[blml] adjudication

[Nigel]

[nige1]
If Alain regards increasing dependence on director judgement as progress, I assure him that some players disagree.
[Alain]
I don't see where this interpretation comes from. Director judgement has nothing to do with this.
[nige2]
Like other NBOs, at certain levels of competition, the EBU regulate opening (conventional continuations were banned after out of range 
agreements). Their restrictions were in terms of HCP and suit lengths. Recently they have added the qualifier:
*or equivalent in the director's judgement*.

[Alain[
There are four relevant questions:
1) Is a player bound by announced ranges ? No (L40A, L40E1 last sentence, and L75B last sentence)
2) Should a pair that considers ranges as a mere indication subject to frequent adjustments mention it ? Yes (L75B second sentence)
3) May SO demand that ranges be explained using a fixed unit ? I'd say yes, and furthermore when a pair uses other criteria they have to say it.
4) When the range for a bid is 6-10, and you occasionnaly downgrade
12-counts to 10, should you rather state 6-10 or 6-12 ? If it's only occasionally, I'd say the former. Writing 6-12 would give the false 
impression that it is normal for you to open weak twos on hands worth an obvious 1-bid.
One solution is to allow the typographical convention for carding, putting uncommon cases between brackets, to be used for bidding 
conventions, here 6-10(12).

[nige1]
I'm happy with Alain's explanation of how rules were interpreted.

Currently, there isn't much you can do about those opponents who declare 12-14 as their notrump range: but non-vulnerable, at pairs, they 
"upgrade" most ten counts and all eleven counts; and vulnerable at teams, they "downgrade" some fifteen counts and all twelve counts. 
Arguably, it is a matter of judgement, general knowledge and experience.

My interest is in rules simplified to allow more accurate disclosure *in future*. IMO disclosure would be improved if the basic vocabulary 
for disclosure were more objective. Suit lengths and HCP are a crude descriptions but more objective than adjusted points that allow for 
various other factors in arbitrary ways. I accept that you should describe other factors *as well as* HCP.

Nobody has yet addressed that argument. I'll rehearse the analogy:

"Available evidence for a court trial comprises (1) Surveillance tape and (2) Inconsistent eye witness reports. I'd be unconvinced if the 
prosecution present a brief dramatic reconstruction loosely based on the tape but modified by an eye-witness report and suppressed the rest 
of the evidence. I'd rather see the tape and hear the witness separately."

Explanation
(1) Objective evidence like HCP [A=4 K=3 Q=2 J=2]
(2) Hodge-podge of factors like suit texture, honour placement and so on, evaluated differently by different players.

I guess that the argument is not difficult to understand; just hard to repudiate.