Money Bridge Tournaments

What are Money Bridge Tournaments?

Money Bridge Tournaments are an exciting twist on the game of Bridge. In a Money Bridge Tournament you are racing against the clock to collect as many points as possible. Should you spend a minute thinking about your next bid or save the time for another board? Only you can decide. When the clock strikes zero, the players with the most points win the prizes.

How does a Money Bridge Tournament Work?

When a Money Bridge Tournament commences you, the human player, are seated at a table as South. Your partner is a Bridge robot (more on that later). Your opponents, East and West, are also robots. You will now be given the opportunity to play as many hands as time allows. Your score will be increased or decreased by the points you score on each board.

Each table in the tournament is setup the same way as your table. One human player and three robot players. You are competing against the other human players to collect the most points. Your score is displayed on the upper-left of the table-top. You can mouse-over the scoreboard at anytime to find out how you are doing compared to your other human opponents. The prize distribution will also be displayed.

What about cheating?

The Money Bridge Tournament format makes cheating impossible. Here is why

There is no way for you to communicate with your partner - it's a robot!
East and West are robots, so, they have no desire to cheat. Why would they?
Each human is dealt a totally different set of hands, so, there is no possibility of collusion
Kibbitzing is disallowed for Money Bridge Tournaments

What about abuse?

Our robots are quiet and polite. They may never thank you for a well played hand, but, they will never yell at you for not making a contract. Interaction between the human opponents is not allowed so there is no chance of cross table abuse.

How do the robots work?

The robots you are playing with are called GIB. The GIB robot is widely considered to be one of the best computer bridge programs ever created. It is occasionally capable of brilliance. It is also occasionally capable of some really poor bids and plays (just like all human players).

Some players may find it frustrating if a particular GIB partner plays especially poorly (or if a particular GIB opponent plays especially well) on a given hand, but, these things will even themselves out over time. We think that GIB plays at least as well as the average BBO member. Some times the GIB does something totally crazy (don't we all). This is what the GIB does. Everyone has the same GIB as partner and opponent, so, everyone is on a level playing field. If your GIB does something crazy we want to know about it so we can see if it is fixable, but, we cannot, under any circumstances, offer a refund.

The GIBs that play in MBTs play a relatively simple and natural bidding system. When you play in an MBT you can find out the meaning of any bid by clicking on that bid as it appears in the bidding diagram. Furthermore, when it is your turn to bid, moving your mouse over the buttons for the various possible bids will cause an explanation of the bid you are considering (as your GIB partner will understand it) to be displayed. These explanations can be somewhat cryptic, but reading them carefully before you bid will help you to avoid misunderstandings with your GIB partner.

You can find out more about GIB's bidding system by clicking on the following link:

http://online.bridgebase.com/doc/gib_system_notes.php

How do I get started?

You can give it a try for free. There is a free Money Bridge Tournament twice an hour (at xx:15 and xx:45). You are limited to one free Money Bridge Tournament per day.

To play for prizes and BBO master points you need BB$, just as you would for any other tournaments. The typical Money Bridge Tournament costs $1 and returns 80% of that back to the players in prizes.

Once you have some BB$ you can get started. Bridge Base has two different looks. Depending on the version of our software you are running you need to do slightly different things.