themarc

They obviously posted this one; and if they did so to gauge interest in continuing to post forum links to the news page, I would vote to continue.

I don't remember. It was some time ago. Hasn't happened recently, so maybe just a glitch or i'm misrembering.

Several times when registered to play in a BBO tournament, I have been unable to discuss with partner a convention card as they show up as not online. Does this have something to do with the separation of competitive and casual servers? Also these "offline" players are then seated when the tournament starts. Does this mean that if someone is playing at a casual table, they are automatically moved to the tournament table when the tournament starts? Also I have been playing in a Daylong match while registered for a future tournament, and then had my tournament registration cancelled when it started. Is that because they are both on the same server? or am I just confused?

Understood but that still doesn't explain why one half of a pair can concede the board without partner input.

Agreed that the browser extensions work reasonably well for these pre alerts, as well as all the other alerts required, but an auto pre alert would save time. The real question is why ACBL and presumably other world organizations requires the pre alert in the first place for systems as commonplace as the big club universe, since all of the low level artificial bids are alertable anyway. Is it to give the opponents time to brush up on their esoteric CRASH-Suction-etc. defenses, and shouldn't they be required to pre alert those as well.

On another note, there is also a problem with concessions, in that if one of a partnership makes a faulty concession, whether out of mistake or petulance, it can be accepted without the other partner having a chance to object. This also contrary to the rules which don't allow the loss of a trick which cannot be lost through any normal line of play. Since the software seems to be capable of calculating the result of unfinished boards when time expires, why cannot it not be allowed to calculate results in these situations as well?

Only clubs in which you are registered as a member will show up on your list of tournaments whether you go through the Competitive/ACBL Virtual tab or the Featured/Virtual Clubs North America tab. However as Joe Old suggests scrolling down to the All Clubs tab after the Featured/Virtual will show all the clubs. Nevertheless, if you are not a member of the club, you likely will still be blocked if you try to invite, but your partner who is a member of that club can invite you.

Only for masochists!!

As Merriman said when you are the host you have multiple options, so you have to choose. When you are not host your only option is to see the player's profile so it comes up automatically.

Might not do everything you want, but you could become a BBO director, then run tournaments and only allow members who you include on your list to play in them.

A couple of more clarifications. Yes I agree that the system creates inequities, but I am not sure if the computer coding to fix it is cost effective or very high on BBO's to do list. There are other system issues that might be considered more pressing. Perhaps a "squeaky wheel" question. As far as I know, only the director can seat a substitute in a virtual game whether by choosing from the list of available substitutes who have clicked the "substitutes" button, or PM'd them prior, or are on a club list of substitutes. The director can elect to default and let the server choose any available sub from the list. You are probably right about the lack of utility of the sub button by navigating to a running game, because as you note the director is usually already - sometimes frantically - searching for substitutes, and unless your volunteering during that process just happens to catch their eye it will probably not result in a seat. But, using the substitute button just for general games and not a particular running game has other issues, such as constantly being sent to team games not tournaments, as I have previously complained in the forum. However, substitutes do not have to be previously "friended" by the director to be seated, in my experience. The tool to check ACBL member's status is not onerous to use, but it does require additional time, and directors' might find it easier to just ask as to your masterpoints. Lastly I understand your "free agent" issue. It is possible for you and a partner to request to be included as a friend in a club for which you are not a member and play in their game as a guest, as long as the club does not exceed the ACBL's 15% guest limit. (Another issue which I have complained about to ACBL, and was definitely a business decision). Some clubs are amenable to this while others are more inclusive. And as a postscript, do not let these issues discourage you from this fascinating wonderful game whether online or F2F. Things look like they are likely to change in the future as there develops a hybrid model of online/F2F bridge, and some of these issues may go away.

I both direct an ACBL virtual game and often sub in other virtual games to help out other directors. I'm not a BBO expert, but have a few insights that might help you. Strats in virtual club games are assigned based on ACBL masterpoint holdings. Players who do not have an ACBL number recorded with BBO are automatically placed in Strat A, as are robots. This might not be totally fair, as I have had some beginning players who were always assigned to Strat A prior to joining ACBL and registering their number with BBO, although they could have placed in Strat C. It may be that the "sitouts" positions are likewise assigned to Strat A since they could not have an ACBL number. This would make sense, since although possible, restratifying an already running game after the game has started based on who the substitutes are would require some additional server resources. To a second point, it is not just club members who are allowed to substitute in a virtual club game. Players from anywhere in the world can be seated by the director. As most of these will not have ACBL numbers placing them in Strat A also makes sense. Also, virtual Club directors do have a tool available to check on the masterpoint holdings of potential substitutes in their games if they are ACBL members. So it would take some collusion on the part of the director to place experts in Strat C replacement seats as a strategy, although this might sometimes happen of necessity if substitutes are scarse when a player is dropped. Finally, IMHO, our substitutes are valued and much appreciated as they make our games run much smoother and eliminate boring sitouts which would detract immensely from the online game; but they do get to play for free, and while I do not begrudge them the masterpoints they earn against Strat A players if they are able, it seems to me that preserving our lower strata paying members' ability to earn a few fractions of masterpoints in the lower strats is not an unwise business decision. I even played in one club where our pair was later assigned adjusted average minuses on our good boards, so that we fell out of the scratching ranks. Might be carrying it a bit too far, but I was advised by the director ahead of time and understand.

It would behoove BBO to implement changes to its substitutes function to separate teams tournaments from pairs tournaments. I often volunteer to play as a substitute in tournaments, both for the adventure and to help out other tournament directors However the challenge of playing with one random partner in a supervised tournament is far different from the often ridiculousness of playing with three randoms in a teams game set up by one of those randoms. Then when an invite to a teams game (calling them tournaments is a misnomer) is refused, it immediately pops up again, and when refused a second time, results in being removed from the list of substitutes. If one persists and again volunteers to substitute, often the same team invite pops up again and the process is repeated once or twice again. (Evidently no one wants to play with these guys.) Given the number of profiles that explicitly reject random team requests, it would seem that BBO is amiss in catering to these games.

Would love to see it for Firefox, as have never been able to make BBO Alert work in Firefox.

Yes, you are right, my mistake, it was all humans who jumped to 4S. Thanks for the explanation of the GIB algorithm. At least I know now the robot wasn't out to get me.

Cruising along in an individual when this hand pops up. https://tinyurl.com/y4ycso56 My robot decides to make a limit raise with this hand. Every other robot jumps straight to 4S. Those who passed with my hand find robot opening 1S and easily get to 4 or 5. What gives?

Playing with an intelligent partner and not a robot, my regular partnership response playing negative free bids would be a double showing one of three types of hand: normal neg dbl, or 10+ pt limit raise or 10+ with a good suit. Over his heart response, 2C would show this hand, and he can bid game, or invite in Clubs or NT which I would accept. And if he then bids Spades showing 4-4-2-3, I would bid 3 or 4 hearts, depending on if I feel lucky.

What she said.

Thank you Felicity. Our auction was same for first three rounds, then went off rails when partner bid 5D. I still made 5H cue bid, but partner responded 5NT where I was lost and passed, making 7 on non-spade lead. Of course 5S would now no longer be a cue bid. I guess I should just have bid 6D.

How should this be bid?[hv=pc=n&s=sk975432ha9d98ck3&w=shdc&n=shk5dakqt432cat52&e=shdc]399|300|E deals and passes, EW pass throughout[/hv]

I have been playing Precision since it was popularized in America by Goren in the 1970's. I remember first playing it in the officer's club and having some of the elder officer's wives having conniptions over our club and diamond bids. But as has been pointed out by others, it is inherently a natural system except for the club and diamond bids, and not one that anyone should be afraid to compete against. At my current club which by the way is for the most part well over 70, many of the club members take great delight in explaining to us what our club and diamond bids mean when we alert them. (I know this is not really legal, but we try to encourage members to have fun as well as compete). Some of the more advanced Precision systems like Super Precision and Transfer Precision do have many more artificial bids, but the way to deal with this is to ban some of those exotic bid types, that others have pointed out can be just as prominent in so-called natural systems, and not throw out a great system that has significant advantages over most.

That's too bad. Neither speedball or robot are real bridge.