[Zelandakh]

barmar, on 2013-April-11, 08:00, said:

We've been down this road many times before, usually in threads (or tangents) about non-regular partnerships who agree to play a convention, but have different ideas about how that convention is played, and haven't discussed the details. Do they actually have an agreement or not? This is probably a question for Plato or Descartes to answer.

Yes, they have an agreement: "We agreed to play convention X but did not discuss follow-ups (or whatever)". Perhaps Plato could have written it better though.

[barmar]

Zelandakh, on 2013-April-11, 08:04, said:

Yes, they have an agreement: "We agreed to play convention X but did not discuss follow-ups (or whatever)". Perhaps Plato could have written it better though.

But that explanation is generally not allowed. Most jurisdictions require you to give the meaning of a call, not just state the name of a convention.

And as we've discussed in those other threads, what actually happens is that the explainer doesn't even realize the need to qualify his answer. They assume everyone plays the convention as they do, so they simply give the description according to their understanding.

And most of the time this works out. While there's occasional variation, many conventions do have a widespread concensus. So if you assume your pick-up partner plays a well-known convention (DONT, Jacoby 2NT, inverted minors) the way you do, you probably have a 90% chance of being right.

So does a 90% chance of being in actual agreement constitute "having an agreement"?

[gnasher]

Vampyr, on 2013-April-11, 07:40, said:

I am not convinced of this. You explain the convention, and it is not UI to partner, because he did forget but that is part of the agreement. Something is not right here.

You explain both the convention and the propensity to forget, and all of that is UI to partner.

[Vampyr]

gnasher, on 2013-April-11, 08:47, said:

You explain both the convention and the propensity to forget, and all of that is UI to partner.

But if the agreement is "constructive in diamonds if we forget", then partner has made the correct bid according to your agreement. How can this agreement then be UI to him?

[VixTD]

barmar, on 2013-April-11, 08:00, said:

We've been down this road many times before, usually in threads (or tangents) about non-regular partnerships who agree to play a convention, but have different ideas about how that convention is played, and haven't discussed the details. Do they actually have an agreement or not? This is probably a question for Plato or Descartes to answer.

Maybe so, but the director still needs some practical advice.

Even if there's written evidence that they play a convention both players have forgotten, the TD may rule that they don't play that convention as the evidence of their actions belies this. What I think Robin is suggesting is that the players themselves may reason: "OK, we agreed to play this several months ago, it's not come up since, I've forgotten it, partner's forgotten it, to all intents and purposes we aren't actually playing it, so we need to tell the opponents this so they aren't damaged by misinformation."

Ed's saying (I think) that although the TD can decide this, the players should be bound by what they agreed in theory and not by what actually happens in practice. I'm not convinced that this is right.

[gnasher]

Vampyr, on 2013-April-11, 10:51, said:

But if the agreement is "constructive in diamonds if we forget", then partner has made the correct bid according to your agreement. How can this agreement then be UI to him?

I thought we were talking about a correction that the 2♦ bidder would make? That would only occur after the question of UI became irrelevant.

[bluejak]

RMB1, on 2013-April-11, 01:17, said:

And the downside of that is what?

I have often said "Partner may be right as to our agreements, but I don't think we can provide evidence, and its not what I've got."

I don't mind you saying it because you know what you are doing. But I dislike this as advice. You are suggesting people do not follow the Laws, and people who will not understand the ramifications may take it up.

Vampyr, on 2013-April-11, 02:37, said:

Drury was illegal in the EBU until quite recently. I believe that this is because the 2♣ response was considered a very nearly risk-free psyche when holding a weak hand with long diamonds.

I wouldn't call twenty-plus years "quite recently".

gnasher, on 2013-April-11, 07:35, said:

By practising it on BBO before inflicting it on real opponents? In my experience the BBO robots seem not to mind if you misdescribe your system.

Oh? So people who do not play online are not allowed to play new agreements?

One of the problems with the game these days is the nastiness of people to their opponents who try playing something new. It is unnecessary, and people who do not know their conventions give you more good boards than bad so should be encouraged.

Tolerance generally will improve bridge, especially at lower levels.

[barmar]

bluejak, on 2013-April-19, 09:14, said:

I wouldn't call twenty-plus years "quite recently".

Time seems to fly in the bridge community. ACBL only makes significant updates to alerting regulations every 5-10 years, but players still complain that they're constantly changing and they can't keep up.

[gnasher]

bluejak, on 2013-April-19, 09:14, said:

Oh? So people who do not play online are not allowed to play new agreements?

One of the problems with the game these days is the nastiness of people to their opponents who try playing something new. It is unnecessary, and people who do not know their conventions give you more good boards than bad so should be encouraged.

Tolerance generally will improve bridge, especially at lower levels.

Perhaps you didn't understand the context of my comment? I was discussing what people should do if they have an agreement which they forget so often that it becomes an implicit agreement, and the implicit agreement is not allowed.

For example, if you agree to play a Multi 2♦ and then keep opening 2♦ with a natural weak two, it becomes an agreement which would be illegal in England or North America. What do you think a pair should do in those circumstances?

[barmar]

Gnasher's main point was that you should practice your agreements to help them sink in, if you have memory problems. "Online" was clearly just a suggestion of a convenient way to accomplish this.

[blackshoe]

gnasher, on 2013-April-19, 10:43, said:

Perhaps you didn't understand the context of my comment? I was discussing what people should do if they have an agreement which they forget so often that it becomes an implicit agreement, and the implicit agreement is not allowed.

For example, if you agree to play a Multi 2♦ and then keep opening 2♦ with a natural weak two, it becomes an agreement which would be illegal in England or North America. What do you think a pair should do in those circumstances?

Change your explicit agreement?

I'm not convinced that the agreement necessarily becomes "multi or a weak two in diamonds". If you always forget, then the agreement is "weak two in diamonds". Of course, if only one of the pair forgets, then the two players are playing different agreements, which is probably illegal most places.

[bluejak]

gnasher, on 2013-April-19, 10:43, said:

For example, if you agree to play a Multi 2♦ and then keep opening 2♦ with a natural weak two, it becomes an agreement which would be illegal in England or North America. What do you think a pair should do in those circumstances?

Not worry too much?

They'll get better. At the moment they are giving more away when they open 2♦ than if they remembered.

[Vampyr]

blackshoe, on 2013-April-19, 14:41, said:

I'm not convinced that the agreement necessarily becomes "multi or a weak two in diamonds".

If it does, the opponents have a right to know, but the players are not likely to announce an illegal agreement, and in fact they will not usually disclose that they have a de facto illegal agreement due to the propensity of one or more of the players to forget. I have some sympathy for Bobby Wolff's position...

[Zelandakh]

bluejak, on 2013-April-23, 08:15, said:

Not worry too much?

They'll get better. At the moment they are giving more away when they open 2♦ than if they remembered.

So if I want to play a Multi 2♥ opening, all I have to do is agree with my partner that it is a weak 2 in spades and forget often? As long as we tell the opponents our tendency to "forget" then there is no foul, right.