[blackshoe]

Then if he does that, and his partner wins the trick (or gets in later) and leads another whatever suit it was for a ruff, the partner has taken advantage of UI and the score might be adjusted.

Interestingly enough, I started an experiment last week - I stopped keeping any notes (personal score, lead, whatever) about hands I play. So far, we're doing a lot better overall.

[sanst]

pran, on 2019-August-29, 15:21, said:

That is our Norwegian regulation and how we enforce it, except that we do not "appreciate" excessive delays beyond 10+ seconds.

Over 10 secs ‘excessive’? What about Bauke Muller, a Dutch player who won the Bermuda Bowl twice, who is known, not to say notorious, for his long pauses, up to twenty minutes?

[axman]

lamford, on 2019-August-29, 16:32, said:

I think writing down the lead is a memory aid, and certainly writing down dummy or the auction would be. I have found sometimes that North has looked at the opening lead during the play to enter in the Bridgemate (sometimes while an opponent is thinking), and I think this is wrong, but it seems churlish to object and SB does not. I think that one should not be allowed to write down the contract until the end of the hand, but the laws seem silent on it.

Memories of my first tournament event emerge. After some pause, pard meekly says 3N (with cards a little sparse for the action) closing the bids. The defense is withering, but sufficient that 3N makes. At this time I start recording the contract and the opponents become vociferous that it was 2N. The TD rules 3N after listening to whatever was said. Appeal! A most miserable 3 hours ensued. Contemporaneous records perhaps would have avoided the conflagration.

[barmar]

pescetom, on 2019-August-29, 15:33, said:

Interesting. Of course one has a right to ask the contract anyway. But did they also decide that writing down the lead, or dummy's hand, is not a memory aid? If not, is TD supposed to inspect their scribbles?
I suspect that case law here in Italy was that you should not be writing anything, because nobody would ever dream of doing so once the opening lead is faced.

I think these are only prohibited if you consult them as reminders during the play. You're allowed memory aids for the post mortem.

Or are you suggesting that they're illegal memory aids because the process of writing something down reinforces it in your mind and helps you remember it? I really don't think that's what they meant.

[pescetom]

barmar, on 2019-August-30, 08:46, said:

I think these are only prohibited if you consult them as reminders during the play. You're allowed memory aids for the post mortem.

Or are you suggesting that they're illegal memory aids because the process of writing something down reinforces it in your mind and helps you remember it? I really don't think that's what they meant.

I'm suggesting they could be illegal memory aids in that there is no control over what they write down or to stop them reading it during play. But more than anything else I'm suggesting that writing things down during play is not part of the game or in the spirit of the game and violates the requirement to pay due attention to play, therefore TDs (and RAs) would do well to not tolerate it IMO.

[pescetom]

axman, on 2019-August-30, 06:36, said:

Memories of my first tournament event emerge. After some pause, pard meekly says 3N (with cards a little sparse for the action) closing the bids. The defense is withering, but sufficient that 3N makes. At this time I start recording the contract and the opponents become vociferous that it was 2N. The TD rules 3N after listening to whatever was said. Appeal! A most miserable 3 hours ensued. Contemporaneous records perhaps would have avoided the conflagration.

This is a different issue and I agree that some official record of the contract should be made before the opening lead is faced. I have been told many times here that such disputes are extremely infrequent but that continues to not be my experience. Bridgemate and similar electronic control schemes could solve this problem but unfortunately are rarely configured to do so and there is no support in Law or Regulations.

[blackshoe]

pescetom, on 2019-August-30, 09:05, said:

I'm suggesting they could be illegal memory aids in that there is no control over what they write down or to stop them reading it during play. But more than anything else I'm suggesting that writing things down during play is not part of the game or in the spirit of the game and violates the requirement to pay due attention to play, therefore TDs (and RAs) would do well to not tolerate it IMO.

I think this goes way too far. For one thing, if it's not part of the game, why does virtually every player I see, except some top players playing with a regular partner, write down the contract at some point (most often immediately after the final pass; in some cases after the play)? If it's not in the spirit of the game, please explain how it is not. As for "due attention to the play" I'll agree that sometimes someone is writing stuff when he should be leading or putting down the dummy, and sometimes the opening leader and declarer have ignored the hapless RR in third seat and the opening lead is faced, the dummy put down, and declarer played from dummy to the first trick before third hand gets around to consider his defense, not to mention his play to trick one. But that last, at least, is unusual (except, perhaps, if it's RR in third seat). But I don't think I would sanction a player for paying insufficient attention to the game just because he's writing down the contract.

[pescetom]

blackshoe, on 2019-August-30, 12:44, said:

I think this goes way too far. For one thing, if it's not part of the game, why does virtually every player I see, except some top players playing with a regular partner, write down the contract at some point (most often immediately after the final pass; in some cases after the play)?

If it's part of the game, how come many players take no notes at all and no player I see in this country ever writes down anything once the lead is faced? There is plenty of time between the end of the auction and the start of play to write down the contract and you can always ask the defender on lead to wait a moment if necessary.

blackshoe, on 2019-August-30, 12:44, said:

If it's not in the spirit of the game, please explain how it is not.

The need to pay due attention expressed by the Laws is a pretty obvious pointer - you should not be doing things extraneous to playing the board, like making notes or using a smartphone. You should be busy doing your best to obtain a good score in full respect of the Laws.

[axman]

pescetom, on 2019-August-30, 09:20, said:

This is a different issue and I agree that some official record of the contract should be made before the opening lead is faced. I have been told many times here that such disputes are extremely infrequent but that continues to not be my experience. Bridgemate and similar electronic control schemes could solve this problem but unfortunately are rarely configured to do so and there is no support in Law or Regulations.

I would not be so sure that compulsion is the appropriate metric. Good regulation facilitates, the nanny state rarely is good regulation. As such, it's a decent idea that if nit picking is to be the rule, there'd better be good reason for it.

[blackshoe]

pescetom, on 2019-August-30, 13:37, said:

If it's part of the game, how come many players take no notes at all and no player I see in this country ever writes down anything once the lead is faced? There is plenty of time between the end of the auction and the start of play to write down the contract and you can always ask the defender on lead to wait a moment if necessary.

Players who take no notes presumably don't see a need to do so. Perhaps they've never had an adverse ruling on a dispute about what the contract was. On your second point what do these players do when the opening lead is faced while they're in the middle of writing something down? Players here might write down the contract, and then pause attentively while waiting for the lead to be faced so they can write that down. Unless they're slated to be dummy, I don't see any problem at all with that. As for asking the defender on lead to wait, I don't understand your point. First you say writing stuff down is "not part of the game", then you say "ask opening leader to wait before… what, leading, or facing the lead? I don't get it.

pescetom, on 2019-August-30, 13:37, said:

The need to pay due attention expressed by the Laws is a pretty obvious pointer - you should not be doing things extraneous to playing the board, like making notes or using a smartphone. You should be busy doing your best to obtain a good score in full respect of the Laws.

Who said anything about using a smartphone? As for the rest, I don't think writing down the contract, or the contract and the opening lead, constitutes not paying due attention to the game.

[barmar]

I doubt that many players outside this discussion have ever thought one way or the other about the legality of players taking notes like this. They're virtually all doing it to help them when reviewing the hands later, not during the play, and no one would begrudge them doing this. It seems to be totally unrelated to "the spirit of the game", because it's not actually part of the game.

Of course there are lots of players who don't do this, because they don't go over their hands much after the game. Some people are more studious than others.

Sure, they could write these notes after the hand is over. But often it's hard to remember what the auction or lead was at that point. Often if we don't enter the opening lead in the electronic scoring device immediately, no one can remember it when we're entering the result later, and we end up pressing the "Skip this step" button (it's easy to remember something like "a low spade", but not the specific spot, and we don't feel like pulling out the player's hand to figure out what it was).

[sanst]

You’re allowed to use memory aids if the RA has given permission (Law 40B2d). The Dutch union has done so. You’re allowed to write down contract, declarer and opening lead - information that should be entered into the Bridgemate at the start of the play. You’re also allowed to consult a defense against BSC’s, including multi 2♦, during the action. Hardly any player is aware of these provisions.

[jhenrikj]

Are you also allowed to consult your notes during play to remember the opening lead?

[sanst]

jhenrikj, on 2019-September-01, 04:33, said:

Are you also allowed to consult your notes during play to remember the opening lead?

Of course you can. Why would you allow to make notes and then forbid to look at these? How would you enforce a prohibition?

[pescetom]

blackshoe, on 2019-August-31, 10:46, said:

Players who take no notes presumably don't see a need to do so. Perhaps they've never had an adverse ruling on a dispute about what the contract was.

I doubt that is always the explanation. On Saturday I was lucky enough to face Alfredo Versace who has probably had a few adverse rulings in his time but was not taking any notes - probably he just doesn't need to.

blackshoe, on 2019-August-31, 10:46, said:

On your second point what do these players do when the opening lead is faced while they're in the middle of writing something down? Players here might write down the contract, and then pause attentively while waiting for the lead to be faced so they can write that down.

Players here will write down the lead when it is formally registered in Bridgemate or the traveller, which is (here) usually at the end of play. This doesn't cost them anything as they would be writing down the result anyway. And unlike the contract, there is no defensive value in having written down the correct lead, as it can be easily verified in case of dispute.

blackshoe, on 2019-August-31, 10:46, said:

As for the rest, I don't think writing down the contract, or the contract and the opening lead, constitutes not paying due attention to the game.

Only if you do it when you should be playing.

[barmar]

Next thing you'll be telling me is that I can't write down my estimates of whether a result was good or bad at the end of the hand.

[pescetom]

barmar, on 2019-September-02, 12:15, said:

Next thing you'll be telling me is that I can't write down my estimates of whether a result was good or bad at the end of the hand.

I'm happy for you to write down anything you want when it is not your turn to play, so long as it can not help you play better. I just dislike the idea of you doing something else when you should be playing. But if that's eccentric ok, I can live with that

[blackshoe]

I will note that here, we do not put the opening lead into the bridgemate.

[Vampyr]

barmar, on 2019-August-31, 19:04, said:

Sure, they could write these notes after the hand is over. But often it's hard to remember what the auction or lead was at that point. Often if we don't enter the opening lead in the electronic scoring device immediately, no one can remember it when we're entering the result later, and we end up pressing the "Skip this step" button (it's easy to remember something like "a low spade", but not the specific spot, and we don't feel like pulling out the player's hand to figure out what it was).

We can’t skip the step when this function is enabled.

sanst, on 2019-September-01, 07:52, said:

Of course you can. Why would you allow to make notes and then forbid to look at these? How would you enforce a prohibition?

I would be astonished if an RA allowed players to consult their notes to remember the opening lead. You enforce it by asking your opponent to close or turn over his scorecard.

[sanst]

Vampyr, on 2019-September-02, 14:51, said:

I would be astonished if an RA allowed players to consult their notes to remember the opening lead. You enforce it by asking your opponent to close or turn over his scorecard.

And I’m astonished that you don’t seem to know Law 40B2d.