Earlier I pledged to finish out the remainder of my black points required for Life Master playing entirely in Support Your Club Events. As an update, I’ve hit my goal, beginning with the first Support Your Club daylong on March 25th, and competing almost daily since then.
Field Is Getting Harder
I suspected early on there would be an adjustment period as new players join BBO and experience their first robotic partnership. There are so many little nuances you learn as you play against the robots more. Ultimately, I firmly believe the robots have made me a better player, but it’s very possible to pick up bad habits. We will see when I make the transition back to humans…
In my first 10 Daylongs, I averaged a 60.34% matchpoints score, earning 11.11 black points. For the second group of 10, I averaged 57.02%, and scored 8.25 black points. It’s possible I’ve hit a dry spell, but I notice the field shrinking daily. There were about 1000 tables on the first March 25th daylong, but only 663 on April 16th. With so many virtual club game options now, some players are probably finding they just prefer human games. Those who stay with the Daylongs have figured out some of the robot quirks (hint: robots play 0314, not 1430).
Raw Results
3/25, 74.11%, 2.50 3/27, 52.90%, 0.75 3/28, 65.00%, 1.40 3/29, 62.53%, 1.00 3/30, 66.67%, 2.00 3/31, 54.68%, 0.56 4/1, 59.58%, 1.05 4/2, 63.15%, 1.05 4/3, 51.18%, 0.40 4/4, 53.62%, 0.40 4/5, 62.09%, 1.05 4/6, 61.06%, 1.00 4/7, 66.43%, 2.00 4/9, 56.54%, 1.05 4/10, 53.23%, 0.75 4/11, 52.49%, 0.30 4/13, 53.86%, 0.12 4/14, 50.79%, 0.53 4/15, 52.33%, 0.40 4/16, 61.38%, 1.05
After twenty daylongs and 180 boards, I averaged 58.68% and 19.36 points. Not quite 20 as promised in the title, but let’s round up since we’re among friends!
Done For Now
With $100 donated to clubs and $20 on top going to BBO, I think it’s time to come out of the shell and go back to human games! There are many choices now in the “All For One” club, formerly Honors plus 7 other affiliated local clubs. I also received more than the required black points – but now I am going to be stuck at 18 silver shy of the LM requirement.
Online Sectionals?!?
All that’s left on the road to life master is silver and total points. Will we see some human online sectionals soon? To be honest, I hope we do not. Not even STaC week.
As much as we would all love reaching Life Master more easily, I’m rooting for a return to live bridge, and a return to the Allendale, the new Woodbridge, and STaC week days (plus that elusive NYC sectional which someday still needs to happen). Besides, I would prefer to cross that 500 threshold among a crew of my favorite friends, partners, directors, opponents, and enemies. Do I really want to my celebratory Life Master moment to be with 3 robots at home?
Much better than me, Lee!! Way to go.
I sure hope the Big Apple Sectional goes ahead online / on BBO (given that it surely isn’t happening at the Hilton). Does anyone have suggestions how to make this more likely?
Great to hear from you, JO. With all the bridge migration to BBO, I wonder if there will be a human vs. machine showdown in the coming years, much like what we’ve seen in Jeopardy, Dr. Mario, Shuffleboard, and of course the capital markets!
The Big Apple Regional is cancelled, but for May 25th to May 31st, we now have the Silver Linings Week. All games are still likely pairs games, but I expect it will be a popular opportunity for players to earn silver points online.
To really bring back the feel of a local regional, BBO will probably need to support Round Robin Teams and Swiss Teams soon. I suspect it is in the works.