistake, in my mind, but > > sometimes everyone goes with the mistake. > > > > +=+ I have an inclination to seal any pinhole that turns up in the text > > of the laws. I tend to feel this is helpful to some who do not have > > English as their first language. English is a difficult language because > > > of its inflections. The majority of the committee on balance are > > disinclined to seek absolute perfection where directors have found no > difficulty in applying the law as intended. I see other problems. But anyway, from the thread that Sebastian pointed out: (http://www.bridgebase.com/forums/topic/46987-established-revoke-followed-by-subsequent-opposing-revoke/) "I was called to the table recently, and informed that a defender had revoked. I discovered it had been established, and explained the relevant laws. Play then continued until trick 12. At this point, declarer revoked by ruffing with his second-last card, then led his last card. The defenders drew attention to the revoke, so I required that it be corrected (62D). I was about to transfer the appropriate number of tricks for the defensive revoke (two, in this case) to declarer, when I hazily remembered something about revokes by both sides. Checking TFLB, I found 64B7: "There is no rectification as in A following an established revoke...when both sides have revoked on the same board." It appears, then, that once declarer revokes here (even if he doesn't establish it!), he is no longer entitled to the 64A rectification, but is limited to the 64C equity adjustment. So I ruled that the equitable one trick only was transferred. Did I miss anything?" And, if you want, this comment by Bluejak (whom I think it is fair to call a noted authority) "Have I missed something? Is this not a matter of complete clarity, unlike many laws? There is no rectification for an established revoke as in A - ie penalty tricks - if the other side revoke, whether established or not. I am not convinced that is what they meant, but how can it mean anything else?" From richard.hills at immi.gov.au Wed Aug 24 08:09:13 2011 From: richard.hills at immi.gov.au (richard.hills at immi.gov.au) Date: Wed, 24 Aug 2011 16:09:13 +1000 Subject: [BLML] Louis Couperis' "Psyche" [SEC=UNOFFICIAL] Message-ID: Extract from an English translation of Louis Couperis' "Psyche" "Why have I wings, and Astra a living star upon her head, and Emeralda eyes of jewels?" "Because you are princesses; they are different from other girls." "And why, dear father,' whispered Psyche, secretly, "has Emeralda a heart of ruby?..." "No child, that she has not. She has, it is true, eyes of emerald, because she is a princess -- as Astra has a star and you two pretty wings -- but she has a human heart." "No, father; dear, she has a heart of stone." "But who says so, my child?" "The nurse does, father, her own pages, the guards at the gates, and the wise men who come to Astra." Matchpoint pairs, dealer South, vulnerable none You, West, hold -> T5 AK J95 QT9643 RHO deals and opens 1C, you trap pass in tempo, LHO responds 1D, pard passes in tempo, RHO rebids 1S, again you pass in tempo, LHO raises to 2S. At this point RHO alerts. Upon pard's enquiry, RHO explains that 2S is natural but forcing for one round, then pard once more passes in tempo. Now RHO passes the 2S raise that RHO has just described as forcing for one round! Does your heart of stone cause you to pass out 2S? Or do you wing your way into a balance of 3C? Best wishes, Richard Hills Specialist Recruitment Team, Recruitment Section Aqua 5, w/s W568, ph 6223 8453 DIAC Social Club movie ticket coordinator -------------------------------------------------------------------- Important Notice: If you have received this email by mistake, please advise the sender and delete the message and attachments immediately. This email, including attachments, may contain confidential, sensitive, legally privileged and/or copyright information. Any review, retransmission, dissemination or other use of this information by persons or entities other than the intended recipient is prohibited. DIAC respects your privacy and has obligations under the Privacy Act 1988. The official departmental privacy policy can be viewed on the department's website at www.immi.gov.au. See: http://www.immi.gov.au/functional/privacy.htm --------------------------------------------------------------------- -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://lists.rtflb.org/pipermail/blml/attachments/20110824/c9b10bc3/attachment.html From rfrick at rfrick.info Wed Aug 24 21:37:27 2011 From: rfrick at rfrick.info (Robert Frick) Date: Wed, 24 Aug 2011 15:37:27 -0400 Subject: [BLML] L64B In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: On Mon, 22 Aug 2011 01:59:34 -0400, Harald Skj?ran wrote: > > L64B7 is clear an unambigous. Wow. Does it apply when one side has an established revoke and the other side 1. has a corrected revoke? 2. missing card (corrected after both sides had played to the next trick)? 3. established revoke on the 12th trick? 4. revoke discovered after the play of the hand? Bob F. From richard.hills at immi.gov.au Thu Aug 25 04:32:29 2011 From: richard.hills at immi.gov.au (richard.hills at immi.gov.au) Date: Thu, 25 Aug 2011 12:32:29 +1000 Subject: [BLML] L64B [SEC=UNOFFICIAL] In-Reply-To: <845609B664604F298B481961E860CD95@Annette> Message-ID: Grattan Endicott If something is put right it is no longer wrong. The error occurred but it no longer exists. IMO. This thread is about angels dancing on the point of a pin. ~ Grattan ~ Terry Pratchett and Neil Gaiman, Good Omens, pages 260-261 How Many Angels Can Dance on the Head of a Pin? In order to arrive at an answer, the following facts must be taken into consideration: Firstly, angels simply don't dance. It's one of the distinguishing characteristics that marks an angel. They may listen appreciatively to the Music of the Spheres, but they don't feel the urge to get down and boogie to it. So, _none_. At least, nearly none. Aziraphale had learned to gavotte in a discreet gentleman's club in Portland Place, in the late 1880s, and while he had initially taken to it like a duck to merchant banking, after a while he had become quite good at it, and was quite put out when, some decades later, the gavotte went out of style for good. So providing the dance was a gavotte, and providing he had a suitable partner (also able, for the sake of argument, both to gavotte, and to dance it on the head of a pin), the answer is a straightforward _one_. Harald Skj?ran's gavotte [snip] L64B7 is clear and unambiguous. Law 64B7 - Procedure after Establishment of a Revoke - No Rectification There is no rectification as in A following an established revoke: when both sides have revoked on the same board. Bob Frick's clear and unambiguous questions Wow. Does it apply when one side has an established revoke and the other side 1. has a corrected revoke? 2. [has a] missing card (corrected after both sides had played to the next trick)? 3. [has an] established revoke on the 12th trick? 4. [has a] revoke discovered after the play of the hand? Rick Hills' clear and unambiguous answers 1. No. The Law 64B7 prefix refers to an established revoke, not to a corrected revoke. 2. Yes and No. See Law 14B4, which states that the missing card is not necessarily a revoke. 3. Yes. While the trick 12 revoke is not subject to rectification under Law 64B6, it is still an established revoke therefore Law 64B7 also applies. 4. Yes. A revoke discovered after the play of the hand (within the Law 79C correction period) is necessarily an established revoke. Either Laws 64B7 and 64C will apply or Laws 64B4 and 64C will apply. Best wishes, Richard Hills Specialist Recruitment Team, Recruitment Section Aqua 5, w/s W568, ph 6223 8453 DIAC Social Club movie ticket coordinator -------------------------------------------------------------------- Important Notice: If you have received this email by mistake, please advise the sender and delete the message and attachments immediately. This email, including attachments, may contain confidential, sensitive, legally privileged and/or copyright information. Any review, retransmission, dissemination or other use of this information by persons or entities other than the intended recipient is prohibited. DIAC respects your privacy and has obligations under the Privacy Act 1988. The official departmental privacy policy can be viewed on the department's website at www.immi.gov.au. See: http://www.immi.gov.au/functional/privacy.htm --------------------------------------------------------------------- -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://lists.rtflb.org/pipermail/blml/attachments/20110825/93464a6e/attachment.html From rfrick at rfrick.info Thu Aug 25 05:16:36 2011 From: rfrick at rfrick.info (Robert Frick) Date: Wed, 24 Aug 2011 23:16:36 -0400 Subject: [BLML] L64B [SEC=UNOFFICIAL] In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: On Wed, 24 Aug 2011 22:32:29 -0400, wrote: > > Grattan Endicott > > If something is put right it is no longer wrong. The error occurred but > it > no longer exists. IMO. This thread is about angels dancing on the point > of > a pin. ~ Grattan ~ > > Terry Pratchett and Neil Gaiman, Good Omens, pages 260-261 > > How Many Angels Can Dance on the Head of a Pin? > In order to arrive at an answer, the following facts must be taken into > consideration: > Firstly, angels simply don't dance. It's one of the distinguishing > characteristics that marks an angel. They may listen appreciatively to > the > Music of the Spheres, but they don't feel the urge to get down and boogie > to it. So, _none_. > At least, nearly none. Aziraphale had learned to gavotte in a discreet > gentleman's club in Portland Place, in the late 1880s, and while he had > initially taken to it like a duck to merchant banking, after a while he > had > become quite good at it, and was quite put out when, some decades later, > the gavotte went out of style for good. > So providing the dance was a gavotte, and providing he had a suitable > partner (also able, for the sake of argument, both to gavotte, and to > dance > it on the head of a pin), the answer is a straightforward _one_. > > Harald Skj?ran's gavotte > > [snip] > L64B7 is clear and unambiguous. > > Law 64B7 - Procedure after Establishment of a Revoke - No Rectification > > There is no rectification as in A following an established revoke: > when both sides have revoked on the same board. > > Bob Frick's clear and unambiguous questions > > Wow. Does it apply when one side has an established revoke and the other > side > > 1. has a corrected revoke? > > 2. [has a] missing card (corrected after both sides had played to the > next > trick)? > > 3. [has an] established revoke on the 12th trick? > > 4. [has a] revoke discovered after the play of the hand? > > Rick Hills' clear and unambiguous answers Thank you very much > > 1. No. The Law 64B7 prefix refers to an established revoke, not to a > corrected revoke. I meant to ask about the established revoke. One side has a corrected revoke, then the other side has an established revoke. Is there a "rectification as in A" for the established revoke? (The heading does not refer to both revokes or all revokes, it just refers to the established revoke in this example.) > > 2. Yes and No. See Law 14B4, which states that the missing card is not > necessarily a revoke. My question was ambiguous, sorry. Law 67. One side fails to contribute a card to a trick. The mistake is found, but only after each side has followed to the next trick. A card of the correct suit is found, it is put in the defective trick, the player is deemed to have revoked, and the plan is to make a 1 trick penalty. Then the other side makes an established revoke, which does not affect the play but would otherwise cause a 2 trick penalty. How do you rule? > > 3. Yes. While the trick 12 revoke is not subject to rectification under > Law > 64B6, it is still an established revoke therefore Law 64B7 also applies. Just to be clear -- now there is no "rectification as in A" for the first established revoke. > > 4. Yes. A revoke discovered after the play of the hand (within the Law > 79C > correction period) is necessarily an established revoke. Either Laws 64B7 > and 64C will apply or Laws 64B4 and 64C will apply. > > Best wishes, > > Richard Hills > Specialist Recruitment Team, Recruitment Section > Aqua 5, w/s W568, ph 6223 8453 > DIAC Social Club movie ticket coordinator > > -------------------------------------------------------------------- > Important Notice: If you have received this email by mistake, please > advise > the sender and delete the message and attachments immediately. This > email, > including attachments, may contain confidential, sensitive, legally > privileged > and/or copyright information. Any review, retransmission, dissemination > or other use of this information by persons or entities other than the > intended recipient is prohibited. DIAC respects your privacy and has > obligations under the Privacy Act 1988. The official departmental > privacy > policy can be viewed on the department's website at www.immi.gov.au. > See: > http://www.immi.gov.au/functional/privacy.htm > > > --------------------------------------------------------------------- > -- http://somepsychology.com From richard.hills at immi.gov.au Thu Aug 25 06:33:33 2011 From: richard.hills at immi.gov.au (richard.hills at immi.gov.au) Date: Thu, 25 Aug 2011 14:33:33 +1000 Subject: [BLML] L64B [SEC=UNOFFICIAL] In-Reply-To: Message-ID: Terry Pratchett and Neil Gaiman, Good Omens, page 261 Then again, you might just as well ask how many demons can dance on the head of a pin. They're of the same original stock, after all. And at least they dance.* * Although it's not you and I would call _dancing_. Not good dancing anyway. A demon moves like the British group in the Eurovision Song Contest. Grattan Endicott +=+ I have an inclination to seal any pinhole that turns up in the text of the laws. I tend to feel this is helpful to some who do not have English as their first language. English is a difficult language because of its inflections. [snip] 2007 Law 64B7 - Procedure after Establishment of a Revoke - No Rectification There is no rectification as in A following an established revoke: when both sides have revoked on the same board. Hypothetical pinhole sealed 2019 Law 64B7 - Procedure after Establishment of a Revoke - No Rectification A Law 64A rectification does not apply to an established revoke: when the other side has also perpetrated an established revoke on the same board. Robert Frick [snip] Law 67. One side fails to contribute a card to a trick. The mistake is found, but only after each side has followed to the next trick. A card of the correct suit is found, it is put in the defective trick, the player is deemed to have revoked, and the plan is to make a 1 trick penalty. Then the other side makes an established revoke, which does not affect the play but would otherwise cause a 2 trick penalty. How do you rule? [snip] Richard Hills Law 67B1 cross-references Law 64A2, creating an established revoke, so this is a straightforward Law 64B7 (and perhaps Law 64C) ruling. What's the problem? It is irrelevant that there would have been a differential transfer of either 1 or 2 tricks had hypothetically just one of the established revokes been perpetrated by just one of the sides. Best wishes, Richard Hills Specialist Recruitment Team, Recruitment Section Aqua 5, w/s W568, ph 6223 8453 DIAC Social Club movie ticket coordinator -------------------------------------------------------------------- Important Notice: If you have received this email by mistake, please advise the sender and delete the message and attachments immediately. This email, including attachments, may contain confidential, sensitive, legally privileged and/or copyright information. Any review, retransmission, dissemination or other use of this information by persons or entities other than the intended recipient is prohibited. DIAC respects your privacy and has obligations under the Privacy Act 1988. The official departmental privacy policy can be viewed on the department's website at www.immi.gov.au. See: http://www.immi.gov.au/functional/privacy.htm --------------------------------------------------------------------- -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://lists.rtflb.org/pipermail/blml/attachments/20110825/3086b517/attachment-0001.html From rfrick at rfrick.info Fri Aug 26 03:23:26 2011 From: rfrick at rfrick.info (Robert Frick) Date: Thu, 25 Aug 2011 21:23:26 -0400 Subject: [BLML] L64B [SEC=UNOFFICIAL] In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: Thanks Richard. First, I am glad you did not follow Grattan's "disappearing revoke" idea. (That does not especially surprise me, it does not seem to be an easy way of thinking.) If the WBFLC decided to fix L64B2 and L64B7, I think there are two reasonable choices: There is no rectification in A for an established revoke if the other revoke a. is established b. is rectifiable as in A. To, me the second choice seems more fair and I would guess them to prefer that if they thought about it. But your choice (a) is very reasonable. Bob > > Terry Pratchett and Neil Gaiman, Good Omens, page 261 > > Then again, you might just as well ask how many demons can dance on the > head of a pin. They're of the same original stock, after all. And at > least > they dance.* > * Although it's not you and I would call _dancing_. Not good dancing > anyway. A demon moves like the British group in the Eurovision Song > Contest. > > Grattan Endicott > > +=+ I have an inclination to seal any pinhole that turns up in the text > of > the laws. I tend to feel this is helpful to some who do not have English > as > their first language. English is a difficult language because of its > inflections. [snip] > > 2007 Law 64B7 - Procedure after Establishment of a Revoke - No > Rectification > > There is no rectification as in A following an established revoke: > when both sides have revoked on the same board. > > Hypothetical pinhole sealed 2019 Law 64B7 - Procedure after Establishment > of a Revoke - No Rectification > > A Law 64A rectification does not apply to an established revoke: > when the other side has also perpetrated an established revoke on the > same > board. > > Robert Frick > > [snip] Law 67. One side fails to contribute a card to a trick. The > mistake > is found, but only after each side has followed to the next trick. A card > of the correct suit is found, it is put in the defective trick, the > player > is deemed to have revoked, and the plan is to make a 1 trick penalty. > Then > the other side makes an established revoke, which does not affect the > play > but would otherwise cause a 2 trick penalty. > > How do you rule? [snip] > > Richard Hills > > Law 67B1 cross-references Law 64A2, creating an established revoke, so > this > is a straightforward Law 64B7 (and perhaps Law 64C) ruling. What's the > problem? It is irrelevant that there would have been a differential > transfer of either 1 or 2 tricks had hypothetically just one of the > established revokes been perpetrated by just one of the sides. > > Best wishes, > > Richard Hills > Specialist Recruitment Team, Recruitment Section > Aqua 5, w/s W568, ph 6223 8453 > DIAC Social Club movie ticket coordinator > > -------------------------------------------------------------------- > Important Notice: If you have received this email by mistake, please > advise > the sender and delete the message and attachments immediately. This > email, > including attachments, may contain confidential, sensitive, legally > privileged > and/or copyright information. Any review, retransmission, dissemination > or other use of this information by persons or entities other than the > intended recipient is prohibited. DIAC respects your privacy and has > obligations under the Privacy Act 1988. The official departmental > privacy > policy can be viewed on the department's website at www.immi.gov.au. > See: > http://www.immi.gov.au/functional/privacy.htm > > > --------------------------------------------------------------------- > -- http://somepsychology.com From richard.hills at immi.gov.au Fri Aug 26 06:15:03 2011 From: richard.hills at immi.gov.au (richard.hills at immi.gov.au) Date: Fri, 26 Aug 2011 14:15:03 +1000 Subject: [BLML] L64B [SEC=UNOFFICIAL] In-Reply-To: Message-ID: Terry Pratchett and Neil Gaiman, Good Omens, page 261 But if you look from really close up, the only problem about dancing on the head of a pin is all those big gaps between electrons. Robert Frick dances Thanks Richard. First, I am glad you did not follow Grattan's "disappearing revoke" idea. (That does not especially surprise me, it does not seem to be an easy way of thinking.) [snip] Richard Hills gavottes Actually I fully agree with Grattan that a corrected revoke is no longer a revoke. Grattan Endicott gavottes [snip] English is a difficult language because of its inflections. The majority of the committee on balance are disinclined to seek absolute perfection where directors have found no difficulty in applying the law as intended. ~ Grattan ~ +=+ Richard Hills gavottes My hypothetical 2019 Law 64B7 rewrite of "revoke" as "established revoke" was merely dancing upon the pinhead of absolute perfection, avoiding ambiguity for a Long Island Director who has found much difficulty in applying the Law as intended. Best wishes, Richard Hills Specialist Recruitment Team, Recruitment Section Aqua 5, w/s W568, ph 6223 8453 DIAC Social Club movie ticket coordinator -------------------------------------------------------------------- Important Notice: If you have received this email by mistake, please advise the sender and delete the message and attachments immediately. This email, including attachments, may contain confidential, sensitive, legally privileged and/or copyright information. Any review, retransmission, dissemination or other use of this information by persons or entities other than the intended recipient is prohibited. DIAC respects your privacy and has obligations under the Privacy Act 1988. The official departmental privacy policy can be viewed on the department's website at www.immi.gov.au. See: http://www.immi.gov.au/functional/privacy.htm --------------------------------------------------------------------- -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://lists.rtflb.org/pipermail/blml/attachments/20110826/7073bb15/attachment.html From rfrick at rfrick.info Fri Aug 26 16:06:30 2011 From: rfrick at rfrick.info (Robert Frick) Date: Fri, 26 Aug 2011 10:06:30 -0400 Subject: [BLML] difficulties following the intention of the WBFLC In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: > > Grattan Endicott gavottes > > [snip] > English is a difficult language because of its inflections. The majority > of > the committee on balance are disinclined to seek absolute perfection > where > directors have found no difficulty in applying the law as intended. > ~ Grattan ~ +=+ > > Richard Hills gavottes > > My hypothetical 2019 Law 64B7 rewrite of "revoke" as "established revoke" > was merely dancing upon the pinhead of absolute perfection, avoiding > ambiguity for a Long Island Director who has found much difficulty in > applying the Law as intended. I have no trouble following the law AS WRITTEN. My only confusion was whether or not I should do that. Grattan says no, but I assume that is just his personal opinion. HOWEVER, consider the situation where the second revoke (by the other side) is an established revoke by the other side discovered too late for "rectification as in A". I am supposed to guess the intent of the WBFLC? They almost certainly never considered this situation. If they had, they would have realized that the current written version of the law is f***** up. How can we talk about intention here? I can try to guess what they WOULD DO if they considered this situation. Is that what I am supposed to do as a director? You guess one way. THAT'S JUST A GUESS. I would guess the other way. It's reasonable that the WBFLC intended two "rectifiable as in A" revokes to cancel each other out. But I really don't know. Isn't that odd? My job as director is to guess the intent of a committee when they have no intent and it isn't obvious what they would decide. What ever happened to the idea of not having the guess the intention of the WBFLC? I would like to live in a world where I follow the laws as written, feel confident I am doing the right thing, and can show players the law and have it support me. From rfrick at rfrick.info Fri Aug 26 18:19:15 2011 From: rfrick at rfrick.info (Robert Frick) Date: Fri, 26 Aug 2011 12:19:15 -0400 Subject: [BLML] L64B [SEC=UNOFFICIAL] In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: On Fri, 26 Aug 2011 00:15:03 -0400, wrote: > > Terry Pratchett and Neil Gaiman, Good Omens, page 261 > > But if you look from really close up, the only problem about dancing on > the > head of a pin is all those big gaps between electrons. > > Robert Frick dances > > Thanks Richard. First, I am glad you did not follow Grattan's > "disappearing > revoke" idea. (That does not especially surprise me, it does not seem to > be > an easy way of thinking.) > [snip] > > Richard Hills gavottes > > Actually I fully agree with Grattan that a corrected revoke is no longer > a > revoke. Grattan's position is more complicated than that. He would "read" L64B7 as "When two revokes still *exist* on the same board." This excludes the disappearing revokes that were failures to play the correct card but aren't failures any more. So you did not follow Grattan. Don't feel bad, that is the poster child for how laws should never have to be interpreted. I doubt he considered the other situations where it would apply. > > Grattan Endicott gavottes > > [snip] > English is a difficult language because of its inflections. The majority > of > the committee on balance are disinclined to seek absolute perfection > where > directors have found no difficulty in applying the law as intended. > ~ Grattan ~ +=+ > > Richard Hills gavottes > > My hypothetical 2019 Law 64B7 rewrite of "revoke" as "established revoke" > was merely dancing upon the pinhead of absolute perfection, avoiding > ambiguity for a Long Island Director who has found much difficulty in > applying the Law as intended. > > Best wishes, > > Richard Hills > Specialist Recruitment Team, Recruitment Section > Aqua 5, w/s W568, ph 6223 8453 > DIAC Social Club movie ticket coordinator > > -------------------------------------------------------------------- > Important Notice: If you have received this email by mistake, please > advise > the sender and delete the message and attachments immediately. This > email, > including attachments, may contain confidential, sensitive, legally > privileged > and/or copyright information. Any review, retransmission, dissemination > or other use of this information by persons or entities other than the > intended recipient is prohibited. DIAC respects your privacy and has > obligations under the Privacy Act 1988. The official departmental > privacy > policy can be viewed on the department's website at www.immi.gov.au. > See: > http://www.immi.gov.au/functional/privacy.htm > > > --------------------------------------------------------------------- > -- http://somepsychology.com From adam at irvine.com Fri Aug 26 20:54:35 2011 From: adam at irvine.com (Adam Beneschan) Date: Fri, 26 Aug 2011 11:54:35 -0700 Subject: [BLML] Partner can't comply with lead requirement Message-ID: <20110826185437.ECA63A8C85A@mailhub.irvine.com> This question just occurred to me; it's not based on a real life story. Also, I suspect it's been answered in BLML before, but either I didn't see it (since I can't follow every thread) or have forgotten. On defense, you lead out of turn when it's partner's turn to lead. It could be an opening lead or a lead to a later trick. Declarer exercises his option to require that partner lead the same suit. However, partner cannot lead that suit. Is the information that partner is out of the suit authorized or unauthorized for you? I couldn't find a clear answer in the Laws. Your withdrawn card is UI for partner, but this isn't the same thing. Also, I think that the fact that declarer chose this option is AI for you (so that if partner did lead your suit, you're not required to delude yourself into believing that partner thought it was the best lead); but I'm not clear about the situation where partner can't lead your suit. -- thanks, Adam From svenpran at online.no Fri Aug 26 22:22:37 2011 From: svenpran at online.no (Sven Pran) Date: Fri, 26 Aug 2011 22:22:37 +0200 Subject: [BLML] Partner can't comply with lead requirement In-Reply-To: <20110826185437.ECA63A8C85A@mailhub.irvine.com> References: <20110826185437.ECA63A8C85A@mailhub.irvine.com> Message-ID: <000001cc642d$e67a6a70$b36f3f50$@online.no> > Adam Beneschan > This question just occurred to me; it's not based on a real life story. Also, I > suspect it's been answered in BLML before, but either I didn't see it (since I > can't follow every thread) or have forgotten. > > On defense, you lead out of turn when it's partner's turn to lead. It could be > an opening lead or a lead to a later trick. Declarer exercises his option to > require that partner lead the same suit. > However, partner cannot lead that suit. > > Is the information that partner is out of the suit authorized or unauthorized > for you? I couldn't find a clear answer in the Laws. > Your withdrawn card is UI for partner, but this isn't the same thing. > Also, I think that the fact that declarer chose this option is AI for you (so that > if partner did lead your suit, you're not required to delude yourself into > believing that partner thought it was the best lead); but I'm not clear about > the situation where partner can't lead your suit. [Sven Pran] Your partner is committing a revoke unless he really is void (Law 61A last clause) and you are permitted by Law 61B to ask him if he has a card in the requested denomination. Consequently the fact that he appears to be void must be AI to you. The fact that declarer chose a lead in a particular denomination in which you had penalty card(s) is clearly AI to you, it is not an action other than legal call or play by your partner nor is it information derived from an irregularity by your partner. From grabiner at alumni.princeton.edu Sat Aug 27 01:04:07 2011 From: grabiner at alumni.princeton.edu (David Grabiner) Date: Fri, 26 Aug 2011 19:04:07 -0400 Subject: [BLML] Partner can't comply with lead requirement In-Reply-To: <20110826185437.ECA63A8C85A@mailhub.irvine.com> References: <20110826185437.ECA63A8C85A@mailhub.irvine.com> Message-ID: "Adam Beneschan" writes: > > This question just occurred to me; it's not based on a real life > story. Also, I suspect it's been answered in BLML before, but either > I didn't see it (since I can't follow every thread) or have > forgotten. > > On defense, you lead out of turn when it's partner's turn to lead. It > could be an opening lead or a lead to a later trick. Declarer > exercises his option to require that partner lead the same suit. > However, partner cannot lead that suit. > > Is the information that partner is out of the suit authorized or > unauthorized for you? I couldn't find a clear answer in the Laws. > Your withdrawn card is UI for partner, but this isn't the same thing. > Also, I think that the fact that declarer chose this option is AI for > you (so that if partner did lead your suit, you're not required to > delude yourself into believing that partner thought it was the best > lead); but I'm not clear about the situation where partner can't lead > your suit. The old Laws (1987 book, I believe) had a specific example to say that the void is AI, as an illustration of the difference between direct and indirect damage. East commits an infraction which allows South to require or forbid a diamond lead. South requires a diamond lead, and West leads something else; East then gives West a diamond ruff, defeating a contract which would have otherwise made. There is no further adjustment. From svenpran at online.no Sat Aug 27 01:38:45 2011 From: svenpran at online.no (Sven Pran) Date: Sat, 27 Aug 2011 01:38:45 +0200 Subject: [BLML] Partner can't comply with lead requirement In-Reply-To: References: <20110826185437.ECA63A8C85A@mailhub.irvine.com> Message-ID: <000101cc6449$4d223760$e766a620$@online.no> > David Grabiner > "Adam Beneschan" writes: > > > > > This question just occurred to me; it's not based on a real life > > story. Also, I suspect it's been answered in BLML before, but either > > I didn't see it (since I can't follow every thread) or have forgotten. > > > > On defense, you lead out of turn when it's partner's turn to lead. It > > could be an opening lead or a lead to a later trick. Declarer > > exercises his option to require that partner lead the same suit. > > However, partner cannot lead that suit. > > > > Is the information that partner is out of the suit authorized or > > unauthorized for you? I couldn't find a clear answer in the Laws. > > Your withdrawn card is UI for partner, but this isn't the same thing. > > Also, I think that the fact that declarer chose this option is AI for > > you (so that if partner did lead your suit, you're not required to > > delude yourself into believing that partner thought it was the best > > lead); but I'm not clear about the situation where partner can't lead > > your suit. > > The old Laws (1987 book, I believe) had a specific example to say that the > void is AI, as an illustration of the difference between direct and indirect > damage. > East commits an infraction which allows South to require or forbid a diamond > lead. South requires a diamond lead, and West leads something else; East > then gives West a diamond ruff, defeating a contract which would have > otherwise made. > There is no further adjustment. [Sven Pran] I cannot find any such example or text in my Norwegian translation of the 1987 laws nor in my Danish commented edition of the 1975 laws. And there is certainly no such example in the WBFLC law editions of 1997 or 2007. That is not to say that there hasn't been such an example in some other national edition, but I don't think it can have been any in the official, original law text. However, I feel pretty sure that the knowledge of partner's void being AI has always been "obvious". From grandaeval at tiscali.co.uk Sat Aug 27 04:01:45 2011 From: grandaeval at tiscali.co.uk (Grattan) Date: Sat, 27 Aug 2011 03:01:45 +0100 Subject: [BLML] Partner can't comply with lead requirement In-Reply-To: <000101cc6449$4d223760$e766a620$@online.no> Message-ID: <4FFC5B8C5EFE4D84B3AB3BB7A74C9B2E@WINOS3Q4NRDA7L> Grattan David Grabiner > "Adam Beneschan" writes: > > > > > This question just occurred to me; it's not based on a real life > > story. Also, I suspect it's been answered in BLML before, but either > > I didn't see it (since I can't follow every thread) or have forgotten. > > > > On defense, you lead out of turn when it's partner's turn to lead. It > > could be an opening lead or a lead to a later trick. Declarer > > exercises his option to require that partner lead the same suit. > > However, partner cannot lead that suit. > > > > Is the information that partner is out of the suit authorized or > > unauthorized for you? I couldn't find a clear answer in the Laws. > > Your withdrawn card is UI for partner, but this isn't the same thing. > > Also, I think that the fact that declarer chose this option is AI for > > you (so that if partner did lead your suit, you're not required to > > delude yourself into believing that partner thought it was the best > > lead); but I'm not clear about the situation where partner can't lead > > your suit. > > The old Laws (1987 book, I believe) had a specific example to say that the > void is AI, as an illustration of the difference between direct and indirect > damage. > East commits an infraction which allows South to require or forbid a diamond > lead. South requires a diamond lead, and West leads something else; East > then gives West a diamond ruff, defeating a contract which would have > otherwise made. > There is no further adjustment. [Sven Pran] I cannot find any such example or text in my Norwegian translation of the 1987 laws nor in my Danish commented edition of the 1975 laws. And there is certainly no such example in the WBFLC law editions of 1997 or 2007. That is not to say that there hasn't been such an example in some other national edition, but I don't think it can have been any in the official, original law text. However, I feel pretty sure that the knowledge of partner's void being AI has always been "obvious". _______________________________________________ Blml mailing list Blml at rtflb.org http://lists.rtflb.org/mailman/listinfo/blml From adam at tameware.com Sat Aug 27 21:04:55 2011 From: adam at tameware.com (Adam Wildavsky) Date: Sat, 27 Aug 2011 21:04:55 +0200 Subject: [BLML] ACBL Louisville (Spring 2011) NABC+ Case 7 Message-ID: I've rethought my comments on this case. I'd love to hear what BLML members think about the legal issue involved. http://web2.acbl.org/casebooks/Louisville2011/07-NABC+.pdf ============== This case highlights two conficting interpretations of the law. Alas, my colleagues and I on the ACBL Laws Comission have so far reached no consensus as to which is correct. I'll bring the matter up again. At issue is Law 40B4, the one cited by the TD. It reads: A side that is damaged as a consequence of its opponents? failure to provide disclosure of the meaning of a call or play as these Laws require is entitled to rectification through the award of an adjusted score. The question here is whether E/W were damaged by the UI or by their own subsequent actions. I would argue that the UI made a 3H call less attractive and that a 3H call might well have led to a more favorable result for E/W, so that E/W were damaged as a consequence of the MI. If that were the case then I would adjust the N/S score, and also adjust the E/W score unless we determined that E/W subsequently made a "serious" error per Law 12C1(b). Under the TD and AC interpretation E/W were damaged not a consequence of the MI but through their own subsequent actions, so no adjustment is warranted for either side. Under either interpretation we need to determine how likely it is that a 3H call would have led to a more favorable result for E/W. It certainly could have. Double-dummy East needs to lead the HQ to defeat 3N by North. In practice East would always lead low, but not every declarer would think to play dummy's jack at trick one, so the result would often be five tricks for the defense. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://lists.rtflb.org/pipermail/blml/attachments/20110827/a7b6d659/attachment.html From svenpran at online.no Sat Aug 27 21:50:35 2011 From: svenpran at online.no (Sven Pran) Date: Sat, 27 Aug 2011 21:50:35 +0200 Subject: [BLML] ACBL Louisville (Spring 2011) NABC+ Case 7 In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <001101cc64f2$9796fde0$c6c4f9a0$@online.no> I tend to agree with the AC here. East is surprisingly passive (I know many players who would actually open East?s hand with 1D, but appreciate that this does not satisfy the rule of 20 which I believe is a requirement in US?). But I don?t accept that East fails to show his support in hearts after the Michaels bid in West (what would have been the meaning of a double after 2S?). And East should expect South to hold 4 spades and 2 or maximum 3 hearts. I hope that in the situation I would have realized that a switch to the HQ in trick two is the best chance to set the contract. Neither of these possible actions appears being made difficult by the misinformation? Fra: blml-bounces at rtflb.org [mailto:blml-bounces at rtflb.org] P? vegne av Adam Wildavsky Sendt: 27. august 2011 21:05 Til: Bridge Laws Discussion List Emne: [BLML] ACBL Louisville (Spring 2011) NABC+ Case 7 I've rethought my comments on this case. I'd love to hear what BLML members think about the legal issue involved. http://web2.acbl.org/casebooks/Louisville2011/07-NABC+.pdf ============== This case highlights two conficting interpretations of the law. Alas, my colleagues and I on the ACBL Laws Comission have so far reached no consensus as to which is correct. I'll bring the matter up again. At issue is Law 40B4, the one cited by the TD. It reads: A side that is damaged as a consequence of its opponents? failure to provide disclosure of the meaning of a call or play as these Laws require is entitled to rectification through the award of an adjusted score. The question here is whether E/W were damaged by the UI or by their own subsequent actions. I would argue that the UI made a 3H call less attractive and that a 3H call might well have led to a more favorable result for E/W, so that E/W were damaged as a consequence of the MI. If that were the case then I would adjust the N/S score, and also adjust the E/W score unless we determined that E/W subsequently made a "serious" error per Law 12C1(b). Under the TD and AC interpretation E/W were damaged not a consequence of the MI but through their own subsequent actions, so no adjustment is warranted for either side. Under either interpretation we need to determine how likely it is that a 3H call would have led to a more favorable result for E/W. It certainly could have. Double-dummy East needs to lead the HQ to defeat 3N by North. In practice East would always lead low, but not every declarer would think to play dummy's jack at trick one, so the result would often be five tricks for the defense. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://lists.rtflb.org/pipermail/blml/attachments/20110827/7e8d218a/attachment.html From adam at tameware.com Sun Aug 28 13:02:29 2011 From: adam at tameware.com (Adam Wildavsky) Date: Sun, 28 Aug 2011 13:02:29 +0200 Subject: [BLML] ACBL Louisville (Spring 2011) Non-NABC+ Case 3: adjusted score changed in favor of the NOS In-Reply-To: <145FAF3AE75C4AE387D382C541C506A7@erdos> References: <145FAF3AE75C4AE387D382C541C506A7@erdos> Message-ID: On Tue, Aug 16, 2011 at 1:40 AM, David Grabiner < grabiner at alumni.princeton.edu> wrote: > Adam Wildavsky writes (typo corrected): > > > 3. With no bridge reason for declarar to play differently in 2S than in > 3S I > > agree > > with the panel's adjustment, NS +50 for both sides. I would never the > less > > have > > found the N/S appeal without merit, since the basis for their appeal > seems to > > have > > been that South should be allowed to bid 3H after partner's unmistakable > break > > in > > tempo. I would further have considered a procedural penalty against N/S. > There > > may > > be other ways to provide an incentive to follow the laws in the future, > but > > this seems > > the most effective. > > The text of the appeal doesn't say that. A reviewer did a poll to confirm > that > passing by South was a LA to his actual 3H bid, but N-S didn't claim that > in the > appeal. "The appealing side presented the argument that declarer had made > a > poor play in 3S." > > And given that N-S made this argument, their appeal must have merit; the TD > ruled -110 and there is a reasonable bridge argument that N-S were entitled > to > +50 under the Laws. Even if the Panel had denied that adjustment, I > wouldn't > rule an appeal without merit. > I agree. I'll update my comments before submitting for the casebook. Thx! -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://lists.rtflb.org/pipermail/blml/attachments/20110828/fa4e1523/attachment.html From richard.hills at immi.gov.au Mon Aug 29 01:06:12 2011 From: richard.hills at immi.gov.au (richard.hills at immi.gov.au) Date: Mon, 29 Aug 2011 09:06:12 +1000 Subject: [BLML] ACBL Louisville (Spring 2011) NABC+ Case 7 [SEC=UNOFFICIAL] In-Reply-To: <001101cc64f2$9796fde0$c6c4f9a0$@online.no> Message-ID: Konrad Lorenz The missing link between animals and the real human being is most likely ourselves. Adam Wildavsky [snip] At issue is Law 40B4, the one cited by the TD. It reads: A side that is damaged as a consequence of its opponents? failure to provide disclosure of the meaning of a call or play as these Laws require is entitled to rectification through the award of an adjusted score. The question here is whether E/W were damaged by the [MI] or by their own subsequent actions. I would argue that the [MI] made a 3H call less attractive and that a 3H call might well have led to a more favorable result for E/W, so that E/W were damaged as a consequence of the MI. If that were the case then I would adjust the N/S score, and also adjust the E/W score unless we determined that E/W subsequently made a "serious" error per Law 12C1(b). Under the TD and AC interpretation E/W were damaged not a consequence of the MI but through their own subsequent actions, so no adjustment is warranted for either side. [snip] Richard Hills In my opinion -- in addition to the Law 40B4 word "consequence" -- at issue is Law 12B1's definition of "damage". Law 12B1 The objective of score adjustment is to redress damage to a non-offending side and to take away any advantage gained by an offending side through its infraction. Damage exists when, because of an infraction, an innocent side obtains a table result less favourable than would have been the expectation had the infraction not occurred ? but see C1(b). Richard Hills If East-West's losing actions were made more attractive as a "consequence" of (not merely subsequent to) the MI infraction, then damage has occurred. East's second Pass, instead of a lead-directing 3H, was made more attractive by the MI that there was a misfit in diamonds. And the East-West misdefence to 3NT was made easier by West's actual spade opening lead. 3NT instead would have been very routinely defeated with a heart opening lead, which defence would certainly occur after East's hypothetical 3H (unless East declared 3Hx). So it seems that Adam Wildavsky and Edgar Kaplan(1) and I are in agreement. In my opinion, the North-South score should definitely have been adjusted. In my opinion, whether or not the East-West score was also adjusted depends upon whether or not East's failure to bid 3H and/or East's failure to switch to the queen of hearts was deemed to be a Law 12C1(b) "serious error". Best wishes, Richard Hills (1) Many years ago Edgar Kaplan discussed a case with a similar principle in The Bridge World. As I recall, LHO opened a 12-14 1NT, pard passed, RHO passed (not alerted), and you indulged in a matchpoint balance of 2H. This was doubled for penalty by RHO and a -300 bottom was the result. But RHO's Pass should have been alerted, as it denied holding 0-5 hcp (automatic Stayman or transfer with such a weak hand). Although you would not have balanced had you known that RHO's Pass promised 6-11 hcp, the Appeals Committee did not adjust the score for either side because your matchpoint balance of 2H was "wild or gambling". -------------------------------------------------------------------- Important Notice: If you have received this email by mistake, please advise the sender and delete the message and attachments immediately. This email, including attachments, may contain confidential, sensitive, legally privileged and/or copyright information. Any review, retransmission, dissemination or other use of this information by persons or entities other than the intended recipient is prohibited. DIAC respects your privacy and has obligations under the Privacy Act 1988. The official departmental privacy policy can be viewed on the department's website at www.immi.gov.au. See: http://www.immi.gov.au/functional/privacy.htm --------------------------------------------------------------------- -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://lists.rtflb.org/pipermail/blml/attachments/20110828/2d03be5b/attachment.html From sater at xs4all.nl Mon Aug 29 08:22:16 2011 From: sater at xs4all.nl (Hans van Staveren) Date: Mon, 29 Aug 2011 08:22:16 +0200 Subject: [BLML] ACBL Louisville (Spring 2011) NABC+ Case 7 [SEC=UNOFFICIAL] In-Reply-To: References: <001101cc64f2$9796fde0$c6c4f9a0$@online.no> Message-ID: <030501cc6613$ffe6a860$ffb3f920$@nl> [RH] (1) Many years ago Edgar Kaplan discussed a case with a similar principle in The Bridge World. As I recall, LHO opened a 12-14 1NT, pard passed, RHO passed (not alerted), and you indulged in a matchpoint balance of 2H. This was doubled for penalty by RHO and a -300 bottom was the result. But RHO's Pass should have been alerted, as it denied holding 0-5 hcp (automatic Stayman or transfer with such a weak hand). Although you would not have balanced had you known that RHO's Pass promised 6-11 hcp, the Appeals Committee did not adjust the score for either side because your matchpoint balance of 2H was "wild or gambling". [HvS] This might have been a reason not to adjust the score for the 2H bidders, but certainly not a reason to let the 1NT bidders keep their 300. Hans -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://lists.rtflb.org/pipermail/blml/attachments/20110829/813c7da3/attachment.html From koen.grauwels at oracle.com Mon Aug 29 08:23:44 2011 From: koen.grauwels at oracle.com (koen.grauwels at oracle.com) Date: Sun, 28 Aug 2011 23:23:44 -0700 (PDT) Subject: [BLML] Auto Reply: Re: ACBL Louisville (Spring 2011) NABC+ Case 7 [SEC=UNOFFICIAL] Message-ID: Hello, Thank you for your mail. I'm on Holiday until 31-Aug-11 and will be unable to respond to your mail before that date. Regards, Koen From richard.hills at immi.gov.au Wed Aug 31 02:55:52 2011 From: richard.hills at immi.gov.au (richard.hills at immi.gov.au) Date: Wed, 31 Aug 2011 10:55:52 +1000 Subject: [BLML] L64B [SEC=UNOFFICIAL] In-Reply-To: Message-ID: Bernard Baruch (1870-1965), American statesman Every man has a right to his own opinion, but no man has a right to be wrong in his facts. Richard Hills Actually I fully agree with Grattan that a corrected revoke is no longer a revoke. Robert Frick Grattan's position is more complicated than that. He would "read" L64B7 as "When two revokes still *exist* on the same board." This excludes the disappearing revokes that were failures to play the correct card but aren't failures any more. So you did not follow Grattan. [snip] Richard Hills "Actually I fully agree with Grattan that a corrected revoke is no longer a revoke" seems to me factually synonymous with failure to follow suit no longer being a failure once the correct card is played as a replacement for the incorrect card. This is confirmed by the Definition of "withdrawn" which includes a retracted card. What's the problem? Is the problem Bob Frick and I blindly giving different descriptions of the same elephant? Best wishes, Richard Hills John Godfrey Saxe (1816-1887) It was six men of Indostan To learning much inclined, Who went to see the Elephant (Though all of them were blind), That each by observation Might satisfy his mind. The First approached the Elephant, And happening to fall Against his broad and sturdy side, At once began to bawl: "God bless me! but the Elephant Is very like a wall!" The Second, feeling of the tusk Cried, "Ho! what have we here, So very round and smooth and sharp? To me 'tis mighty clear This wonder of an Elephant Is very like a spear!" The Third approached the animal, And happening to take The squirming trunk within his hands, Thus boldly up he spake: "I see," quoth he, "the Elephant Is very like a snake!" The Fourth reached out an eager hand, And felt about the knee: "What most this wondrous beast is like Is mighty plain," quoth he; "'Tis clear enough the Elephant Is very like a tree!" The Fifth, who chanced to touch the ear, Said: "E'en the blindest man Can tell what this resembles most; Deny the fact who can, This marvel of an Elephant Is very like a fan!" The Sixth no sooner had begun About the beast to grope, Than, seizing on the swinging tail That fell within his scope. "I see," quoth he, "the Elephant Is very like a rope!" And so these men of Indostan Disputed loud and long, Each in his own opinion Exceeding stiff and strong, Though each was partly in the right, And all were in the wrong! Moral: So oft in theologic wars, The disputants, I ween, Rail on in utter ignorance Of what each other mean, And prate about an Elephant Not one of them has seen! -------------------------------------------------------------------- Important Notice: If you have received this email by mistake, please advise the sender and delete the message and attachments immediately. This email, including attachments, may contain confidential, sensitive, legally privileged and/or copyright information. Any review, retransmission, dissemination or other use of this information by persons or entities other than the intended recipient is prohibited. DIAC respects your privacy and has obligations under the Privacy Act 1988. The official departmental privacy policy can be viewed on the department's website at www.immi.gov.au. See: http://www.immi.gov.au/functional/privacy.htm --------------------------------------------------------------------- -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://lists.rtflb.org/pipermail/blml/attachments/20110831/50b46db7/attachment.html From nigelguthrie at yahoo.co.uk Wed Aug 31 03:13:24 2011 From: nigelguthrie at yahoo.co.uk (Nigel Guthrie) Date: Wed, 31 Aug 2011 02:13:24 +0100 Subject: [BLML] L64B [SEC=UNOFFICIAL] In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <594E3A2BCB14484A8B1954F7A0F7516B@G3> [Richard Hills quotes John Godfrey Saxe (1816-1887) It was six men of Indostan To learning much inclined, Who went to see the Elephant (Though all of them were blind), That each by observation Might satisfy his mind. The First approached the Elephant, And happening to fall Against his broad and sturdy side, At once began to bawl: "God bless me! but the Elephant Is very like a wall!" The Second, feeling of the tusk Cried, "Ho! what have we here, So very round and smooth and sharp? To me 'tis mighty clear This wonder of an Elephant Is very like a spear!" The Third approached the animal, And happening to take The squirming trunk within his hands, Thus boldly up he spake: "I see," quoth he, "the Elephant Is very like a snake!" The Fourth reached out an eager hand, And felt about the knee: "What most this wondrous beast is like Is mighty plain," quoth he; "'Tis clear enough the Elephant Is very like a tree!" The Fifth, who chanced to touch the ear, Said: "E'en the blindest man Can tell what this resembles most; Deny the fact who can, This marvel of an Elephant Is very like a fan!" The Sixth no sooner had begun About the beast to grope, Than, seizing on the swinging tail That fell within his scope. "I see," quoth he, "the Elephant Is very like a rope!" And so these men of Indostan Disputed loud and long, Each in his own opinion Exceeding stiff and strong, Though each was partly in the right, And all were in the wrong! Moral: So oft in theologic wars, The disputants, I ween, Rail on in utter ignorance Of what each other mean, And prate about an Elephant Not one of them has seen! [Nigel] Good stuff Richard. I agree that TFLB works well as a kind of Rorschach Test :) but has some deficiencies as a rules for a game :( From rfrick at rfrick.info Wed Aug 31 03:46:24 2011 From: rfrick at rfrick.info (Robert Frick) Date: Tue, 30 Aug 2011 21:46:24 -0400 Subject: [BLML] L64B [SEC=UNOFFICIAL] In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: On Tue, 30 Aug 2011 20:55:52 -0400, wrote: > > Bernard Baruch (1870-1965), American statesman > > Every man has a right to his own opinion, but no man has a right to be > wrong in his facts. > > Richard Hills > > Actually I fully agree with Grattan that a corrected revoke is no longer > a > revoke. > > Robert Frick > > Grattan's position is more complicated than that. He would "read" L64B7 > as > "When two revokes still *exist* on the same board." This excludes the > disappearing revokes that were failures to play the correct card but > aren't > failures any more. > > So you did not follow Grattan. > [snip] > > Richard Hills > > "Actually I fully agree with Grattan that a corrected revoke is no > longer a > revoke" seems to me factually synonymous with failure to follow suit no > longer being a failure once the correct card is played as a replacement > for > the incorrect card. This is confirmed by the Definition of "withdrawn" > which includes a retracted card. What's the problem? > Is the problem Bob > Frick and I blindly giving different descriptions of the same elephant? No, I am A LOT more empirical than that. According to Grattan, L64B7 does not apply to revokes that no longer exist because they were corrected. That would included unestablished revokes (which is presumablly all Grattan thought about), established revokes on the 12th trick, and tricks with a missing card. Right? So, if someone could follow Grattan in his torturous thinking, they would realize that -- according to Grattan -- L64B7 does not apply to these three situations. You did not follow Grattan. You ruled, consistently, that disappearing established revokes triggered L65F. You didn't even realize you weren't following Grattan. (If you want to argue, fine, but you didn't even know what to argue.) This is really important. General principles apply in general. It can be really difficult to discover the implications of a general principle. And whacky general principles are especially dangerous, not that anyone wants them or likes them except to pretend that the laws don't have errors. Thanks for replying to this. You were brave and this was helpful. Bob From richard.hills at immi.gov.au Wed Aug 31 06:04:33 2011 From: richard.hills at immi.gov.au (richard.hills at immi.gov.au) Date: Wed, 31 Aug 2011 14:04:33 +1000 Subject: [BLML] L64B [SEC=UNOFFICIAL] In-Reply-To: <594E3A2BCB14484A8B1954F7A0F7516B@G3> Message-ID: John Godfrey Saxe (1816-1887) [snip] Moral: So oft in theologic wars, The disputants, I ween, Rail on in utter ignorance Of what each other mean, And prate about an Elephant Not one of them has seen! Nigel Guthrie Good stuff Richard. I agree that TFLB works well as a kind of Rorschach Test :) but has some deficiencies as a rules for a game :( Richard Hills If one visits THE website for analysis of multi-player strategy games, BoardGameGeek http://www.boardgamegeek.com/ one will find very many theologic wars about the deficient rules of any and all particular games under discussion (unless the rules of the game are _too_ simple, thus the game is a waste of time to either discuss or play, for example Noughts-and-Crosses / Tic-Tac-Toe). 7252 strategy games are ranked on BoardGameGeek, with Bridge having a very high ranking of 165th place. An interesting point was raised by BoardGameGeek blogger Dave Ross. http://www.boardgamegeek.com/blogpost/1008/opacity-in-gaming I?d like to draw a distinction between two different kinds of games: games that are _opaque_ and games that are _transparent_. A transparent game is one whose basic strategies are available even to first-time players; an opaque game is one whose basic strategies are only revealed to those who have played the game many times before. A transparent game has an easy point of entry, though it might take a long time to master; an opaque game is difficult to get into, however long it takes to master. A transparent game is newbie-friendly; an opaque game appeals only to those who are more dedicated to the hobby. It might on first inspection appear that opacity is closely related to the game?s learning curve, and perhaps it is, but I hope to define opacity in a more precise way so as to be able to say something more specific about a game?s approachability [snip] Bridge, on the other hand, is fairly opaque: while card play is straightforward, bidding effectively requires the memorization of a great many guidelines and conventions. And while Chess and Bridge will both reward a lifetime of study, I?ve never heard anyone say that Bridge is harder to master than Chess. Harder to pick up _initially_, yes, but not harder to master. I?m not really saying anything new, here, I?m just trying to create a shorthand when talking about games: transparent games are newbie-friendly, have an easier point of entry, have a more gradual learning curve, and have no hidden information. Opaque games, on the other hand, have a steeper learning curve, have lots of hidden information [snip] Richard Hills To my mind the key phrase is "lots of hidden information". Not only does that hidden information make Duplicate Bridge devilishly tricky to play, the hidden information also makes the rules of Duplicate Bridge devilishly tricky to design without creating any real ambiguities. An even greater challenge is designing the rules without creating merely apparent ambiguities (i.e. creating a straightforwardly "obvious" rule, for example creating a rule using the word "infringe", which is nevertheless capable of being misconstrued by a blmler). Best wishes, Richard Hills Specialist Recruitment Team, Recruitment Section Aqua 5, w/s W568, ph 6223 8453 DIAC Social Club movie ticket coordinator -------------------------------------------------------------------- Important Notice: If you have received this email by mistake, please advise the sender and delete the message and attachments immediately. This email, including attachments, may contain confidential, sensitive, legally privileged and/or copyright information. Any review, retransmission, dissemination or other use of this information by persons or entities other than the intended recipient is prohibited. DIAC respects your privacy and has obligations under the Privacy Act 1988. The official departmental privacy policy can be viewed on the department's website at www.immi.gov.au. See: http://www.immi.gov.au/functional/privacy.htm --------------------------------------------------------------------- -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://lists.rtflb.org/pipermail/blml/attachments/20110831/3f096650/attachment-0001.html