Boxed Card Law

[bluejak]

My understanding is that the WBFLC deliberately required that cards be shuffled rather than sorted, because of the succeptibility of sorting to cheating through communication with another table.

As has happened similarly in another post yesterday, I think you are over-assuming a single meaning where none was intended.

 

The WBFLC expressed the view that any form of communication between tables was undesirable and shuffling eliminates that. Not just a question of cheating, but all sorts of other things, eg if it goes pass pass pass to you, and you have the only sorted hand you have had so far, do you believe it was passed out at the last table?

 

:)

 

He GOT ME!

Your troll sniffer was turned off :P

 

However, I do not believe Nigel meant to be a troll. He was doing what he has been doing for a long time - expressing his views on how he wants things to be.

It was not Nigel's post to which he referred: he was caught by the reply to it, taking it seriously.

[campboy]

Not easy to do this unless you sort another player's cards? However, finding the ♦Q between the ♥K and ♥J in a sorted hand would be more of a concern.

I believe that the cheating method that some people had come up with (hypothetically, I hope!!) under the previous laws was for a teams-of-four match with screens. If you play the board first and oppo have a thin game/slam that makes, sort your cards before passing the board; if not, shuffle. Then if you play the board second you observe whether your screenmate sorts his cards or not.

[axman]

2: If the Director then identifies (to his own satisfaction) the player who restored some of his cards boxed to the pocket the Director is still unable to show any law that this player has violated and thus has no foundation for penalizing him.

 

So long as the player has restored all his 13 cards (after shuffling them) he has complied with Law 7C even if some of his cards are now boxed.

This L7C requirement approaches something rather curious

 

L7C: after which he restores them to the pocket corresponding

 

If it is given that a board arrives with one or more cards face up, then to return those cards face down at the end would be an infraction of the requirement to restore them to the condition that they arrived- face up.

[peachy]

2: If the Director then identifies (to his own satisfaction) the player who restored some of his cards boxed to the pocket the Director is still unable to show any law that this player has violated and thus has no foundation for penalizing him.

 

So long as the player has restored all his 13 cards (after shuffling them) he has complied with Law 7C even if some of his cards are now boxed.

This L7C requirement approaches something rather curious

 

L7C: after which he restores them to the pocket corresponding

 

If it is given that a board arrives with one or more cards face up, then to return those cards face down at the end would be an infraction of the requirement to restore them to the condition that they arrived- face up.

LOL, good one...

[nige1]

My understanding is that the WBFLC deliberately required that cards be shuffled rather than sorted, because of the succeptibility of sorting to cheating through communication with another table.

If so, the WBF were mistaken.

• If you sort the cards within suits, in JDonn's way, you can't pass any message.
  
• If you sort the cards in an ordinary way, you can pass a limited amount of information by varying the order of suits; or ordering the cards in ascending rather than descending order.
  
• If you "shuffle" the cards, as now, you can pass 13! different messages. Although, for practical purposes, it would probably suffice to code the bottom one or two cards.
  
• But why would you want to pass any message? In ordinary play, the next player to pick up your hand will be an opponent.
  

[nige1]

However, I do not believe Nigel meant to be a troll. He was doing what he has been doing for a long time - expressing his views on how he wants things to be.

Most of the views expressed here are repeated many times. Many are pro-establishment trolls.

 

Many of those, who advocate change, are too old to hope to live to see any significant improvement in the laws of Bridge; the changes that we suggest may benefit future generations of Bridge players.

[pran]

2: If the Director then identifies (to his own satisfaction) the player who restored some of his cards boxed to the pocket the Director is still unable to show any law that this player has violated and thus has no foundation for penalizing him. So long as the player has restored all his 13 cards (after shuffling them) he has complied with Law 7C even if some of his cards are now boxed.

And this, IMO, is wrong. While you may or may not have a reasonable argument to say that it should be caught without trouble by the next player, I don't think it should be legal to set traps for subsequent players who are less careful than you.

There is no way one can set a trap like that for another player who complies with Law 7B. He will simply detect the situation and correct it for himself.

 

Careless players will sooner or later run into all kinds of problems simply because they are careless.

 

I believe the main "problem" here is a curious interest in finding some other person to penalize rather than focusing on the player who carelessly handles his cards (violating law 7B) and thereby unneccessarily causes this boxed card to become exposed.

[mjj29]

2: If the Director then identifies (to his own satisfaction) the player who restored some of his cards boxed to the pocket the Director is still unable to show any law that this player has violated and thus has no foundation for penalizing him. So long as the player has restored all his 13 cards (after shuffling them) he has complied with Law 7C even if some of his cards are now boxed.

And this, IMO, is wrong. While you may or may not have a reasonable argument to say that it should be caught without trouble by the next player, I don't think it should be legal to set traps for subsequent players who are less careful than you.

There is no way one can set a trap like that for another player who complies with Law 7B. He will simply detect the situation and correct it for himself.

 

Careless players will sooner or later run into all kinds of problems simply because they are careless.

 

I believe the main "problem" here is a curious interest in finding some other person to penalize rather than focusing on the player who carelessly handles his cards (violating law 7B) and thereby unneccessarily causes this boxed card to become exposed.

Sure, but there is no reason for the laws to promote making it difficult for careless players. Where possible the laws should be arranged such that it is hard to commit an infraction. There's clearly no reason not to specify that they should be restored face down, it's certainly not correct procedure to restore any of them face up.

 

In fact, as far as I can tell, if I box the top card you believe noone has committed an infraction. Certainly you can't blame the next table as they have not handled them and you seem to be suggesting I'm under no obligation to place the cards face down...

 

As another example consider the law about leaving the board in the center of the table. Doing so stops the board being rotated before the hands being restored. Now, obviously the players should have check that they were restoring them to the correct pocket, but the law still requires leaving the board on the table to stop it happening.

[jdonn]

There is no way one can set a trap like that for another player who complies with Law 7B. He will simply detect the situation and correct it for himself.

You can.... wait for it... set a trap for a player who doesn't!

 

And don't forget people who are careful while doing something make mistakes as well, just not nearly as many.

 

I believe the main "problem" here is a curious interest in finding some other person to penalize rather than focusing on the player who carelessly handles his cards (violating law 7B) and thereby unneccessarily causes this boxed card to become exposed.

I believe the 'interest' is in penalizing the person who causes a problem rather than the person who fails to fix a problem that was (curiously?) apparently legal to cause. But the suggested change to the law, which is very easy and simple, would satisfy that interest. It's hard to imagine too many disagreeing with wanting to prevent a problem. What I find curious is that you are happy allowing a problem and creating an onus on another player to correct it rather than placing the responsibility either the other way around or at least on both players.

[campboy]

There is no way one can set a trap like that for another player who complies with Law 7B. He will simply detect the situation and correct it for himself.

Lol. In the first simulation we had on the TD course, we were given a board with no instructions, and someone was sent out of the room. I counted my cards without exposing any but the top, as I always do, noticed that one was boxed and corrected it without anyone noticing, then had a look at my hand while I was waiting to be told what infraction to commit. John Pain came over and complained that I'd messed up his simulation :angry:

[axman]

There is no way one can set a trap like that for another player who complies with Law 7B. He will simply detect the situation and correct it for himself.

Lol. In the first simulation we had on the TD course, we were given a board with no instructions, and someone was sent out of the room. I counted my cards without exposing any but the top, as I always do, noticed that one was boxed and corrected it without anyone noticing, then had a look at my hand while I was waiting to be told what infraction to commit. John Pain came over and complained that I'd messed up his simulation :)

Reminds me of the story of Captain Kirk's officer training. In a battle simulation Kirk saved the day, the only candidate in the history of the training to do so. It eventuates that the the computer was programed to kill off all the good guys no matter what the captain did. Kirk reprogrammed the computer.

 

Have to admire the guy.

[blackshoe]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kobayashi_Maru

 

:)

[Siegmund]

And actually we sometimes intentionally return the cards face up. For instance in a swiss team or ko match we'll sometimes face one of the hands after we've played the board for the second time in a match (I.e., if the board started with our team mates then when we finish it we'll face a hand).

 

Somebody playing a match at my club this weekend did that with half the set of boards. I suppose they don't realise how irritating and time-consuming it is for the person who deals the boards by Duplimate to have to turn them all around again before dealing.

 

If nothing else, this points up a hazard of getting too precise with procedural details in the Laws.

 

In my area (where duplicating machines are uncommonly seen), intentionally turning a card face-up after the last time a board is played is so standard that it would be regarded as a mild failure to follow procedure to not face at least one card in a finished board. (It is definitely mandatory in my club for the director to ensure a card is faced in every board before he puts the set away after the game -- once upon a time it was just a custom; but after we had a few boards get re-played unshuffled, we took steps to ensure it wouldn't happen again. The players face the card as a courtesy to save the director some work.)

 

Presumably in a club where duplimates are in use, there exists some other procedure to guarantee the non-reuse of boards.

[jeremy69]

In England I think the habit of facing a card in a played board came about as a result of a player adjusting the odds in his favour by inserting a couple of pre-dealt fixed boards into a match played privately. This was way before duplimating machines. Even if it makes it slightly inconvenient for the dealer using the machine I think it is still good practice to minimise the chances of the wrong set of boards being played or the same set being used twice.

[pran]

In England I think the habit of facing a card in a played board came about as a result of a player adjusting the odds in his favour by inserting a couple of pre-dealt fixed boards into a match played privately. This was way before duplimating machines. Even if it makes it slightly inconvenient for the dealer using the machine I think it is still good practice to minimise the chances of the wrong set of boards being played or the same set being used twice.

The first generation of duplimating machines used tiny holes punched in the cards to make them machine readable. Such cards and machines are still widely used, and one effect is that the machine will read boxed cards equally well as the other cards.

 

The result is that boxed cards within the thirteen cards in a pocket frequently pass the dealing process undetected and that players eventually will find such cards still boxed when taking them from the boards.

 

With bar-coded cards a boxed card within the pack will cause a machine stop, and when one runs the machine at an effective speed of 300-360 boards/hour (like I do) such stops are really annoying.

 

We tell the players to take care when restoring their cards to the boards.

[bluejak]

The clause to confirm the blindingly obvious is present in Law 7B2: "each player counts his cards face down". Thus, by your own argument, the fact that the same clause is not to be found in 7C means that there is no requirement for the cards to be returned face down. The two laws, as you say, should be consistent.

Not according to the EBU L&EC. I put to them the possibility of a regulation to cover this. The L&EC's view is that the vital word is "restore": the cards are restored to the board if they are replaced in the same condition, so the word face down are unnecessary.

[campboy]

The clause to confirm the blindingly obvious is present in Law 7B2: "each player counts his cards face down". Thus, by your own argument, the fact that the same clause is not to be found in 7C means that there is no requirement for the cards to be returned face down. The two laws, as you say, should be consistent.

Not according to the EBU L&EC. I put to them the possibility of a regulation to cover this. The L&EC's view is that the vital word is "restore": the cards are restored to the board if they are replaced in the same condition, so the word face down are unnecessary.

Great, thanks. So long as there is official guidance from the L&EC that the law is to be interpreted in that way, that seems to be all we need (within England, at least).

[axman]

The clause to confirm the blindingly obvious is present in Law 7B2: "each player counts his cards face down". Thus, by your own argument, the fact that the same clause is not to be found in 7C means that there is no requirement for the cards to be returned face down. The two laws, as you say, should be consistent.

Not according to the EBU L&EC. I put to them the possibility of a regulation to cover this. The L&EC's view is that the vital word is "restore": the cards are restored to the board if they are replaced in the same condition, so the word face down are unnecessary.

Great, thanks. So long as there is official guidance from the L&EC that the law is to be interpreted in that way, that seems to be all we need (within England, at least).

the LEC's assertion is faulty. The word restore cuts in more way than one.

 

Consider the case where the board arrived boxed. To restore then requires the board to be boxed.

 

Further consider that to restore the board requires the cards be returned in the same order.

[blackshoe]

What's that saying about from the sublime to the ridiculous?

[dburn]

Consider the case where the board arrived boxed.  To restore then requires the board to be boxed.

 

Further consider that to restore the board requires the cards be returned in the same order.

Not really. To "restore" is, among other things:

 

To bring back to the original state; to improve, repair, or retouch (a thing) so as to bring back something like the original form or condition.

If we consider the "original state" of the cards in the board to be that immediately following a deal performed in accordance with Law 6B, then there were thirteen of them in each pocket randomly ordered and all face down. It is that state to which they should be "restored" in accordance with Law 7C.

 

Of course when that Law was written, instead of "restores them to the pocket..." the Lawmakers should have said "replaces them face down in the pocket..." Maybe one day the Laws will be written in English - but that will not constitute a restoration, merely a revolution.

[campboy]

the LEC's assertion is faulty.

It would not matter if it were. Insofar as I direct at EBU-affiliated clubs, the L&EC has the authority to tell me how to interpret law 7C.

[matmat]

He GOT ME!

<SARCASM>

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

jdonn's head

[axman]

Consider the case where the board arrived boxed.  To restore then requires the board to be boxed.

 

Further consider that to restore the board requires the cards be returned in the same order.

Not really. To "restore" is, among other things:

 

To bring back to the original state; to improve, repair, or retouch (a thing) so as to bring back something like the original form or condition.

If we consider the "original state" of the cards in the board to be that immediately following a deal performed in accordance with Law 6B, then there were thirteen of them in each pocket randomly ordered and all face down. It is that state to which they should be "restored" in accordance with Law 7C.

 

Of course when that Law was written, instead of "restores them to the pocket..." the Lawmakers should have said "replaces them face down in the pocket..." Maybe one day the Laws will be written in English - but that will not constitute a restoration, merely a revolution.

This most certainly is a common usage for restore and it would do well to examine what effects there are:

 

1. To which original state is the target- today? last week? last year? Is it so outlandish to go back even further than a year- after all this is the.original.state.

 

I don't think so. But since the presumed original state is the cards put in the pockets after the deal of today, then why not should the original state be the cards as they arrive in the current round. If the player each round is culpable for the imperfections of they who preceeded him then he must have a mechanism to ascertain precisely the original state of the cards to protect himself if he so chooses. i could imagine that the mechanism should fall to the TD and I can believe easily that it can take some time for the TD to visit every table after every board.

 

On the other hand, if the player only is responsible to restoring the cards to his pocket as he found them for such a thing he needs no outside assistance and the game would proceed more quickly. And that is satisfactory reason for the presumptive original state to be the cards that arrive at the table.

 

Which all is neither here nor there. As you have said kings and potentates and rulemakers may speak and write as they fancy without regard for what carrying out the commands will look like. Yet, if every player at the Bermuda Bowl were to protect himself by verifying every hand with the TD that he gets the correct L6B cards in the correct order prior to actually returning the cards to the pocket then after Meckwell's, Hamman's, zia's, Hellness', Helgemo's, Versace's, Lauria's.......blood has been cleaned up there might be some impetus to write the rules in ENglish.

 

ps A reasonably entertaining vugraph Sunday.

[dburn]

To which original state is the target- today?  last week?  last year?  Is it so outlandish to go back even further than a year-  after all this is the originalstate.

One makes certain basic assumptions that may or may not seem reasonable. It would for example seem unreasonable to expect a player to attempt to restore the original state of his cards by planting a tree to replace the one cut down for the paper from which those cards were "originally" made.

 

On the other hand, it would seem reasonable to expect a player to "restore" the (ideal) state of the hand he received - 13 cards in random order all face down - by shuffling his cards and returning them to the board all face down. If the Law does not make it clear that this is what he should do - why, the Law should be changed. Until then, if the Law at any rate suggests that this is what he should do, and if it would in any case be a sensible thing to do - why, he should do it.

 

In the former case he can (after the Law is changed) be penalized for not doing it; in the latter case he cannot - but surely we do not play the game merely in order to irritate people by acting as obnoxiously as we can within the limits of the Laws. Do we?

 

In passing, we may remark that deliberately returning your cards to the board with one or more of them face up might interfere with the enjoyment of the game of the players at the table next to play the board. This is contrary to Law 74A2, so that...

[jdonn]

The clause to confirm the blindingly obvious is present in Law 7B2: "each player counts his cards face down". Thus, by your own argument, the fact that the same clause is not to be found in 7C means that there is no requirement for the cards to be returned face down. The two laws, as you say, should be consistent.

Not according to the EBU L&EC. I put to them the possibility of a regulation to cover this. The L&EC's view is that the vital word is "restore": the cards are restored to the board if they are replaced in the same condition, so the word face down are unnecessary.

I think their interpretation of the implications of the word "restore" is wrong, but it's good to at least have their interpretation on record whatever it is.