Stop cards are tools of the devil

[gerry]

Sorry to hijack the thread, but am I the only person in the world who thinks that stop cards are the tools of the devil? In my experience the main outcome of their use is in helping cheats.

When was the last time anyone had a favourable ruling for UI after an opponent pushed the stop card away and passed instantly?

When was the last time anyone had a favourable ruling for UI after a player clearly just marked time while the card was out?.

When was the last time anyone had a favourable ruling for UI when the same opponent clearly had a problem and used the full 10 seconds?

When I began bridge I quickly learned to make decisions over preempts in tempo and now I am too old to change :lol:

 

On the original question my heart goes out to NS but my director's head to EW.

[jdonn]

Sorry to hijack the thread, but am I the only person in the world who thinks that stop cards are the tools of the devil?

I agree with you and have long argued against them. Bluejak argues equally as vociferously for them. Gwnn could probably locate at least one thread where we had a long back-and-forth on the topic.

[bluejak]

Whether they are a good thing or not, it is their use that is what decides, not their misuse.

[jdonn]

Was this really moved to start a new thread? There is too much moderator license in this part of the forums. Anyway...

[bluejak]

It is not our policy to delete posts unless we really have to. Since these posts were completely unsuitable for the forum in which they are posted, and since we do not want to delete them, a new thread in the correct forum seemed preferable.

 

As for "too much moderator license" if you want a forum where you can post to the wrong forum without any problem, there are no doubt plenty to choose from.

[jeremy69]

No question that there are many times when the stop procedure is ignored, especially at club level, but it is like the 30mph speed limit in that it is there if needed. If you do choose to ignore the stop card and it then matters you will get ruled against on occasion in the clubs I play in. In matches, more than once, I have asked an opponent to use the stop card after the first failure and although I get looked at strangely there has been compliance with the request.

[helene_t]

Most readers of this forum are probably well aware what a normal tempo is in various situations so don't need the stop card.

 

Club players are generally not aware of what a normal tempo is, nor are they aware of the problem with creating UI for partner through a fast action. Most are aware of the issue with slow actions but they often have misguided ideas about it (for example, it is a widespread belief that you can't bid after partner's tank. Most don't realize that sometimes it is pass that is suggested by the tank). Or they are aware of the issue but don't have it on the top of their mind when it occurs.

 

So I think a "stupid" mechanistic rule for how long you have to pause is a good idea for club bridge and low-level tournaments.

[JoAnneM]

It would be nice to know what this thread was originally about. Who really cares if it is in the right slot. I think the stop card is nothing but a nuisance. There were rules for the spoken "stop" or "wait", and in the newer replacement bid box cards the stop card is smaller than the rest so it slows the game down while players search for it, making them play out of tempo!

[Lanor Fow]

Isn't that a failure of the 'newer replacement bid box cards' rather than the regulation?

[blackshoe]

I don't think I've run across these new smaller cards, but perhaps they're intended to encourage people to do what I often do anyway: take the stop card and the alert card out of the box and put them face down on the table next to the box, for easy access. Certainly smaller cards would be helpful in that scenario, since they would take up less table space.

[jdonn]

So I think a "stupid" mechanistic rule for how long you have to pause is a good idea for club bridge and low-level tournaments.

Of course you can have such a rule without having a little card to remind people. Just like we have rules about whose turn it is to bid and play at each moment with having to be reminded by the opponents.

[Phil]

I like them. There are folks that won't pause over a skip bid but will pause over a stop card. Obviously this is wrong.

 

They seem to work in practice, even if they make me feel like a school crossing guard requesting the kiddies wait for the traffic to pass.

[EricK]

Why 10 seconds though? This has always seemed ridiculously long to me, and is probably at the root of all the problems with the procedure.

[mycroft]

10 seconds is amazingly long, and significantly longer than most people counting 10 seconds without a watch think it is.

 

But having said that, 10 seconds is long enough that if you have a medium-size problem against the preempt, you'll be able to come to a decision.

 

Mandating a 3, or 5 second stop over all calls gets us nowhere:

- if everybody does it, then if there's no problem, wait 3 seconds; if there's a small problem, it takes 3 seconds to decide; if there's a moderate or bigger problem, everybody knows it.

- if they don't do it, we're no farther ahead.

 

Yeah, playing effectively pickup, I held at all white SAKQJxxx and out (7132 or something like that). The auction went 1NT (12-14)-p-3NT to me. Hmm - if I double, will it ask for spades? Will partner get it if it doesn't? If partner isn't gong to lead a spade, is 4Sx going for 300? What's the likelihood that partner will lead spades into blank? Well, let's take the chance - pass.

 

Dummy says after 3NT= that if partner found a spade, he would have called the TD. Lucky for me, I have lots of people who will say "yeah, he pauses for 10 seconds over every skip bid, announced or otherwise, preempt or otherwise, AND IT'S REALLY ANNOYING".

 

The skip bid procedure is there for your protection - if you choose not to do it, less power to you. Now, fast action doesn't pass UI - unless you ever need to think. Then it says "pard, clear action here." And WeaSeL works.

 

Oh, and I hate-hate-HATE the bidboxes that are designed to not hold the stop-and-alert cards. People take them out (reasonable) - and DON'T PUT THEM BACK. And in three weeks, 60% of the boxes have alert cards and 80% have stop cards. Anything that encourages the players to not put the cards back is a misfeature in my book.

 

And of course you can have it without the card. We did for many years. And it didn't work. I'm not surprised, really - even with the card, it still doesn't work. Why? At least partly because, frankly, it's in one's own best interest NOT to follow the policy - because they get all the benefits of (non-deliberate) WeaSeL, and don't get punished for doing it, even not deliberately.

 

And if I had the answer to that, I'd be as famous as Spider Harris. But ignoring the policy because it doesn't work is definitely not the answer.

[mycroft]

On a side note, in Reno at the NABCs, I had one person explain to my partner that she couldn't bid until he put the Stop card away, and another explain to me that he could bid as soon as I put the stop card away. Both were American, and both were Names with paying clients. And neither have actually *read* the policy, obviously.

[JoAnneM]

What other game has so many actual players who do not know the rules? It seems like in golf, tennis, baseball, football, etc. those playing actually make an effort to know the rules before they start the game. It's included in how to play the game, which is how I have always thought of the bridge laws, part of how to play the game. The directors are there to enforce or adjudicate the laws, but the players should know them, or many of them.

[jdonn]

What other game has so many actual players who do not know the rules?

That's an easy one, pool (billiards), particularly 8 ball. Having worked in a pool hall for several years in college and played casually for a long time you wouldn't believe how consistently people have completely screwy ideas of what are and aren't rules. What happens after a scratch, legal ways to jump the ball, what makes a break illegal, etc.

[bluejak]

It would be nice to know what this thread was originally about.  Who really cares if it is in the right slot.

I care. We are trying to provide advice on how to rule, and completely off-topic remarks that had nothing whatever to do with the topic and furthermore were nothing to do with how to rule did not help. Confusing people is not desirable nor necessary. I find it surprising that you do not care about making things difficult for people.

 

I think the stop card is nothing but a nuisance.  There were rules for the spoken "stop" or "wait", and in the newer replacement bid box cards the stop card is smaller than the rest so it slows the game down while players search for it, making them play out of tempo!

If you use bad equipment sure there will be a problem. But please blame the equipment not the regulation. You never have to search for the Stop card in any good bidding box.

 

Of course the Stop card is completely useless in the ACBL because the regulations are pointless: its use is voluntary, probably because getting people to follow any rules is so difficult there. But it helps the game in th UK without any obvious downsides.

[jdonn]

Conversations to not have some constitution or bible to follow, they migrate and change course and go along an unpredictable path. That is what makes them interesting and what naturally happens. It is not difficult for anyone.

 

Also the digression didn't have nothing to do with the topic under discussion. If there is a topic about how great baseball is and I say "I especially love the Yankees" and you say "Me too but I hate their stadium" and I say "but their stadium has good hot dogs" and you say "there is a great restaurant not far from there with better hot dogs anyway" that is not an off-topic digression. That is a conversation!

 

Awaiting for you to dispute that in what would most-ironically become your third post in this thread that has nothing to do with "changing laws and regulations" (but is instead about proper thread and forum behavior).

[bluejak]

It was in reply to a comment. What is wrong with that?

 

We have produced three forums for advice on how to rule in situations, and one to discuss what is best. It does not seem unreasonable that discussing what is best should be in the one designed for discussing what is best.

[blackshoe]

The Skip Bid Warning regulation in the ACBL was changed many years ago. Prior to the change, a pause was mandatory. That regulation was rescinded, and replaced with "Players should [make a skip bid or stop card warning]." In the laws (and hence in regulations made supplementary to those laws) the word "should" implies that "failure to do it is an infraction jeopardizing the infractor’s rights but not often penalized." So I don't think it's correct, in general, to say that the procedure is "optional" in the sense that players can choose to use it or not. That's based on the wording of the relevant laws and regulations, of course. In practice, David is right that the regulation is administered as if it were optional in that way.

 

There is one caveat in the skip bid regulation: section F says

The warning is effective for all ACBL sanctioned events. For sanctioned games at clubs, the club may elect to discourage it's use and require no mandated pause.

I don't know of any clubs that do this. Note that the first sentence of this section F is even more specific that the use of the warning (or stop card) is not optional.

 

NB: This is section F of Chapter XII, Section A of the ACBL Codification. It is not mentioned in the Bidding Box Regulation, which is as far as most players (and directors, probably) are going to get.

[JoAnneM]

Of course the Stop card is completely useless in the ACBL because the regulations are pointless: its use is voluntary, probably because getting people to follow any rules is so difficult there. But it helps the game in th UK without any obvious downsides.

Trashing the ACBL gets boring after a while, but excuse my need to defend it, I am a candidate for the BOD.

 

The bidding box replacements that I purchased for our club, that have the short stop cards, are for the standard boxes that are used at every tournament that I have attended. I am sure that they didn't make short stop cards just for us.

 

The idea about pulling them out and having them ready under the bid box is good and I will suggest it.

[pran]

The bidding box replacements that I purchased for our club, that have the short stop cards, are for the standard boxes that are used at every tournament that I have attended. I am sure that they didn't make short stop cards just for us.

 

The idea about pulling them out and having them ready under the bid box is good and I will suggest it.

Doesn't your bid boxes (like ours) have a cleft (behind the compartment for the bid cards) intended for holding the STOP and ALERT cards so they can be easily reached when needed?

[blackshoe]

The bidding box replacements that I purchased for our club, that have the short stop cards, are for the standard boxes that are used at every tournament that I have attended.  I am sure that they didn't make short stop cards just for us. 

 

The idea about pulling them out and having them ready under the bid box is good and I will suggest it.

Doesn't your bid boxes (like ours) have a cleft (behind the compartment for the bid cards) intended for holding the STOP and ALERT cards so they can be easily reached when needed?

Nope. Here's a picture. It's hard to see, but there's no slot on the back of these things. (I have seen some with a slot, but the vast majority around here don't have it).

[bluejak]

Yes, but, but, but ....

 

That is a standard bidding box, with normal length Stop cards, which do not get lost in the box.

 

I know of about three designs, one as above, two with a slot at the back. I still believe that small cards and no slot is a poor design.

 

As for the Stop card being voluntary, perhaps I should say that Mike Flader, who answers queries on rulings for the ACBL, has told me it is voluntary. Of course, custom & practice at NABCs suggest it is voluntary.