[Fluffy]

dummy has ♥KQ103

Declarer plays ♥K to the opponent´s ace, later plays the jack from hand and overtakes with the queen. Now asks for "heart"

Dummy says wich one, and declarer says the only one. defenders call director and ask for the 3 to be played.

What happpened is that dummy was very close to the board, and declarer is not very tall, ♥3 was completelly hidden from his view and could only see the 10.

[Hanoi5]

Let the 10 be played. That was the 'intent' card anyway.

[barmar]

This falls under 46B's exception "except when declarer’s different intention is incontrovertible" -- declarer couldn't have intended the 3 if he couldn't see it.

However, could there be a problem with dummy "participating in the play"? Does this dummy always ask for clarification any time his partner makes an incomplete designation, rather than following the disambiguation rules in 46B? If not, why did he ask this time?

However, declerer might still be able to resolve this in his favor. Suppose dummy simply played the lowest card without asking. I presume declarer would notice and ask "Where did that 3 come from?" The TD would be called, and he could apply the "different intention" criteria to rule that he didn't designate the 3. We would then apply the law about dummy playing a different card than declarer designated.

[ahydra]

Not sure I understand how the combination of dummy being close to the table & declarer's height can combine to hide the 3. One would think that the higher-ranked cards would be hidden (since the Laws require the lower-ranked cards to be closer to declarer).

But barmar pretty much summed it up - if he saw only the 10 (as evidenced by the "the only one" response to dummy's slightly-dodgy question), then he intended to play that heart.

ahydra

[blackshoe]

The card was hidden by the stack of boards.

[barmar]

If we're playing a long match, we usually take enough boards off the table to keep the stack to at most 3 or 4 boards, to mitigate problems like this.

[blackshoe]

Sure. In fact, the only board that must remain on the table is the one in play. Doesn't matter in this case, since it didn't happen.

[iviehoff]

Can it possibly be correct for dummy to say "which one"? I think not. I think that was an offence. Fortunately not one that has any cost on this occasion, but on other occasions it might.

L46 tells us that the designation "heart" means the lowest heart, unless some different intention is uncontrovertible. Dummy is certainly not in the business of checking whether declarer is avoiding carelessness in his designation, that would be intervening in the play. So I think, normally (see exceptions below), hearing "heart" from declarer, dummy must simply wait long enough (and no longer) to ensure that is the end of the designation, and then put the lowest heart in the played position. If declarer then needs to rescue himself from the consequences of his own carelessness in designation, it is for declarer of his own initiative to argue that his different intention is uncontrovertible, not dummy to invite him to do so.

There are some exceptions to my "normally" in the last paragraph. One is if dummy is unsure of the provisions of Law 46, and does not confidently know that "heart" is to be interpreted as "lowest heart", and thus needs instruction. The other is when dummy has a well-founded concern that by moving the low heart into the played position he is not inflicting declarer's carelessness upon him, but rather he is rescuing him from his carelessness. In both these cases, dummy will need instruction from the director what to do. But he may not draw attention to what the problem is, nor call the director of his own initiative. So he has to try hard to preserve his innocence while hoping that another player will do something that will enable the director to be called.

So how is dummy to try and get instruction, given he is not allowed to draw attention to any irregularity, nor call the director unless such attention is drawn by someone else? I think he has to scrupulously avoid drawing attention to anything, which "which one?" does not achieve. So I think he should try something like "I heard you, but I do not know what I should do."

That said, I agree that on the facts of the case declarer must be required to play the 10. Dummy should also get an warning/explanation that he must not participate in the play, nor draw any attention to any facts.

[blackshoe]

Good analysis, I like it.

"Required" in your penultimate sentence did confuse me. In fact, declarer wanted to play the 10 in the first place, so I think "allowed to play the 10" is more accurate than "required". Also, the 3 would be a change of mind now that he knows it's there. Declarer should not be allowed that.

[pran]

blackshoe, on 2012-March-05, 18:23, said:

Good analysis, I like it.

"Required" in your penultimate sentence did confuse me. In fact, declarer wanted to play the 10 in the first place, so I think "allowed to play the 10" is more accurate than "required". Also, the 3 would be a change of mind now that he knows it's there. Declarer should not be allowed that.

This raises an interesting question (I think?):

Say that one of dummy's cards is not visible (covered by another card, dropped on the floor or for whatever reason).

Declarer now calls one of the dummy's (visible) cards, at which time the previously "invisible" card becomes visible. May declarer now change his call and instead play that card?

The answer is obviously yes if the first call would happen to become a revoke (in fact he must), but generally?

What if his designation was "high", "low" or something similar that matches the card previously not visible (his call was obviously not originally aimed at that card)?

My feeling is that he is bound by his original apparent intention, but shall this apply even if this intention becomes irrational in view of the new card suddenly being visible?

Example: LHO produces a King, dummy has the stiff Queen which declarer calls, only to then immediately discover that dummy also had the Ace? What now?

[blackshoe]

I think Law 14B applies, and the card is deemed to have been there all along. If it was there and covered, that's dummy's fault. If it was elsewhere, that's probably dummy's fault as well. So he's stuck with playing the Q. Sorry, tough luck, as Rik would say.

[barmar]

iviehoff, on 2012-March-05, 05:57, said:

Can it possibly be correct for dummy to say "which one"? I think not. I think that was an offence. Fortunately not one that has any cost on this occasion, but on other occasions it might.

That was the point I was raising in my 2nd paragraph of comment #3.

Quote

There are some exceptions to my "normally" in the last paragraph. One is if dummy is unsure of the provisions of Law 46, and does not confidently know that "heart" is to be interpreted as "lowest heart", and thus needs instruction.

But if this were the case, one would expect him to ask all the time, as I mentioned. If he only asks in cases where it seems to him that the 46B disambiguation is the "wrong" card, I think he's participating in the play.

I've encountered novices who didn't know about the 46B rules, so they do frequently ask which card. I don't think there's anything wrong with this question. Someone who doesn't know about 46B probably also doesn't know about 46A, so they're not knowingly drawing attention to an irregularity, they're just expressing confusion and requesting instruction. It's little different from when they couldn't hear the designation clearly.

[iviehoff]

Some latitude is given to novices, and their actions may be less meaningful than more experienced players doing the same thing. We all need to learn correct procedure as we grow in the game. And just because it doesn't usually matter that is not an excuse for illegal procedure that may sometimes matter. So the director should kindly explain that dummy is not allowed to draw attention to facts or irregularities. "Which heart" draws attention to (1) the irregularity of an incomplete designation and (2) the fact of there being more than one card in the suit. So if dummy didn't hear, or didn't understand, or doesn't know what to do, dummy can mention his own difficulty, preferably having given the opponents just enough space to call the director first. But not "which card" or the like.

[bluejak]

If declarer calls for a card form dummy, absent a revoke, the card called for is played because that was his intention at the time. Whether it is irrational when another card is found is a matter between himself and dummy, who are allegedly on the same team.