Scoring, MPs etc
Because responder's transfer bid sounds like responder has a suit other than the suit responder really has, it is necessary to alert the use of a transfer to your opponents.
This is done immediately after responder makes the transfer bid and before the next play in rotation bids. The notrump bidder simply announces, "alert" and plays the Alert card next to partner's bid. Only explain what responder's bid means if your opponent asks.
You may ask your opponents about the meaning of an alert or call at your turn to call as well as before you play to any trick.
After playing in the Teams events at the recent Peninsula Congress and the NSBC@Lindfield Restricted Congress, I thought I would try and understand and then explain how the extra report on the individual pairs performance is constructed.
It came to my attention that no one teaches new players about masterpoints (MPs) or the progression through the Australian Bridge Federation (ABF) levels. So here is some information for you.
In Australia there are 3 kinds of masterpoints. Green, Red, and Gold.
I feel the need to explain further the process and problems with masterpoints (MPs) - what follows supplements my earlier explanatory article.
Why aren't Pianola's MPs always accurate?
I have fielded many queries this year from players who assume their Pianola email is always accurate in reporting masterpoints. Timely it may be, but always accurate - not so much...
After a recent experience of being surprised how a passed in hand was scored, I thought I would share it with you. I naively had the idea that more or less the two pairs would get the same (middling) score but that is not quite how it works.
In normal duplicate, after a board is played there is a score - eg +80 for the pair making 1S and -80 for their opponents. At the end, all the EW scores for that board are ranked and the same separately for the NS scores. You are competing only against the other pairs sitting in the same direction. The highest ranked EW pair gets the most matchpoints (different to masterpoints) on the board, earning two for each EW pair with a lower score and one for a pair with the same score.
Do you lie awake sleepless at night wondering how BBO displays the results of Teams matches and in particular why a score is + or - ? Me neither, but in case like me you are finding it not obvious to understand, read on.
The current SALT teams competition is being scored using VPs or Victory Points. Probably none of us in the staircase division knew what these were so I asked Robin Devries and this article is an amplification of his explanation - thanks Robin!
VPs are a teams scoring system developed by the World Bridge Federation to ensure that each IMP scored by a team was important but not necessarily of equal value. It is a sliding scale so that a small difference in IMPs between the two teams is worth more VPs than the extra VPs scored from a large IMP difference. In other words, diminishing returns set in.
