[lamford]

 mrdct, on 2011-December-10, 17:55, said:

I rule one down and advise South to be more careful with his compass designations in future.

So a valid claim would have been "I will play the person sitting East, who took out the West hand, for the queen of diamonds?"

[ahydra]

 campboy, on 2011-December-10, 16:58, said:

No. The board was rotated but the hands were rotated with it I think. So the hand that held the ♦Q was the West hand, held by the player indicated on the board as West, but sitting in the seat which had been East's for the preceding boards.

But check out the diagram. Declarer is South and the West cards include the DQ. We then see

Quote

South said, "No, I am North, but I see the board has been rotated through 180 degrees".

implying that the person in the South seat has the North cards, the person in the West seat has the East cards, and so the person in the West seat does NOT have the DQ. As I've stated, my contention is the board states which hand is which, and decl meant the same. So when declarer says "I am playing East for the DQ" he means the person holding the East cards, even though he may be sitting in the West seat - and I read Law 2 to say "the seats don't matter, only the board". Hence the claim is good.

If the guy sitting in the East seat was holding the DQ, the diagram would imply North is declarer, which doesn't fit with the story. Perhaps lamford could clarify?

Edit: hang on a minute something's not quite right

ahydra

[lamford]

Quote

If the guy sitting in the East seat was holding the DQ, the diagram would imply North is declarer, which doesn't fit with the story. Perhaps lamford could clarify?

The diagram is as it would be for a duplimat file, and as it would be printed as a hand record. So declarer, who opened 1NT was sitting in the North seat, but had taken out the South cards, as the board had been rotated. When making the claim, he referred to East which he regarded as the person on his left. This was the person with the West hand.

[ahydra]

 lamford, on 2011-December-10, 18:22, said:

The diagram is as it would be for a duplimat file, and as it would be printed as a hand record. So declarer, who opened 1NT was sitting in the North seat, but had taken out the South cards, as the board had been rotated. When making the claim, he referred to East which he regarded as the person on his left. This was the person with the West hand.

Right, that makes a lor more sense. It took me a while to figure out what was happening because the wording "[The board was rotated 180 degrees]... the person holding the South cards on this board should have sat North throughout..." almost made it sound like North had sat down in South's chair and hence gotten confused, but then that wouldn't make sense because the board was rotated and so declarer would be North, which he isn't. (If that makes any sense!)

So in that case I change my vote to "one off". If declarer says East, he means "the guy with the East cards", and the West cards have the DQ. In fact my entire logic earlier was flawed because I'd failed to realise my interpretation implied North was dealer (although the auction would be identical). To avoid further headaches please do not make a rehash of this with North opening out of turn (unnoticed)!

ahydra

[barmar]

I would try to ascertain declarer's demeanor when his claim was contested. Unless he's a great actor, if he seemed really surprised that "East" claimed to be "Wast", I'd judge in his favor. I think what matters is claimer's intent. If a player had been North all night, I'd forgive him for not noticing that the board had been rotated.

[lamford]

 ahydra, on 2011-December-10, 18:31, said:

If declarer says East, he means "the guy with the East cards", and the West cards have the DQ.

Why doesn't he mean "East"? He did not say "the guy with the East cards". Why should the TD always ask the player to repeat his claim statement if its exact meaning does not matter? In this, and other claims, people seem prepared to substitute what they think the person meant for what he actually said, whether or not it is to his advantage. If he had said "queen of clubs" you would also have substituted "queen of diamonds," I am sure. I would have just ruled one off if he had said "clubs" and would, as mrdct says, tell him to be more careful with the suits next time

[Jeremy69A]

Quote

No, 'the East hand' is defined by the markings on the board. East is defined by the organisers.

I don't agree with this. When you sit down and play you pick out cards from the first board. If you started as North and there is the largest N behind you you could ever wish to see but the second board is placed carelessly on the table so you are picking up the South cards then for the purposes of this board you are South. It will be scored as so and on the bridgemate or traveller you will enter that you have played 7NT by South.Law 3 says that the director(not the organisers) designates a direction to be North but not what happens if North and South are reversed. IMO you won't find a director on Planet Earth who, if his attention were drawn to this, would say anything other than "get the next board right please"

[pran]

 Jeremy69A, on 2011-December-11, 10:13, said:

I don't agree with this. When you sit down and play you pick out cards from the first board. If you started as North and there is the largest N behind you you could ever wish to see but the second board is placed carelessly on the table so you are picking up the South cards then for the purposes of this board you are South. It will be scored as so and on the bridgemate or traveller you will enter that you have played 7NT by South.Law 3 says that the director(not the organisers) designates a direction to be North but not what happens if North and South are reversed. IMO you won't find a director on Planet Earth who, if his attention were drawn to this, would say anything other than "get the next board right please"

Oh yes, I would (and indeed always) say: Make sure you register the result on the board with declarer according to the cards he held, not according to where he sat at the table!

[Jeremy69A]

Quote

Oh yes, I would (and indeed always) say: Make sure you register the result on the board with declarer according to the cards he held, not according to where he sat at the table!

I think you misunderstand me. I completely agree the board is scored as it was played i.e. the normal North sitting South for this board and when this is drawn to the attention of the director which often it never will be the director will say "play the next board the right way round please".

[lamford]

 Jeremy69A, on 2011-December-11, 10:13, said:

When you sit down and play you pick out cards from the first board. If you started as North and there is the largest N behind you you could ever wish to see but the second board is placed carelessly on the table so you are picking up the South cards then for the purposes of this board you are South.

I agree with you (and others) on reflection, and I was wrong. North will change his compass direction when he takes out the South (or any other cards) and the claim should therefore be disallowed.

[campboy]

 Jeremy69A, on 2011-December-11, 10:13, said:

If you started as North and there is the largest N behind you you could ever wish to see but the second board is placed carelessly on the table so you are picking up the South cards then for the purposes of this board you are South.

Also you're probably in Los Angeles sometime between 1923 and 1949

[mrdct]

 lamford, on 2011-December-10, 17:59, said:

No, 'the East hand' is defined by the markings on the board. East is defined by the organisers.

When that claimer says "I'm going to play East to hold the ♦Q" that is to be taken as "I'm going to play the East Hand to hold the ♦Q".

The bit at the end of Law 2 strongly implies that the markings on the board are the sole determinant of who is which compass direction through the statement "No board that fails to conform to these conditions should be used. If such board is used, however, the conditions marked on it apply for that session".

You could also look at Law 7B1 "Each player takes a hand from the pocket corresponding to his compass position" which reinforces the concept that the board markings define each player's compass position. In other words, whichever person pulled out the east hand from the east pocket of the board, assumes the compass position of east and is thereafter referred to as "east".

It is quite common for boards to played out of alignment with magnetic compass directions and/or markings on the wall of the playing room; e.g. arrow-switched rounds, boxed tables and N-S being switched because the board was incorrectly placed on the table. It all comes back to the marking on the board.

[blackshoe]

"is to be"? sez who?

I'll grant you that if the board is oriented so that the guy who's been North all night (and probably every night for the last ten years) has the South pocket of the board in front of him, for this board he's South. I think he can be forgiven though, for not noticing that the board had been rotated 180 degrees — after all, it seems no one else noticed that either. He thinks he's North. If he's North, he thinks the guy on his left is East, so when he said "East" he meant "the guy on my left". Unless you believe that every bridge player cheats, or at least bends the rules in his favor, at every opportunity. In that case clearly declarer always intended to claim he was finessing in whichever direction works. But I don't buy it.

[ahydra]

 lamford, on 2011-December-11, 07:14, said:

Why doesn't he mean "East"? He did not say "the guy with the East cards". Why should the TD always ask the player to repeat his claim statement if its exact meaning does not matter? In this, and other claims, people seem prepared to substitute what they think the person meant for what he actually said, whether or not it is to his advantage. If he had said "queen of clubs" you would also have substituted "queen of diamonds," I am sure. I would have just ruled one off if he had said "clubs" and would, as mrdct says, tell him to be more careful with the suits next time

My contention is that the board markings define which hand is which. So in absence of any further clarification, "East" (uttered by anyone at the table) means "the guy with the East cards". And surely the exact meaning does matter here.

If he said "queen of clubs" then I would rule one down, but not for the reason he got the suits wrong. Playing an opponent for a card you hold is completely nonsensical and so the claim must be completely discarded. But play has finished and we can't give declarer a trick that depends on finding a particular opponent with a specific card (here the DQ), so he's one off.

ahydra

[barmar]

I think we should be realistic, not pedantic, about this. Declarer has conflicting information in front of him: the board says one thing, the table mat (which probably has bigger, bolder type, and matches his experience of the rest of the evening) says another. Ask him to clarify: "Did you mean the East on the board or East on the table mat?"

Unless you think he's deliberately trying to take advantage of the board rotation (I'll have to remember to rotate the board whenever I think I may have a guess like this), this should be a reasonable solution.

[Vampyr]

 barmar, on 2011-December-12, 16:25, said:

the board says one thing, the table mat

The what?

[barmar]

Also called movement cards or guide cards.

[barmar]

Another thing you can check is the player's private score. If they wrote down the contract, and entered it as played by North, this corroborates the claim that they didn't notice the board was rotated.