[bluejak]

Hello all. Sorry I have not been around, for a number of reasons. I am not sure what I shall do in future. My interest in the Laws remains as strong as ever, but I am finding it harder and harder to survive in a world where people have a go, and I feel that here what I post does sometimes encourage people to do so. Of course I am still a moderator and you can write to me or to Ed, who will consult me if he sees fit. Anyway, two things have come up recently, and whatever I do, I shall look at and read the answers.

I have decided to delete a lot of threads unread, so if this or my other query has been discussed, please let me know.



I answer queries on the Laws for a free magazine called BRIDGE. It is generally aimed at the players who are in the lower half of the game, but very interestingly there is sufficient interest in the Laws that my column is a few pages long in every issue.

Someone wrote in to me and told me this query:

Assume declarer is South. East leads a spade, South revokes and plays a club, West revokes and plays a club, North [dummy] looks puzzled and asks what is going on. It is obvious to him that both West and South have spades.

Ignoring for a moment that dummy should not initiate a call for the TD, let us say everyone agrees there are two revokes and the TD is called.

Now, the obvious ruling seems to be that since neither revoke is established, both must be corrected, South puts the club back in his hand, West's club becomes a major penalty card. Does this seem fair? Well, no, but those are the rules.

My correspondent knew this but he put a suggestion to me. Consider the first revoke. The Law says it must be corrected, and any card played thereafter by the non-offending side may be withdrawn without penalty. So, when considering the first revoke only, can the second club not be put back in his hand without penalty, because for that revoke E/W are the non-offending side? Of course this is another example of the problems of multiple infractions but in this case it seems we could do this to make the result seem fairer.

What do you think?

[mink]

I would really disregard the revoke by the defender and only handle declarer's revoke as demanded by Law 62. Apart from that this is the easiest and most elegant way to solve the problem, it really might be the case that the second revoke never would have happened if declarer followed suit in ♠, as the defender might have been playing ♣ because he saw declarer's ♣ card and thought that it was led.

Karl

[blackshoe]

I agree with Karl, although I would add that, as a director, if I think it's possible that the defender's club play was because he thought clubs were led, I would investigate that possibility at the table if it mattered (it may not in this case). I guess what I'm saying is that the TD, in arriving at a ruling, should not rest on assumptions when he can probably determine the facts. See Laws 84 and 85.

[barmar]

I believe the rule regarding third hand being allowed to change his play without penalty should only apply to legal plays. The intent of this is that with the original card played by declarer, third hand might not have to play a high card for his side to win the trick, but if declarer corrects the revoke with a high card, third hand may need to play higher. Because his change of card is necessitated by declarer's infraction, the rule says that he can do this without any penalty, and his original card is AI to his partner.

But in the case at hand, the reason the defender has to change his card has nothing to do with declarer's infraction. I don't buy the argument that he thought clubs were led because declarer played a club. If that's what was going through his mind, it's his own fault for not paying careful enough attention. So he simply revoked, and has to change his card because that's the rule when rectifying an unestablished revoke. And in that case, the revoke card becomes a MPC.

P.S. What does "have a go" mean? It sounds like a British expression, but when I googled it a few sites said it means "make an attempt at something", which doesn't seem to fit what you're saying. And I also hope you didn't really mean it when you said you deleted threads (as a moderator, you have the ability to do that), but actually meant that you simply marked them as already read.

[pran]

 barmar, on 2013-August-25, 14:10, said:

I believe the rule regarding third hand being allowed to change his play without penalty should only apply to legal plays.

Law 62C1 says nothing to limit its application in such ways. What more this law caters for the possibility that the second revoke might be a directly unfortunate result of the first revoke.

And finally we have a minute from WBFLC to the effect that when there has been a revoke from each side then both revokes shall be handled under Law 64C (only), i.e. the Director shall establish the result on the board as if no revoke had occurred.

Let South correct his revoke and apply Law 62C1 on the revoke by West.

[gnasher]

 barmar, on 2013-August-25, 14:10, said:

P.S. What does "have a go" mean? It sounds like a British expression, but when I googled it a few sites said it means "make an attempt at something", which doesn't seem to fit what you're saying.

That's the traditional meaning in English English, as in "I'll have a go at learning Fantunes". There is a more recent idiom "to have a go at" a person, which means to attack them verbally or physically.

[vigfus]

Hello David

I like your idea about cases of over-revoking.
The laws are not fair for the second revoker. If fact the first revoker walks away with no damage.
The second revoker is punished heavily. My simpathy is all with him.

[barmar]

 pran, on 2013-August-25, 14:38, said:

Law 62C1 says nothing to limit its application in such ways. What more this law caters for the possibility that the second revoke might be a directly unfortunate result of the first revoke.

62C prescribes different consequences for the OS and NOS. In this case, both sides are offending. I don't see where it caters for the possibility that the second revoke by be a result of the first one, but even if it did I don't see how that can be. All players can see the first card led to the trick, "following suit" to the 2nd card is just inattention.

Quote

And finally we have a minute from WBFLC to the effect that when there has been a revoke from each side then both revokes shall be handled under Law 64C (only), i.e. the Director shall establish the result on the board as if no revoke had occurred.

Law 64 is about established revokes, this is an unestablished revoke. Does the minute really say that when there are two unestablished revokes we handle them as if they were established?

[Trinidad]

There are two irregularities. We deal with them separately.

Declarer's revoke is dealt with by letting him pick up the card he played and letting him play a correct card. LHO may pick up his card and change it. There is no penalty to the defending side for the fact that LHO changed his card (no UI, no penalty card).
The defender's revoke is dealt with by leaving the played card as a penalty card and letting him play a correct card. (The latter happens to coincide with the rule for declarer's revoke.)

The law says that LHO can change his card without penalty. It doesn't say that we are supposed to forgive him for all his sins. If that would be true LHO could drop his entire hand on the table after declarer revokes. After all, there is no penalty.

Rik

[pran]

 barmar, on 2013-August-25, 19:03, said:

62C prescribes different consequences for the OS and NOS. In this case, both sides are offending. I don't see where it caters for the possibility that the second revoke by be a result of the first one, but even if it did I don't see how that can be. All players can see the first card led to the trick, "following suit" to the 2nd card is just inattention.

Law 64 is about established revokes, this is an unestablished revoke. Does the minute really say that when there are two unestablished revokes we handle them as if they were established?

Paris, France, 1st November 2 said:

The Chairman quoted the case of a defender who revokes by ruffing and is over-ruffed by declarer who also has a card of the suit led. The committee noted that when the first revoke is made the declarer’s side is non-offending and when the second revoke is made the defenders’ side is non-offending. The committee decided that the Director should deal with this situation by restoring equity, based on what would have happened if no revoke had occurred, under Law 64C.

This minute apparently applies to non-established revokes as well as to established revokes. The objective is to "restoring Equity".

[mycroft]

Well, dummy's right is to enquire if *partner* has revoked, per L61B2a. Dummy may not say anything about defender's revoke, per L61B2b. Assuming he's asked about both with his query, then declarer's revoke must be corrected, and information about third-hand's card is unauthorized (L16B). L50 states that the correction requires a penalty card unless Declarer Director designates otherwise, and as I'm having real problems handling a card that must be played and may involve lead penalties, but that Declarer must avoid playing to that knowledge, I think it's reasonable to designate otherwise in this case, even if the "you can pick it up and play a different card, without penalty" which manages to "unrevoke" doesn't apply.

[barmar]

 pran, on 2013-August-26, 01:53, said:

This minute apparently applies to non-established revokes as well as to established revokes. The objective is to "restoring Equity".

I'd like to know the context of that minute.

Also, note that 64C only applies when the automatic revoke penalty doesn't compensate the NOS sufficiently. All you can do is transfer MORE tricks to the NOS, not fewer -- you can't just try to figure out what would have happened if there had been no revokes. But since there's no automatic penalty for non-established revokes, 64C still doesn't make sense.

So I suspect that the case the committee was discussing must have involved multiple established revokes. It's not possible to apply 64C any other way.

[blackshoe]

 mycroft, on 2013-August-26, 09:43, said:

L50 states that the correction requires a penalty card unless Declarer designates otherwise…

Director, not Declarer.

[pran]

 barmar, on 2013-August-26, 10:22, said:

I'd like to know the context of that minute.

Also, note that 64C only applies when the automatic revoke penalty doesn't compensate the NOS sufficiently. All you can do is transfer MORE tricks to the NOS, not fewer -- you can't just try to figure out what would have happened if there had been no revokes. But since there's no automatic penalty for non-established revokes, 64C still doesn't make sense.

So I suspect that the case the committee was discussing must have involved multiple established revokes. It's not possible to apply 64C any other way.

This was minute #4 out of 10 minutes handled in that particular session and my quotation is accurate and complete.

The fact that Law 64 (only) applies to established revokes is immaterial, the Committee discussed the general case of revokes by both sides to the same trick. Their resolution was that the Director shall restore equity, and they referred to the procedure outlined in Law 64C (i.e. as an example, or if you wish: By extending Law 64C to explicitly apply also in this special situation).

[mycroft]

 blackshoe, on 2013-August-26, 13:52, said:

Director, not Declarer.

Argh, fingers faster than brain. Corrected. Thanks.

[barmar]

 pran, on 2013-August-26, 14:52, said:

This was minute #4 out of 10 minutes handled in that particular session and my quotation is accurate and complete.

The fact that Law 64 (only) applies to established revokes is immaterial, the Committee discussed the general case of revokes by both sides to the same trick. Their resolution was that the Director shall restore equity, and they referred to the procedure outlined in Law 64C (i.e. as an example, or if you wish: By extending Law 64C to explicitly apply also in this special situation).

OK, I guess they decided that the simple, mechanical rule is too simple for the double-revoke case, and we have to resort to restoring equity. I wish they hadn't referred specifically to 64C, as that seems to confuse things because it emphasizes the reason for abandoning the simple rules (they aren't sufficient penalty to the OS), not the method.

I'd be much happier if they'd decided that when both sides revoke on the same trick, and they're not yet established, they cancel each other out -- both sides are both offending and non-offending. Back up to before the first revoke, and continue as if no infraction had occurred. The TD can still adjust based on some of the general laws, like the "could have known it would benefit" law.

[pran]

 barmar, on 2013-August-27, 13:55, said:

OK, I guess they decided that the simple, mechanical rule is too simple for the double-revoke case, and we have to resort to restoring equity.

Precisely!

 barmar, on 2013-August-27, 13:55, said:

I wish they hadn't referred specifically to 64C, as that seems to confuse things because it emphasizes the reason for abandoning the simple rules (they aren't sufficient penalty to the OS), not the method.
[...]

The original reason in Law 64C has never been insufficient penalty to the OS, it is insufficient compensation to NOS!

[barmar]

 pran, on 2013-August-27, 15:03, said:

The original reason in Law 64C has never been insufficient penalty to the OS, it is insufficient compensation to NOS!

In this case, the two are equivalent -- or could you assign split scores when adjusting for a revoke?

[pran]

 barmar, on 2013-August-28, 10:07, said:

In this case, the two are equivalent -- or could you assign split scores when adjusting for a revoke?

NO - not as far as I know.