Table Talk

[JoanR20]

Since recently joining BBO, I have noticed that many people resort to table talk during their bidding. As a long time player, this practice has, to me, always been forbidden. I believe this could and should be verboten on line as well, and could be stopped if no one could play without a profile. Many players don't even provide their level of play and many more don't state their system of play. This seems to be a basic courtesy at the bridge table. And bridge has the reputation of being a very civilized game!

[zheddh]

Welcome to online bridge :D

[babalu1997]

I think this section of the forum is for law issues in off-line bridge.

 

Zero tolerance online means--

 

try to be the host of your table

 

boot the rude players

 

mark those who swear as enemies-- you will never hear from them again

 

but if someone makes the rules you talk about no one will be able to enforce it

 

those who call people morons enough times will be suspended in due time, if people complain to abuse

 

i dont bother, i just enemy them (enemy is averb)

[helene_t]

It doesn't help to state your skill level in your profile. Nobody takes it serious.

 

It doesn't help opps if you state your system in your profile as you p may have insisted you play something different. But it can be useful for partners as they can just say "your profile, p" and avoid further discussions.

 

Ideally, every pair should fill in the convention cards but pick-up partnerships may not bother. Since BBO has the feature that it automatically loads the convention card you used last time with the same partner, I think it is worth the effort.

 

As for table talk: Obviously it shouldn't be allowed to discuss system with p once bidding has started. In a tourney, at least. In the main room and in clubs, people feel differently about it. If you like opps to discuss their system before starting to bid, you should say so. Some like to save time by just starting and then discuss system as the situations come up.

 

Note that when you play at the club in real life, there is a club annual meeting and/or committee which largely implements the regulations of the national bridge federation, which in turns largely implements the WBF laws (and add a few things to them such as alert procedures).

 

At BBO it is different. BBO as such has no policies other than that you can't abuse opps, use BBO for political propaganda etc. The table host (or tourney host) can make up whatever rules he pleases. So if you feel strongly about some issue (such as the table talk issue), create you own table (or tourney) and make your rules clear.

[jdaming]

I think depending on the "level" of your table and the partnerships thereof "table talk" is not at all a bad thing. I will always ask what my partner plays when we have no agreements so as to remove simple bidding misunderstandings. When I play with my regular partners I allow my opps to do the same as I don't see the value in "winning" a board just because 2 opponents have never played together.

[blackshoe]

Note that when you play at the club in real life, there is a club annual meeting and/or committee which largely implements the regulations of the national bridge federation, which in turns largely implements the WBF laws (and add a few things to them such as alert procedures).

Not around here (Rochester, NY, USA) there isn't.

 

"Forgive him, Theodotus, for he is a barbarian, and thinks that the customs of his tribe are laws of nature." - G.B. Shaw, Caesar and Cleopatra

 

At BBO it is different. BBO as such has no policies other than that you can't abuse opps, use BBO for political propaganda etc. The table host (or tourney host) can make up whatever rules he pleases. So if you feel strongly about some issue (such as the table talk issue), create you own table (or tourney) and make your rules clear.

 

Now, that is very much what the f2f clubs around here are like! :angry:

[blackshoe]

I think this section of the forum is for law issues in off-line bridge.

The IBLF is for the discussion of law and regulation issues in both on-line and off-line bridge.

[awm]

The main issue here is one of formality.

 

If you start discussing your system in the middle of playing a hand during a national championship, one would hope that the director would apply severe penalties. Certainly this is a violation of any number of laws (actually, a well-known pair did this against me in a national tournament a few years back and the director did nothing, but that's hopefully the exception rather than the rule).

 

On the other hand, if you are playing in a friendly game at home, perhaps where you draw for partners between rounds, no one would begrudge you a little discussion. Mostly people would let you discuss things like "which keycard do we play" on the fly. Normally people don't really want to win because their opponents didn't have time to fill out a card, and home games aren't so cutthroat anyway.

 

The issue on bridgebase is that it's "in between" these levels of formality and people have different ideas of which direction to go. Generally the rule is at tables in the main bridge club it's up to the table host, but most people tend towards the "friendly game, be lenient" view since a lot of pairs are pickup partnerships who've never met before and there's no money (or even master points) on the line in the main club. In tournaments people tend more towards the "serious event" approach and most directors will act if people are discussing conventions during the bidding.

[dellache]

mark those who swear as enemies-- you will never hear from them again

(...snip...)

i dont bother, i just enemy them (enemy is averb)

The problem with this approach is the following :

You have reached the maximum number of enemies (which I think is 1024 or 512).

 

This is the message I got a few... years ago. :angry:

[bluejak]

All the posts seem to assume the table talk is between partners about system. If that is happening, fair enough, it is a waste of time playing since that is not bridge. Why people find it enjoyable to avoid problems in this way is beyond me. I like playing with pickup partners because part of the skill is avoiding ambiguous calls, and working out what partner is doing. Anyone who wants to discuss it with partner as it goes along is just childish.

 

Of course, other table talk is disliked by some, but I am an inveterate talker at all forms of bridge. To me, this is a wonderful game because it is a pastime which is a mix of a good intellectual exercise and a social event. I do shut up if asked.

 

:)

 

The rules of the set of forums are that people are asked to say in the opening post or title or [best] in 'Description (Optional)' which is the jurisdiction, or to say "online" if suitable. We are happy with online based threads which are based on Law or Regulation.

[Echognome]

All the posts seem to assume the table talk is between partners about system. If that is happening, fair enough, it is a waste of time playing since that is not bridge. Why people find it enjoyable to avoid problems in this way is beyond me. I like playing with pickup partners because part of the skill is avoiding ambiguous calls, and working out what partner is doing. Anyone who wants to discuss it with partner as it goes along is just childish.

David,

 

I think you are just being a bit outdated here. I think Adam has pretty much nailed it above. Playing an informal game of kitchen bridge with friends may not be "bridge", but it is certainly enjoyable and not a waste of time. I can tell you that I have played many informal games like this on BBO against top quality players and learned a lot. The idea here is more one of saving time. Rather than having a long conversation about what we do and do not play, we bend the rules, knowingly rather than waste our time discussing intricate agreements with someone we may rarely play with again.

 

I understand your point about playing with a pickup partner and that certainly happens. But let me give you an example of typical occurrence on BBO:

 

I want to practice with a regular partner. We can either beat up on random opponents or, wait, there are two people we know that are good players not playing. So we ask them to be our opponents. Rather than have them have a long discussion about what to play to this or that convention that we play, we say "We play some complicated conventions. Please feel free to discuss as they arise." I agree with you, it's not "bridge", but it certainly allows us to get to doing what we enjoy doing sooner and that's playing the cards. No one thinks this would happen in bridge at the table. But we're not at a tournament and I can tell you the level of play is plenty high. We don't get any enjoyment or practice out of opponents playing in a silly contract because they haven't agreed something basic. Nor do we get any enjoyment out of listening to long conversations out of agreements.

 

So basically, I think the rules that apply to a sanctioned game are quite different to the informal rules of playing with friends. In the end, it may not be "bridge", but it can certainly be a heckuva game.

 

-Gnome

[bluejak]

Goodness, that must be horrible. I would hate playing that sort of farce. Why not just play against a robot if you do not want to play real bridge?

[karlson]

Goodness, that must be horrible. I would hate playing that sort of farce. Why not just play against a robot if you do not want to play real bridge?

Wow, I had no idea anyone felt this way.

 

Agree 100% with echognome and others -- would much rather have the opponents discuss what they need to than go out of their way to avoid accidents (or have them anyway).

 

We're not talking about discussing what a 5th round cuebid shows, but simple first/second round things that everyone would discuss before playing a semi-serious session.

[blackshoe]

Certainly if my partnership's objective is to practice our system, I don't particularly care what score we get on any particular hand. And doing that in a "kitchen bridge" environment works fine, afaics.

 

I would not like to see players who do this kind of chatting fairly regularly in that kind of environment do it in a tournament — even in a "club" tournament, or a BBO non-sanctioned tourney. Well, online may be different if everyone understands up front that's part of the deal. And if they don't - it's a "real" tournament or whatever, then I wouldn't expect to see this either.

[matmat]

I agree with the Gnome (and others who posted similar things).

 

One other thing is that there might be people out there working on their system and discussing things as they happen at a main bridge club table is just a-OK for me in that situation.

 

I certainly understand that people would prefer to play with a zombie partner against two corpses, but I would not.

[JanM]

Rather than have them have a long discussion about what to play to this or that convention that we play, we say "We play some complicated conventions.  Please feel free to discuss as they arise."  I agree with you, it's not "bridge", but it certainly allows us to get to doing what we enjoy doing sooner and that's playing the cards.  No one thinks this would happen in bridge at the table.

Maybe, maybe not. Many many years ago, when multi was pretty much never played in the US (long before there were approved defenses), my partner and I played a round against Fred Stewart & Steve Weinstein in the Reisinger. We sat down, they said they played that a 2♦ opening showed a weak 2 bid in a Major, and I, being somewhat into systems even back then, started to consider what we should do against that. They cheerfully said that if the bid came up we could look at our hands and decide what we wanted bids to mean. Saved a lot of time (no 2♦ bids that round), left us feeling very positive about them. I know, it's not according to the rules, and I wouldn't expect very many people to take that attitude in a National Championship, but I certainly agree with Gnome about online games, especially if the purpose of the game is to help us all work on our agreements; it's a lot more productive for both sides to know what they're doing.

[jdonn]

I'm with the majority here. I get absolutely no joy in any setting from a hand where my opponents don't even know what they are playing, especially in a setting when there is no expectation they should be very prepared such as online. I may enjoy my score but I will not enjoy the hand. Who cares if in the purest sense it's "bridge" or not? That's a semantic argument that has nothing to do with how enjoyable it is.

 

David I really object to your comments here. Could you please learn that it's possible to state your opinion without automatically insulting everyone who disagrees with you? It's possible that, despite how you feel, the vast majority here aren't all childish and wasting our time.

[campboy]

Hmm. There are really three types of system discussion during a board that I see online.

 

1) Very basic things. Avoidable since you can agree them in about 10 seconds when a new partner turns up, but harmless there really isn't any difference from discussing them at the start.

 

2) Defences to things you can't be expected to deal with otherwise. Personally, I would be fine with oppo doing this in a random game: it is the price I pay for them not objecting to my strange methods. But not in a tournament. The problem with discussing as you go is that there are usually hands which are difficult to describe with one defence but easy with another. My normal multi defence, for example, can't act immediately with a takeout double of 2M. If I was allowed to wait until it came up, and then say "Dixon" if I had such a hand, I would be gaining an unfair advantage.

 

3) Things that clarify a genuinely ambiguous auction. If you have an auction where 4NT might be natural or blackwood, saying "RKCB" makes it easier. I disapprove of this. No-one else playing online will have clear agreements here either, so they will have to work it out or avoid ambiguous bids -- which as Bluejak says is part of the skill of playing with an unfamiliar partner. Note that this is not the same as saying "RKCB" when it is clear that 4NT is some sort of Blackwood -- that is a case of (1) above.

[bluejak]

David I really object to your comments here. Could you please learn that it's possible to state your opinion without automatically insulting everyone who disagrees with you? It's possible that, despite how you feel, the vast majority here aren't all childish and wasting our time.

We are on a Laws-related forum and everyone is cheerfully relating the advantages of ignoring the rules. I really think it pretty dreadful. Just think of the long term effects of this. People come to expect the laws to be not followed - we have all seen that - and the effects are dire.

 

I am sorry, I am shocked and disgusted at people who want to ignore the basic rules of bridge. It is like finger signals: telling partner what you illegally have is absolutely against the basic nature of bridge and spoils it for others. It even spoils it for people who do not realise that it spoils it for them.

[barmar]

David I really object to your comments here. Could you please learn that it's possible to state your opinion without automatically insulting everyone who disagrees with you? It's possible that, despite how you feel, the vast majority here aren't all childish and wasting our time.

We are on a Laws-related forum and everyone is cheerfully relating the advantages of ignoring the rules. I really think it pretty dreadful. Just think of the long term effects of this. People come to expect the laws to be not followed - we have all seen that - and the effects are dire.

 

I am sorry, I am shocked and disgusted at people who want to ignore the basic rules of bridge. It is like finger signals: telling partner what you illegally have is absolutely against the basic nature of bridge and spoils it for others. It even spoils it for people who do not realise that it spoils it for them.

Just to reiterate, I don't think I've ever seen this behavior in a tournament (I think Jan's example is explicitly allowed in ACBL's CoC -- if your opponents play a convention that requires them to provide a written defense, you're allowed to consult it and decide which options to play when the situation arises).

 

We're talking about friendly, informal games. Meckwell and Fantunes decide to play for an hour or so, but they switch partners, so they don't have any established agreements. The first time Blackwood comes up, they on-the-fly decide whether they're playing 3014 or 1430. Or when they end up on defense one of them asks "UDCA or std?". Kibbitz expert tables like this, you'll see it happens all the time.

 

Filling out a convention card with a new partner typically takes at least 10-15 minutes, or 5 minutes if you really rush it and skip all the details. No one wants to wait that long before starting a quick, online game.

 

Randoms avoid this problem by having their preferences in their profile, it's like a really abbreviated CC. Experts don't usually play with randoms, so they don't typically bother with this. They all know each other, they're familiar with the above shortcut, and it's not in a setting where strict adherence to the letter of the law is critical.

 

They also usually allow UNDOs. What do you think of that?

[helene_t]

We are on a Laws-related forum and everyone is cheerfully relating the advantages of ignoring the rules.  I really think it pretty dreadful.  Just think of the long term effects of this.  People come to expect the laws to be not followed - we have all seen that - and the effects are dire.

Yeah, it may be unfortunate if newbies watch (or play in) those casual games and get the impression that discussing system on the fly is condoned (or maybe even allowed?) in real bridge.

 

Maybe there should be a clear distinction (as per software) between tables where the laws apply and tables where they don't, so newbies don't get confused, and players who expect one kind of table and get the other don't get frustrated. (As the OP). Coming to think of it, there is this relaxed club, but people open all kind of tables in the main room.

[cherdanno]

David I really object to your comments here. Could you please learn that it's possible to state your opinion without automatically insulting everyone who disagrees with you? It's possible that, despite how you feel, the vast majority here aren't all childish and wasting our time.

We are on a Laws-related forum and everyone is cheerfully relating the advantages of ignoring the rules. I really think it pretty dreadful. Just think of the long term effects of this. People come to expect the laws to be not followed - we have all seen that - and the effects are dire.

 

I am sorry, I am shocked and disgusted at people who want to ignore the basic rules of bridge. It is like finger signals: telling partner what you illegally have is absolutely against the basic nature of bridge and spoils it for others. It even spoils it for people who do not realise that it spoils it for them.

I am sorry that you find me disgusting. But really, if you are so easily disgusted, I recommend not leaving your house and going on the internet. You might find it a scary place.

 

Anyway, are you really thinking that asking "1430 or 3041" is equivalent to finger signaling? I am just curious.

[jdonn]

Great now I'm so stupid that only David realizes I are spoiling the game for myself even though I can't tell. But I'm not so stupid as to believe signalling when your opponents don't know it is equivalent to discussing in front of your opponents with their approval.

 

I apologize for offending the purity of the laws forum by discussing breaking a law. I hope the earth doesn't tilt off its axis.

[pran]

David I really object to your comments here. Could you please learn that it's possible to state your opinion without automatically insulting everyone who disagrees with you? It's possible that, despite how you feel, the vast majority here aren't all childish and wasting our time.

We are on a Laws-related forum and everyone is cheerfully relating the advantages of ignoring the rules. I really think it pretty dreadful. Just think of the long term effects of this. People come to expect the laws to be not followed - we have all seen that - and the effects are dire.

 

I am sorry, I am shocked and disgusted at people who want to ignore the basic rules of bridge. It is like finger signals: telling partner what you illegally have is absolutely against the basic nature of bridge and spoils it for others. It even spoils it for people who do not realise that it spoils it for them.

It is with some comfort I notice that I am not alone having felt insulted on this forum. Some of the insults have consisted of plainly false accusations that I am deliberatly violating the laws of Bridge.

 

I participate here because I believe that I might have much to give and much to receive, but I have for some time now been, and still am seriously considering terminating my participation.

 

It is with strong reluctance that I write this. I do it with a hope for a change in attitude, or I shall probably join other contributors in leaving this forum for precisely the same reason they stated when leaving it (or its predecessor).

 

I might add that I have over some time received many questions on law from people who explicitly stated that they preferred to ask me directly rather than exposing themself on the forum, because of the attitude they met here.

 

Sven :)

[HeavyDluxe]

While I sympathize with David re: the fact this is a laws forum...

 

We're talking about friendly, informal games.  Meckwell and Fantunes decide to play for an hour or so, but they switch partners, so they don't have any established agreements.  The first time Blackwood comes up, they on-the-fly decide whether they're playing 3014 or 1430.  Or when they end up on defense one of them asks "UDCA or std?".  Kibbitz expert tables like this, you'll see it happens all the time.

THIS. A thousand times this.

 

If you're playing a tournament or team match on BBO, I think it's reasonable to expect something closer to the Laws to be in effect. However, these are mostly pickup games that count for nothing ("Hey, guess what?? I got a top board on BBO last night!" :) ) or practice for serious partnerships that will compete elsewhere. Just get rolling and play.