[benellis58]

The GIBBO robots sitting East-West and "defending" against South's 2H could have done a few things better, but the biggest piece of comedy was how West singlehandedly managed to SHRINK their three NATURAL and "guaranteed" trump (heart) tricks into only two! His inept handling of his trump assets deserves to become the stuff of legend. These clowns are SO bad!

https://www.bridgeba...H9%7Cpc%7CC3%7C

[benellis58]

At trick four, the incompetent GIBBO robot sitting West makes the cowardly and unabashedly stupid play of popping his club king. The M.O.R.O.N. gets what he deserves when he crashes his "partner's" king.

https://www.bridgeba...C2%7Cmc%7C11%7C

[benellis58]

Time to talk about the supremely lousy GIB definitions...again!

East-West pass throughout, and it's about time someone...threw out (ha, ha) the wretched GIB definitions.

South opens 1C and GIB feels it MUST begin by telling us that this is a "Minor suit opening". Gee, no KIDDING?

North responds 1D, which we are advised is "One over one". Wow! SO useful!

South bids 2NT, and we're proudly told that this is a "Jump in notrump". Pure, unadulterated garbage in all three cases!

It later says that, among other things, the 2NT bid shows "18-19 HCP". That's correct (alert the press!), so why am I mentioning it?

Well, I'm mentioning it, because North then bids 3D, which (sigh!) begins with the unnecessary, annoying, insulting words "Rebid suit", over which South bids 3NT. But this 3NT call NOW claims that South has exactly...nineteen HCP. Not "18-19", as the definition for 2NT correctly stated, but exactly 19. WHY, pray tell? Why must he now...magically...have 19? Answer: He DOESN'T have to have 19. The bid shows the SAME "18-19 HCP" that 2NT showed, but the typically PATHETIC GIB definition can't even be consistent or get a simple and obvious thing like that right.

It's no wonder that the GIBBO robots are such outstandingly bad bridge players when they're saddled with a hopeless, antiquated system and some of the worst definitions in history.

https://www.bridgeba...C3%7Cmc%7C13%7C

[benellis58]

Do the GIBBO robots play fourth best leads?

Well, uh, yeah, I guess they do...as this hand HILARIOUSLY shows, when the slow-witted (or should I say NO-witted???!!!) GIBBO robot leads the TEN of clubs from AKQ10! Is he a robot...or is he a TROUT? Probably both!

https://www.bridgeba...CH2%7Cmc%7C8%7C

[benellis58]

It's crashing time again. The last time we saw a crash was three posts above, in # 622. Well, as The Fortunes sang way back in 1965, "Here It Comes Again".

In #622, it was West who was guilty when he stupidly popped a king. On this hand, it's East who stupidly pops an ace, showing why these two nitwits play together: They're BOTH GIBBO robots and they're BOTH imbeciles!

South has five "inescapable" losers: three top diamonds and two top clubs...but against these two inept GIBBO robots - as dumb a pair of simpletons as you'll find anywhere except in an ant colony - he loses only TWO diamonds when the clueless East robot crashes his "partner's" stiff king.

To once again quote The Fortunes, this time also from 1965, but from their first and biggest hit, we can say quite truthfully to the GIBBO robots "You've Got Your Troubles"!

https://tinyurl.brid...se.com/2p86ncu9

[benellis58]

This is a reminder that although several hundred hands discussing GIBBO absurdities have thus far been documented in this thread, those hands are merely an infinitesimal portion of the ones that could have been recorded.

The sad truth is that there is almost always something that is rotten in the state of Denmark when it comes to GIBBO. (That's merely a literary reference, not a knock on the great and wonderful nation of Denmark!). The GIBBO system, definitions, bidding, leads, defence, and yes, even declarer play are almost always exposed as being sub-optimal.

[benellis58]

Eleven tricks are open and shut for North-South in hearts, so the lead was irrelevant. Leads often involve guesswork and luck. But still, why would the GIBBO robot sitting West be leading the 10 of clubs from 102 doubleton rather than the king of diamonds from KQ985 on this auction where hearts was the only suit bid? A club lead could be best on some layouts, but the king of diamonds will, I think, be a safer lead and a more attacking one. The GIBBO robots, though, seem to lack not just intelligence but also courage, with their fear of leading from honours and their ill-judged LOVE of leading doubletons.

I'm always happy to have TWO GIBBO robots as "opponents" and only ONE (thank HEAVEN!) as a "partner". Even that ONE is often one MORE than I would prefer!

https://tinyurl.brid...se.com/ycx4z7hd

[benellis58]

It often pays to compete for a partial, but the GIBBO robots do it too often and sometimes - as on this hand - at the wrong times and under the wrong circumstances.

Over North's preference to 2H, East stupidly (what else is new?) bids 2S. I say that for several reasons:

One: He only has 4 spades, and his partner East is marked for at most 3, because with 4 he would have made a negative double over South's 1H rather than bidding 2C.

Two: Yes, of course West can always pull 2S to 3C, as he did here,...BUT: Does East really WANT that very likely scenario to happen? Probably NOT, because...

Three: HE (East) knows that he has ONLY a three-card club suit...with a flattish (almost pancake) 4-4-2-3 shape...and with no significant extra values (13 HCP in a hand with which he already opened the bidding).

Four: East is doing this in DIRECT position, not even in the passout seat. If it's "right" to compete, his partner West can STILL do it even if East passes. The GIBBO robots are OFTEN guilty of this same sin, apparently feeling that they and ONLY they can decide for the partnership. If they were decent players, that might occasionally be reasonable, but these VERY inaccurately named "intelligent bridge players" are the lowest of the low. Calling a GIBBO robot an "intelligent bridge player" is like calling a bald person "Curly"!

Five: MOST significantly, he is doing this RED against WHITE...but these dimwitted GIBBO robots NEVER pay attention to vulnerability, which is one of the numerous reasons that they are such hopeless bridge players.

https://tinyurl.brid...se.com/5n8awdfx

[benellis58]

Overcompeting AGAIN. This time it's West who's the I.D.I.O.T.

He's vulnerable. His initial 1D overcall was about as shabby as it could be, with a fairly unshapely 2-4-5-2, an unimpressive 8 HCP, and a LOUSY diamond suit...opposite a partner (East) who had PASSED as dealer. But okay, we'll forgive him for the 1D overcall. We WON'T forgive him, though, for later bidding THREE diamonds in the passout seat (competing against NS's 3C). Yes, his partner East had indeed shown a limit raise of diamonds, but that did not alter the fact that he did so as a PASSED hand, and it certainly did not alter the fact that West had only barely (if THAT!) been justified in earlier bidding ONE diamond.

The fact that he was vul made his decision all the more silly, as borne out by what happened. He went down two, for the dreaded matchpoint result of minus TWO hundred, and a score on the board of ZERO percent. At least if he had been NON-vul and escaped being doubled (as he did in actuality - not that it mattered!), it would have been "only" minus ONE hundred. But again: Vulnerability is irrelevant to these fools...BECAUSE they are fools!

He also declared the hand like Abdullah the Butcher, but that's another story.

https://tinyurl.brid...se.com/55fa79c3

[benellis58]

The GIBBO robots sitting EW bid 3NT and took 9 tricks for plus 400. They scored 25 % on the board. We scored 75 %. But who really cares? That's not why I'm writing about the hand. I'm writing about it for the usual reason: to, in Diana's terminology (since she was the person who wisely created and named this thread), "BASH" the GIBBO robots in the hope of exposing their multitudinous shortcomings so that the powers that be might be inspired to make LONG overdue improvements to this key component of BBO.

I personally feel that the GIBBO system of JUMPING in response to an overcall to initiate a force (as in East's jump to 2S on this hand) is wasteful and silly. Some might disagree, but come ON! This is 2026 , not 1957!

EW barrel into game on sheer momentum after the wasteful 2S bid. West bids 3C, defined as showing "13-17 HCP"...even though he actually has only TEN (!), a full THREE fewer than the MINIMUM he is "promising" and SEVEN fewer than his defined maximum. Hopeless! They reach 3NT on (only) a combined 22 HCP (10 opposite 12). It's not a great game, but EW luck into a very favourable layout: ace of spades onside and spades 3-3. King of hearts onside and hearts 3-3. KQ of clubs both onside. The ONLY unfavourable lie is that the diamond king is off, but that's of little harm, as even there EW can and do take three diamond tricks while losing only one.

North is on lead with AJ4, 732, 10652, 1062. Does he lead a CLUB, the suit that I, South, his partner opened? Of COURSE he doesn't, because HE'S a GIBBO robot and they HATE leading PARTNER'S suit. He leads a DIAMOND, the suit that East bid, because they LOVE leading the ENEMY suits. Yeah, great philosophy...well, on Bizarro World anyway.

I win the offside diamond king at trick one and shift to the 5 of clubs from KQ754. Declarer West has AJ83 and can see the stiff 9 in dummy. He KNOWS that I opened one CLUB. He plays his...3...LOSING to North's 10. Had he instead inserted his JACK, he would have WON the trick and still had his ace. Am I being too tough on declarer? Maybe yes, since playing the 3 seems "normal" and uses the value of dummy's stiff 9 to force a higher card from North, ...BUT...in addition to what he knows from the auction and what he might be able to deduce from my shift, there is the KEY inference that if I had held the club 10, I might have LED it (rather than the 5) to pickle dummy's stiff 9.

Okay, let's now fast-forward to trick 6 and a typically STUPID play that the GIBBO robots LOVE...because THEY are stupid! By this time, two rounds of diamonds have been played, with everyone showing in. Thus, 8 diamonds are gone and only five remain. This is how the remaining ones are distributed:

Declarer West has the stiff 8. "Defender" North, my GIBBO "partner", has 106. Dummy East has J9. I, the sole human at the table, am void. The diamond situation is AN OPERN BOOK to my "partner" North! He KNOWS that 8 diamonds have been played, so he KNOWS that only 5 remain. He can SEE that declarer West just led the 8, he can SEE the 106 in his OWN hand, and he can SEE the J9 in dummy. That adds up to FIVE...ALL the remaining diamonds, so he KNOWS that I am void. DECLARER, however, does NOT know that.

Now, as you can see, when declarer leads his diamond 8, he CAN now take two diamond tricks in dummy...IF he GUESSES the suit correctly. If North plays his SIX from his remaining 106 doubleton, declarer CAN insert dummy's 9 from J9 doubleton. It will win the trick and he can then cash the HIGH jack of diamonds also. BUT...he has to GUESS the diamond layout. The remaining NS diamonds might be 1-1 OR they might be 2-0. If declarer guesses to hook, playing for them 2-0, and inserting dummy's 9, then good for him for guessing correctly. BUT...if he guesses to play for them being 1-1 and therefore goes up with dummy's jack hoping to drop a stiff 10 in the South hand, he will take only ONE diamond trick at this point, NOT two. Sometimes a declarer (any declarer) will guess right and sometimes he'll guess wrong...but when a GIBBO robot is "defending", the declarer won't HAVE to guess, because...the M.O.R.O.N., the clueless, hopeless M.O.R.O.N. sitting North did NOT make the easy, obvious, and NORMAL play of the diamond SIX from his remaining 106! The oblivious ignoramus played his TEN! But yeah, all you robot protectors out there, by all means KEEP blabbing about how they are "better" (ha, HA, HA!) "than most human players". Yeah, right...and the sky is actually made of marshmallows too, right?

These GIBBO robots are SO hopeless in every way imaginable.

https://tinyurl.brid...se.com/4sbwdps4

[benellis58]

Question: Did the GIBBO robots sitting East-West produce the greatest defence of all time on this hand?

Answer: No, they didn't...they definitely didn't. Then again, do they EVER?

https://tinyurl.brid...se.com/67v8ah9e

[benellis58]

Not my table, but well worth posting as an example of the astounding cluelessness of the GIBBO robots.

Against South's "ambitious" (ahem) 6C contract, West leads the heart king, which seems reasonable. BUT...do the robots have any idea what to DO in a situation like this? For example, in "real" F2F bridge with a human partner and human opponents, I play that at the five level or higher the lead of an ace demands attitude and the lead of a king demands count. Other people might have their own defensive signal systems and they don't have to be the same as mine, but they should have SOMETGING in place so that they can get appropriate information.

With GIBBO robots, however, IF they ever signal (and I don't know if they ever do!), they seem wildly and consistently unsuccessful in getting their message across. In other words, they're as hopeless with this essential task as they are with just about everything.

Anyway, West leads his heart king from AKQJ and his partner East follows with the DEUCE from 10972. Is this supposed to be count? Attitude? Standard? Upside down? Who knows? I don't. I think they play standard, NOT upside down, but is it supposed to be count or attitude here, in THEIR (Bizarro) World?

Very possibly, it means NOTHING in their Bizarro World, although I could be wrong, and maybe the two IS supposed to mean something. But whatever the story is, the fact is that West now went VERY wrong (something he is VERY good at, since he does it VERY often).

At trick two West, imbecile that he is, continued with the ace of hearts...and declarer South had ALL 12 of the last 12 tricks (via 7 clubs and 5 spades), scoring up his slam despite being off two CASHABLE aces!

West, as usual, "defended" like the total I.D.I.O.T. that he is. EVEN if these nincompoops lack a signaling system (which in and of itself would be downright stupid), it was obvious for West to play his DIAMOND ace at trick two. Why? Because a second heart might or might not be cashing, but the diamond ace is guaranteed to cash. South had bid 3NT, pitifully defined as usual as "5- hearts; 5- spades;25-32 HCP; likely stop in diamonds". Yeah, I would think he WOULD have "a likely stop in diamonds", since West had OPENED 1D and South said he wanted to play 3NT! So it was OBVIOUS for West to cash his diamond ace at trick two. The fact that he didn't underscores how overwhelmingly bad these so-called "intelligent bridge players" (the *****ous GIBBO robots) are. And BTW, that definition for 3NT, especially the utter nonsense about "25-32 HCP" illustrates for the Nth time how overpoweringly worthless the GIB definitions are.

https://www.bridgeba...D6%7Cpc%7CDJ%7C

[benellis58]

Most people, including me, feel that declarer play is by far the best part of the game for a GIBBO robot. The GIBBO robot playing THIS hand, however, seems intent on proving that they aren't even good at declaring. After South leads the heart king, all East has to do is pull three rounds of trump and then play diamonds, Instead he goes off on some half-baked mix and match "strategy" (ha, ha!) of pulling only ONE round of trumps, punching himself in clubs, and then finally playing diamonds BEFORE playing a second round of trumps. And, as a reminder, declaring is by FAR the BEST part of his game.

https://www.bridgeba...CS5%7Cmc%7C9%7C

[benellis58]

The bidding "judgment" and "wisdom" of the GIBBO robots is on full display here.

North can't bid over TWO hearts but is later THRILLED to bid over FOUR hearts, no doubt because of his FABULOUS spade support of Q2 doubleton...opposite a partner, South, who opened 1S but never bid again, as EW barreled into 4H.

4S would NOT have been a success, but luckily West was ALSO a GIBBO robot, so despite having good defence against 4S, he chose to bid 5H, get doubled, and go for 500. When these clowns play against each other, it's not a question of who will make a mistake, because usually they BOTH will. Thus, it's usually a question of who will make the biggest or final mistake.

https://www.bridgeba...C7%7Cpc%7CST%7C

[benellis58]

I played some robot games today. The GIBBO robots unerringly exhibited their world class incompetence. The more I play with them, the more my contempt for them increases. I'll write up some hands later, but only a small number of the ones that deserve to be written up. Why only a small number of them? Because it would probably take several days to fully document the massive amounts of atrocities the hopeless fools committed. North, East, West, take your pick, but if you're talking about GIBBO robots, they all rot.

[benellis58]

I am writing up this hand purely for "amusement" (?).

West, North, and East are all GIBBO robots. The only human is yours truly, sitting South.

NS scored 53.6 % on this board. It was played 15 times in all, with these results:

West declared 2D at 12 tables. He made 10 tricks at nine of them and 11 tricks at the other three.

West declared four diamonds at one table, ours. He made 10 tricks.

North declared 3C at one table and made 10 tricks.

South declared 4C at one table and made 11 tricks.

So, why did EW get all the way to FOUR diamonds at our table when all the other EW pairs who played diamonds stopped in two? Answer: Because when I play in a game with three GIBBO robots, I do a lot of strange things.

Why is that? Answer: Because I know going in that I am playing with a totally incompetent fool who is hopeless at bridge, AND that I am playing against two totally incompetent fools who are equally hopeless at bridge. Consequently, I often throw a spanner into the works just to see what will happen. Here the "spanner" was my 2C overcall on a...FOUR-bagger. Would it work out well or poorly? I certainly didn't know, but I was so fed up by the actions of the three imbeciles that I figured I'd experiment. So, after West opened 1D, North passed, and East bid 1S, I chirped in with a completely ridiculous 2C overcall on K973, J4, Q62, AK104. There's a saying "When in Rome...", so I just adapted it to "When in BIZARRO WORLD...". Nobody was vulnerable.

West made a support double and North, looking at J8, A10952, VOID, Q98752 (!!!) bid...3C!!! I'm not sure what the "perfect" bid would be with North's hand, but I am VERY sure that his unthinking and cowardly bid of 3C is NOT ideal!

East bid 3D, and South and West passed. North then collected his massive amounts of robot "courage" (ha, HA, HA!) and bid 4C, undoubtedly PRAYING that we would not be doubled and go down 10 tricks. After all, he "on;y" had six clubs to the queen...in the suit his PARTNER had overcalled at the TWO level, he "only" had a...VOID (!) in the enemy suit of diamonds, and he "only" had a side suit of FIVE hearts to the ace. Maybe if he ever goes to a store to purchase some badly-needed intelligence, he can also pick up a few bottles of courage at the same time! What a wimp!

After East and South passed, West competed with 4C, and the coward in the North breathed a huge sigh of relief, ecstatic that his partnership had been "rescued" from what he feared would have been a bloodbath in 4C. What a gigantic trout! Anyway, 4D by West became the final contract, and now the TROUT was on lead. What did he choose? For reasons best known to himself (and possibly to others in the fish species), he quickly tabled... the spade jack (!!!???). Regardless of whatever the layout might have turned out to be, why would Captain Courageous (the trout in the North) want to lead that card on the auction that had occurred?

Anyway, my foray into Bizarro World with my ridiculous 2C bid ended up being just slightly above average, but at least I had the "fun" (?) of experimenting and seeing yet AGAIN how hopeless the robots are. You can play a perfectly normal game, OR you can operate like mad and "experiment", but WHICHEVER approach you take, you can bet that the GIBBO robots will be as clueless as ever.

https://tinyurl.brid...se.com/bdzzjcas

[benellis58]

Not exactly the killing lead, as (among other things) it picks up the whole club suit without South having to raise a sweat. But those robots sure love their doubleton leads, don't they?

https://www.bridgeba...H6%7Cpc%7CHK%7C

[benellis58]

East and West both fell in love with their hands and decided to compete to FOUR clubs VULNERABLE. The two love affairs ended in two broken hearts when their ridiculous auction got them to a bad contract and they "earned" a score of 3.57 % on the board. Their NS opponents graciously thanked them for the 96.43 % that THEY scored. You know, I think a LOT of GIBBO's opponents OFTEN thank them graciously for tops or near-tops. The robots might be execrable bridge players, but they're very good at making friends.

https://www.bridgeba...CH7%7Cmc%7C8%7C

[benellis58]

That's quite an AMAZING 4H bid by the GIBBO robot in the North, and I don't mean "amazing" in a GOOD way.

It worked out okay, since he lucked out and found - purely by CHANCE - his partner South with a very useful hand. He made 11 tricks for a score of 82.31 %, but that doesn't mean that it was a good call.

https://www.bridgeba...S5%7Cmc%7C11%7C

[benellis58]

Another piece of incriminating evidence in the ongoing saga of the wretched GIB definitions and the laughably bad GIBBO system:

Over North's "impossible 2S" bid, South would have LIKED to bid 2NT, since he had basically a weak 1NT type of hand (albeit with five hearts, which he had already shown). That way he could stay at the TWO level with his mere 12 HCP opposite a partner who was KNOWN to have at MOST 12, since this was a "best hand" game. 2NT would have been the best description of South's hand at that point. He even had at least a partial stoper in every suit EXCEPT clubs.

2NT would have been the perfect bid...but he couldn't make it, because the hideous GIBBO system defined it as "Invitational to 3NT game". Not only is that a remarkably stupid way to play the bid, but the annoying and ridiculous GIB definition also felt it was ESSENTIAL to advise BBO players that 3NT is "game". Pathetic joke of a system, pathetic definitions!

South looked at alternatives, but in the incredibly bizarre world of GIB/GIBBO, the definition most applicable was for 3C, so South glumly bid 3C, knowing full well how stupid the call was.

North now...bid 3NT! What if South had wanted to END the auction in 3C? I guess there's no way he can do that in their imbecilic system! The definition of North's 3NT, by the way, said that it showed "12+ HCP" and "12- total points". More stupidity! First, he doesn't have even 12 HCP, let alone "12+", which literally means 12-37, since the hopeless GIB definition lazily fails to identify an upper limit. Second (sigh), HCP can be equal to or less than "total" points, but they CANNOT be greater, although this definition implies the reverse. Third, why are "total" points even in the conversation, given that the contract is now in NT?

The result was fine, as the 12 opposite 11 3NT happened to make, but as is so often the case, the definitions and even more so the system were exposed as being garbage.

https://www.bridgeba...DQ%7Cpc%7CC9%7C