smerriman

https://webutil.bridgebase.com/v2/tview.php?t=ARDCHALLENGE:c904e3a7.3543.11eb.94ca.0cc47a39aeb4-1606985081&u=smerriman&v3b=web&v3v=5.6.16 smerriman 33 - 18 garant_7

I allowed a little extra time given the extra players from when I set the original deadline. I've added in one of the results which was played but not reported. The only result I don't have from the first half is now pilowsky vs sep123 which I'm following up on, but yes, you can start sending out remaining challenges to those two players. While several matches in "round 2" have already been played, I will still set a deadline based on the normal frequency for those who haven't yet begun. This turns out to be Christmas eve, so let's see if we can wrap things up by then before sorting out people's schedules for the semis + final.

I can't see anything other than ♥A / ♥Q. Crossing in diamonds to take a finesse doesn't seem a good plan, since if West ducks then we're committed to repeating it and hoping for Kx/Kxx onside. If West has Kxxx, we still have chances if they have a spade honor - there are various endplay possibilities.

That's exactly what I'm referring to in my message above. That link is wrong and should point to the main BBO website (as I stated). But as mentioned, the chances are that everyone who arrives at the BBO forums for the firstime already has a BBO account, which is probably why nobody has noticed so far.

Normally when playing lebensohl, it only applies for overcalls of 2♦ - 2♠; over a 2♣ overcall, you can just play "systems on" with double = Stayman.

You can create an account on BBO without needing flash.. It just seems like when you're logged out, the forum message telling you that you need to create a BBO account links to the old version, so that just needs the URL updated to point to the new one. Though I doubt anyone really tries to register for the forum before registering for BBO itself, so it's highly unlikely anyone clicks that link anyway.

You must post links to get them added to the results. I believe I recall you saying you were on mobile in the past and couldn't, but they can be done on mobile just like other devices. smerriman 51 - 20 mlbridge https://webutil.bridgebase.com/v2/tview.php?t=ARDCHALLENGE:f751c265.33aa.11eb.94ca.0cc47a39aeb4-1606809495&u=smerriman&v3b=web&v3v=5.6.16

smerriman 56 - 1 muddylane https://webutil.bridgebase.com/v2/tview.php?t=ARDCHALLENGE:fa60c8a4.3126.11eb.94ca.0cc47a39aeb4-1606532904&u=smerriman&v3b=web&v3v=5.6.17

I think you missed his update where he stated that the auction that actually occurred resulted in the opposite player on lead. Thus an auction to the actual situation does not exist, making the entire question unsolvable - but not that he was blind and deaf.

No, it is not. However, you can easily review the last trick at any time by clicking on the stack of tricks, so you can take your own time to look at it before continuing to play.

BBO does not impose any restrictions on claiming. You can claim 0 or 13 tricks at trick 1, and both will be accepted if both opponents accept, even if you're forced to win or lose a trick you didn't claim.

Ah, I didn't realise there was an earlier version to the one in his book. You're right that he didn't provide any form of justification in that original excerpt, but it's pretty well agreed that human shuffling leads to flatter deals than 'normal', so I can't say it would be a massive surprise if there were other corollaries like greater 'symmetry'. And of course all hands back then were human shuffled.

What are you talking about? Did you read the actual article? It specifically mentions that the whole law is about shuffling, and not the pure mathematical side - the whole first 5 paragraph intro is about this and nothing but this.

As mentioned in the other thread, this doesn't validate or disprove the law at all - it's nothing to do with the law. The law is that the process of imperfect shuffles combined with the groupings of tricks formed by playing out a bridge hand biases the deck. The most complex part here is coming up with a shuffling algorithm that most resembles real life. If you had one of those, then perhaps you could shuffle, use robots to play out the hand, shuffle, etc and then after a while (he says 'a few hours', however many deals that would be) see if the tend is towards patterns, which is the whole basis of proving whether the law is true or not.

Just to reiterate, this is not what the law says. Culbertson was well aware that it is not true for mathematically random hands. The law applies to real-life shuffled hands only:

When playing duplicate, since the scoring is not cumulative, a 50 point bonus is added for making a partscore, and a game bonus (300 nv, 500 v) is also counted immediately; the only other difference is that there are no points for honors. Yes, the score is a duplicate score.

Nothing to do with it? The shuffling is the entire point and premise of the 'law of symmetry' - the first paragraph of Culbertson's article: With perfect shuffling it's trivial to prove mathematically. If you fix North and South's hands, for example, you can swap cards between them without affecting any frequencies of East + West's - so the shape of one cannot influence the shape of another.

Gap In the Bidding sums it up pretty well.

Exactly. Give GIB something like AQJxx KQx x xxxx and you would get the bidding sequence mentioned, and it would clearly be correct.

[hv=https://www.bridgebase.com/tools/handviewer.html?n=SQHAKJ73DA98432CA&s=SAKJ62HT6D7CQJT75&w=ST9873DKQJT6CK92&d=e&a=P1SP&v=e]400|300[/hv] Where do you end up (be honest)? (I probably would have overcalled as West, but opps were silent).

The exact diamond and full auction are still vital. The opponents have 17 cards in the majors and haven't led one against 3NT; did they have a chance to overcall? Is one/both a passed hand? Do they lead 4th best and led the 2 of diamonds, showing a 4 card suit to an honor? And so on. You can't play this suit in isolation unless you remove the biggest clue that the suit was broken by the opponents. Edit - if the opponents didn't lead the suit and you were playing it in isolation, the MP best line (according to SuitPlay) is be low to the 8, then if it loses to the 9, low to the king.

The full auction + which diamond East led are both pretty important things to know here.

See first post :) You can challenge those who have completed their half (but not others).

Agree with others that you should be raising diamonds. You know your partner doesn't have 4 hearts (or they would have bid 2♥), and given 2♥ is natural in GIB's system, it should really be emphasising the shape / lack of a heart stopper. Unfortunately, GIB's system is atrocious here and after you raise to 3♦, it will jump to 5♦, killing all attempts at sensible slam investigation :(

I get the same behavior re trying to edit a folder name - must be a bug in the latest version of the software. The rest appears to work though - after you've gone into "Use saved deals", you click a folder, click select at the top right, then close the window. Go back to the menu and hit redeal to start the first hand; each time you hit redeal it will move through the folder. Note that GIB isn't very good at bidding, so I definitely wouldn't assume you "clearly went wrong" somewhere each time something goes wrong.