[gnasher]

ggwhiz, on 2011-March-15, 22:08, said:

My feeling is that if this hole in the system has happened before, meaning an implicit agreement exists, no one can possibly know without administering sodium pentathol.

Couldn't we just ask them?

[Trinidad]

bluejak, on 2011-March-15, 18:46, said:

One view that intrigued me is the one that they did know there was a hole in the system because if you devise a complex system you will know the holes. From experience of many years this is plain wrong: there are always unknown holes, and I have devised a few in my time!

You will certainly have holes in any system. There are holes everywhere, certainly when the opponents come into thet auction.

But I find it highly unlikely that:
- You play a relay system.
- You play in a serious tournament.
- You get into an uncontested auction.
- And suddenly there you discover that you have a hole in your system: Opener doesn't have a rebid for an 18-19 NT without three card support for partner.

Do you really believe that this pair has not had an 18-19 balanced opener with a doubleton in partner's suit before?

Rik

[gnasher]

East's statements aren't entirely consistent, but one interpretation is that they did have a system bid for a balanced 18-count with a doubleton heart - 2NT - but East chose not to make it, possibly because of the weak diamond holding, or possibly because he just doesn't like playing in 2NT. Similarly, they did have a system bid for a hand with spades and clubs, but East chose not to make this because of the weak clubs and strong hearts.

If that's the case, what East has actually done is to intentionally misrepresent his heart length, departing from the partnership's agreed methods, because in his judgement that is preferable to either of the systemic choices. If he doesn't do this often enough to make it an implicit agreement, I don't think there's any misinformation.

This post has been edited by gnasher: 2011-March-16, 05:44

[Math609]

South played the correct defense according to the information available to him. South combined all his chances he had in theory by cashing ♦A (3-4 hearts in the East hand): 1) Spade ruff+♣A or 2) club to partners AQ or 3) club to partners Ace, securing all the defensive tricks in a pairs tournament.

This deal was put before the Appeal Committee (AC) and I think it is of a great interest to discuss its ruling: 1/5 versus 4/5. It is very important for us to understand the logical and mathematical thinking behind this ruling. The AC worked according to the requisite (principle) that it was fair to estimate that East holds ♥Kx 20% of the time. Let´s say, for arguments sake, that this estimation is correct. Now South, given the necessary information about the highly unusual EW-system (which he did not get in the opinion of the AC), should be given the opportunity to base his defense on this ground. This understanding of the AC is confirmed beyond a shadow of doubt. Hence this ruling: 1 down 20% of the time and contract made 80% of the time (in reality a 10% correction from topscore).

It is rather easy to see why this conclusion is wrong and where the failure in the line of thought lies. If South is allowed to assume for ♥Kx in the East hand 20% of the time you must also allow him to assume for ♥Kxx at the same time! Namely one thing leads to another and are combined. Let’s say, also for arguments sake, that East holds ♥Kxx 50% of the time. And remember we have an agreement for ♥Kx in the East hand 20% of the time. Then South can plan his defense by combining his chances and his plan should work 70% of the time – playing a spade immediately. Either putting the contract down or securing all the defnsive tricks. Only when East holds exactly 4-card suit in hearts is this the wrong defense. So, by putting a new variable into the defense-equation (20%-variable) it changes the whole landscape enormously for the defense. My conclusion is that the AC was a little too hasty and did not not work out this problem properly, at least not from a mathematical point of view.

Was there a severe damage to the defense? Yes, as I have shown...and much greater than just allowing NS to put the contract down 20% of the time. Maybe a reverse ruling was justifiable or even 4♥-1 was justifiable because of serious damage to the defense.
Misinformation or lack of information? That is another story!
Jón Thorvardarson, Iceland

[dburn]

gnasher, on 2011-March-16, 05:27, said:

If that's the case, what East has actually done is to intentionally misrepresent his heart length, departing from the partnership's agreed methods, because in his judgement that is preferable to either of the systemic choices. If he doesn't do this often enough to make it an implicit agreement, I don't think there's any misinformation.

He has just done it often enough to make it an implicit agreement.

[gnasher]

dburn, on 2011-March-16, 07:14, said:

He has just done it often enough to make it an implicit agreement.

<br><br>Sorry, I should have said "If he hasn't done it often enough..."<br><br>I was trying to avoid having to define "often".
<br>

[dburn]

Did anyone ask East why he did not correct his partner's explanation?

[ggwhiz]

Quote

South lead ♠2 and declarer took it with ♠K and lead a heart to the ♥K and ♥A. Now South reguired further information about the bidding and was told that 3♥ was at least 3-card support and invitational to game. Now South took the ♦A and gave his partner a ♠ ruff and declarer took the rest of the tricks.

This portion of the original post with the timing and nature of the requested information suggest that South would always get the defence right with a full explanation. Doesn't it?

[Math609]

ggwhiz, on 2011-March-16, 11:56, said:

This portion of the original post with the timing and nature of the requested information suggest that South would always get the defence right with a full explanation. Doesn't it?

We can obviously not think along this line while analysing this particular problem. Why? South, beyond any doubt, had to ask this question at this moment in the defense. He could obviously not play spade back without further information, Why again? Because it is the wrong defense if East had promised 4-card suit in heart with his jump to 3♥. Bridge is not a poker

[gnasher]

dburn, on 2011-March-16, 11:01, said:

Did anyone ask East why he did not correct his partner's explanation?

If they had, it seems likely that East would have said that he believed his partner had correctly described their agreements, and therefore no correction was necessary. It may be that the rules require East to modify the explanation by adding a description of the unbiddable hand-type(s), but if so I think few players would realise that.

[Bad_Wolf]

I once met a pair who claimed their opening suit lengths were 5543! They had opened 1C. At the time we stupidly played methods contingent on openers club length. We asked what they bid with 4432, they had no idea, of course. "we just do the best we can" sort of thing.

It all depends on familiarity of course, in a simple natural method everybody knows that 1s-2c might be less than 4 clubs, so one doesn't need to "appease the lawyers", but if I strike a moscito pair who open 1d and say "9-14 4+h unbalanced" I will be surprised if it has only 3h. If they claim that this is a hole in their system I will say "bullshit".

I liken the current case to the moscito example, and thus agree with Nigel.

[blackshoe]

Trinidad, on 2011-March-15, 17:27, said:

It would certainly be relevant... if only it were credible.

If you go through the trouble of devising a relay system, you will be aware of the holes in your system and you will know what to do about them. And in this case we are dealing with opener's rebid in a non contested auction.

"You have to disclose this hole." "I didn't know there was a hole." "Go and fool somebody else."

Rik

Were we talking about relay systems? I must've missed that memo.

[ggwhiz]

Math609, on 2011-March-16, 14:20, said:

We can obviously not think along this line while analysing this particular problem. Why? South, beyond any doubt, had to ask this question at this moment in the defense. He could obviously not play spade back without further information, Why again? Because it is the wrong defense if East had promised 4-card suit in heart with his jump to 3♥. Bridge is not a poker

Fair enough. I was thinking imps, not matchpoints.

I feel strongly that if you are going to put a homegrown gadget on the table you have an obligation to plug all the holes or should suffer an adverse ruling when a hole you didn't cover comes up and now you can plug it putting the onus on the perpetrators, where it belongs.

This ruling has the tail wagging the dog. Can you really trot out a half-baked thing like this and win rulings while you complete it? Why bother to complete it if you win the rulings?

[hrothgar]

ggwhiz, on 2011-March-16, 16:24, said:

I feel strongly that if you are going to put a homegrown gadget on the table you have an obligation to plug all the holes or should suffer an adverse ruling when a hole you didn't cover comes up and now you can plug it putting the onus on the perpetrators, where it belongs.

Discriminating against systems that you don't like isn't one of the design goals of the Laws

[ggwhiz]

hrothgar, on 2011-March-16, 16:44, said:

Discriminating against systems that you don't like isn't one of the design goals of the Laws

I don't dislike ANY systems if they come with full disclosure.

[hrothgar]

ggwhiz, on 2011-March-16, 17:11, said:

I don't dislike ANY systems if they come with full disclosure.

Couldn't care less...

What I do find highly objectionable is your statement that people playing particular systems should be treated differently by the legal system.

Inept disclosure is inept disclosure.
The Laws shouldn't care whether an infraction is generated by some senile LoL playing bog standard or incompetent kids playing a souped up system they don't understand.

[dburn]

dburn, on 2011-March-16, 11:01, said:

Did anyone ask East why he did not correct his partner's explanation?

gnasher, on 2011-March-16, 14:42, said:

If they had, it seems likely that East would have said that he believed his partner had correctly described their agreements, and therefore no correction was necessary. It may be that the rules require East to modify the explanation by adding a description of the unbiddable hand-type(s), but if so I think few players would realise that.

They might not realise that, and maybe they are not legally obliged to do so.

But if I'd been this East, and partner had categorically told South that I had three hearts, I might have said "actually, there are some hands in the context of our system on which I might bid 3♥ with only two". This is as close to full disclosure as I can get for practical purposes, but it may be that I'm just being masochistic again despite (or perhaps because of) already having gone eight down in four spades doubled elsewhere in these forums.

[Vampyr]

hrothgar, on 2011-March-16, 17:24, said:

What I do find highly objectionable is your statement that people playing particular systems should be treated differently by the legal system.

The problem is that an unusual system will be unknown to the opponents; so they will not be able to make whatever negative inferences that might be available, and they will be totally unaware of holes in the system that might necessitate the use of a "wrong" bid for an otherwise unbiddable hand.

I also believe that when a player discovers such a hole, and finds a bid at the table with which to "plug" the hole render the unbiddable hand biddable, then such use of the bid was actually always a part of the system, and non-disclosure of this part of the system is MI, regardless of whether the OS knew about the possibility beforehand.

[gnasher]

dburn, on 2011-March-16, 20:05, said:

They might not realise that, and maybe they are not legally obliged to do so.

But if I'd been this East, and partner had categorically told South that I had three hearts, I might have said "actually, there are some hands in the context of our system on which I might bid 3♥ with only two".

I might too, but it would depend on whether I thought I'd discovered a hole in the system, or had merely deviated from our agreed methods.

[hrothgar]

Vampyr, on 2011-March-16, 21:13, said:

I also believe that when a player discovers such a hole, and finds a bid at the table with which to "plug" the hole render the unbiddable hand biddable, then such use of the bid was actually always a part of the system, and non-disclosure of this part of the system is MI, regardless of whether the OS knew about the possibility beforehand.

Let's extend the precise same logic to psyches:

1. You are claiming that "agreements" are based on bids made rather than explicit discussion
2. Furthermore, a single use of a bid renders that bid systemic, subject to disclosure, and (presumably) subject to system regulation...

See where I am going?