[benlessard]

http://bridgewinners...=399056#c399056

Shorter example that goes with law

20 F5(a)

A player whose partner has given a mistaken explanation may not correct the error during the auction, nor may he indicate in any man
ner that a mistake has been made. “Mistaken explanation” here includes failure to alert or announce as regulations require or an alert
(or an announcement) that regulations do not require.

This came for a hand where

1NT (15-17 from opener point of view) but alerted as 10-13

responder bid 2H.

Now 2H is to play vs 10-13 but xfer vs 15-17.

Do you announce transfer ??


If you announce transfer you are immediatly breaking 20 F5. You are giving the wrong information to your opps (im not using misinformation) since they will think hes got !S while you know hes got !H. You are also giving UI to your partner, he will notice that 1NT should have been 15-17 or that you (opener) think that in that seat condition its 15-17 and not 10-13 so the partnerhsip misunderstanding will be exposed to both players.

If you dont annonce transfers you are somehow not properly disclosing your agreements since you know for sure or think that 1NT is 15-17 and that 2H is a xfer.

Wich law to break ? the one about not giving UI and not waking up partner or the one about disclosing your a priori agreements (2H is xfer after a strong NT)

Note that im not asking on what should you bid. Its clear that the 10-13 is UI, so will need to bid accordingly, this post is all about what should be announced.

[weejonnie]

You announce (or not) your partnership agreement. So you announce transfer since that, to you, is the agreement. It is not (presumably) your fault that partner has misremembered.

So you bid 2 Spades. (You can't field the misbid because of the UI position.)

If you have an agreement that 2 Hearts cannot be removed then your partner can wake up - but by then of course it will be too late. He should of course call the director.

I somehow suspect that the opponents won't be damaged.

[barmar]

There's no law that says you must not give UI to partner. Every time you alert or answer an opponent's question you're potentially giving them UI. You're should try to avoid giving UI, but the laws on disclosure trump them. That's why the real infraction is when partner uses the UI, not when it's transmitted. If your explanation wakes up partner, he needs to avoid using the wakeup in his subsequent bidding.

I read the BW thread, and this does seem like a thorny issue that isn't really clear in the Laws. You're required to explain your agreements. But which agreements do you explain? What his bid would have meant if he'd correctly understood your bid, or what his bid actually means given that he misunderstood your bid.

[weejonnie]

barmar, on 2016-September-01, 09:29, said:

There's no law that says you must not give UI to partner. Every time you alert or answer an opponent's question you're potentially giving them UI. You're should try to avoid giving UI, but the laws on disclosure trump them. That's why the real infraction is when partner uses the UI, not when it's transmitted. If your explanation wakes up partner, he needs to avoid using the wakeup in his subsequent bidding.

I read the BW thread, and this does seem like a thorny issue that isn't really clear in the Laws. You're required to explain your agreements. But which agreements do you explain? What his bid would have meant if he'd correctly understood your bid, or what his bid actually means given that he misunderstood your bid.

What his bid means if he had understood your bid - opponents are entitled to the agreement not to knowledge what cards are in your hands. You, of course, know what cards are in his hand but must carefully avoid taking advantage of that information.

The problem on the BW thread is when you aren't certain whether you have misbid or not. I think you would have to make a conscious decision one way or the other and then act consistently on it.

[benlessard]

Quote

There's no law that says you must not give UI to partner.

Agree but

20 F5(a)

A player whose partner has given a mistaken explanation may not correct the error during the auction, nor may he indicate in any man
ner that a mistake has been made. “Mistaken explanation” here includes failure to alert or announce as regulations require or an alert
(or an announcement) that regulations do not require.

This is a pretty clear sentence to me. Does this law trump the laws on disclosure is not clear but since

Quote

You're required to explain your agreements. But which agreements do you explain? What his bid would have meant if he'd correctly understood your bid, or what his bid actually means given that he misunderstood your bid.

I prefer to not break a law and maybe give the wrong agreement, than clearly break a law.


I was always told that if partner is on the wrong track you cannot wake him up and you cannot help him field the UI mess.
The top notch director comment was "its much easier to deal when there is one player that got UI and one player that gave misinformation than when both players of the offending side have UI and gave MI.

[benlessard]

Quote

The problem on the BW thread is when you aren't certain whether you have misbid or not. I think you would have to make a conscious decision one way or the other and then act consistently on it.

This is also a nasty point. Lets just say that it will take me 15 seconds to decide if I should say transfer or not, partner will guess there is a partnership misunderstanding.
If you adopt the spirit that you dont try to help partner and just assume that responder is right i dont see how it can backfired (but you bid according that you have UI).

Ex

1NT--2D
2H

2D could have been GF stayman or transfers if it take me 15 second to choose one or the other im breaking law 20 F5.

[lamford]

I agree that you alert and announce according to your actual agreement and it does not change if you have misbid or partner has wrongly announced.

[barmar]

I've always interpreted the clause about "indicate in any manner that a mistake has been made" to refer to things like reactions of surprise. You're still supposed to alert and explain according to your actual agreements, even if the players (including partner) will be able to infer that a mistake has been made.

[barmar]

weejonnie, on 2016-September-01, 09:40, said:

What his bid means if he had understood your bid - opponents are entitled to the agreement not to knowledge what cards are in your hands. You, of course, know what cards are in his hand but must carefully avoid taking advantage of that information.

I don't think this is the issue here. It's not a matter of what cards are in his hand, but what his bid means. And the meaning of his bid depends on what he thought your bid meant, and you know that based on the alert+explanation he gave previously.

One simple solution is to adopt the "pretend we have screen" approach. With screens you never would have heard his weak NT announcement, so you would give explanations of his bids based on a strong NT context.

[benlessard]

Somebody else found this for me

From http://worldbridge.o...2008beijing.pdf

LAW 20
There is no infraction when a correct explanation discloses that partner’s prior explanation was mistaken. The words “nor may he indicate in any manner that a mistake has been made” (in Law 20F5(a)) do not refer to compliance with the overriding requirement of the laws always to respond to enquiries under Law 20F with correct explanations of the partnership understandings.

Wich initially simply made no sense to me but after reading the 1997 version ive understood what is happening.



In the 2007 (Wbf) and 2008 (Acbl)

they completly change law 20 and they added...

Law 20 F4.

If a player subsequently realizes that his own explanation was erroneous or incomplete he must call the Director immediately. The Director applies Law 21B or Law 40B4.

So the idea is that when opener announce transfer responder will understand that he gave a misexplanantion and will be forced to call the director. At this point the director will clearly explain to north that he must give explanation according to the authentic agreements (15-17) but that for him the transfer announcement is UI and he will need to bid as if your are in a weak NT sequence. Opener will still bid and explain as if he is in a strong NT sequence and its still UI that responder is GF and doesnt promise 5H.

Ive tought about it a lot and nothing else make sense.