[jdonn]

bluejak, on Aug 17 2010, 05:14 PM, said:

Is not sticking a question mark so that the TD sees it at the end after half the players have gone and it is difficult for him to do anything about it:

• posturing, and
  
  
  
• discourteous, and
  
  
  
• wastes time, and
  
  
  
• leads to wrong results?

It's possibly 3, and possibly 4, but definitely not 1 and 2, that is a gross overreaction. Especially if the situation is a small or medium sized game with a playing director then I think this is normal, players tend not to leave until they have seen how they did and you don't risk the director seeing the scores for a board he hasn't played.

[campboy]

bluejak, on Aug 17 2010, 11:14 PM, said:

Pict, on Aug 17 2010, 09:29 PM, said:

The only time  I recall putting a ? against a club score is when the score and the contract and the vulnerability didn't match (ie incoherence).

Don't you think summoning the TD and pointing the alleged incorrect score out to him would be:

• helpful, and
  
• timely, and
  
• courteous, and
  
• following the Laws of bridge?

Is not sticking a question mark so that the TD sees it at the end after half the players have gone and it is difficult for him to do anything about it:

• posturing, and
  
• discourteous, and
  
• wastes time, and
  
• leads to wrong results?

That depends. If there is a non-playing TD then of course you should always call him, but if there is a playing TD who is due to play the board in a later round (which is usually easy enough to verify) then drawing attention to it with a question mark will ensure that he sees it as soon as he has played the board and is ready to deal with it.

[bluejak]

My experience is that they put a question mark with a non-playing TD, and with a playing TD who has played the board. I found it very annoying.

[shintaro]

what constitutes a 'sensible' auction

is 1NT p - 2♥-p - p - p

a sensible auction

The transfer to ♠ being passed


played in a 2 - 1 fit making 8 tricks when opps holding 5 ♥ each decide not to double and trap Declarer

Declarer then made 5 top outside tricks and 3 Ruffs for 8

Club level at every table from then on Calling director saying it is IMPOSSIBLE

[pran]

In one club where I am a regular playing director I often found question marks on the traveller next to funny results when I scored the travellers at home after the event. (This is a small club with just about four or five tables playing old-fashioned Howell and recording results on paper)

I told the players that I cannot deal with question marks (only) and nobody to ask, I need something more substantial to work on.

The results that are at all legally possible remain unchanged by me, I correct impossible recordings to what in my opinion seem most likely, but now I see very few such question marks any more.

[aguahombre]

It is a design flaw with BridgePad that there is no "?" key. The next version will correct the problem.

[Phil]

aguahombre, on Aug 18 2010, 10:23 AM, said:

It is a design flaw with BridgePad that there is no "?" key. The next version will correct the problem.

LOL.

Speaking of Bridgepads / Bridgemates, Laguna Woods FKA Leisure World bought these about six months ago. At the beginning I thought it was great a club was entering the 21st century. Operating these took some getting used to for the players who aren't used this cutting edge technology. With this new power some strange things started happening:

- the Directors discovered that they could use a function that forced the players to enter their own ACBL nos. This eliminates the need for the directors to input anything except the initial setup. Maybe they'll discover a way to automatically DBADD the game too.

- the players wanted the option to show the results which AFAIC is one of the main reasons to have the gizmos in the first place since there are no travelers to peruse.

I suppose the games don't take any longer since the Directors were slow in the first place.

[Pict]

It's a surprise (almost) that I might have been posturing by questioning an impossible score at the club.

My partner said, leave it to the TD and scorers. So maybe I was posturing.

I have, I must say, much respect for Bluejak's knowledge and reasoning powers, and zero belief in his honest expression of his true opinion when posting.

[bluejak]

Circumstances alter cases. So I am not saying what happens in one particular case.

But after I have told a group of people on something like twenty individual times that to write a question is unhelpful, discourteous, and causes wrong scores when they should call the TD, I am allowed to have the view that people that then do so do so for an unfortunate reason.

Certainly, some people do so out of stupidity. But too many people do so because it looks bloody clever when it is obviously the wrong thing to do.

Pict: if you have questioned an impossible score in the club in the past by writing an extremely annoying and unhelpful question mark I shall do you the courtesy of assuming it was ignorance. If you do so in the future I cannot believe that will be the reason.

You also might like in future to educate your partner as well.

[aguahombre]

While I agree that just putting a question mark on a traveller is not productive, because it often arives in the hands of the director too late --- the only thing else it does is assume that the score itself is an obvious reason for query.

And that is probably giving a lot of directors too much credit.

[MBV53]

sometimes unexpected results are bound to appear! This is game of BRIDGE! just conform the deal from records.
MBVSubrahmanyam
India

[CSGibson]

campboy, on Aug 16 2010, 12:51 PM, said:

The point is that we all see implausible numbers of tricks made in implausible contracts all the time in clubs.

In one of my early partnerships, my partner revoked on defense with the Ace of trump against a slam, allowing it to make 7. Every single table after that called the director when opening the slip, saying "this result is impossible", then getting the full explanation of our stupidity. Jerks.

[bluejak]

aguahombre, on Aug 19 2010, 02:55 AM, said:

While I agree that just putting a question mark on a traveller is not productive, because it often arives in the hands of the director too late --- the only thing else it does is assume that the score itself is an obvious reason for query.

Of course that is why people put a question mark against the score. But being seriously unhelpful in this way is a bit like coming up to the TD two weeks later and saying "Did you do anything about the score where they bid and made a grand off the ace of trumps?". Very unhelpful.

[Mbodell]

As a sometimes questionmarker I think this is being a little unfair to them. If the choices are call the director or put the question mark then we call the director. But if the choice is put a question mark or do nothing, the question mark wins. Around me when folks do use travelers they usually collect them in the second to last round and use pickup slips for the last round so the director will enter in the travelers scores while everyone is playing the last round and thus can confirm question marks early.

Also, to go with the OP question, I think it is a little odd if the TD will not even look at other scores in cases of "obvious" errors. I.e., All vulnerable N/S have 28 points and 9 card fits in both majors and the field is making N/S +650 fairly flat. Except one E/W pair who somehow scored N/S -650. Seems quite likely that there was a mistake in the scoring of this board.

[pran]

Mbodell, on Aug 19 2010, 10:34 PM, said:

As a sometimes questionmarker I think this is being a little unfair to them. If the choices are call the director or put the question mark then we call the director. But if the choice is put a question mark or do nothing, the question mark wins. Around me when folks do use travelers they usually collect them in the second to last round and use pickup slips for the last round so the director will enter in the travelers scores while everyone is playing the last round and thus can confirm question marks early.

Also, to go with the OP question, I think it is a little odd if the TD will not even look at other scores in cases of "obvious" errors. I.e., All vulnerable N/S have 28 points and 9 card fits in both majors and the field is making N/S +650 fairly flat. Except one E/W pair who somehow scored N/S -650. Seems quite likely that there was a mistake in the scoring of this board.

Or they played the board switched, or . . . . . . ?

[Mbodell]

pran, on Aug 19 2010, 02:33 PM, said:

Mbodell, on Aug 19 2010, 10:34 PM, said:

As a sometimes questionmarker I think this is being a little unfair to them.  If the choices are call the director or put the question mark then we call the director.  But if the choice is put a question mark or do nothing, the question mark wins.  Around me when folks do use travelers they usually collect them in the second to last round and use pickup slips for the last round so the director will enter in the travelers scores while everyone is playing the last round and thus can confirm question marks early.

Also, to go with the OP question, I think it is a little odd if the TD will not even look at other scores in cases of "obvious" errors.  I.e., All vulnerable N/S have 28 points and 9 card fits in both majors and the field is making N/S +650 fairly flat.  Except one E/W pair who somehow scored N/S -650.  Seems quite likely that there was a mistake in the scoring of this board.

Or they played the board switched, or . . . . . . ?

I meant the score should be investigated. This was found after the first session of a two session pair event. The director could have investigated with the pairs in question during the second session. Or they could do nothing. In New Orleans the do nothing was the outcome.

[aguahombre]

Hmm.. how did the problem get from England in the OP to the NABC?

I guess I missed something.

[McBruce]

Echognome, on Aug 17 2010, 12:49 PM, said:

McBruce, on Aug 16 2010, 11:42 PM, said:

A few weeks ago I encountered a different type of traveler violation:

6N....N...+1.....1470
6D....N...+1.....1390
6N....N... = .....1460 ?
6N....N...+1.....1470
3N....N...+4.....710
6N....N...+1.....1470
6N....N... = .....1460 ?
6N....N...+1.....1470
6N....N...+1.....1480 ?

The last player (scoring from the top down) decided that since he was playing in notrump he was deserving of an extra ten points.  Because it was the last round, there were no members of the IQMB to express their disapproval.

And when I entered it into ACBLScore, the program just assumed they were in 4S**+1, which it did not find unusual enough to express its disapproval with a beep or even an on-screen highlight. 

My application for the IQMB is above.

Serves me right for quick-editing my example...

[McBruce]

As an occasional playing club director myself, I think I would encourage players to call, even if I am about to play the board -- instead of placing a question mark.

Even a playing director can usually tell it is a scoring error while approaching (because the North player is waving or looking puzzled at the traveler) and note that the board has yet to reach him -- now you can simply ask for the board number and line (or N-S pair) number, and check it when you play it. Or, as is usually the case, it is the most recent North that has made the dubious entry, so you get the player to make the enquiry when the round ends.

Even if it is a serious problem and the TD needs to do some immediate investigating, you can recruit a substitute or simply give A+ to the opponents when the board gets to you (and decide whether you want to fine the offending North player as compensation). Better this than trying to work out what a mysterious question mark may mean at the end of the game.

If "reasons for traveler question marks" were made into a question on Family Feud, the survey results would be something like:

22 - Wrong Vulnerability
18 - Score entered on Wrong Side
14 - Score Correct but Illegibly or Ambiguously Written
11 - Missing Asterisk(s) for (Re)Doubled Contracts
9 - Number in Wrong Column (between "Making" and "Down")
8 - No Discernible Problem but Every N-S After the Question Marker Blindly Assumes There Is One Somewhere
7 - Declarer Initial Letter Wrongly or (usually) Illegibly Entered
5 - Somebody Scored On My Line, so I'll Let You Figure Out Who and Score Way Down Here (Someone will follow along blindly compounding the problem)
4 - Wrong E-W Pair Number (most N-S players are trained to ignore this one)
2 - I Hate Travelers So I'm Going To Enter The Score But No Other Details At All

Yes, I have encountered the last type. They are astonished to discover that they have earned a N-S ban when they are assigned E-W for the next seventeen weeks and ask why.

[campboy]

I think you have missed out one of the top (and most troublesome) answers, viz: score is plausible given the contract, but doesn't agree with the number of tricks written.