Lestat

The problem is I can't stop the software from attempting to reconnect - all 5 times - when I could reconnect immediately (at least I did in the past). Your reconnection code dosn't work well. Has this been tested recently when you have 6000 players online?

I like the systems, but it's difficult to work with them on the computer screen. You can't print them off and read them. Practically illegible with chat garbage also printed on the bottom of the screen. Please make the systems downloadable.

This system is pretty awkward, even with the right clicking of players' names. People indicate they want to play, but by the time you've finished clicking 7 players into the game, at least one player has gone to do something else. Then you have to add someone else, which takes time, only to find someone else has left. Some leave probably because they think they didn't get into the team game. We need a faster method of entering people. I suggest two things. 1st, keep the team formation on top all the time while building a team. 2nd, when you right click on someone's name to add them in, send a message immediately to them inviting them to the team. That way they know for sure and will be more likely to wait.

Recently I seem to be experiencing disconnections, not common in the past. The reconnection software simply does not work (at least for me). I would prefer a clear disconnection, so I can log on myself without waiting for the reconnection software to do its thing and do its thing, and .... , then finally fail.

Hi, I haven't posted in ages, but after trying to set up team games with various problems such as laborious typing in of players names only to find them gone by the time I create, I decided to check the suggestions. What a surprise to find a posting that said I could right click and assign them to the team. This is terrific, but the problem is that it does not appear to be in the help files for setting up teams, so I suspect very few know this can be done. So my suggestion is to update the help files, unless it's there and I've just missed it. Thanks!

tried to chat to a player who had just left for a tourney and the system hung.

Ah, thanks. I wasn't aware of the keyboard play option.

I don't know if this has been reported yet, but when the opening lead is made and dummy comes down, as Declarer, I type typ and if there is a 10 in dummy in the suit led, the software plays it. Clever. :(

Hi all, BBO hand: You hold, red vs. red: S 85 H AJ2 D QJ983 C A72 LHO opens 2S (weak), passed around to you. What call do you make?

Hi all, Club game: You hold as declarer, white vs. red, S QJ63 H T764 D 863 C T3 Pass 1D 1NT(15-18hcp) 2D ? Do you compete for the part score, e.g. 2H or 2S? If so, what call do you make? Would double be considered penalty or stayman? Regards, Jim B)

Hi all, Club game: you hold, red vs white: S AK4 H 93 D KQ C KJ9543 LHO bids 1NT (13-15), partner bids 2H (natural), RHO passes. What do you call? Part 2 Assuming you bid 2NT (cue bid), is it forcing to game? Partner bids 3D (with the opponents passing). What do you call? Part 3 Regarding wk or strong notrump openers by your opponents, what tools do you have to either invite game or force to game? I'm familiar with Dont, Capp, etc. which are methods for interference and finding part score contracts, but what about game? Is slam out of the question? Does vulnerability influence your methods? Will post all 4 hands later. B) Regards, Jim

;) Using the new beta software, I noticed a very strange scoring result. You may want to check out my fourth hand record for today, Lestat. I declared 5D. After 11 tricks, of which I won 9, I claimed, which was accepted. Rather than showing 5D +5, the results showed 5D -9 for minus 450! lol I've never seen that happen before so there must be a PLOB (a petty little odious *bug*). It turned out to be the 16th result recorded, but I don't know if that had any significance. Best, Jim :)

;) Various BBO members have suggested we come up with some kind of ratings methodology. Let's think about how we might do this. Major factors to consider: 1. +/- Imps 2. Anomalies to account for gifts and disasters 3. Skill level of opponents Let's create a continually evolving "BRIDGE HANDICAP" for each player, similar to the way in which golf handicaps are calculated. a. Base each player's handicap on, say, the last 50 hands they played. b. Of the 50, select the best 25 hands played by a player (e.g. highest Imps scores) to automatically eliminate the disaster factor and to showcase those hands where the players were at their best. For each BBO player, almost all of these 25 scores should be pluses. c. Average all of the BBO players' handicaps at the time to create a BBO PRIME Handicap. This number should also be a positive. d. Adjust the Imp scores on each hand by the ratio of the average opponents' ratings divided by the BBO Prime Handicap, thus weighting each player's scores according to the skill level of the opponents. e. Throw out the five highest, to negate the gift factor f. Average the 20 remaining adjusted Imp scores to create each player's handicap. g. Update monthly or periodically. h. Finally, sort the players according to the skill level CATEGORY they rate themselves: one for beginners, another for intermediates, one for advanced, one for expert, and a final one for world class. This, I believe is a necessary step for a variety of reasons which I won't go into now. An interesting feature of this methodology is that PLAYERS WILL BE ABLE TO MEASURE THEIR PROGRESS OVER TIME. E.g. As they advance to the top of the beginner's list, they may choose to change their announced skill level and move up to the intermediate category. There would not be any restrictions preventing any player from playing with any other player, unless table minimums (and maximums) were established by the table host. I suspect that such a rating system would have the effect of AIDING EACH BBO MEMBER TO PROPERLY ESTIMATE THEIR SKILL LEVEL. Each player could choose to display their rating or keep it private as they wish, however, the table host could establish a table category and minimum and maximum rating to maintain the skill level integrity of the game. As mentioned above, an overall BBO Prime Handicap could be calculated based on all BBO players, or one could be calculated based on only those players within each category. E.g. Create a Prime for each category. I think this might be better than a single overall Prime. As in golf, one might use the players' handicaps to enable beginners to compete on an equal footing with intermediates, advanced, and experts. And, when tournaments are indeed set up on BBO, one could also weight tournament scores heavier than casual game scores to penalize "sandbaggers." This approach is somewhat preliminary in that one should work with the data to fine tune the approach. Best, Jim :)

;) Good to see the peeking problem is fixed! Should be fewer successful finesses and drops now. Re kibitizing when one selects to kibitiz one player ... when a hand is over, the traveller pops up. You click that off and see ALL 4 hands of the next deal. After the first bid is made, the other 3 hands flip and you kibitiz just the one player you wanted to kibitiz. For proper kibitizing, we need to have only the specified hand appear initially. Hope this helps. Best, Jim :)

;) While I like the idea of a Competitive Bridge Club, it seems silly to conceive it as "competitive" for experts and advanced++ players only. When I first started playing years ago with 000.01 masterpoints, I wanted to compete as I'm sure many of our beginners and intermediates would now. But I didn't want to get killed by experts. There needs to be a way for all players of all skills to compete with players of similar or close abilities. This makes for more enjoyable games for all. SWAN bridge has in effect a social club, which is not heavily used, though they have fewer members than BBO. I believe that most people who are interested in bridge are by nature competitive. Already there exists on BBO several private and public clubs which are rarely used (most appear to be abandoned). I suspect they aren't used much because of the way they are treated--they are not set up on an equal footing with the main bridge club. I think it's important to improve what we have here, before we jump into uncharted waters by changing things. Who knows if those changes will make things better? Changes don't come free. Someone has to go to a lot of trouble to program those changes. Regarding booting players... Perhaps there are minor things we can do which minimize the problem. Tagging the table as to minimum skill level desired is a possibility that others have suggested. If someone joins a table lacking the minimum skill level requested, then he or she shouldn't be surprised to be asked to leave or booted. As table host, I have designated the table as Adv ++ Players, please, then checked "Permission Required to Play" box, but find that no one reads the skill level request. When I try to read their profile, I may find the skill level "private" which doesn't help at all. Or perhaps before I can read it, someone else tries to join the table and I lose the first player's profile, then someone else jumps in, etc. and all is lost in a jumble. This is a nightmare which we cannot manage. If this can be fixed, then the table host might have better control and less to worry about the problems involved in bumping someone. Frankly, when I host a table, I appreciate those players who have labeled their skill level. In this "Casual Partnership" and ever-changing player environment, this is essential toward setting up good games. I would like to go back to the previous method of requiring players to list their skill level, rather than keeping it Private. I'm beginning to form a criterion to automatically reject those players who have private skill levels. Seems silly to keep it private, because you can't hide your skill level once the game starts! Oh, and one more problem I noticed with this beta version. The situation is that you click to join a table, and are waiting permission and nothing happens. You get tired of waiting so you can click the "sign off" button, but when you do this, you get signed off of Bridge Base! I'd just like to go back to the tables and NOT get kicked off. Hope this helps. Best, Jim :)