Hi Ed

This is a Brown Sticker one "opening bid from 2C through to 3S that could be weak...and does not promise at least 4 cards in a known suit"

and therefore only permitted  at A point tournaments and with 8 or more boards in each round.

This is according to the 2013 Manual (I don't have the current one with me)
I will stand corrected if the current one is different

cheers
Nick

Thanks for that reply Nick. That is how I understood it also. The tournament in question was a 5A Swiss with 8 board matches so it was legal IMO. Why it should be allowed in Swiss / Teams but not Duplicate Pairs is a mystery to me however.

Cheers

Ed

Hi Ed

Although the Manual refers to "Teams style" and "Pairs style" it is the number of boards per round which determines whether HUMs (or brown stickers) are allowed, not the type of scoring.

One can run a "Swiss pairs" type format with matchpoint scoring (although I haven't heard of that ever being done)

And one can run a "duplicate pairs" type format with IMPs scoring (this is often done (sometimes called Butler scoring)

The rationale behind the rule is with long rounds there is time for the opponents to devise a defence to those bids before they start the round (totally impractical with short rounds)

cheers
Nick