[nige1]

Scottish On-line Lockdown League Swiss Teams. At the end of the auction, South, asked West the meaning of his double of 2♥. West alerted it as penalties. After a misdefence, South could have made an overtrick. South misclicked, ruffing one of his winners, to reach a 3-card ending:. South was on lead with ♥AT8 and defenders had ♥ KQ54 between them. South considered exiting with a low ♥ but reasoned that would be necessary only if
- East has opened 1NT with a small doubleton or
- West had made a penalty double with a small singleton.
Otherwise the danger was that East would win with one honour and promote a trick for West's other honour. After the 1 trick defeat, South asked defenders "Was it really your agreement that the double was penalty?" Both answered that they had "No agreement". South contended that. with correct information, he would make the contract. How would you rule?

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[Vampyr]

 nige1, on 2020-July-23, 10:32, said:

Scottish On-line Lockdown League Swiss Teams. At the end of the auction, South, asked West the meaning of his double of 2♥. West alerted it as penalties.After a misdefence, South could have made an overtrick. He misclicked, ruffing one of his winners, to reach a 3-card ending:
South was on lead with ♥AT8 and defenders had ♥ KQ54 between them. South considered exiting with a low ♥ but reasoned that would necessary only if
- East has opened 1NT with a small doubleton or
- West had made a penalty double with a small singleton.
Otherwise the danger was that East would win with one honour and promote a trick for West's other honour. After the 1 trick defeat, South asked defenders "Was it really your agreement that the double was penalty?" Both answered that they had "No agreement". South contended that, with correct information, he would make the contract. How would you rule?

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What can now say no agreement, but he originally said penalty. Since this (mis)information was what declarer had to go on at the time, I would rule in favour of the non-offenders. Declare it might well do the right thing if he knew or guessed that West’s double was takeout, especially as this would be normal

[StevenG]

 Vampyr, on 2020-July-23, 10:42, said:

West [edited] can now say no agreement, but he originally said penalty. Since this (mis)information was what declarer had to go on at the time, I would rule in favour of the non-offenders. Declare it might well do the right thing if he knew or guessed that West’s penalty was takeout, especially as this would be normal

Nowhere has West said he intended it for takeout.

[Vampyr]

 StevenG, on 2020-July-23, 10:52, said:

Nowhere has West said he intended it for takeout.

No, but if West had accurately said that it was no agreement in the first place, declrer could easily have guessed that it was intended as takeout, since this would be normal as I mentioned above.

Also, the East/West actions do not pass the smell test for me.

[KingCovert]

 nige1, on 2020-July-23, 10:32, said:

South contended that, with correct information, he would make the contract. How would you rule?

So, if I'm understanding this correctly:

1) West makes a lead directing double of clubs (probably)
2) West makes a penalty double of hearts.
3) East passes the double.
4) West, when asked, explains the meaning of their bid (but not necessarily their agreement).
5) South fails to count the high card points of the hand.
6) South makes a faulty assumption about the heart situation.
7) South complains that their assumption wasn't right.

Clearly my recounting of the events is somewhat skewed in one favour... But, I really don't see how South thinks they have an argument here.

Is it so unreasonable for West to think their double is penalty here? If South didn't request an explanation and made an assumption, what assumption would they make? It could easily be the case that West thinks that, while they may not have an explicit agreement, they have an implicit agreement or meta-agreements that would dictate that this double is penalty.

The bid was described as penalty, functioned as a penalty double, was intended as penalty, and has enough values to justify a penalty double. I'm not really sure how an accurate description of the intended meaning of the bid can cause harm here. I've read no law obligating that penalty doubles show length in the trump suit, when doubling a suit contract.

Far more consequentially, the club switch at trick two clearly marks West for the A♣ or K♣, subsequent play in clubs confirms that it's the A♣, which isn't shocking given the whole lead directing double thing. East cannot possibly have enough values for their 1NT opener without holding both heart honours. But... South cannot count high card points and bungled the hand.

The description of South's thinking show that they made a faulty assumption that simply doesn't have to be true, and in fact can never be true, and upon exposure of that faulty reasoning, they're seeking to run to the director (or review board). I'm not a big fan of this sort of behaviour.

[blackshoe]

After the hand, did West independently say that his second double was undiscussed, or did he agree with East after East said that? If the former, then why, at the end of the auction, did he explain it as penalty?

[StevenG]

What if West had typed in "undiscussed, intended as penalty"?

[FelicityR]

 KingCovert, on 2020-July-23, 11:21, said:

The description of South's thinking show that they made a faulty assumption that simply doesn't have to be true, and in fact can never be true, and upon exposure of that faulty reasoning, they're seeking to run to the director (or review board). I'm not a big fan of this sort of behaviour.

I couldn't agree more. Though I do have a very small amount of sympathy for South as West's hand is hardly penalty double material with the singleton ♥. But as we all know, if South had clocked up the doubled contract, nothing more would have been discussed.

Though I also find it strange that South asked West about the second double only but not the first double, too. Surely, as declarer, before embarking on a contract, where someone has doubled an artificial bid, you'd want to know what that meaning was also.

[gordontd]

 FelicityR, on 2020-July-23, 20:54, said:

Though I also find it strange that South asked West about the second double only but not the first double, too. Surely, as declarer, before embarking on a contract, where someone has doubled an artificial bid, you'd want to know what that meaning was also.

It seems the second double was alerted, the first one not.

[lamford]

 Vampyr, on 2020-July-23, 10:42, said:

West now says no agreement, but he originally said penalty. Since this (mis)information was what declarer had to go on at the time, I would rule in favour of the non-offenders. Declarer might well do the right thing if he knew or guessed that West’s double was takeout, especially as this would be normal

Good summary. One might consider a PP for West for deliberately trying to deceive by alerting the second double as penalty. All that is relevant is what would have happened without the misinformation. The misclick is, however, SEWoG, and without that he would have made the contract anyway. East-West clearly get -790. Without the misinformation and without the misclick, NS would get +990. The misclick only cost the overtrick so South just gets +790.

[Cyberyeti]

 lamford, on 2020-July-24, 08:05, said:

Good summary. One might consider a PP for West for deliberately trying to deceive by alerting the second double as penalty. All that is relevant is what would have happened without the misinformation. The misclick is, however, SEWoG, and without that he would have made the contract anyway. East-West clearly get -790. Without the misinformation and without the misclick, NS would get +990. The misclick only cost the overtrick so South just gets +790.

And playing for a layout that is impossible is not SEWoG ? E opened 1N and can have an absolute maximum of a 4333 11 points with only the ♠10 as an intermediate without ♥KQ. Are you really playing them to have opened 1043, K94, AJ42, K43 1N ? You also already know W's penalty double is on an absolute maximum of Qx so is not any sort of trump stack.

[weejonnie]

 Cyberyeti, on 2020-July-24, 08:17, said:

And playing for a layout that is impossible is not SEWoG ? E opened 1N and can have an absolute maximum of a 4333 11 points with only the ♠10 as an intermediate without ♥KQ. Are you really playing them to have opened 1043, K94, AJ42, K43 1N ? You also already know W's penalty double is on an absolute maximum of Qx so is not any sort of trump stack.

No - at least not in the EBU Blue book. (BTW SeWoG no longer exists and hasn't since August or September 2017 - it is now ESEoG) - and of course the ESEoG has to be unrelated to the infraction.

"For clarity, the following would usually not be considered to be ‘an extremely serious error’:
• Forgetting a partnership agreement, forgetting that partner is a passed hand or misunderstanding partner’s call. The class of player and experience of the partnership are relevant. Treating a double of an opening 1S bid as penalties might be considered an extremely serious error by a strong player.
• Any play that would be deemed ‘normal’, albeit careless or inferior, in ruling a contested claim.
• Any play that has a reasonable chance of success, even if it is obviously not the percentage line.
• Playing for a layout that detailed analysis would show is impossible, such as for an opponent to have a 14-card hand. It is common in misinformation cases for a player to get ‘tunnel vision’: if they know from misinformation that there is a certain layout, they will not change that view during the play. It is sometimes possible to work out from the sight of dummy or the first few tricks that there must have been either misinformation or a misbid during the auction. Many people, including experienced players, do not correctly draw that conclusion if they have been misinformed, even if it would be considered obvious when given as an academic exercise away from the table."

[KingCovert]

 weejonnie, on 2020-July-24, 10:40, said:

No - at least not in the EBU Blue book. (BTW SeWoG no longer exists and hasn't since August or September 2017 - it is now ESEoG) - and of course the ESEoG has to be unrelated to the infraction.

"For clarity, the following would usually not be considered to be ‘an extremely serious error’:
• Forgetting a partnership agreement, forgetting that partner is a passed hand or misunderstanding partner’s call. The class of player and experience of the partnership are relevant. Treating a double of an opening 1S bid as penalties might be considered an extremely serious error by a strong player.
• Any play that would be deemed ‘normal’, albeit careless or inferior, in ruling a contested claim.
• Any play that has a reasonable chance of success, even if it is obviously not the percentage line.
• Playing for a layout that detailed analysis would show is impossible, such as for an opponent to have a 14-card hand. It is common in misinformation cases for a player to get ‘tunnel vision’: if they know from misinformation that there is a certain layout, they will not change that view during the play. It is sometimes possible to work out from the sight of dummy or the first few tricks that there must have been either misinformation or a misbid during the auction. Many people, including experienced players, do not correctly draw that conclusion if they have been misinformed, even if it would be considered obvious when given as an academic exercise away from the table."

Is it considered "detailed analysis" to assess that a 1NT opener needs to have opening values? I don't think it's normal to play a 1NT opener to have 9 HCP points, much less 7.

[mycroft]

Alerted? or asked about and answered? Both would lead to the result in the OP. Not saying it wasn't, but the explanation of what happened in the OP seems much more reasonable than West Alerting their second double.

[Vampyr]

 mycroft, on 2020-July-24, 12:53, said:

Alerted? or asked about and answered? Both would lead to the result in the OP. Not saying it wasn't, but the explanation of what happened in the OP seems much more reasonable than West Alerting their second double.

I don’t quite understand what you mean. It would be correct to alert a penalty double, and West presumably did.

[lamford]

 Vampyr, on 2020-July-24, 15:01, said:

I don’t quite understand what you mean. It would be correct to alert a penalty double, and West presumably did.

Indeed the silver bullet is the yellow border which displays "Pen" when you hover over it. Perhaps Mycroft is colour blind.

[blackshoe]

Or perhaps he's recognized that in posting these kinds of problems people sometimes use that yellow box even though there was no alert at the table.

[nige1]

 Cyberyeti, on 2020-July-24, 08:17, said:

Are you really playing them to have opened 1043, K94, AJ42, K43 1N ? You also already know W's penalty double is on an absolute maximum of Qx so is not any sort of trump stack.

CyberYeti correctly points out that few Easts would open 1N on ♠ 1043 ♥ K94 ♦ AJ42 ♣ K43 . But had he done so, in the 3 card ending, if South exits with a ♥, East wins his ♥ honour to lead a plain suit , promoting West's ♥ honour. In the actual 3-card ending, the only way South can succeed is to play for West to have made a low-level penalty double with a small singleton trump.

 lamford, on 2020-July-25, 16:03, said:

Indeed the silver bullet is the yellow border which displays "Pen" when you hover over it.

The chat-log confirms that the OP information is correct .
At the end of the auction, South asked West about his double of 2♥ and West annotated it as "Pen".
At the end of play, South asked the table if the double is really penalty. Both West and East answered that they had "No agreement".

[sanst]

There was a misexplanation, so you have to rule in favour of the NOS. S has a not completely idiotic story about the way he was damaged, so I would decide 2♥X+1. Whether a misclick counts as an extremely serious error I leave to the pundits of directing online bridge, but I don’t think it would count as such when compared to the examples given by the WBFLC.

[nige1]

 sanst, on 2020-July-26, 14:49, said:

S has a not completely idiotic story about the way he was damaged, so I would decide 2♥X+1.

IMO, 2♥X+1 is over-generous. South made (at least) 2 idiotic mistakes

• Not rising with ♣Q at trick 2. A cost-nothing play. which would gain when, in view of dummy's ♣ holding, and having heard West double 2♣, East under-led his ♣s with ♠ 1043 ♥ Q94 ♦ A42 ♣ AK43.
• Ruffing dummy's ♦ winner.

Defenders can make mistakes too: Double-dummy, 2♥ can always be defeated