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Defender detaches card and places it face down..


keeper2

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Would it? You'd play Hell convincing a club director around here to rule that way.

 

It is not at all unusual for the other players to quit the trick when you haven't, and for one of them then to lead to the next trick.

 

In any case the custom of leaving a card face up to indicate a desire for time to think is not defined as correct procedure in the laws; therefore it is not correct procedure. So where the custom exists, it may work okay, but where it does not exist, you're stuck.

It will work as long as your partner cooperates. Even if an opponent leads to the next trick, partner can (and should, IMO) refuse to play until the current trick is quitted.

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Doesn't "I'm not thinking about this trick but the whole hand" impart some information to partner? I find the habit of putting the card face down quite irritating. If you want to think then you can

a. do so before playing but other than at trick one there will be potential UI problems arising from this

b. play your card in the normal way and at the end of the trick keep it open for as long as you want to think(if you do this very often you may run into time problems but no more or less than playing it face down).

 

You occasionally run into people who are impatient and turn their card over and try to play to the next trick. Just be robust! Bridge players aren't normally shrinking violets.

 

The worst sort are those who not only play their card face down but when they've made their mind up turn it over and get impatient if it takes more than 0.02 seconds to move on to the next trick.

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Doesn't "I'm not thinking about this trick but the whole hand" impart some information to partner?

 

Doesn't

 

b. play your card in the normal way and at the end of the trick keep it open for as long as you want to think.

 

also impart information to partner?

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Doesn't

b. play your card in the normal way and at the end of the trick keep it open for as long as you want to think.

also impart information to partner?

Yes, the same UI is conveyed whether you play your card face-up and then pause, play it face-down and then pause, or announce that you know what you're going to play and then pause before playing it. The difference is that the first allows everyone at the table to use the time effectively, whereas the other two do not.

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Yes, the same UI is conveyed whether you play your card face-up and then pause, play it face-down and then pause, or announce that you know what you're going to play and then pause before playing it. The difference is that the first allows everyone at the table to use the time effectively, whereas the other two do not.

 

Thanks, everybody. I think Andy sums it up very nicely.

 

In the game in question I don't think there is much risk of an opponent machine-gunning the next trick, particularly if you ask people to "leave their card out for a moment."

 

You have to break people of habits like these early, or it's too late

 

The player in question is a platinum life master so I guess it's probably too late.

 

I think as Gnasher suggested that it's well intentioned, but it is annoying.

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I prefer to play my card in one unhurried movement, having already thought if I need to.

 

I also invariably turn my card in a consistent unhurried way once everyone has played to a trick, unless I have a reason related to the current trick.

 

None of the devices described in this thread appeal to me at all, but I've learned to live with them.

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I don't think it's just a bad habit - in my experience the people who do this have the good intention of trying to avoid misleading the opponents. There's a similar and equally irritating group of people who announce that they're not thinking about the current trick, but still don't play a card until they've finished thinking about the causes of the Franco-Prussian War or whatever it is that's occupying their time.

 

Both groups seem not to understand that they can achieve the same effect by turning their card face-up and leaving it like that whilst they think; or they understand that they could do this, but don't understand why what they actually do is unfair and annoying.

No, I am not so stupid as to believe I can get the same effect by this, because it is not true. I am allowed to think when I want to, and if I turn the card face up the play will progress. So the effect is not the same.

 

The laws don't define a procedure for informing the opponents that you want some time to think about the hand or for taking time to think about the hand* (except as the RA may specify by regulation). Apparently, therefore, in the absence of a pertinent regulation, it is not correct to do so.

I would say the exact opposite: there is a Law about misleading opponents, so, in my view, in the absence of a pertinent regulation it is definitely correct to do so.

 

Doesn't "I'm not thinking about this trick but the whole hand" impart some information to partner?

Of course, But the first importance is always not to mislead opponents. Giving UI to partner is not illegal, misleading opponents is. Plus, as others have pointed out, when you are trying to sort out a problem, whatever you do gives UI to partner.

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There are several laws about misleading opponents, but I understand your point, I think. You are not permitted to mislead opponents by anything other than actual calls and plays, so where opponents might be misled by your need to think, you have to tell them what (in general, not specifically) you're thinking about. Okay, fair enough. Do I play my card in tempo and request time to think (or inform opps I need to think) about the whole hand? If they play on regardless do I have any recourse? Or do I withhold the card I intend to play? What if it's a singleton? Even aside from giving UI to partner, I see potential problems.
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Nonsense. They not only can, they do. AFAIK, no law prevents it. In fact, Law 66A implicitly acknowledges the possibility.

 

If you refuse to contribute to the next trick while the previous one is not quitted, you will now not be given MI that you are thinking about which card to play to this trick. Problem solved.

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No, I am not so stupid as to believe I can get the same effect by this, because it is not true. I am allowed to think when I want to, and if I turn the card face up the play will progress. So the effect is not the same.

Assuming that your partner isn't as obtuse as your opponents, play will progress by a maximum of one card, or two if declarer leads from one hand then plays out of turn from the other.

 

It's true that you're allowed to think when you want to - I didn't suggest otherwise - but if you do it in a way that is annoying and unfair it will still be annoying and unfair.

Edited by gnasher
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It's true that you're allowed to think when you want to - I didn't suggest otherwise - but if you do it in a way that is annoying and unfair it will still be annoying and unfair.

It is not unfair, and it is not annoying unless people decide to make themselves be annoyed in a fairly silly fashion.

 

So, some people just don't believe my #34?

I believe you, of course, but so what? If my card is face down while I think I certainly do not expect people to continue to play, and have never known someone do so. If ever they do I shall call the TD then.

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It is not unfair

The argument for considering it unfair is this: During the time that the player is thinking, he knows what card he is going to play to this trick. Therefore he has more information during that period, and is able to use the time more effectively than anyone else. If the other players at the table do their strategic thinking after playing to a trick, they do not have the same advantage.

 

Several people have already made this point, but you seem not to have offered any refutation. Can you explain why you believe that we are wrong?

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There is no such rule as the one you have invented.

 

On the other hand there is also no rule that says that you must think when others want either.

 

Since neither rule exists, neither is necessary or desirable, and both rules are merely based on supporting the views of intolerant others, I do not see the advantage in assuming such rules exist.

 

I actively dislike the serious intolerance that a minority bring to this game, which I believe is far worse than the alleged bad behaviour.

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There is no such rule as the one you have invented.

 

On the other hand there is also no rule that says that you must think when others want either.

 

Since neither rule exists, neither is necessary or desirable, and both rules are merely based on supporting the views of intolerant others, I do not see the advantage in assuming such rules exist.

I didn't say that such a rule exists, I didn't say that it should exist, and I didn't say that we should assume that it exists.

 

I said that the given practice, although legal, is also unfair. Then I told you (again) why I and others consider it unfair. Are you going to explain why you disagree, or are you just going to erect a few more straw men?

 

I actively dislike the serious intolerance that a minority bring to this game, which I believe is far worse than the alleged bad behaviour.

I'm not sure who that's aimed at. Speaking for myself, my only response to this category of annoying and unfair behaviour is to discuss it in abstract terms on an internet forum. It seems to me that that this approach isn't particularly intolerant.

Edited by gnasher
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I don't understand the term straw men, I have explained, and if I explain again it will now doubt be the same. I follow a recommended procedure which others have followed and object to certain people who want to change it for intolerant reasons.
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I don't understand the term straw men

The Wikipedia explanation of straw men is quite good: "To 'attack a straw man' is to create the illusion of having refuted a proposition by replacing it with a superficially similar yet unequivalent proposition (the 'straw man'), and refuting it, without ever having actually refuted the original position." When you said "There is no such rule as the one you have invented", that was a straw man, because I had never suggested that there was any rule.

 

, I have explained, and if I explain again it will now doubt be the same. I follow a recommended procedure which others have followed and object to certain people who want to change it for intolerant reasons.

Who has said they want to change your behaviour? And why does the fact that you and others do it mean that it is fair?

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That's an easy one - because bluejak obviously wouldn't do it if it wasn't fair! :)

 

LOL. I think that Andy's point is that it is both considerate and time-saving if everyone, including you, can think about the hand while they know what has happened in the last trick.

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