[mycroft]

In the new ACBL Alert Procedures, the following lines are in the Alert Procedure:

Quote

• Additionally, Control Bids should be Alerted at the end of the auction even if they are below 3NT.
  
• When behind screens or online, do not delay any Alerts.

There are calls, especially after inverted minor auctions, which are "looking for 3NT, but if I continue, it's a control cue instead".

Online (or behind screens), what should be done? This is definitely a situation where 90% of the time, these calls are "looking for 3NT, I'm not going to continue", so if they're always Alertable because they could be Control Bids people will forget to Alert them, so when they do, it's almost certainly a slam try. If they're only Alertable after proven to be a control, people won't notice or understand. F-t-F, there's no problem, because you don't Alert it at the time, and you Alert it at the end of the auction if it turned out to be a control cue.

Looking at the charts carefully, it seems that the "one suit asks" part of "two suits tell, one suit asks" is Alertable if not a suit the opponents have shown. It will be interesting to see if that happens - I know I wouldn't think about it (and the number of "does that show or ask?" questions I remember from the before times leads me to believe I'm not the only one).

I'm going to raise this to my contact on the committee that writes these, but is there anything that makes sense to us all?

[smerriman]

mycroft, on 2021-September-27, 11:05, said:

If they're only Alertable after proven to be a control, people won't notice or understand.

Online, if you alert the bid once its proven to be a control, it pops up on their screen immediately - they're forced to notice.

[mycroft]

but can frequently read it as the current call, not the previous one. That's my concern. If it's obvious to most, then that's the obvious answer.

[pescetom]

mycroft, on 2021-September-27, 14:40, said:

but can frequently read it as the current call, not the previous one. That's my concern. If it's obvious to most, then that's the obvious answer.

I am prone to a literal interpretation of any interface, and will still panic after years if BBO flashes yellow when I am dummy. But even I cannot imagine thinking that an explanation of a previous call in the auction is about the current call. At very worst, it can be hard to figure out who made a certain call in the table, if not 100% at that moment (not excusable, but this difficulty does not exist f2f or on platforms that simulate f2f and put calls in position of players).

[smerriman]

The alert popup says which bid it's referring to. These also pop up when an opponent clicks a bid asking you what it means, and often this isn't the 'current bid' - I've never had any confusion over which bid is being asked about, nor referred to when the explanation then pops up.

Except for the bit when people continually click the explain button to hide the box leading to a ping pong of popups, but that's a UI (the *other* UI ) issue.

[pilowsky]

Quote

...Additionally, Control Bids should be Alerted at the end of the auction even if they are below 3NT.

Is this really what it said?
Does this mean that control bids made 'below' 3NT could be left unalerted during the auction, but those over 3NT needed to be?

[mycroft]

Cut and paste is your friend (well, mine). If it didn't say what it does, I wouldn't have this problem.

[smerriman]

pilowsky, on 2021-September-27, 17:38, said:

Is this really what it said?
Does this mean that control bids made 'below' 3NT could be left unalerted during the auction, but those over 3NT needed to be?[/size]

Bids over 3NT were always delayed. The only change is applying this to control bids below 3NT as well.

[mycroft]

Well, and the changes to what is Alertable over 3NT (a key change: responses to Gerber/Blackwood are now Alerted).

Basically, players are going to be explaining their slam auctions before the opening lead routinely (unless they're defending the sacrifice, in which case, they'll Alert, but only explain if asked).

[pescetom]

I struggle to see the need for all this. Over here we just don't alert bids over 3nt and the opponents can always ask 'please explain the auction' without creating any particular UI. Is that so bad?

[Huibertus]

[There are calls, especially after inverted minor auctions, which are "looking for 3NT, but if I continue, it's a control cue instead".]

The answer to this is simple; ANY call that serves a dual purpose is alertable. For instance, 1 club - 1 Diamond being Natural OR 6-HCP, or two way doubles like 1-Spades - Pass - 1NT - Double being either pure penalty or pure information double (assuming partner can work it out by looking at his hand) or any puppet call that may also be natural. All of this is alertable.

[mycroft]

I wondered why Control Cue bids were added to the Delayed Alerts, but I think "getting into the habit of explaining your slam investigation auctions before the OL" is a net good thing (as is "getting used to having their slam investigation auctions explained before the OL"). So I'm not complaining about it.

And in most cases, it's not going to be an issue. F-t-F, they're delayed, so we know which it is at Alerting time. Behind screens "we all know" enough about control cues and different styles to not be surprised. Online, neither completely apply.

However, given that on Monday, I had (1NT, announced 12-14)-2♥-p; come around to me, only to find on ask that lefty had Majors; I'm not concerned that "some pairs" aren't completely au fait with the complexities of my cuebidding style...