psyche exclusions

[EdmundB]

In general, I think psyche-exclusion events are not bridge, any more than 1♦ exclusion events would be.

 

What are the best arguments, pro and con?

[hrothgar]

IMHO

 

The best argument in against psyche free tournaments probably goes like this:

 

"Psyches are a legitimate and legal part of bridge. By allowing TDs to run tournaments that ban psyches you are implicitly teaching inexperienced players that these types of regulations are appropriate. When these players venture out into the world, they'll be ill equipped technically and emotionally to cope with players who psyche."

 

The best argument in favor of psyche free tournaments probably goes like this:

 

"TD can (pretty much) run whatever type of tournament they want. Many national organizations either

 

1. Ban pysches outright (Italy) OR

2. Allow club directors to ban psyches (the ACBL)

 

Why should BBO try to control psyches? (especially since the decentralized nature of the playing environment would make this much more difficult)

[Siegmund]

Some of us vote with our feet, and never enter the tourneys that ban psyching. (And, frankly, have a somewhat low opinion of BBO allowing rules contrary to the laws in some tournaments -- though since there are goulashes etc offered too, there is precedent for allowing "non-bridge" tournaments here.)

 

Of course, the people who enter those tourneys are probably glad that we psychers are out of their hair. heh.

[jillybean]

IMHO the problem is even larger than Richard’s post suggests.

 

People who ban psyches (and multi, polish club, and so on) do not understand psyches, don’t know what to do if they get a TD call about one, have learned that they are bad, therefore fear and ban it.

 

If that isn’t bad enough, the damage does not stop there. What happens in these games is that any unusual or misunderstood bid is treated as a psyche and an adjustment made. Players are booted and banned for not alerting or “mis describing” their hand.

 

Not only will players be ill equipped to cope with psyches if they ever venture into the real world, they will be ill equipped to cope with a normal game of bridge.

 

Unfortunately, I think this is the new look for online bridge. There are 1000’s of players happy to play this way and seemingly as disinterested in the rules of the game as BBO is to promote the laws. You can’t even find a link to the laws of duplicate bridge from the help pages.

 

There are many other ways in which the laws are being corrupted online. I hope this isn't the future of the game.

[Bbradley62]

Banning psyches is basically setting up a less competitive lower-level game. Some people legitimately want, need and/or like that. Not everyone who plays bridge online is doing so to "train" for higher-level competition.

[nige1]

Psychs are a legitimate element of normal bridge. IMO, however, it makes sense to ban psychs from some BBO tournaments:

 

1. Many of competitors are beginners. Psychs may confuse their learning.
2. As a BBO player, you alert and explain your own calls. Opponents are prone to cry foul if your explanation bears no relationship to your hand.
3. It is easy to cheat on-line, so the fielding of psychs becomes more suspicious and generates more bad feeling than it would at face-to-face bridge.
4. Many on-line tournaments are free. Some competitors are not the full shilling. Many have a low attention-span. In the past, when such players were doing badly, they would quit. Now runners are discouraged. So there is a strong temptation for such players to psych and fool around. This tendency must be discouraged because it can detract from the enjoyment of others.
5. Some players try to get round system-restrictions by spurious claims that their banned conventional call is a "psych". (Personally, I don't approve of system restrictions but if we must have them, then I think that they should be enforced).
6. Psychs attract director calls. On-line, few experienced directors are available.

[blackshoe]

I am frankly surprised that an NBO (Italy) bans psychs. I'm more surprised that the ACBL has made an official statement that clubs in North America may do so. I'd like to see a link, myself. In either case, whatever happened to "not in conflict with these laws"? :(

[hrothgar]

I am frankly surprised that an NBO (Italy) bans psychs. I'm more surprised that the ACBL has made an official statement that clubs in North America may do so. I'd like to see a link, myself. In either case, whatever happened to "not in conflict with these laws"? :(

 

Here's a document describing the regulations in Italy.

I think that I misremembered the regulations in question.

It doesn't completely ban psyches but it does restrict the types of psyches allowed

 

http://www.federbridge.it/Regolamenti/doc/apertureinterventi.pdf

 

" Allowed openings and overcalls

NATURAL OPENINGS

1 OF A SUIT

MIN HCP: 8 hcp

Min no. of cards in the suit opened:

a ) MAJOR SUIT = 4 cards

b ) MINOR SUIT = 3 cards

 

"Length psyche" allowed: YES ....MIN NO. OF CARDS ALLOWED = 0

"HCP PSYCHE" allowed: YES ......MIN HCP ALLOWED: 8

[barmar]

The Laws allow the RA to regulate psychic artificial calls (this change in the 2007 revision legitimized ACBL's long-standing prohibition of psyching artificial, strong openings), but don't allow regulation of psychic natural calls. So it seems to me that Italy's regulations are as illegal as ACBL's restriction was before the 2007 Laws.

 

Maybe that means that Italy will get the same lenient treatment as ACBL did for all those years that it had the illegal regulation. On the other hand, now that the Laws contain such a narrow allowance, it should be clearer that Italy's restrictions are not within the spirit.

 

As far as why no-psyche tournaments are allowed on BBO, it's because many people don't consider online bridge to be "serious bridge". It's part of the same attitude that causes people to bail whenever their partner does something stupid, or bid random 7NT's to mess up all the IMP scores. And as someone else mentioned, many online TDs simply don't want to have to deal with the aggravation of explaining to unsophisticated players that psyches are allowed; it's easier to just ban them. While there are players who will boycott these tourneys, there are plenty who like them, so they're not losing anything they care about.

[nigel_k]

I agree with the people who said that online bridge is not the same as face to face bridge. The entire internet is full of people doing things that they would never consider doing face to face.

 

Anyway, what is the problem if non-psyche events are technically not bridge? It's still a game that bears a strong resemblance to bridge and will appeal to the vast majority of people who also enjoy playing bridge. Do you think you could sue BBO for false advertising and win? Actually, if we are resorting to technical and legalistic arguments, BBO stands for 'Bridge Base Online' not 'Contract Bridge Base Online'. There are other forms of bridge besides Contract Bridge that are obviously not governed by the laws of Contract Bridge.

[barmar]

One could, of course, raise the "slippery slope" argument. If they can ban psyches, what else can they prohibit? How about a no-preempt tourney? Mrs. Guggenheim finds no-trump contracts hard to play, so can we have tourneys where the contract has to be in a suit?

 

How far can you go and still claim that the game is "bridge"?

[jillybean]

I had the understanding that BBO promoted Duplicate Contract Bridge. If as you say Nigel, they only stand for "bridge online", you're right, who cares and why am I getting my knickers in a twist?

[mycroft]

It's not really that it's a slippery slope from no psychic calls to no preempts, but from no psychic calls to no systems where you open hands that would be a psychic playing the director's system (or the opponents').

 

I play (haven't for a while, but plan on again soon) EHAA. AT Q53 854 86432 is a 2C opener, as is KT8543 8 -- AQ9542, or QJT7 QJT6 -- JT853, or 64 7 8 AKQT98432. But I bet, even if Alerted and auto-explained, in a "no-psych" tourney, I'd be ruled against for all of those hands, and probably also for opening my 25-count 1 of my longest suit (no strong bid available), or "double-and-pull" on the 13-count 6-4, or any of the other oddities of the system. I'm sure other systems have other issues (what about 9-14 1 bids in a 15+ Strong Club?)

[spwdo]

when i directed i implemented a rule where a psych bid needed to be reported to td: why? i simply wanted to be aware of such bids in order to prevent having a partnership establishing an understanding of a patrone and having an advantage vs their opss. i remember a pair that "psyched" a 2♦after a 2♣opening all the time to mess opps up.Besides that i didnt have much problems with the psychbidders.

 

But and here comes my point: even this rule, clearly allowing psych bids caused almost every time(midiocre and lower level players are opps) when a sych occured and opps realised it they start demanding a adjust. Why? because they saw something about psyche while reading tournament rules(option A) or/and because (my conclusion) they are used that psyche bids are often subject for adjust and more in favour of the "victims"

 

I once won the lottery on bbo and had a chance to play with Fred in an ACBL TR. at one point FRed opened 1nt with a singleton. Opps called TD after they realised , FRed response was " excuse me , i sinned and opened 1nt with a singleton" . Now Tds let it slip. But clearly, the mere fact that opps called td to start their quest for a better deal then the fair result goes totally against the rules of this game.

 

There are many reasons to think of why psych bids are disallowed in TR and frankly a few good ones were named prior but none of them are coming close to a fair game.

 

Its same as when south korea asks soccer to be played with players with a maximum height because they mainly have smaller players.

 

What rule is next? We see already in for example ACBL multi beeing disallowed because the majority doesnt like to defend against multi(too difficult) , we`ll come down to a game where stayman and gerber are allowed when enuff people will pay for it? not the best path to take imo

[paulg]

In real life, and on-line, most people feel cheated when a psyche works against them. I expect this is why no-psyche tournaments are popular.

 

As nige1 implies, the problem is that psyches seem to so successful on-line that it is hard to believe that they are all genuine. Especially as most experts do not psyche against less experienced opponents and the psyches seem to be perpetrated by fairly poor players.

 

I don't really think it is the sign of impending doom that these tournaments exist. Even a number of NBOs now ban the psyching of strong artificial opening bids and these tournaments are just the next step.

 

Naturally it would be best if the TDs who run these tournaments have the judgement required to properly understand what is a psyche, and what isn't.

[jillybean]

In real life, and on-line, most people feel cheated when a psyche works against them. I expect this is why no-psyche tournaments are popular.

 

As nige1 implies, the problem is that psyches seem to so successful on-line that it is hard to believe that they are all genuine. Especially as most experts do not psyche against less experienced opponents and the psyches seem to be perpetrated by fairly poor players.

 

I don't really think it is the sign of impending doom that these tournaments exist. Even a number of NBOs now ban the psyching of strong artificial opening bids and these tournaments are just the next step.

 

Naturally it would be best if the TDs who run these tournaments have the judgement required to properly understand what is a psyche, and what isn't.

 

I don't see many psyches at all online or at the club. Are we sure the people (online)who are crying foul are concerned about genuine psyches or rather, expert or unusual bidding?

[barmar]

I don't see many psyches at all online or at the club. Are we sure the people (online)who are crying foul are concerned about genuine psyches or rather, expert or unusual bidding?

That's the thing, it can be difficult to tell the difference.

 

A couple of weeks ago, my partner opened 1♠, RHO doubled, I redoubled (showing 10+ HCP and no ♠ fit), and it went all pass. The doubler had an opening hand with ♠KJTx and 2 ♥, not even close to an appropriate hand for a takeout double, and his partner passed with 5 ♥. Partner went down 1 redoubled and vulnerable, for a disaster score.

 

So was that a lucky psyche, a fix (RHO thinks he needs to double with any hand with opening strength, and LHO thinks he needs points to bid over the redouble), or was there a wire? I reported it to the director; they couldn't do anything about that hand, but at least they could record it in case this pair has some other similar results.

[jillybean]

This happened just now, here is a bid one expert BBO'er claims is a psyche. (weak 1nt opening)

 

[hv=pc=n&s=saq95ht72dkc87642&w=skt3hj8da97632ckt&n=s84haq3djt854cqj9&e=sj762hk9654dqca53&d=w&v=0&b=8&a=1np2d2sp2nppp]399|300[/hv]

 

West called me saying "another psychic call 4cd sp and nothing"

 

I checked with South, 2♠ was intended as lead directing, when I told West this he still claimed "it s a psyche no points no suit"

I attempted to explain why 2♠ was not a psyche, it ended with West saying "as i said forget it. Nevertheless think its not a natural call"

 

This is imho, typical of the psyches reported on BBO.

[blackshoe]

It seems an awful lot of people have wrong ideas about what a psych is.

 

Once, quite a few years ago, I made a really bad 2♦ bid. I posted the hand here and asked "was this a psych?" The answer was "you had no clue what you were doing, so no, it wasn't a psych". :lol:

 

The fact that a call is not natural does not make it a psych. The fact that it was not natural and not alerted does not make it a psych. The fact that Joe Random Player wouldn't make that call in a million years does not make it a psych. Even if Joe is an expert. What makes it a psych is (1) there is a partnership agreement, (2) the bidder has grossly deviated from the agreement in his call, (3) his partner will not have expected it, and (4) he did it on purpose.

[jillybean]

It seems an awful lot of people have wrong ideas about what a psych is.

 

Once, quite a few years ago, I made a really bad 2♦ bid. I posted the hand here and asked "was this a psych?" The answer was "you had no clue what you were doing, so no, it wasn't a psych". :lol:

 

The fact that a call is not natural does not make it a psych. The fact that it was not natural and not alerted does not make it a psych. The fact that Joe Random Player wouldn't make that call in a million years does not make it a psych. Even if Joe is an expert. What makes it a psych is (1) there is a partnership agreement, (2) the bidder has grossly deviated from the agreement in his call, (3) his partner will not have expected it, and (4) he did it on purpose.

 

Hi, please explain what you mean by (1) there is a partnership agreement

Thanks.

[blackshoe]

A psych is a departure from partnership agreement. If there is no agreement, there can be no psych.

[nigel_k]

What makes it a psych is (1) there is a partnership agreement, (2) the bidder has grossly deviated from the agreement in his call, (3) his partner will not have expected it, and (4) he did it on purpose.

I didn't know about part (3) and it seems kind of implied by (1) and (2) anyway. But I think there is an implicit agreement to bid somewhat normally when the partnership has discussed nothing, otherwise banning psyches would not really ban anything by a scratch partnership. So I would say that (1) and (3) are satisfied in Jillybean's example. Probably (4) is too, though maybe South is enough of an idiot to think this kind of action is normal. It comes down to whether the 2♠ bid is a gross deviation from what is normal, and I think reasonable people could disagree about that.

[blackshoe]

And how do you define "somewhat normally"? I doubt you can come up with a definition with which everyone (or even most everyone) will agree.

 

Even if we accept that you can, a player whose call is "a gross deviation from what is normal" has not necessarily psyched. For him to have psyched, he must be aware "what is normal", and have deviated from it deliberately. Players do make unwise or even stupid bids. To hold that they have psyched when they only made a mistake is just wrong.

[blackshoe]

If the "psycher's" partner expects that he might make this call in this situation, then it isn't a psych, it's a concealed partnership understanding (CPU) (unless the call is alerted and properly explained). CPUs are illegal (and even if it's properly explained, it may turn out to be an illegal agreement, depending on the regulations in force).

[1eyedjack]

Agree with all of the above, but there are three other reasons so far not mentioned (unless I have missed them in the thread) in favour of allowing psychs.

 

1) The sort of TD who is inclined to ban psychs tends to be a player of caliber who is not particularly adept at judging whether an actual sequence falls within the definition. Frequently they will rule a minor and fairly innocuous departure from agreements as falling into this category, such as an occasional opening of a weak 2 on a 5 card suit. To be a psych it should be a deliberate and *gross* distortion of distribution or strength. It is of course possible (although perhaps not legal) for a TD also to ban minor deviations from system, but strictly he should not be calling it a ban on psychs.

 

2) Connected in some respects to item 1 above, TDs are inconsistent regarding what they regard as a borderline psych. Indeed some TDs are individually inconsistent from one day to the next, but more significantly one TD may differ dramatically from another TD in his opinion as regards what constitutes a psych, and yet both will simply put in the tourney description nothing more detailed than that psychs are banned. This leads to confusion among players as regards just what rules apply to them.

 

3) Personally I may have no intention of psyching and yet I believe that I stand to gain more than I lose by the act of opponents psyching against me, so I would prefer it if my opponents had the freedom to hoist themselves on their petards.

 

Actually I think that a few TDs ban psychs because they have a personal animosity against psychs rather than because of any independent or impartial assessment of what would be good for the game, for the tournament or for the players in their tournies, and I have never yet seen any evidence of a TD polling regular players for their preferences.