Hey Nick,

An 'unrelated error' in this case would be NS bidding to 6H over the hesitation sacrifice and going off. In that case NS would get 6H-2 and EW would get 4H=.

In this case, the serious error is related to the infraction; as NS should have never been in the context of defending.

It is my belief, both as a qualified tournament director and a player that this is the correct ruling in the situation. However this is a very delicate distinction, so I could see a needle argument against it (just because the opponents have used UI doesn't mean NS can stop playing bridge).

I would rule as 4H= as the score for both pairs, but will forward the question on to an actual top director who might grace it with a response.

Just to follow up with this, I checked with a top director and found out that I was wrong.
You need to calculate the amount of damage done in the context of the scoring of the results.

In order to explain it, they used an teams match context for the same problem, citing that doing the maths for others is more tedious / fiddly and would leave it as an exercise to the reader.

Before doing any of the math, you need to convert to the relevant scoring method, so you never have to deal with scores of 220.

Table 1: NS 4H = +420
Table 2: infraction by EW

EW score gets adjusted to -420 - EW team's result = 0 IMPs

For NS, it's different
With normal play they would have been - 3 (420 v 300)
Because of the revoke, they are -8 (420 v 100)
NS's self-inflicted damage is -5
Therefore NS get the normal result (0) less their self-inflicted damage = -5

It is different if say 4SX should have gone 3 down, but only went -2 due to the revoke.
Now they would have been + 1 IMPs
Instead they are - 3 IMPs
So, this time their self-inflicted damage is -4
Compared to the normal result (0), their self-inflicted damage is greater than the score they actually obtained (-3). So they keep -3.

I hope this makes sense.

Hi Brad

Yes it all makes sense (when read very carefully), but
Doesn't converting the "impossible" score of 220 to IMPs give the same answer, or possibly 1 IMP different due to the IMPs scale being in bands
(I dare say the time will come when IMPs are in a continuous scale like was done recently with the IMPs to VPs conversion)

Matchpoints are quite different and, as you say, fiddly but doable if in a discreet section
But that becomes NOT doable if the section is one small heat of a much larger event (such as the NZ wide Pairs)
Therein lies the problem
So I would guess the best solution is to award them 220 if possible, or if not, then say they played in 1 Spade making 6 (=230 which would be the same (or very similar) matchpoints as 220 over the large group
or, to make it more obvious it is a contrived score, 1 Club Redoubled making 1 which also happens to be 230 

I also put this to a top director
He wasn't 100% sure and intended to consult another (presumably topper) one
watch this space 

Hey Nick,
There are some faults with the approach you propose.

Firstly

If you had to give a pair 50% of 4H= and 50% of 4H-1, you would not average the 'raw' score and give them that (185). Instead you'd find the 'actual' result for each of the two scores and average them.

e.g. 4H= -> 70% & 4H-1 -> 15% --> 42.5% average.

Depending on what the other scores recorded were, trying to matchpoint a score of +185 could give anywhere between 15% and 70%; but it wouldn't be a fair adjustment either way.

Secondly

It isn't always such that the IMP result you achieve would be the same either way. Remember that the IMP scale gets more extreme towards the ends. If we adjust this example to comparing a 'legal' 1460 in 6H with an 'illegal' +300 defending 7Sx with a revoke; you get the following:

Table 1: NS +1460 EW -1460
Table 2:                  EW -2210
 

With 'normal play' NS would have been +500, and with the infraction they're only +300.

Their normal IMP result was therefore -14, and with the infraction they're -15. 
Therefore there's only 1 imp of damage.
You'd adjust the score to EW losing 13 IMPs (effectively because their teammates didn't bid the grand), and NS gaining 12 imps (the 13 they won in the auction minus the 1 they lost in due to the revoke).

Here if you 'subtract the damage' from the "table result", you get NS+2010; for an 11 imp gain.

This is obviously a different imp result.

Thirdly

If every pair in the field bid to 4H, and one pair 'cheaty-sacced' in 4S; then subtracting any raw score from the NS pair will result in them getting a MP bottom, while the offenders get a MP average. That doesn't seem very equitable.

Fourthly

Just because both your initial question and the example in use used a revoke of 1 trick as the extent to which N/S damaged themselves; it doesn't always have to be such. It could be that they poleaxe the defence and go -990 instead of +500, or bid on over the top and turn +300 into -50 in the auction, or any other reason. 

Fifthly

There might be more than two scores in consideration for the adjustment. If matchpointing +220 doesn't make sense, then matchpointing +147.25 will make even less sense. Dealing only in the 'actual' results will keep things consistent.

Sixthly

If you look at resources like the NABC casebooks from their national tournaments (e.g. here) then you'll see them adjusting to bridge results, not averaging the scores to get some nebulous number.

The only reason I'm so confident on it now is that when I asked a top director, I was meaning Matthew McManus-who's definitely in the top 2 of Australian directors and a very erudite director. 

To answer your question about the babich, I will refer to the appendices which were distributed to the clubs running it:

Note: Non-standard scoring such as match-pointing a board in two separate groups, or different contract results for the NS and EW pairs, or miscellaneous match-pointing adjustments cannot be entertained. The director should handle these cases by using the "average/plus/minus" scoring process.

This clearly states that nothing as 'complex' as an adjusted score can be handled. I would simply enter the board as NS 60 / EW 40%, and then include the 'intended' adjustment alongside the XML file of the results. Best case scenario, the xclub scoring team would adjust the MP scores to be what the laws say they should. Worst case scenario, one of the warts of running distributed but 'combined' sections comes to a head. 
Technically, disallowing these adjustments ever would mean that the Babich results run contrary to the laws of duplicate bridge, but you'd need to be quite particular to care about that in a fundraising/fun event...

The 'naive' thing to do if this note didn't exist would be to carry out the due diligence of calculating damage in the context of the 4 table movement, and submitting that score. (One can appreciate that this isn't tenable; as what would a "70% score" from a single club translate to on this board across the country)?

Thanks Brad for all the effort you have made in explaining this

It appears with this sort of event (that is one small section in a large event) an artificial adjusted score is the only practicable option for a "self-inflicted damage" adjustment
Similarly for a weighted score

Now changing the subject (slightly)
I see the 2017 Law 12 C 1 (e) has the wording changed to "extremely serious error" (although the commentary in the NZB 2020 Manual is the same as pre-2017)

which suggests one should be so tough on non-offending pairs who make a mistake when in a situation they would not normally have been in but for the opponents infraction

So what is an "extremely serious error" compared with a "serious error" or an "error"

I don't think the NZB Manual example  of ducking the setting trick against a slam is what I would call an  "extremely serious error"
It could just be pulling out the wrong card
I've done that on a number of occasions!

And i'm not convinced a revoke should be classified as an "extremely serious error"

I would be interested to hear others views

OOPS
Left out a critical word in my previous post

(the introduction of the extra adjective "extremely" in the 2017 Lawbook)
suggests one should be NOT so tough on non-offending pairs who make a mistake when in a situation they would not normally have been in but for the opponents infraction

I view of that change in the law I would be in favour of awarding both pairs the score for NS 4H = in this particular example