[johnu]

 barmar, on 2017-July-10, 10:23, said:

We'll keep this in mind for the future. Unfortunately, it's too late to change the conditions for this one.

It's not an excuse, but a big majority of ACBL members are retired.

My guess is that whoever set up the times didn't even consider that players are playing from multiple time zones. If you think Pacific time zone players are disadvantaged, think about anybody playing from Alaska or Hawaii. And I don't understand why the times couldn't be adjusted even now. All somebody has to do is edit the web pages with the tournament dates and times and send out an email (and BBO will have to make adjustments to the start and end times). The only disadvantage I can see is that results from each session will be sent out later than originally planned by a few hours.

[mrc242]

 johnu, on 2017-July-10, 11:45, said:

My guess is that whoever set up the times didn't even consider that players are playing from multiple time zones. If you think Pacific time zone players are disadvantaged, think about anybody playing from Alaska or Hawaii. And I don't understand why the times couldn't be adjusted even now. All somebody has to do is edit the web pages with the tournament dates and times and send out an email (and BBO will have to make adjustments to the start and end times). The only disadvantage I can see is that results from each session will be sent out later than originally planned by a few hours.

Yeah, this doesn't make any sense to me. Also, I suspect that a large number of non-retired ACBL players play regularly on BBO, especially with the disappearance of evening club games, so they're really missing their key demographic who live on the West Coast or beyond.

People talk about east coast bias in sports reporting all the time, I've thought it was overblown in the past. This is the first time I can say I've seen it live and in person.

[Mbodell]

FWIW I know I'm not necessarily normal in my schedule but I actually like the times. In the free practice I played around midnight or 1am West Coast time. I plan to play from Toronto and will be likewise playing in the shortly after midnight or 1 am time period, possibly later if I were to play zip KO, so for me if it were 3am-3am that would be worse and 6am-6am would not be great. I figure it will take me about an hour, maybe slightly more, to play each session, so I do prefer playing them before going to sleep, since I'm likely to wake up around noon on NABC days and not want to play before or during in person NABC events.

[barmar]

 johnu, on 2017-July-10, 11:45, said:

My guess is that whoever set up the times didn't even consider that players are playing from multiple time zones.

Or rather that some time zones would be disadvantaged, even though they can play during any 3-hour window in the day. No one at ACBL or BBO noticed this was an issue, nor did anyone in the forum suggest it early on in discussions.

Quote

And I don't understand why the times couldn't be adjusted even now. All somebody has to do is edit the web pages with the tournament dates and times and send out an email (and BBO will have to make adjustments to the start and end times). The only disadvantage I can see is that results from each session will be sent out later than originally planned by a few hours.

The problem isn't technical, it's that players have already signed up based on the existing CoC -- we don't think it would be appropriate to change them now.

And is it really that big a problem? 3 hours is the normal time for a club duplicate of 24 boards, but online bridge in general, and robot bridge specifically, generally goes faster. So most people won't need the full 3 hours that they're given. If they start at 6:30 or 7pm they should have little trouble finishing before the deadline, or they can play at 9pm and finish before bedtime.

The Alaska/Hawaii people should have no problem. Each session starts at 6pm their time, so they have the whole evening to play.

[johnu]

 barmar, on 2017-July-11, 10:21, said:

The problem isn't technical, it's that players have already signed up based on the existing CoC -- we don't think it would be appropriate to change them now.

And is it really that big a problem? 3 hours is the normal time for a club duplicate of 24 boards, but online bridge in general, and robot bridge specifically, generally goes faster. So most people won't need the full 3 hours that they're given. If they start at 6:30 or 7pm they should have little trouble finishing before the deadline, or they can play at 9pm and finish before bedtime.

The Alaska/Hawaii people should have no problem. Each session starts at 6pm their time, so they have the whole evening to play.

CoC! Really! I doubt many people have actually read the conditions of contest, and even if they did, why would they object to a liberalization of the playing hours? You could keep the midnight start times and have an overlap where the previous day's session and the current day's session are going on at the same time. More work for BBO and maybe not worth the effort.

A lot of people leave for work first thing in the morning, and with meetings and rush projects may be at work until 7PM, 8, or hours later, not getting home until it's too late to play. True, they can try to play the night before if they have time. Still, on the east coast, moderately late nighters can play before they go to bed, or play earlier in the evening the next day so they have a lot more flexibility.

[diana_eva]

Fourth and last Free NABC Practice Tournament is held this weekend (Friday, July 14 though Sunday, July 16) on BBO in conjunction with the ACBL and awards free entry to the NABC Online to top 10 winners overall. Details here.

More good news:

• The award payout for the NABC Online Individual has been significantly increased. ACBL has just confirmed an increase in the total number of awards, to 67 places for each daily session and 187 places for the overalls.
• Points earned in the NABC Online will count towards the Mini-McKenney Race (masterpoint race for points earned at ACBL sanctioned tournaments and clubs, excluding online), as well as the Fishbein Trophy (awarded to the player who wins the most masterpoints at the Summer NABC).

This does mean the points earned in this event do not count towards the Ace of Clubs (for points won at a local sanctioned club) and Online Race (for most points won online).

[A2003]

Is there a carry over ? If so, how is it calculated?

[barmar]

 A2003, on 2017-July-14, 07:00, said:

Is there a carry over ? If so, how is it calculated?

100% carryover -- the overall award is simply your average percentage across all 4 sessions.

[olegru]

Is it possible to include at least one GIB in competition? Or at least at this practice one? Very curious:
1. How would robot perform compare to humans?
2. How big difference will be between robots, depending on the sets of board they got?

[johnu]

 olegru, on 2017-July-14, 13:33, said:

Is it possible to include at least one GIB in competition? Or at least at this practice one? Very curious:
1. How would robot perform compare to humans?
2. How big difference will be between robots, depending on the sets of board they got?

Good idea. Maybe 10+ GIBS playing South to give a better idea of the spread on percentages based on different boards. I'm not sure who plays the $1 robot games, but surely the NABC game will be a lot tougher competition.

Edit: Have robots play the same boards as the 10 human leaders instead of random boards.

[PhantomSac]

I think they did something like that a long time ago and the robot was like 56 %. Ofc the field for this will probably be stronger, but the robots have also gotten better, so I wouldn't be surprised if it was somewhere around there if they tried it.

Everyone likes to complain about the bots but they are much better than most humans.

[Quarky]

Practice tournament's conditions seem to be inaccurate. They state: "Please note that you must play at least one board each day to be able to play the next day."

I played 3 boards, didn't get around to finishing the rest. 3>1, so I should have qualified to practice the next day, yet there's no practice tournament available to me today.

[diana_eva]

You should see the tourney. Look in ACBL World, maybe you were in free tourneys or some other tab?

[Quarky]

 diana_eva, on 2017-July-15, 11:25, said:

You should see the tourney. Look in ACBL World, maybe you were in free tourneys or some other tab?

Trust me, I looked. Nothing.

[Quarky]

Here is proof that I completed 3 boards:
http://webutil.bridg...username=Quarky

[diana_eva]

 Quarky, on 2017-July-15, 13:35, said:

Here is proof that I completed 3 boards:
http://webutil.bridg...username=Quarky

Yes, I saw you played yesterday. We're checking.

[diana_eva]

According to our records you already played all your boards today. So you saw the tourney and played it out. Look in Completed Tournaments if there are provisional results available.

[Quarky]

 diana_eva, on 2017-July-15, 15:38, said:

According to our records you already played all your boards today. So you saw the tourney and played it out. Look in Completed Tournaments if there are provisional results available.

Oh well good My mistake then, and I apologize! Then I should see day 3 of 3 tomorrow (or late tonight). I played a number of robot tourneys yesterday, and must have randomly participated in the practice one without realizing it. My bad!

[A2003]

How to find the link from Leo Lasato and Donn on Gib lectures and Notes?

[skiborder]

Without Stratification there really isn't much of a reason for anyone but the top players to compete with each other if u expect to earn points... and its expensive if you know yr not going to have a chance at points.. They need stratification to interest more players. and interesting that it seems like the total number of players playing so far is about equal to the numbers I've encountered playing the "daylong" tournament events.

With stratification there should be more