[sailoranch]

I'm not sure where to put this, but I guess it's related to laws.

I played in a sectional pairs game yesterday. After giving one of the hands to a friend, he told me he played the exact same board at a regional last week and proceeded to give me correct details of other boards from the set. I've already informed the director, so they're aware. But what is supposed to happen in this situation?

[blackshoe]

Quote

Law 6D2: Unless the purpose of the tournament is the replay of past deals, no result may stand if the cards are dealt without shuffle from a sorted deck* or if the deal has been imported from a different session. These provisions shall not prevent arrangements, where desired, for exchange of boards between tables.

* A “sorted deck” is a pack of cards not randomized from its prior condition.

This law says that the results of the sectional in which you played must be thrown out. I would say the entry fees should be refunded, as well. But neither will happen. I expect nothing will happen, and the fact the boards were, in terms of this law, "imported from a different session" will be ignored. I hope I am wrong, not about the law, but about what will be done, and please let us know if I am.

[GreenMan]

What's supposed to happen in that situation is that it's not supposed to happen. The ACBL will tell you that each set of deals is independently generated from a starting key generated by the order of a hand-shuffled deck of cards.

Someone once told of a tournament in Australia where the deals were repeats from a couple of weeks earlier; their deal generator apparently used something from the previous set to generate the next set, and when their computer crashed and they restored a slightly outdated backup, the cycle restarted at its earlier point.

[blackshoe]

So it'll be "it didn't happen," in spite of the evidence that it did. Why am I not surprised?

[pran]

Such events are evidence that either the card deals generating program itself is faulty or the procedures when using this program are faulty.

Either way Law 6D2 is absolute and not negotiable nor subject to compromise. (What people do is a different matter.)

[barmar]

If the error came to light during the tournament, they might have been able to make reparations.

But several days after the event is over, it doesn't seem practical.

[pran]

barmar, on 2013-March-04, 08:40, said:

If the error came to light during the tournament, they might have been able to make reparations.

But several days after the event is over, it doesn't seem practical.

Practical or not, a serious administration can always rule the event as void and cancel it completely because of errors.

But I would really be surprised if anyone had the guts to do so.

[gombo121]

pran, on 2013-March-05, 02:45, said:

Practical or not, a serious administration can always rule the event as void and cancel it completely because of errors.

But I would really be surprised if anyone had the guts to do so.

Is that really question of guts?

The tournament is over (as far as I understand), correction period have expired. I'll bet that total cancellations of the results would upset much more people than the information that it was a rerun. There is a big chance that nobody among participants recognized the deals and everybody ha a great time. And if somebody did and took advantage... oh well, lucky bastards.

Apologies are certainly in order but if nothing serious was at stake, like big money or BB tiket (I'm unfamiliar with the event), I personally would vote to let the results stand.

[pran]

gombo121, on 2013-March-05, 04:53, said:

Is that really question of guts?

The tournament is over (as far as I understand), correction period have expired. I'll bet that total cancellations of the results would upset much more people than the information that it was a rerun. There is a big chance that nobody among participants recognized the deals and everybody ha a great time. And if somebody did and took advantage... oh well, lucky bastards.

Apologies are certainly in order but if nothing serious was at stake, like big money or BB tiket (I'm unfamiliar with the event), I personally would vote to let the results stand.

The law is clear and unambiguous, but . . . . .

I personally know of one incident in Norway, decades ago (before the age of duplicating machines) where a (then) fellow club member of mine participated in an event at "the other end of Norway" (some 2000 km away), recognized the boards from an event he had recently played here, and "blew the whistle".

An inspection of the list of participants apparently revealed that he was probably the only one who had seen the boards before. And as there had been no particular publishing from the previous event the rest of the field played as if no irregularity had occurred while he was compensated his fees.

Today we have routines to ensure that such errors should never happen.

[Zelandakh]

If all of the losing players joined together and threatened to sue the organising body for their entry fees back plus costs on the grounds that it was not held under the published rules then something might be done. Of course you would need to be able to prove it in court, which might be difficult.

[barmar]

Zelandakh, on 2013-March-05, 06:51, said:

If all of the losing players joined together and threatened to sue the organising body for their entry fees back plus costs on the grounds that it was not held under the published rules then something might be done. Of course you would need to be able to prove it in court, which might be difficult.

Most tournaments that use preduplicated boards give out hand records. So all you need are hand records from each tourney.

I'll bet that the organization would be willing to refund the entry fee to anyone who complained. But they'll also forfeit any masterpoints they won. I suppose the real issue would be what happens if a loser complains, and they want all the winners' masterpoints voided.

[Phil]

pran, on 2013-March-05, 02:45, said:

Practical or not, a serious administration can always rule the event as void and cancel it completely because of errors.

But I would really be surprised if anyone had the guts to do so.

Sectionals are put on by a local non-profit unit and they frequently rent a location.

A local sectional that I attended in February ran for three days, and had a total of 235 tables. If you throw out the swiss teams on Sunday, and the Saturday KO's (that didn't have pre-duplicated hand records), you come to 129 tables.

The revenue for these tables is $10 per player x 4 = $5,160. If you had to refund these cards fees and cancel the tournament, the tournament would have a huge operating loss, instead of a modest profit. I do not know the cash reserves of this unit, but they might be wiped out, and the members would be asked to chip in in order to cover the shortfall.

Its easy to sit back from the cheap seats and tell others that they should take a loss that can wipe out an organization. In reality, solutions are a lot more difficult than that.

[JanM]

When the second session of the Women's Board A Match teams in 1994 used the same boards as had been used for one of the Knockout rounds at the previous Women's Knockout, that session was canceled and qualification for the next day was based on the team's performance in the first session. I do not remember whether entry fees were refunded.

[ggwhiz]

Phil, on 2013-March-05, 10:22, said:

Sectionals are put on by a local non-profit unit.

I vaguely recall that Dorothy Truscott once played in a major tournament in France(?), called the Director and told him card for card her partners hand and it turned out they were using the same set from a tourney 20 years ago!

I can't remember how they handled that but this is a SECTIONAL! Gotta cut them some slack as no Unit is in this to make profits. A free beer to each player in ther next Sectional (or whatever is affordable) is enough of a mea culpa.

[blackshoe]

gombo121, on 2013-March-05, 04:53, said:

Is that really question of guts?

The tournament is over (as far as I understand), correction period have expired. I'll bet that total cancellations of the results would upset much more people than the information that it was a rerun. There is a big chance that nobody among participants recognized the deals and everybody ha a great time. And if somebody did and took advantage... oh well, lucky bastards.

Apologies are certainly in order but if nothing serious was at stake, like big money or BB tiket (I'm unfamiliar with the event), I personally would vote to let the results stand.

It was a sectional. Masterpoints were awarded. Those awards should be voided. But I'll wait to see if we get a final report on the outcome.

[mycroft]

Also remember that it is very likely that nobody involved in the sectional had anything to do with generating the hand records, except for checking the "need hands" button and paying the fee. If this did happen, and if there was a problem with it, the unit shouldn't be on the hook for whatever reparations are required - even the free beer.

[blackshoe]

Fair enough. That involves HQ in the picture. I'm not going to try to predict what they'll do.

[Phil]

mycroft, on 2013-March-05, 13:44, said:

Also remember that it is very likely that nobody involved in the sectional had anything to do with generating the hand records

Who says? Our hands are generated by a local who uses Dealmaster pro.

[wyman]

Please enter a seed: 123456789

[GreenMan]

Phil, on 2013-March-05, 14:21, said:

Who says? Our hands are generated by a local who uses Dealmaster pro.

Then your unit's Sectional surely didn't replicate hands from a Regional several states away. Same for any other that makes its own deals, unless they're using wyman's approach.