[jillybean]

Declarer plays to trick1, leaves her card face up on the table, thinks for an extended period (opps and dummy have turned their cards) then asks to see the cards.

Is there any problem with this?

[aguahombre]

Yes, it is o.k. to think. The question you asked is covered by 66A verbatim. They show your their cards played to that trick.

[bluejak]

No problem whatever.

[jules101]

Supplementary questions ...

Having asked oppo to reveal their cards again....

1) May you ask them to leave cards face up while you think on?

2) If oppo flips their card over for a millisecond before returning their card to face down position, may you ask them to turn them face up again and leave them there?

3) If oppo performs action (2) and refuses to return their card to face up position again as requested is this acceptable?

[Vampyr]

You are entitled to view all the cards face up for as long as you like.

[AlexJonson]

Vampyr, on 2011-October-03, 09:03, said:

You are entitled to view all the cards face up for as long as you like.

I can't imagine trying to refuse to leave my card turned up, but where does the right to insist on that come from?

[Vampyr]

AlexJonson, on 2011-October-03, 09:24, said:

I can't imagine trying to refuse to leave my card turned up, but where does the right to insist on that come from?

66A

[AlexJonson]

Mm. 65A certainly doesn't give declarer the right to lead the way in turning cards over when everyone has played.

66A seems at best ambiguous. If facing the cards was not temporary, you might expect 66A to say they must remain faced.

[Vampyr]

AlexJonson, on 2011-October-03, 11:13, said:

Mm. 65A certainly doesn't give declarer the right to lead the way in turning cards over when everyone has played.

66A seems at best ambiguous. If facing the cards was not temporary, you might expect 66A to say they must remain faced.

Of course it is temporary. The trick has to be quitted sooner or later so that the next trick can be played.

[AlexJonson]

Vampyr, on 2011-October-03, 11:16, said:

Of course it is temporary. The trick has to be quitted sooner or later so that the next trick can be played.

That's the point, 65A tells you how a trick is quitted, and declarer has no control over the who turns first.

[aguahombre]

65A speaks to what happens re: arranging the cards on the table when a trick is completed. It does not cover the current trick issue.

66A states:

"A. Current Trick
So long as his side has not led or played to the next
trick, declarer or either defender may, until he has
turned his own card face down on the table, require
that all cards just played to the trick be faced"..

Nothing ambiguous about either section, IMO. One describes where the cards of a trick end up on the table and that they will be face down. The other is about inspecting those cards after the four players have contributed to the play of that trick.

[Vampyr]

How did 65A get into it anyway?

[Cascade]

Vampyr, on 2011-October-03, 09:03, said:

You are entitled to view all the cards face up for as long as you like.

Vampyr, on 2011-October-03, 09:59, said:

66A

Vampyr, on 2011-October-03, 11:16, said:

Of course it is temporary. The trick has to be quitted sooner or later so that the next trick can be played.

Vampyr, on 2011-October-03, 17:54, said:

How did 65A get into it anyway?

65A specifies the correct procedure at the end of the trick. It tells us when we are required to turn our card face down - "When four cards have been played to a trick"

66A says nothing about viewing all cards face up for as long as you like. Indeed doing so would violate other laws in particular laws concerning tempo variations. It says if you happen to have not turned your card down then you are entitled to still inspect the previous cards. In my view this is to prevent a player from turning a card quickly and depriving you of seeing properly its face. It is not so that a player whose turn it is not to play can delay the game by keeping his card face up.

There is nothing in any law as far as I am aware that says a player cannot lead to the next trick before the previous trick has been quit by all four players. If I have won a trick then I have a responsibility to play to the next trick in my normal tempo. I do not believe that I have to wait for a player who has not complied with Law 65A by not quitting his card when four cards were played to the previous trick.

[Cascade]

jules101, on 2011-October-03, 07:05, said:

Supplementary questions ...

Having asked oppo to reveal their cards again....

1) May you ask them to leave cards face up while you think on?

2) If oppo flips their card over for a millisecond before returning their card to face down position, may you ask them to turn them face up again and leave them there?

3) If oppo performs action (2) and refuses to return their card to face up position again as requested is this acceptable?

1. As far as I am aware there is no provision in the laws to ask a player to leave a card face up on the table while you "think on". The law allows you to inspect tricks I cannot see anything in there that says that you can use this to buy time to think. Players should think in their own time.

2. So long as you have not quit your trick you may ask to see the card again. I do not believe though you have an explicit right in law to ask for the card to be left on the table.

3. I don't think it is acceptable. However I also do not it is acceptable to keep asking to see the card after you have seen it just for the purpose of delaying the play.

[Vampyr]

Cascade, on 2011-October-03, 18:23, said:

66A says nothing about viewing all cards face up for as long as you like. Indeed doing so would violate other laws in particular laws concerning tempo variations. It says if you happen to have not turned your card down then you are entitled to still inspect the previous cards. In my view this is to prevent a player from turning a card quickly and depriving you of seeing properly its face. It is not so that a player whose turn it is not to play can delay the game by keeping his card face up.

It is, though.

Quote

There is nothing in any law as far as I am aware that says a player cannot lead to the next trick before the previous trick has been quit by all four players. If I have won a trick then I have a responsibility to play to the next trick in my normal tempo. I do not believe that I have to wait for a player who has not complied with Law 65A by not quitting his card when four cards were played to the previous trick.

65A defines a completed trick; of course you may not lead to a subsequent trick before all four players have quitted the trick; in fact, a player whose card is still face up is still entitled, as we have seen, to inspect the trick.

[Vampyr]

Cascade, on 2011-October-03, 18:28, said:

The law allows you to inspect tricks I cannot see anything in there that says that you can use this to buy time to think. Players should think in their own time.

What "own time"? If not between tricks, then when? In the bar after the session? Many players do most of their thinking then, but others consider that to be too late.

[Cascade]

Vampyr, on 2011-October-03, 18:35, said:

65A defines a completed trick; of course you may not lead to a subsequent trick before all four players have quitted the trick; in fact, a player whose card is still face up is still entitled, as we have seen, to inspect the trick.

I do not know on what basis you say "of course". Indeed 66A foresees the possibility that ones partner (or even oneself) has played to a (the next) trick before the player has quit the previous trick.

[Cascade]

Vampyr, on 2011-October-03, 18:37, said:

What "own time"? If not between tricks, then when? In the bar after the session? Many players do most of their thinking then, but others consider that to be too late.

1. You can think when other players are playing

2. You can think when it is your turn to play

3. You can think when others (usually the leader to the next trick) are thinking about their play

[blackshoe]

#2 carries a problem - that of constraining partner through some putative information conveyed by thinking in this situation. As for the other two situations, what if the others don't do any thinking (which seems to happen quite a lot around here)?

I play a card. Whoever won the trick leads instantly. Even if I'm fourth to play to this new trick, if the others also play fast, I may have had as little as 2 or 3 seconds of "thinking time" before it's my turn to play. Now if it takes me more than another second or two to decide what to play, the opponents are highly likely to call the cops. Not to mention that my "thinking time" is further reduced by the distraction of seeing the cards as they're played. You can say "just ignore them" but that's not easy, and even if you do, you can get problems. I once was thinking about trick one, and did not see declarer's lead to trick two. Declarer accused me of cheating (not with that word - she said that I deliberately hesitated in order to induce her to take a finesse). Not pleasant.

Danny Roth, in one of his books, suggested what he called "the seven roll calls": figure out the distribution of the four suits, the distribution of the HCP, and from those the declarer's tricks and the defense's tricks. Sounds easy, but it is not. I have hopes that some day these "seven roll calls" will be second nature, and will on most hands not take me more than a second or two. But right now, it will take me much more than that, at least for the first few rounds of play.

"I played quickly, why can't you?" doesn't cut it.

[Vampyr]

I would just like to say to the OP that I am sorry for any provocation I may have given to the nonsense that has appeared in this thread.