[pilowsky]

Yesterday I joined the EBU, and today I played in my first tournament.
Without a partner, I decided to hire a robot since I understand (a little bit) the GIB system.
As it turned out, I was in good company; human+robot accounted for 50% of my opponents.

The tournament started with the Director ‘Dave’ introducing him(her)self.
Dave asked me to alert my system and carding.
I announced, “GIB 2/1, but the carding is a little bit of a mystery”.
Then Dave warned me, inter alia, that chat was recorded - but only for disciplinary purposes. I warned my partner to behave and to explain all his bids. He was generally compliant. I was a little concerned that if asked about his signals, my partner might refuse to explain, but no-one asked—a narrow escape.
Since my Human/Human opponents were all playing variants of Acol (AKA Bridge), this allowed me to discover how much better or worse Acol is than 2/1 GIB.
My average result against Human/GIB opponents was almost exactly 25% worse than my results against Human/Human pairs.
The findings prove - beyond any shadow of a doubt - that Acol is 25% better than GIB (n=1).

Conclusion: I very much enjoyed my first outing in the EBU.
My only quibble or cavil is that, unlike the ACBL, the EBU does not provide tournaments (other than daylongs) at times suitable for semi-British ex-pats like me that live in Australia.