[Coelacanth]

Just thought I'd share this story.

The NAOP (Flight B) had 37 tables, resulting in sections of 18 and 19 tables. During the second qualifying session I was in the larger section and for the first time in my life sat down to play Board 37.

I made a truly horrible bid (overcalling 2♦ at unfavorable with something like ♠xx ♥Jxx ♦KQJxxx ♣Qx) and my partner ended up in 3NT for -300 when the opponents can't make anything. A nice cold zero.

As we are taking out the cards for Board 38 (another first for me!) a TD who'd been hovering nearby swoops in and grabs the North cards from Board 37. He looked at the hand, consulted briefly with a colleague, said something like "that's not it" and replaced the cards. All of this without a word to any of us at the table.

We proceeded with Board 38 and I started the auction with a Pass. The TD returned and told us to stop play and directed me to return my pass card to the bidding box. He then picked up Board 37 and directed us to shuffle and deal the cards from Board 38. "Trust me, go ahead and shuffle them". He then explained that during pre-duplication, Boards 37-38 were dealt with the same cards as Boards 5-6. Evidently someone playing board 5 at another table noticed this and called the TD.

He explained that we should deal and play Board 38 and would be matchpointed against the pairs who would play the re-dealt cards subsequently. He also noted that we'd recognize the hands when we came to play Board 6, but since there had been almost no auction on Board 38 we could play that normally. He then told us that both pairs would receive Average Plus on Board 37. Great news for my partner and I, of course, but our opponents were not pleased with this news. We duly commiserated with them.

Do you think this was the correct resolution? The TD seemed to be ruling Directors' Error under Law 82C, and adjusting the score under Law 12C2(a), but did not say so explicitly. Would any other Laws cover this situation?

But wait, there's more! On the recap sheet at the end of play, for Board 37 instead of AVE+ it showed -300 and 12- matchpoints. (This was exactly average on a 25 top). No TD ever told us that we were to receive AVE instead of AVE+. This seemed to be an assigned adjusted score (assigned in matchpoints) rather than an artificial adjusted score. Any comments on this resolution?

[pran]

I would score the affected boards as follows:

Boards 5 and 37: I shall consider boards 5 and 37 to be the same board and cancel the results on all "second-time plays" of either of these boards. The remaining results, whether made on board 5 or on board 37 are then scored in one and the same group as if they were intentionally scheduled and played as the same board. Any contestant not receiving a result on either board 5, board 37 or both (because they or their opponents played it for the second time) shall then receive A+ instead of the cancelled result.

Boards 6 and 38 in case any contestant has played both boards in identical versions should be handled the same way.

Board 38 (and in case board 37) after reshuffling is a new board and shall be scored as specified in Law 87B.

This of course means that the result you received on board 37 could very well be from a correct scoring.

(I agree with TD ruling related to your eventual play of board 6)

[TimG]

Coelacanth, on 2011-March-24, 12:28, said:

He then explained that during pre-duplication, Boards 37-38 were dealt with the same cards as Boards 5-6.

Which cards were boards 37 & 38 dealt with during duplication?

[Coelacanth]

TimG, on 2011-March-25, 13:19, said:

Which cards were boards 37 & 38 dealt with during duplication?

Not sure I understand this question.

When the dealing machine dealt Board 37, it used the same hand records as for Board 5. Likewise for Boards 6 and 38.

I'm not sure who operates the dealing machines; the TD seemed to think that he had failed to properly supervise the process of producing these unusual boards. (The boards had a plain white sticker over the usual sticker which contains the board number, and the 37 and 38 were just written in with a pen.)

[tciacio]

Coelacanth, on 2011-March-25, 14:33, said:

Not sure I understand this question.

When the dealing machine dealt Board 37, it used the same hand records as for Board 5. Likewise for Boards 6 and 38.

I'm not sure who operates the dealing machines; the TD seemed to think that he had failed to properly supervise the process of producing these unusual boards. (The boards had a plain white sticker over the usual sticker which contains the board number, and the 37 and 38 were just written in with a pen.)

My guess is these were boards 5 and 6 from an additional set made up for the same session. Vulnerability and dealer repeat in a 16-board pattern. When extra boards are needed in a crunch, often handwritten labels are slapped on a board that is 16 or 32 lower. They should have been shuffled before their first play.

[barmar]

There were two events using pre-duplicated boards taking place at the time, NAP Flight C and NAP Flight B. My guess is that they meant to use boards from Flight C's additional set, but mistakenly took them from Flight B's set. Although in this case, I wonder why they told them to shuffle board 38, instead of giving them the other set's board 6. Maybe it was just quicker this way, since they would have to find the board and do the makeshift number label.

The directors were apparently caught by surprise by the number of entrants. When I was getting my entry, they'd apparently run out of flight B entries and had to scirbble over a C entry. We had 74 pairs, which means all 3 qualifiers from every district but one showed up. ACBL reimburses the 1st and 2nd place pairs from each district, so they're generally expected to be there, but not so many of the 3rd place pairs. Flight C was also pretty close to full, with 70 pairs.

[McBruce]

barmar, on 2011-March-26, 13:23, said:

The directors were apparently caught by surprise by the number of entrants. When I was getting my entry, they'd apparently run out of flight B entries and had to scirbble over a C entry. We had 74 pairs, which means all 3 qualifiers from every district but one showed up. ACBL reimburses the 1st and 2nd place pairs from each district, so they're generally expected to be there, but not so many of the 3rd place pairs. Flight C was also pretty close to full, with 70 pairs.

Wouldn't it be a lot smarter for the ACBL to contact the qualifying pairs and find out which were planning to attend, then choose a movement that is more suitable for a national championship (even if it isn't Flight A) than one which has pairs missing more than one-third of the boards in play? With 37 tables, how difficult would it have been to switch to 12-12-13 and play 24 boards scoring across the field? Even if only two sets of boards have been preduplicated, it would not be a major delay to have players in two sections play one board (one section doing odds, the other doing evens) and make a copy for the third section.

[shintaro]

tciacio, on 2011-March-25, 18:29, said:

My guess is these were boards 5 and 6 from an additional set made up for the same session. Vulnerability and dealer repeat in a 16-board pattern. When extra boards are needed in a crunch, often handwritten labels are slapped on a board that is 16 or 32 lower. They should have been shuffled before their first play.

yup my view as well some TD in a hurry has cocked it up

[blackshoe]

Probably the TDs should have put a bowl on the scoring table, and let the players pick slips of paper from it. Different slips would have different numbers of masterpoints on them. In this way, the ACBL fulfills its desire to give away masterpoints, and the players fulfill their desire to get masterpoints as easily and quickly as possible. No need for cock-ups with boards, heck, no need for boards at all. The session takes 15 minutes instead of three hours, and everybody can go take a nap or something.

[suprgrover]

McBruce, on 2011-March-27, 03:30, said:

With 37 tables, how difficult would it have been to switch to 12-12-13 and play 24 boards scoring across the field? Even if only two sets of boards have been preduplicated, it would not be a major delay to have players in two sections play one board (one section doing odds, the other doing evens) and make a copy for the third section.

I would wager that the real problem there is that the players expect to play 26 or 27 boards per session. (The less-real "problem" is that it involves some work.) Of course, even with that restriction does not prevent 9-13-13, scored across the field (with the Neuberg formula automatically applying for board 27 in the first section). Or 13-24 with the 24 being a web movement that is already in ACBLScore.

[shintaro]

blackshoe, on 2011-March-27, 07:06, said:

Probably the TDs should have put a bowl on the scoring table, and let the players pick slips of paper from it. Different slips would have different numbers of masterpoints on them. In this way, the ACBL fulfills its desire to give away masterpoints, and the players fulfill their desire to get masterpoints as easily and quickly as possible. No need for cock-ups with boards, heck, no need for boards at all. The session takes 15 minutes instead of three hours, and everybody can go take a nap or something.

Ed duno about ACBL and Bridge over the Pond But you must recognise that the TD (or whoever was responsible for the Boards) Cocked it up

[jeffford76]

McBruce, on 2011-March-27, 03:30, said:

Wouldn't it be a lot smarter for the ACBL to contact the qualifying pairs and find out which were planning to attend, then choose a movement that is more suitable for a national championship (even if it isn't Flight A) than one which has pairs missing more than one-third of the boards in play? With 37 tables, how difficult would it have been to switch to 12-12-13 and play 24 boards scoring across the field? Even if only two sets of boards have been preduplicated, it would not be a major delay to have players in two sections play one board (one section doing odds, the other doing evens) and make a copy for the third section.

They do ask if you're coming - I've preregistered every year I've played. But I suspect that just caps the entries and they usually have no-shows, especially among the people not getting any money to show up.

[Coelacanth]

jeffford76, on 2011-March-28, 13:47, said:

They do ask if you're coming - I've preregistered every year I've played. But I suspect that just caps the entries and they usually have no-shows, especially among the people not getting any money to show up.

The guy in front of me in line to register was not even on the prequalification list. He was a late addition to the field after someone else from his district presumably decided not to come.

What I do think is interesting is that they qualify the exact same number of teams for Day 2 regardless of how large the field is on Day 1.

[blackshoe]

shintaro, on 2011-March-28, 08:39, said:

Ed duno about ACBL and Bridge over the Pond But you must recognise that the TD (or whoever was responsible for the Boards) Cocked it up

Did I say he didn't?

[barmar]

Coelacanth, on 2011-March-28, 14:54, said:

What I do think is interesting is that they qualify the exact same number of teams for Day 2 regardless of how large the field is on Day 1.

Yes, going from 74 down to 28 -- 38% cut. I assume this was because 28 produces an optimal movement, allowing everyone to play everyone else in two sessions.

I did poorly enough that I wouldn't have qualified even if they were only cutting half the field, as is more typical.

[shintaro]

blackshoe, on 2011-March-28, 16:53, said:

Did I say he didn't?

Nope

But I tell it like it is

[bluejak]

Coelacanth, on 2011-March-28, 14:54, said:

What I do think is interesting is that they qualify the exact same number of teams for Day 2 regardless of how large the field is on Day 1.

barmar, on 2011-March-29, 01:48, said:

Yes, going from 74 down to 28 -- 38% cut. I assume this was because 28 produces an optimal movement, allowing everyone to play everyone else in two sessions.

I did poorly enough that I wouldn't have qualified even if they were only cutting half the field, as is more typical.

In a lot of British competitions the number qualifying for the next round is the same whatever the entry, and often the same from year to year. It seems quite normal to us.