[Bolo_]

Introduce a one-second delay in the bidding and the gameplay of robots.

[barmar]

Why?

Do you mean make them take more consistent time for each action, to avoid "tells" when they're thinking (usually this means they're running simulations instead of making an automatic bid or play)? That does seem like a good idea.

The curious thing is that the longest tanks I notice from the robots is when you're taking a losing finesse, it always needs to think before taking its winner. But at this point it's too late to take advantage of the hesitation, you already guessed wrong.

[pescetom]

Making their time longer and uniform would not only avoid tells by robot to partner about simulation, but help avoid putting the next human player under stress due to an unusually fast play (which would be an infraction if intentionally perpetrated by a human). It would also make the robots look less alien to beginners and to conservative humans.
I can't see any downsides.

[Huibertus]

pescetom, on 2026-April-24, 14:50, said:

1. You can't draw any conclusions about the amount of time it takes a robot to show a response on your screen (except potentially of fast connectivity and the absence of a connection glitch)
2. Humans are ALLOWED to play as fast as they like, except for some regulating bodies mandating a 10 second wait time before dummy can play a card. It is NOT an infraction to play exceptionally fast, it is ALLOWED to put opponents under pressure. What POTENTIALLY can be an infraction is PARTNER making use of the observation of fast play. But that is not the same.

Wait times are a nuisance. We are already waiting way too long in most varieties of tournaments.

[pescetom]

Huibertus, on 2026-April-25, 00:50, said:

1. You can't draw any conclusions about the amount of time it takes a robot to show a response on your screen (except potentially of fast connectivity and the absence of a connection glitch)
2. Humans are ALLOWED to play as fast as they like, except for some regulating bodies mandating a 10 second wait time before dummy can play a card. It is NOT an infraction to play exceptionally fast, it is ALLOWED to put opponents under pressure. What POTENTIALLY can be an infraction is PARTNER making use of the observation of fast play. But that is not the same.

Wait times are a nuisance. We are already waiting way too long in most varieties of tournaments.

You are wrong on all three counts:

- Barmar (who speaks for BBO) told you that one can tell when the robot needs to simulate

- it IS an infraction to play unusually fast to put opponents under pressure (explicitly forbidden in 74C7)

- a wait of 1s by the habitually fast robot can hardly be a nuisance (if everyone took 1s, a board would be bid and played in just over a minute).