Would you get to 6?

[smerriman]

Apologies if you thought I was putting you down in any way - not my intention in the slightest.

 

I though the main point of this thread was that you thought the description implied a lack of stopper, and thus the description needed fixing - was just pointing out that if you follow this through to a logical conclusion, you'd get something absurd, so your assumption couldn't have been correct.

 

But I guess I must have misunderstood :)

[zhasbeen]

Apologies if you thought I was putting you down in any way - not my intention in the slightest.

 

I though the main point of this thread was that you thought the description implied a lack of stopper, and thus the description needed fixing - was just pointing out that if you follow this through to a logical conclusion, you'd get something absurd, so your assumption couldn't have been correct.

 

But I guess I must have misunderstood :)

 

Thanks, merriman--greatly appreciated. People who are insensitive don't do what you just did. I didn't do the greatest job of explaining where I was coming from.

[jdonn]

Partial stopper means partial stopper or better. Common sense must be used. Sorry but I think you were being a bit too literal.

[zhasbeen]

Partial stopper means partial stopper or better. Common sense must be used. Sorry but I think you were being a bit too literal.

 

“Sorry but I think you were being a bit too literal.”

No doubt about that part

 

“"we are all in agreement there with the ACBL def you quoted"”

Finally, following post after post, it was finally confirmed. That was enough for me to let this thing go, but…

 

“Common sense must be used”

This one strikes a nerve, as do words like “ridiculous” and “absurd”

 

I would wager that I’m not the only person who has been confused by this one. Of course these people with the double digit, K, Q, R, star, and double digit number ratings will have learned their lesson after a couple years of play or longer. I just learned mine after 3 months. When I enter a tournament I am often “flight B” with my 7 rating, but I have enough common sense to have consistently finished in top 3 overall (45% after 613 tournaments). You give me a great excuse for bringing up my playing record for at least the 3rd time. I know that I’m outgunned by some of you but I’m still pretty good at this.

 

Remember, not everyone who plays in robot tournaments looks at these situations the way a programmer would. It seems that many, if not most, of the people who post here are programmers that have years of experience playing with robots.

Does it really take a lack of common sense to run your cursor over the 3NT definition without having to ask yourself “I know it says partial stopper, but does it really mean that?”

The players should be able to put their energies into deciding how to bid and play the hands. I was on my 11th board. After GIB’s 3NT bid I ran my cursor over the call and it landed squarely on “Partial stop in [heart icon]” and I ran with it. Normally I wouldn’t bother with definition following a NT response, but I thought it might have a systemic meaning in the context of this auction, and that it did. I would have been much better off with no definition in this case.

 

Would it be that unfeasible to incorporate “or better” into the definition? It makes such a huge difference in how the definition could be interpreted. Click on tinyurl link in first post of thread, and then look at definition of 3NT bid. It is about a foot wide with “Partial stop” appearing 3 times. You could save 9 characters just by saying “Part” rather than partial. How about saying it only once rather than 3 times, and using the suit symbols? Couldn’t it be something like:

“14-21 hcp; 4+trump; Part stop or better ♠;♥;♦;♣"

 

Btw, the north hand has only 13 hcp.

[Stephen Tu]

Does it really take a lack of common sense to run your cursor over the 3NT definition without having to ask yourself "I know it says partial stopper, but does it really mean that?"

 

Yes. The explanation said "partial stopper club, partial stopper diamond, partial stopper heart". A partial stopper is Qxx or worse. So you are positing that partner has Txxx Qxx Qxx Jxx and bid Jacoby 2nt, if you take partial stopper 100% literally and are assuming an "exactly, no more than" qualifier.

 

You have 16 HCP and think partner made a GF bid with zero aces and zero kings?

 

Basically this forum has been around a long time and you are the first to have complained about the wording of this as thinking full stopper is denied. (previous complaint was when a takeout dbl followed by cue bid had explicit description "at best partial stopper in x", despite having a full stopper, which was supposedly fixed). Most people are capable of making the logical deduction that partial stopper means "partial or better". Not just from playing with bots, but also from general bridge experience that no one ever defines NT bids as "partial stoppers only, full stoppers not allowed!".

 

As for adding the "or better", we don't really know how the descriptions are generated here. The descriptions are combinations of descriptions attached to multiple rules as they are matched, it might require quite a bit of work to combine say "partial stopper or better in H; partial stopper or better in D;" into a single "partial stopper or better in H, D". There are many more, much bigger fish to fry than asking for them to spend time on this one to make it more verbose just for you.

[zhasbeen]

Yes. The explanation said "partial stopper club, partial stopper diamond, partial stopper heart". A partial stopper is Qxx or worse. So you are positing that partner has Txxx Qxx Qxx Jxx and bid Jacoby 2nt, if you take partial stopper 100% literally and are assuming an "exactly, no more than" qualifier.

 

You have 16 HCP and think partner made a GF bid with zero aces and zero kings?

 

Basically this forum has been around a long time and you are the first to have complained about the wording of this as thinking full stopper is denied. (previous complaint was when a takeout dbl followed by cue bid had explicit description "at best partial stopper in x", despite having a full stopper, which was supposedly fixed). Most people are capable of making the logical deduction that partial stopper means "partial or better". Not just from playing with bots, but also from general bridge experience that no one ever defines NT bids as "partial stoppers only, full stoppers not allowed!".

 

As for adding the "or better", we don't really know how the descriptions are generated here. The descriptions are combinations of descriptions attached to multiple rules as they are matched, it might require quite a bit of work to combine say "partial stopper or better in H; partial stopper or better in D;" into a single "partial stopper or better in H, D". There are many more, much bigger fish to fry than asking for them to spend time on this one to make it more verbose just for you.

 

“You have 16 HCP and think partner made a GF bid with zero aces and zero kings?”

 

This comment is not even related to the conversation. “Notrump opener –can have 5-card major” or something very close is what definition says. It doesn’t promise a stopper in any suit, since you can have a worthless doubleton. The 3NT response we are talking about is unique to a particular type of auction.

 

“Yes. The explanation said "partial stopper club, partial stopper diamond, partial stopper heart". A partial stopper is Qxx or worse. So you are positing that partner has Txxx Qxx Qxx Jxx and bid Jacoby 2nt, if you take partial stopper 100% literally and are assuming an "exactly, no more than" qualifier.”

 

I am looser on the various descriptions of partial stopper. The part I won’t bend on is that it could contain an ace. Part stoppers can’t contain aces; plain and simple. However, I am confident I can handle the current definition as is. It's a definition I haven't seen used anywhere other than these tournaments.

 

If it’s too hard to change the definition to describe what it really means, then so be it.

 

“Basically this forum has been around a long time and you are the first to have complained about the wording of this as thinking full stopper is denied.”

This forum makes up a tiny fraction of the players that have entered BBO tournaments and others who will enter them in the future. From my experience forum members are not your typical players either. Most of the exchanges I’ve had since joining have been with members having programming backgrounds to go with their strong bridge credentials. I’ve also looked in on a few threads that I could understand only small parts of. You can’t expect your new customers to apply the same reasoning you do.

 

“There are many more, much bigger fish to fry than asking for them to spend time on this one to make it more verbose just for you.”

I couldn’t agree more on the underlined part, and I personally don’t need it to be changed. However, I believe it is possible to make a more accurate description than what is in place now that is even more compact.