[VixTD]

Currently law 12 states that the purpose of an assigned adjusted score is to remove any advantage the offenders may have gained from their own infraction. The new laws will add:

Quote

[Law12C1(b)] The Director in awarding an assigned adjusted score should seek to recover as nearly as possible the probable outcome of the board had the infraction not occurred.

This clause does not appear in the current laws.

Current practice, in England at least, is to apply what has become known as "sympathetic weighting" to an adjustment, to skew the weightings of possible outcomes slightly in favour of the non-offending side. So if without an infraction you think the opponents would bid a making game half the time, you might award 60% of +620 and 40% of +170 rather than 50% of each score.

I don't care for the name, as it's not really being done out of sympathy for the non-offenders, but rather in an effort to make sure the offenders don't gain from the infraction, but I approve of the practice.

Is the new wording of law 16 supposed to put a stop to sympathetic weighting?

[Trinidad]

VixTD, on 2017-April-25, 07:25, said:

I don't care for the name, as it's not really being done out of sympathy for the non-offenders, but rather in an effort to make sure the offenders don't gain from the infraction, but I approve of the practice.

The reason why I think that "sympathetic weighting" is appropriate is that the infraction robbed the non-offenders of a possibility to obtain a great score.

Without the infraction they just might have guessed every card right or they might have bid to the excellent contract. They could have chosen to go against the field. With the infraction, they are convicted to the "middle of the road" from the point of the infraction. I don't think it is fair to give them the excellent contract with the maximum number of tricks, like it used to be. But I do think that the non-offenders deserve a little bit of compensation for losing the opportunity for a fantastic score.

Rik

(edited to include the part that I was commenting on.)

[WellSpyder]

Trinidad, on 2017-April-25, 10:00, said:

The reason why I think that "sympathetic weighting" is appropriate is that the infraction robbed the non-offenders of a possibility to obtain a great score.

I don't think VixTD is querying the appropriateness of "sympathetic weighting". Rather, I read the OP as worrying about its legality under the new laws.

[Vampyr]

WellSpyder, on 2017-April-25, 10:49, said:

I don't think VixTD is querying the appropriateness of "sympathetic weighting". Rather, I read the OP as worrying about its legality under the new laws.

Yeah pretty obv. However, I wouldn't worry about the law in question. It doesn't actually say anything. The assumed result is a continuum, so you can choose any point along it within reason.

Yes, you could interpret it as "heads I win, tails I break even", since that is the situation for just about any infraction in the new laws. But I don't think you need to in this case.

[Trinidad]

WellSpyder, on 2017-April-25, 10:49, said:

I don't think VixTD is querying the appropriateness of "sympathetic weighting". Rather, I read the OP as worrying about its legality under the new laws.

We all agree to that. I should have made it clearer to what part of VixTD's post I was replying. I edited my post accordingly.

I also think that we agree that the "benefit of the doubt" should go to the non-offending side, though perhaps not as much as used to be the case long time ago.

Rik

[nige1]

Some infractions go unnoticed or unreported. Hence, effectively, score-weighing rewards law-breaking. The new law re-enforces that policy

[jallerton]

VixTD, on 2017-April-25, 07:25, said:

Currently law 12 states that the purpose of an assigned adjusted score is to remove any advantage the offenders may have gained from their own infraction. The new laws will add:

This clause does not appear in the current laws.

Current practice, in England at least, is to apply what has become known as "sympathetic weighting" to an adjustment, to skew the weightings of possible outcomes slightly in favour of the non-offending side. So if without an infraction you think the opponents would bid a making game half the time, you might award 60% of +620 and 40% of +170 rather than 50% of each score.

I don't care for the name, as it's not really being done out of sympathy for the non-offenders, but rather in an effort to make sure the offenders don't gain from the infraction, but I approve of the practice.

Is the new wording of law 16 supposed to put a stop to sympathetic weighting?

I don't think that the new wording changes this. One could equally argue that the wording of the current Law 12C1c "may be weighted to reflect the probabilities of a number of potential results" does not authorise the practice of sympathetic weighting.


The way I justify sympathetic weighting is as follows;

Taking your example, If I could be sure that game would be bid exactly half of the time, then I would assign 50% of +620 and 50% of +170 because that is what the Law tells me to do.

However, in practice I can rarely be sure. I am more likely to judge that game will be reached about half of the time. About half might translate to somewhere between 40% and 60%, but I can't be sure where within this range. This is where the sympathy comes in: I judge the probability to be either 40% or 60%, whichever is more beneficial to the non-offenders. The object is simply that the non-offenders do not lose out through my inability to estimate accurately enough what would might have happened.

[VixTD]

jallerton, on 2017-May-05, 16:35, said:

I don't think that the new wording changes this. One could equally argue that the wording of the current Law 12C1c "may be weighted to reflect the probabilities of a number of potential results" does not authorise the practice of sympathetic weighting.

I agree that the current wording does not authorise the practice, but under the new wording the practise will contravene the new laws.

[jallerton]

VixTD, on 2017-May-10, 06:13, said:

I agree that the current wording does not authorise the practice, but under the new wording the practise will contravene the new laws.

Why would it contravene the new laws?

Quote

[Law12C1(b)] The Director in awarding an assigned adjusted score should seek to recover as nearly as possible the probable outcome of the board had the infraction not occurred.

© An assigned adjusted score may be weighted to reflect the probabilities of a number of potential results, but only outcomes that could have been achieved in a legal manner may be included.

In my previous example, I don't know whether the probable outcome of the board includes game making 40%, 50% or 60% of the time. I see nothing in this wording which requires me to pick the median or mean of these percentages as my assessment of the probability of this outcome for the purposes of Law 12C1.

[VixTD]

VixTD, on 2017-May-10, 06:13, said:

I agree that the current wording does not authorise the practice, but under the new wording the practise practice will contravene the new laws.

jallerton, on 2017-May-16, 16:07, said:

Why would it contravene the new laws?

In my previous example, I don't know whether the probable outcome of the board includes game making 40%, 50% or 60% of the time. I see nothing in this wording which requires me to pick the median or mean of these percentages as my assessment of the probability of this outcome for the purposes of Law 12C1.

The new wording requires the director to make their best estimate of the outcome without the infraction and award that. What we do at the moment if we apply sympathetic weighting is to make our best estimate and take a little off the offenders and give it to the non-offenders.

I'm not suggesting that this skewed score will lie outside the set of possible outcomes, but it won't be the TD's best estimate of the probable outcome.

[I can't believe I misspelt "practice" in the quotation above.]

[barmar]

VixTD, on 2017-May-17, 11:31, said:

[I can't believe I misspelt "practice" in the quotation above.]

That obviously makes everything you've said suspect

[jallerton]

VixTD, on 2017-May-17, 11:31, said:

The new wording requires the director to make their best estimate of the outcome without the infraction and award that. What we do at the moment if we apply sympathetic weighting is to make our best estimate and take a little off the offenders and give it to the non-offenders.

I'm not suggesting that this skewed score will lie outside the set of possible outcomes, but it won't be the TD's best estimate of the probable outcome.

[I can't believe I misspelt "practice" in the quotation above.]

I don't interpret it that way.

12C1b refers to probable outcome, not probable outcomes; so it is relevant to cases when weighted scores are not applicable.

12C1c, the section relevant to weighted scores, refers to probabilities, but does not tie the TD's hands into using the median of his estimated range of probabilities for particular outcomes.

I also think we should get back to first principles. Law 12B1 starts:

Quote

The objective of score adjustment is to redress damage to a non-offending side and to take away any advantage gained by an offending side through its infraction

If I'm not sure whether 40%, 50% or 60% is the fairest estimate of the probability that the game bid without the infraction would have made, then how can I ensure that I have taken away any advantage gained by the offending side unless I give the non-offending side the benefit of the doubt within my plausible range?

[VixTD]

jallerton, on 2017-May-18, 15:00, said:

I don't interpret it that way.

12C1b refers to probable outcome, not probable outcomes; so it is relevant to cases when weighted scores are not applicable.

12C1c, the section relevant to weighted scores, refers to probabilities, but does not tie the TD's hands into using the median of his estimated range of probabilities for particular outcomes.

I also think we should get back to first principles. Law 12B1 starts:


If I'm not sure whether 40%, 50% or 60% is the fairest estimate of the probability that the game bid without the infraction would have made, then how can I ensure that I have taken away any advantage gained by the offending side unless I give the non-offending side the benefit of the doubt within my plausible range?

It is still the intention of a score adjustment to take away any advantage gained by the offending side, but as I pointed out at the Panel TD training course on the new laws, if you wanted this to be done by means of sympathetic weighting of scores you wouldn't phrase law 12C1(b) in this way.

I've been assured that it is the intention of the laws committee that sympathetic weighting continue, and that this will be made clear in a commentary.