jlup Posted November 5, 2020 Report Share Posted November 5, 2020 What happened to the non life master games? There were three each day and consisted of 12 boards. It was great for beginner/intermediate players who don’t want to play against someone with 1000 points. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
melbob Posted November 7, 2020 Report Share Posted November 7, 2020 I'm wondering the same thing. I was planning to play today. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
sallydk Posted November 9, 2020 Report Share Posted November 9, 2020 ACBL told me that NLM games were cancelled because of low participation rates. Too bad because newer players need to practice against others whose bids they understand. It’s disheartening to be cannon fodder for the better players. The mental engagement of bridge will be negated by the stress of being overwhelmed by your opponents. The 12 board game gives you time to play and review in about 2 hours. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mycroft Posted November 9, 2020 Report Share Posted November 9, 2020 While I agree that it's too bad that the NLM games were cancelled, "newer players need to practise against others whose bids they understand" is a *really good reason* for cancelling NLM games. One of the serious advantages, and one of the things I hear most commonly from the pairs who decide to play up, is "you can trust the opponent's auction". And it's true. Also important - if you tune your system to beat the NLM game, it will take much longer to unlearn the bad habits when you have to play against the open pairs. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
melbob Posted November 10, 2020 Report Share Posted November 10, 2020 My two cents again since I asked BBO and ACBL to offer NLM games months ago.....just like F2F clubs offer NLM or limited games, the same should be true on BBO. We all like to get points but in an open game?? Really? I think ACBL has dropped the ball by not including NLM games (18 bds/$1.75) as they do for open players. We pay the same ACBL membership fee. I was very disappointed to just suddenly discover the NLM games has been cancelled without any announcement or warning. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
sallydk Posted November 22, 2020 Report Share Posted November 22, 2020 While I agree that it's too bad that the NLM games were cancelled, "newer players need to practise against others whose bids they understand" is a *really good reason* for cancelling NLM games. One of the serious advantages, and one of the things I hear most commonly from the pairs who decide to play up, is "you can trust the opponent's auction". And it's true. Also important - if you tune your system to beat the NLM game, it will take much longer to unlearn the bad habits when you have to play against the open pairs. You are right. We’ve seen some odd bids. How about an ACBL NLM Daylong with robots? You play with your partner, because developing a partnership should be a goal. Most complaints about robots are when the robot is your partner. No games with pairs against robots are listed, so that might be a programming issue first. If the game was advertised or announced, more people would know about it. If Daylong showed popular times and participation, it could be held at certain times. A set game time allows for immediate review. Against robots, every bid is defined. New players would be introduced to Drury, New Minor Forcing and Fourth Suit Forcing and be given a description. I have practiced all 3 with robots before starting to play with my partners. Twelve boards would be nice to maintain focus then review. Accept the invitation and your game starts in 1 minute. Play all boards in one sitting with 7 min/board. Unplayed boards are zeros. No claim button. Maybe NLM games could use Basic robots. The Advanced robots are very good. Do you have any thoughts from an advanced player’s viewpoint? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
akwoo Posted November 22, 2020 Report Share Posted November 22, 2020 You are right. We’ve seen some odd bids. How about an ACBL NLM Daylong with robots? You play with your partner, because developing a partnership should be a goal. Most complaints about robots are when the robot is your partner. No games with pairs against robots are listed, so that might be a programming issue first. If the game was advertised or announced, more people would know about it. If Daylong showed popular times and participation, it could be held at certain times. A set game time allows for immediate review. Against robots, every bid is defined. New players would be introduced to Drury, New Minor Forcing and Fourth Suit Forcing and be given a description. I have practiced all 3 with robots before starting to play with my partners. Twelve boards would be nice to maintain focus then review. Accept the invitation and your game starts in 1 minute. Play all boards in one sitting with 7 min/board. Unplayed boards are zeros. No claim button. Maybe NLM games could use Basic robots. The Advanced robots are very good. Do you have any thoughts from an advanced player’s viewpoint? The biggest problem with pairs against robots is that there is no way for players to inform robots of their bidding system. This means that if you're playing something non-standard, the robots will end up playing you for a different hand than you actually showed. Pairs playing non-standard systems will have a big unfair advantage in a pairs-vs-robots game. I did earn all of my first 50 or so masterpoints playing weak NT - so yes there are NLMs playing non-standard systems. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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