[whisp]

I play a hand as S against three GIBs. The results are in, and I'm the the first -- no other results yet. A few minutes later, upon refresh, another result comes in. S bids as I did, but the GIB at W bids differently at the two tables. Assuming there was no GIB upgrade in the intervening few minutes, is there a reasonable explanation? If the pseudo-random seed is the same, as I've been told, then each GIB in each seat at the two tables should run the same simulations and make the same bids (for the same GIB version). One explanation would be if it took that many minutes to load older results (from an older GIB version), but that seems unlikely to me.

[smerriman]

Firstly, basic robots never simulate during the bidding, so are guaranteed to bid the same. Only advanced robots simulate during the bidding.

Secondly, the seed is only equalised during robot tournaments, not for the main bridge club.

So two options:

a) (Most likely) One table was using a basic robot, one had paid for an advanced robot

b) Both tables were using advanced robots, and simulations differed due to the seeds not being equalised.

[whisp]

Thanks!