BBO Discussion Forums: indecisive use of the Stop Card - BBO Discussion Forums

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True enough, but I think stop card users will leave it out the appropriate amount of time in a much greater percentage than opps pausing appropriately after the bid now given the current procedure.

Stephen Tu, on Mar 30 2009, 11:52 AM, said:

Frankly, my real problem with that procedure is that I find it obnoxious. I am not RHO's puppet.

Stephen Tu, on Mar 30 2009, 04:34 PM, said:

No, the EBU requires next opp to wait either until the stop card is withdrawn, or 10 seconds, whichever is longer.

Thanks everyone. I felt like I was obligated to make a skip bid and eventually bid 4♣ (which worked out horribly). Next time I'll know and I'll make the confusing "Stop.... Pass" call .

I normally count to myself to seven. That way it's long enough to pause, but fast enough to not cause issues. I used to be a stop card user, but I went to Stop Card Anonymous and now have embraced the Alert card for my fix.

jdonn, on Mar 29 2009, 10:54 PM, said:

That certainly would make sense. But I really hope that this will never be a regulation or law. In practice there are many cases where people obviously use the stopcard by mistake (often with some giggles at the table). Recent examples that I encountered were:

1♥-Pass-2♥-STOP 4♦;
... STOP 4♥, giggles all around.

and

Spades are set as trumps, early in the auction. Science follows. Then comes Blackwood:

4NT-5x
5NT-6y
... STOP: 6NT

In the last case, the 6NT bidder's brain tells him that he leaped past 6♠, which was where the auction was heading originally. The 'leap' made him use the STOP card, even of there was no jump in the auction.

The same goes for the 4♥ bidder. He meant to jump to 4♥ all along and had his bid mentally ready. He just needed to pause for 10 s before he could make his bid, even though he didn't have much to think about. After the 10 s, he did what he intended to do all along: 'jump' to 4♥. Except of course that it wasn't a jump anymore.

While I agree that there is some (pretty vague) UI crossing the table in these cases, I would be very much against forcing the 6NT bidder to bid at the 7 level and forcing the 4♥ bidder to bid 5♥.

And a long time ago, I actually saw an auction where diamonds were set as trump. It ended with:

7♣ (offering a choice)-Pass- STOP 7NT

How would you handle that one?

Rik

barmar, on Mar 30 2009, 05:43 PM, said:

A solution to that might be that the player who removes the stop card prematurely loses right to redress for UI that passes as a result of his default. I am not saying that is the law, but it might be a sensible one.

Trinidad, on Mar 31 2009, 02:09 AM, said:

Do I really have to answer that? How do you think I would handle that one?

As for the rest of your post, I agree the stop card can be pulled out by mistake. Just like pass or double or 5NT can be pulled out by mistake. The rules about making a mechanical error would not be any different. If it was just a brain fart, well that's what they get. I have seen 1♣ p 1♠ p 2♠ p, think think think on an opening strength hand, decide to not try for slam, then have a brain fart and pass since mentally you have decided on the low road. Oops. But when that happens you have to live with it.

And call me heartless, but I don't think that giggling when you make a brain fart entitles you to more sympathy.

Vilgan, on Mar 29 2009, 02:48 PM, said:

I think this is the real problem with the stop card, and one of the reasons I don't use them. I've heard at least a half dozen opponents postmortems that include "why didn't you use the stop card so I'd know you had skipped a level".

Mbodell, on Mar 31 2009, 02:45 AM, said:

One might hope to hear the response "because that would be cheating".

jdonn, on Mar 31 2009, 02:19 AM, said:

I think most of the stop-card brain farts come from not realizing that the bid you were going to make is not really a jump. Like the example above where the player was presumably planning on jumping to game over his partner's single raise, but RHO stuck a preempt in, so his game bid was not a jump. Does it really make sense to force him to jump to the 5 level?

There may be some UI in this case -- the stop card suggests that partner has full values for his game bid, rather than stretching over the preempt. But unless there's further competition, it's unlikely to make a difference.

I've never considered an inadvertent use of the stop card to require a jump.

jdonn, on Mar 31 2009, 02:19 AM, said:

I suppose that question is as rhetorical as mine.

Nevertheless, I would rather throw the STOP procedure out of the window then force people who actually follow the rules and use the STOP card (ok, one time too many) to make a ridiculous bid.

My ideal would be that players just routinely pause at bidding occasions where they could easily have a bidding problem. Usually, that would be after a jump bid, but there are plenty of non jump bid situations where you can expect tempo problems.

But practice is that many players don't even pause after a STOP card has been pulled out.

Rik

Trinidad, on Apr 1 2009, 12:39 AM, said:

I saw some Norwegians that used stop in match points in 3/5 level in competitive biding. For example 1♥ (P) 2♥ (2♠); stop 3♥ [non-invite of course]

A great many players break tempo in many different ways. Most of them, if you even suggested there might be a UI problem, will look at you as if you're insane.

Today, my LHO pulled his bidding card out of the box and waved it around in the air — while I was still reaching for my box. IOW, tempo so fast he was in danger of bidding out of turn. Did this bother him? Not in the slightest.

ISTR that some NBO - and now that I do think about it, I think it was the Norwegians - deciding to add a mandatory pause to certain competitive auctions (how it was defined, I don't remember), and using the STOP card for those as well.

So suokko's story doesn't surprise me at all.

blackshoe, on Mar 31 2009, 09:11 AM, said:

You'd hope...