Jlall

Yeah I was thinking about your last suggestion. That would be 52 boards cut to 3 teams. 26 boards of a 3 way 26 boards heads up That means that first and 2nd will have played 52 boards against each other. That is pretty simple and eliminates the results vs the bad teams from the 3 way/finals (I like), and allows for adequate amount of play vs the semifinalists/finalists without cutting so many teams that the best team could get eliminated from the round robin. To me that seems very superior to cutting to 2 and playing a 52 board heads up with a 13 board carryover. Cutting from 5 to 2 puts too much emphasis on beating up on the weaker team and increases randomness a lot imo.

I've heard that too. $100 / day or something like that right? http://www.worldbridge.org/tourn/Philadelp...mation.htm#fees

Kfay, if you only raise with 4 except with 3451 (meckwell style) then it's easy to show 3451 over the ask

This is not fair, I am obv not Rodwell but I had no idea what the ruling for this kind of situation is, and from all my experiences with top pros very few know stuff like this. In a recent regional in Florida, playing vs Meckwell, my partner (Grue) led out of turn, and I asked Meck if he knew his options and he was like "I think so but I'm not sure, let's call the director." Lead out of turn is way way way more common. Pretty much the only ones I know are lead out of turn and revoke (though I always call the director in the latter just in case). I def don't know when someone is barred for one round, or barred forever, and I don't know if I've ever seen a bid out of turn when it wasn't an opening bid. Arguably since I'm youngish/post on forums/whatever I would be more likely to know this than most professional bridge players like Rodwell. I would take an average forum poster over even Fred for knowing the basic rules in situations like this, and certainly over Rodwell. It seems like there is a misconception about how well these top pros know the rules in situations like this.

Not that I think Richard cares but just a heads up for anyone considering this, the entry fees for the world championship events are super high iirc (don't remember what they are exactly, I'm sure you can find it). Hope to see you there Richard!

I really don't buy this auction, the south hand is massive if partner has 4 spades, and your style of raising makes that very likely. Precision also makes it less likely that partner has bad diamond wastage.

Playing completely standard methods: 1D 1S 2S 3C 3D 3S P Playing some kind of asking bid over 2S: 1D 1S 2S 2N 3D 3S p 3D= 3 and a max. Playing my preferred answers to the asking bid: 1D 1S 2S 2N 3H 3S p 3H=3 max unbalanced

Or it means the 4S bid was slow :P

It just means 4H was a legit control. Think of 4H as any hand with a slam try not willing to go past game, or just a 4H cue that may or may not go past game.

Interesting. Weren't you one of the ones who supported Meckwell in the thread about the multi bid and provided defense controversy with the Singapore team? For example: pwned! How is this pwned. Again in this scenario I would never EXPECT my opps to not do this if they figured it out, and I would never criticize them for doing this. The quote of me is very carefully worded, I never said I would do what Meckwell did and if you read between the lines I implied that I personally would not do that. This is analagous to taking advantage of a penalty card which everyone does/I don't care if they do, but I personally do not believe in doing so. I always expect my opps to do whatever they can legally to gain advantage, especially in a high level event, call me cynical! I don't believe in imposing my own morals on others. Edit: And fwiw people have argued that I am in fact behaving unethically/unfairly to my team/the field because I don't accept penalty cards (there have been threads on this also). Some have told me it is illegal. But at the very least I can accept the penalty card and not take some "finesse" because of it (eg dummy has Qx, I have Ax, they have a penalty card and I know they have the king, I can lead the queen for a gain). That is very similar to me, and I would not do it, but I would always expect my opps to do it and not look down upon them for it.

Also I just realized another interesting thing about the way our district currently has it set up is that it would be very beneficial for everyone but the best team to "encourage" some random 5th team to join the event if only 4 are going to play. I guess that's the case in any format though, kinda sucks.

Meh I think T2-T5 would object to this so it would never fly but it's an interesting idea.

This is dictated by the district. Anyways obv 64>52, as I said assume 52 and 2 days are forced.

Hi Gerben, I was thinking maybe dropping your score completely against the 2 teams that are cut (doesn't really matter how well you do against those teams imo), and having full carryover against teams that are not cut. This does create some possibility for dumping scenarios where you dump to a team which hurts you for the next day but might be beneficial if it knocks out a team that is crushing you, but it's unlikely that a team would be crushing you and in the bottom 2, while you're so comfortably in the top 3 that you can dump so I don't think it would be that bad. How do you think this compares to your idea? Also, you recommend VPs for the 3 way. This implies to me that you think if one team wins 2 matches by 1 imp, and another team wins 1 match by 100 and loses the other by 1 (extreme example), that the latter team should win. Is there any merit in your mind to the team that wins both matches being the better team, even if they have a lower + imp quotient? In my head I had been thinking full imp carryover from day 1 to day 2 which the other scores dropped, then if one team wins both matches they are the winner, if all are 1-1 it goes to imp quotient. Do you think this would make it less likely that the better team wins?

Just curious. The Texas GNT is a 2 day affair. Assume each day has to have 52 boards, and it has to be played on a Sat/Sun (I realize that playing matches over several weekends etc would be preferable, not really looking to hear anything on that). The goal of the event is for 1 team to win and advance to the nationals. Assume the goal is for the best team to win as often as possible. If there are 4 teams then obv you just play 2 52 board matches, easy game. However there is a distinct possibility of a 5 team event. If that happens the conditions of contest stipulate a 52 board round robin to cut to 4, then a 26 board semi and a 26 board final. I assume there will be carryover, and that the winner can select his opp from 3/4. That format seems retarded to me. I'm curious what the best format is though. Playing a round robin and cutting to 2 for a 52 board final seems like a steep cut. Playing a full round robin has it's problems, namely beating up on the bad teams becomes very important and ideally the best team is the one that can beat the other good teams. Maybe something like day 1 is a round robin to drop 2 teams, and day 2 is a round robin between the top 3 teams? Maybe something else completely since I'm not creative/know nothing about formats etc? Thanks for your help!

Yeah it's always been obvious to me that the rake should be lower for higher stakes games as in poker since it incentivizes people to play the higher stakes ones (more money for them), and because there is less edge in the higher stakes games, but I doubt they're going to change it.

Even if the way the director described it was true and I was smart enough to figure out the loophole and bid 4H I would never do that. I know that most won't agree with that since it's legal etc, but this is not what the game is all about to me.

I'd pass!

I don't know that much about NBA so take this fwiw but I always considered him about where Rodney said, top 20 but not top 10.

Whats the vul who are the opps etc. This is basically a poker hand and the vul is very important imo.

Without any agreements I think gerber then 6D is fine. I'm driving to slam opposite 2 aces and hoping for the best. I don't see why gerber would be worse than just jumping to 6D other than just for general hate of gerber.

umm gross

East's bidding was silly. Gnasher, how can east sign off in 5S on that auction?

I'm about .5 points heavier after a balancing X. Probably like half the 8 counts direct, and few 8 counts after a balancing.

I think the advantages of: 1) Showing your major immediately before LHO can bid 2) Showing your major naturally so LHO doesn't get numerous chances to bid 3) Concealing whether you have a 1 suiter or 2 suiter to help you when you're declaring 4) Having a natural 2D bid outweigh the benefit of showing a major+minor 2 suiter. I mean honestly if it goes 1N 2S p ? how often do you end in the minor? Partner has to have length in both minors, and a stiff/void spade. Even with 2344 partner will probably pass. Even if partner is something like 1543 I'd usually rather play a 5-1 spade fit at the 2 level than a 4-3 club fit at the 3 level. So basically I don't like multi-landy more than just landy. But I am in a minority on that one. If you want to use 2D as something like a bad 2M overcall that is fine, or even diamonds and a major (big difference here is that you can play the minor at the two level rather than the 3 level, and it's a known minor). I am quite fond of penalty doubles but you can play X as 5m 4M if you like that.