Director Decision

[alphatango]

I would have thought that you give favourable weightings to both sides. For example, if you think 3H-2 and 3H-1 are the only plausible results on the hand, and are equally likely, you might consider:

NS
80% of 3H-2, +100
20% of 3H-1, +50

and

EW
80% of 3H-1, -50
20% of 3H-2, -100

Or is that not legal?

[Paul Sherman]

It's almost a given that this board will not be permitted to be replayed; even if the next match had started, there is no way to be certain that there was no discussion of the hand by the players. E.g. East may have said: "Oh gee, I certainly would have raised you with my hand, I had a void opposite your 4 small clubs and would have redoubled if they applied the axe for a great score" or somesuch. So it's hard to even guess what split - if any - the TD would have applied. But as I've said, for curiosity only, it would be helpful to see all 4 hands if you could produce it. Then at least we could entertain the possible outcomes if it's blatantly obvious that:
1. East will always bid game with his 15-count and take 10 unstoppable tricks on any lead;
2. East will always pass with his 8-count and lose 5 certain tricks, there being nowhere to park the losers
and so on. But the board would have had to be played almost immediately to prevent any UI changing hands. My money is still on the A+/A+. I cannot think of any sensible reason why a split would even be considered here. The players were not at fault.                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                 

[bluejak]

Looks like time I really worked out what happened and advised accordingly.

South dealt: West bid 3H out of turn.  North did not accept the bid out of turn so it is cancelled.  South passed: West decided to pass, North passed, and East was forced to pass.  The board was passed out, the score was zero, next board, what is the problem?

“The board was discounted”.  What does this mean?  It looks like the TD decided not to score it which is pure TD error.  What Law did he think gave him the right not to count it?  Suppose N/S had bid and made a grand slam: would he have discounted it then?

“NS felt they had been disadvantaged - EW may have gained an advantage from their infraction - and equity not restored on the particular board.”  Where does it say in the Laws that equity should be restored?  This is a call out of turn and as such there is no rule about restoring equity.  But there is a Law against TDs discarding results on a whim.

We certainly have TD error.  So Law 82C applies, and we have to adjust.  Note that TDs usually give an artificial adjusted score, but this is a well-known error: if a result was obtained on the board, then an assigned adjusted score is given, not an artificial adjusted score.  So what assigned adjusted score shall we give?

That’s the easiest question I have run into for months: the board was passed out, the result without the TD error would have been passed out, so the assigned score for both sides is passed out.

Ok, fine, but as was pointed out, the basic ruling was also wrong.  This shows how easy it is when told something to believe it without thinking.  Well done alphatango for not falling into the trap.  It also shows something else, which this might be a good time to remind people: when giving rulings, RTFLB, ie read from the ******* Law book.  No doubt this TD did not.

So now we have another Law 82C case.  I do not understand this idea of whether they might have discussed it: the moment the bidding progressed it is too late to restart the bidding so we can only deal with it by adjusted scores.  As before, we do not use artificial adjusted scores because there was a result: we assign.

Note to Paul: “Average or average+ are adjusted scores; NS+100 and EW-50 are artificial adjusted scores”.  This is the wrong way round: ave or ave+ are artificial adjusted scores, and unsuitable when we have a result: NS+100 and EW-50 are assigned adjusted scores, which we give, though, as usual, we should weight unless completely sure what the result would have been.

What scores do we assign?  No idea without seeing the whole hands, but alphatango’s idea of a split and weighted score is eminently sensible.  In fact alphatango seems far ahead of everyone else including me in this whole thread.

Finally, Paul, you argue against replaying the board.  Well, that’s fine, there is no Law allowing you to replay the board.  But A+/A+ is more bad directing: when you correct TD error, assign if the board was played.

[Paul Sherman]

So now we have another Law 82C case.  I do not understand this idea of whether they might have discussed it: the moment the bidding progressed it is too late to restart the bidding so we can only deal with it by adjusted scores.  As before, we do not use artificial adjusted scores because there was a result: we assign.

I cannot agree with this, David. The bidding may have progressed but almost immediately an infraction had occurred: West had illegally changed his bid from 3H to a Pass. So this auction, which ended up with 4 passes was illegal. To me, a result (based on an infraction) was not reached, therefore a score should not be assigned but an artificial A+/A+ be given. How can it be bad directing if you are correcting an already bad directing (in allowing an illegal bid to be made)?

[bluejak]

You are required to follow the Laws, which often deal with illegal situations.  Once a result has been obtained, the Laws say assign, so why not?

[Ed Reppert]

"A result" does not mean that someone must have got a positive aggregate score. Zero aggregate points for both sides is certainly a result. "A result" also doesn't mean that there has to have been some play of cards.

[bluejak]

Passed out is certainly a result, since you can imp it or matchpoint it.

Please note: after being barred on this machine for months [I have had to use a different computer for this forum only] suddenly the forum has re-appeared!  :)

[Ed Reppert]

Clarke's Third Law, David. "Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic".  :D

[MIP]

Dear David

If you were indeed barred it was nothing personal; we hold you in great esteem (and a number of other esteemed members were also barred). It was because our Forum came under sustained spam attack and our Webmaster had to bar a number of IP addresses, and apparently your old IP address was caught up in this.

Please keep up the good work.

Rgds...Mike

[bluejak]

I understood it was nothing personal, but it was a pain doing all my forum work on the laptop except this one forum.  Now I can go back to doing all my forum work here with no exceptions.