Instructions for Kirwan Intermediate Master Teams Tournament
Saturday 22nd May at 19:30
First, we need to cover a little nomenclature. Each team consists of two pairs. One person acts as the team Captain. The Captain obviously plays with his or her partner. That leaves two others who constitute the second pair. One of that pair takes on the role of its Leader. So, the Team consists of the Captain and Captain’s partner plus a Leader and Leader’s partner. It is important that the Captain and the Leader are both comfortable with the BBO registration processes.
Finding the Game
Login to BBO and go to the Competitive Area. There are two ways you can do this:
- 1. On the home page, click on “Competitive”, then click on “All Tournaments” and then search for DNR.
- 2. Alternatively, on the home page, click on “Virtual Clubs”. Then click on “CBAI & NIBU – Ireland” and then search for DNR.
Registering
Registration starts as usual at 17:30 but is a little more complex than registration for a pairs game. At a pre-arranged time, the Captain and his or her partner logon together. The Captain invites partner to play in the usual way. Once partner accepts the invitation, you will notice the first difference; your name does not appear on the “Entries” list but on a different list which you access by clicking on a new tab at the top right of the screen which is labelled “Select Teammates”. In the meantime, Leader and his or her partner should go through the same process.
Once Captain and Leader have both registered with their partners, they must now form the team. Their partners are not required for this part of the process and don’t even need to be online. Captain and Leader must be online. Captain goes to the “Select Teammates” list and finds Leader and Leader’s partner’s names on it. Beside the names, there will be a button labelled “Invite”. Click it and Leader gets an invitation to join Captain’s Team. As soon as the invitation is accepted, all four players disappear from the “Select Teammates” list and appear on the “Entries” list.
What Can Go Wrong?
Plenty – for example you might inadvertently join the wrong team. If anything does go wrong, phone me (087 246 9129 or 01 538 0516) and I will try to get you sorted. Note that this can take a bit of time so please register early. I don’t want to get a bunch of calls at 19:00.
What Happens if a Registered Pair Fail to Get In?
Team captains should enter their teammates as friends in BBO. At 19:15, they should enter the Competitive Area of BBO and check that all their teammates are online and visible in the Competitive Area. If they are not, phone them. If a pair fail to get in, their teammates will get in regardless. I will initially replace missing pairs with robots. After 7 minutes or so (when the first board is completed), I will replace the robots with substitutes. If you fail to get in and phone me while the robots are replacing you, I will try to get you in. This is sometimes, but not always, possible.
If two pairs fail to get in, their respective teammates will be merged by the system to form a team. There is absolutely nothing I can do about this. If it happens, the team will play but are ineligible to win (unless they happen to be from the same club). I will adjust their scores, so they come last.
At present, there are 14 teams entered. In the event of a team not showing up, we will end up with an odd number of tables. The BBO Swiss Teams movement tolerates a half table but as each round will have 4 or 5 boards, the resulting sit-out would be intolerably long. In this event, I will use a Robot Team, or perhaps, a team of 4 substitutes from two different clubs and adjust their score, so they come last.
In the event that I have to use one or more Robots for more than half the duration of the game in a given team, I will also adjust that team’s score, so they come last.
Substitutes
If you are a substitute, DO NOT REGISTER. Simply login at about 19:20, go to the competitive area and wait there. Stay with your computer and move the cursor every minute or so to prevent your device going asleep. Please stay logged in until about 20:00.
Results
The official results will be available via a link on the DNR website’s home page about 20 minutes after the game ends. Note that if I have to make any adjustments, they will be on the official version of the results. Adjustments may not be reflected on the results as published by BBO. BBO does not use the Neuberg formula but BBOtoXML, which is the program used to generate the final official results, does. This too may lead to minor discrepancies between the BBO results and the official ones.
Very Important
These Swiss Teams events are a little more difficult to run than normal tournaments. Consequently, at 19:20, I will close registration. So be warned, you must be fully registered with your team formed by 19:20, otherwise you won’t be able to play.
This document, together with a pdf file containing BBOs instructions is being sent to all Captains. Each Captain must select a Leader and copy both documents to them.
Aidan Synnott
7/5/2021.