Main Individuals

Individual Players

There are two groups of files for individual players: for eight, nine, or ten players, and for twelve, sixteen, or twenty players. The possible configurations are given in the table at the bottom of the “Introduction” webpage.

For 8-10 individual players, the scoring is manual, as with four or five pairs (two tables in all these cases). All the necessary Word documents are in the Individuals subfolder of the Word folder (itself a subfolder of the HDB folder), and the filenames are of the form “BrIyxxxx.doc”, where “xxxx” gives the number of players and the number of boards. Here, “y” refers to the function of the document. These documents are essentially the same as those whose use is explained in the 4&5 Pairs webpage, and those instructions won’t be repeated here. The “y” codes are: “1” for the “Table 1” sheet, “2” for the “Table 2” sheet, “R” for the rotation sheet (the same for any number of boards), and “S” for the “Scoresheet” sheet. For Imps scoring, these scoresheets are the same for any number of boards, for a particular number of players (e.g., “BrIS09.doc” for nine individuals), while for victory-point scoring (when possible) the scoresheet filename specifies the number of boards (e.g., “BrIS0927.doc” for nine individuals playing 27 boards). The nine-player configurations have one sitout round for each person, while the ten-player configurations have two sitout rounds for each person, and in addition each player misses playing with two other players.

For 12 or 16 individual players, the scoring uses the Excel Workbooks “BrIExxxx.xls” in the Programs subfolder of the HDB folder. Here, “xxxx” refers to the thirteen configurations, such as BrIE1218.xls for 12 players and 18 boards. Use of these scoring programs is exactly the same as explained in the “6-17 Pairs” webpage, and won’t be repeated here. To give an average score on a board, just enter 8000 (or anything higher). The needed Word documents are in the Individuals folder: “BrIR1218.doc” etc. for the rotation sheets, and “BrIT1218.doc” etc. for the traveling scores.

For 12 individual players, it is possible to play 18, 27, or 36 boards, with two, three, or four boards/round respectively. Since only nine rounds are played, each player misses partnering with two persons, and the three stationery players (one at each table) never see each other. The other possibility for 12 individual players is 22 boards (two boards/round), in which case each player partners with every other person.

For 16 individual players, two boards/round are used. If 30 boards are used, each player partners with every other person. Such a session can run for quite a long time, since with only two boards/round there is less cancellation of slow boards. (If you are playing four boards and have two slow boards, you may be able to catch up with the other two boards.) The other possibility is using 24 boards, in which case each player misses partnering with three persons, and the four stationery players (one at each table) never see each other.

There are also configurations for 16 individuals playing three boards/round, with 24 (version 2, denoted by “v2”), 27, 30 (v2), 33, or 36 boards played. In these cases 36 boards are actually used, but some boards are played only twice or three times (except for the 1636 case), with an average score being given to those who missed playing a board. Our singles group prefers to play 30 boards at three boards/round rather than two boards/round, in order to reduce the amount of table-changing.

There are two configurations of thirty boards played by twenty individuals. These are based on the “Rainbow Movement”, in which at each table during a round North remains stationary and the other three players rotate so that each of them partners with North. If each combination plays two boards, you have a total of 30 boards played in five rounds of six boards each (the “2030” configuration). On the other hand, if each combination plays only one board, there are 15 boards played in five rounds of three boards each, and this whole sequence can be repeated (with different starting positions for the players) to get 30 boards played in ten rounds of three boards each (the “2030v2” configuration). The first of these configurations gives less table-changing and more consecutive time spent with other players, while the second configuration mixes up the table configurations more.