Blind Seating (for teams) now available in RealBridge
In version 1.3.5, just released, there is an option for blind seating.
This impacts organisers, and tournament directors. You may want to think about putting this as part of your conditions of contest.
Introduction
In teams sessions, at the start of each round the system can randomly assign the seating of each team. That is, the pairs may stay in their current directions, or NS may be swapped with EW. This is equivalent to providing blind lineups – a pair can’t choose which opposing pair they will play.
To enable this, in Session settings on the General tab, tick Randomize starting positions.
(This option already existed for pairs sessions, to provide random starting positions in a Mitchell or Howell. Now it can be used for teams too. At pairs, it only affects the first round; at teams it affects every round.)
This functionality can be used with all teams formats (Swiss Teams, Round Robin, Round Robin 2x½, Head-to-Head), but please see the notes below.
Notes
You can’t use Randomize starting positions as well as Auto-rotate: NS <-> EW.
The normal use of Randomize starting positions is in Head-to-Head with a single round, Round Robin, or Swiss. That is, formats where you play only once against each opponent.
If you use Randomize starting positions with Head-to-Head and more than one round: on each round the seating will be random. That may mean that in the second round the pairs sit the same way as in the first round.
If you use Randomize starting positions with Round Robin 2x½: the seating in the first half will be random, then the seating in the second half will be the same as in the first half.
Recommendations
If your event does not give either of the teams seating rights, we suggest:
• Swiss: it is often a good idea to use Randomize starting positions.
• Round Robin, either:
- Standard Round Robin with Randomize starting positions, or
- Round Robin 2x½ with Auto-rotate: NS <-> EW.
• Head-to-head matches, one of:
- 1 round with Randomize starting positions
- 2 rounds with Auto-rotate: NS <-> EW
- With 3 or more rounds, there would normally be a rule about seating rights.
More info
If you want to attend top up training on this, please contact support@realbridge.online.