Leo LaSota

The ACBL does not use these MPs for seeding purposes, with the exception of the miniscule impact potential on a team entering into a Vanderbilt or Spingold of being seeded higher because a member of the team has alot of MPs from ACBL best hand robot tournaments. In pairs events in which seeding is based on another individual's relative rankings of various expert partnerships entering into the event, an individual that earns a large number of masterpoints through robot tournaments is given a lower relative seed as a result.

ACBL does setup a "separate ladder/rating" by disallowing any online "monsterpoints" earned from counting in certain trophy races (Mini-McKenney, Barry Crane Top 500 for example).

What is more important to the ACBL than anything else is to continue to foster interest and participation and keep the game going strong in the future. Fred Gitelman and all of the workers for BBO deserve our continued praise and thanks for all that they do to promote the game of bridge. The ACBL robot tournaments have seen a large number of members participating. This has meant great news for the ACBL by offering another way for gathering additional members, as well as increased participation in ACBL events from many of the members that choose to play in the ACBL robot tournaments. While it is true that there will always be disagreement as to whether these tournaments should be offered as another way for members to earn masterpoints, there is no argument against the fact that regular participation in these events will improve an individual's declarer play. The quote "Please, ACBL, credit me with the points I need. No, I haven't earned them, but apparently that doesn't matter" is very disrespectful.

A player can win any given matchpoint bridge session by making "anti-field" bids and plays if luck is on their side and they also receive enough gifts (i.e. mistakes from the opponents). Over the long run, the regular names that you see in the winner circle are terrific at the key to matchpoints. The top experts regularly make fewer mistakes than their opponents, and they take advantage when their opponents make mistakes against them. It is true that there are situations in which an expert makes a non-standard bid or play because they have more knowledge and experience with certain bidding and play situations also.

It is hard to argue against the fact that the best hand robot events are a great measure of specific bridge skills. A player that is strong at declarer play will certainly be successful when participating in these events. This would become even more true if the human always declares the hands that end up being played by North or South.

There are many different forms of the game that allow for masterpoints. There are many arguments for and against other forms of the game that award masterpoints. As an example, Imp Pairs introduces more randomness than just about any other form of the game. If you are unlucky enough to play a board against a pair that lucks their way into a poor but making vulnerable slam, you are at a tremendous disadvantage. At least in matchpoint events, one board is worth no more weight than any other board. Should Imp Pairs events be allowed to award masterpoints? I believe that Imp Pairs and "Best Hand" robot tournaments should both continue to award masterpoints. While the events have varied amounts of luck involved (Luck plays a much larger factor in Imp Pairs), they also focus on specific skills to succeed at the game of bridge.

This is a very welcome idea. I am not sure if this will be allowed in the ACBL robot games. As I have mentioned before in other threads, I make some unusual bids in the ACBL robot games in order to get the practice of declaring additional hands. This would no longer be necessary if the human is allowed to declare all hands that end up with North or South declaring. Only issue is that this would result in my average increasing from 61% to about 65%, which may result in less opporutnity for others to win the robot tourneys against me :).

While "best hand" robot bridge tournaments do not focus on all aspects of a live bridge game, I can say from experience that they are a much greater measure of skill than many live bridge games. Me and my partner, John Adams, likely played stronger on the final day of the Wernher Open Pairs than any other pair. However, we only managed a 64% and 60% in the two final sessions largely because the opponents did alot of very good things against us. As an example, the opponents bid and made 4 slams against us (one grand) and the results of these hands were completely out of our control. We scored well below average on all 4 of these boards. I checked the results from just 2 of these boards from the evening session. Against the first place pair, the opponents did not bid either of the slam. This resulted in two great scores for the winners. The additional matchpoints that they earned on these two boards was more than the difference in our final scores. Additionally, the second place pair stated in the bulletin that they had alot of luck in the event.

Hi all, I took a couple of weeks off from BBO, but I was glad to see the 18 bd tourneys fairly well participated in when I started playing again.

I really do not understand the point that you are trying to make in bringing this hand up for discussion. Is the fact that ace spades is poorly placed for your side the reason that you know that passing is the correct choice? It certainly could go against you to pass on different layouts of the other 3 hands. Besides, it appears that there are auctions where you open and likely end with a plus score.

While I believe that you should be granted a second opportunity, it would only be fair that ACBL/BBO remove all masterpoints earned and backtrack to eliminating your name from the awards list in all games that you participated in and providing the earned masterpoints to the appropriate individuals.

Instead of balancing with 2H on a 3 card suit, the robot should be programmed to double, which shows maximum passed hand values (good 9 to 11), plus a spade stack. In general, penalty doubles of low levels should be based on strength in suit bid on your right. In other words, penalty double here should not show diamond penalties, it should show spade penalties. I would convert the double and take likely down 2.

Welcome to you to ACBL bridge. As you are a newcomer to duplicate bridge, my recommendation to you is to try different versions of the game. Find one or two local bridge clubs with duplicate games, as well as try some of the online bridge games. BBO is a terrific site for the many different versions of the game that they offer. In terms of ACBL games, BBO offers: 1)speedball tournaments in which you and a partner register (12 board tournaments starting on the hour, plus some 12 board tournaments starting on the half hour, plus some 18 board tournaments offered 3 times a day), 2) individual tournaments (12 board tournaments starting on the hour in which you play 4 3 board rounds, rotating to different partners every 3 boards), 3) robot duplicate (12 and 18 board tournaments in which you are dealt at least as many HCP as each of the 3 robots; these are offered throughout the day). There are 2 advantages to particpating in the ACBL robot duplicates: 1) Since you are dealt at least as many HCP as every other hand, you receive a great deal of declarer practice and this improves anyone's declarer play http://webutil.bridgebase.com/v2/news_fetch.php?id=850 2) You can learn from your mistakes on your own since when you make a mistake, you do not have a partner that may look to discuss the hand with you later. If you participate in some of BBO's online games, this will make you a better bridge player. Therefore, you will be better prepared when you compete in local clubs and tournaments.

I posted this hand after I finished the 18 boards and making sure that everyone else had completed the board. I was unable to see what the description of the bid was wehn I posted this before the tournament was complete. Nevertheless, if the bid is supposed to show 4+ hearts, I do not think that 109x qualifies for this explanation.

On ACBL tournament #66, hand #1, the auction went P-P-1C-1S-P-2D-P-P-2H**, which was a "twice rebiddable" suit on AQ109xx 109x Kx Qx.

It is very sad that you continue to post on something that you have no actual experience participating in. The purpose of these GIB robot discussion topics is to discuss certain bidding situations and card play scenarios that individuals have seen that they believe the programmers of GIB should update. Most, if not all of the participants in the ACBL robot games would agree with me that the GIB robot is programmed to bid, defend, and declare many of the hands very well. Very few individuals would agree with your statement that the secret to robot bridge is "luck or skill at gaming the robots".

On board 9 of ACBL tournament #7344, I had the following impossible auction: 4H opener by partner - pass - pass - 4S - pass - pass - 5H - pass - 6C** - double - 6H - pass - pass - double - all pass. Result was 6H dbled down 1. BBO programmers, this is a very poor mistake that needs to be corrected. When partner has passed and then simply bids one more once the opponents balance, this is not at all invitational on their partner to bid again.

Hopefully, the Philadelphia nationals turn out to be a great success for the organizers and volunteers. Unfortunately, there are a few factors that may harm attendance. As others have already mentioned, for those living on the West coast, playing bridge at 7:00 a.m. for the time that they are used to will be difficult for some. This may mean small participation from those living on the West Coast. Starting at 10 a.m. will prevent many members from having the option of working for the morning before starting bridge. Also, there will be some morning traffic concerns for members that live in Philadelphia or surrounding cities. Perhaps the ACBL could consider starting times that are in between 10 a.m. and 1. Starting premier national events at say 12 and 6 would likely work out well. The current 6.5 hours between the start of one session and the next for many of the national events is considered to be too long by many. Philadelphia appears to have gotten the 6 hour difference in starting times correct for the Spingold, as most days the 1st half starts at 10 and the 2nd half starts at 4.

Hi all, I was just wondering why more people do not play in the 18 board ACBL robot tournaments. The 18 board tournaments are worth 100% of ACBL masterpoints, while the 12 board tournaments are only worth 60%.

I take it this means the card that you did not provide from the actual hand was the king of clubs? If so, ruffing and cashing ace hearts is reasonable. Otherwise, ruffing and leading ace clubs should work as partner should not have AK diamonds plus the KJxxx of clubs and pass initially playing your version of precision.

Line of play I would take is jack spade trick 2. If the finesse does not lose to the king behind the AQxx, I then lead king club planning to discard diamonds if RHO does not show ace clubs. If spade jack loses to king offside, I still have many possible layouts that will enable 4H to make. Another option would be to just enter dummy trick 2 via a diamond ruff or spade to the ace and take the ruffing finesse in clubs. On a few layouts in which king spades is offsides, this would be the only winning line to take. However, the % line is to finesse jack spades trick 2. It is clear on the hand that you must go after gathering extra tricks in one of the two black suits. Again, the % line is to go after the spades trick 2 by running the jack.

We cannot expect GIB to be programmed to incorporate many "expert standard" agreements into the bidding methods. Just be glad that GIB at least plays Lebensohl at all in this auction. Many experts would use the 3 diamond bid in this auction to show 5+ spades, INV+, and therefore if E/W remain silent, the auction would go 1nt-2h-3D-pass-3s- all pass. Opener would reject the invite with soft, aceless 16 count without aces and KQ hearts in front of heart bidder.

It seems as though your hand has one more club (2317?) than is given in the diagram. Regardless, this is a classic hand in which you trump one of your partner's tricks as you have a 100% defense. Ruff the high diamond at trick 2 and cash the ace clubs. Declarer cannot have a club void since that would require partner to have an opening bid (unless the card that you mistakenly left out of the East hand was the king of clubs).

Not sure why Uday would doubt that it is possible. Many people (including Uday) find it hard to believe I win about 50% of the 18 board tourneys I enter as it is. If my goal was just to win the things, I would probably win about 80% of them.

Justin, I promise you that I do not use strategies to maximize my % in the robot games. I just like to get more and more declarer hands in in a short period of time. If my goal was just to max my average %, I have no doubt that I could average 65%. I am naturally competitive at alot of stuff as you are, but having the best % average is not a competitve itch of mine. I have never even visited this rating site that everyone has talked about. For all I know, I may be considered a novice.