In the July issue of the ACBL Bridge Bulletin, there's an
intriguing article on page 16, "Reinventing the Game," about how
clubs in Seattle and Portland have restored the social nature of a
bridge game using Zoom.
I want to try this here at PPDVBC. I'm planning to hold a social Zoom-BBO
bridge game experiment on Tuesday evening, at 7:00.
Here's the plan: At 7:00, or a little before, everyone joins my Zoom
meeting. I'll set up a game, for as many people as can play (maybe
throw in some Robots to fill tables, since live subs would have
trouble joining the Zoom meeting).
It works by using Zoom "breakout sessions." Say the game starts, and
you look at the top of the screen and see that you're assigned to
Table 3.
On Zoom you would find a breakout meeting called "Table 3" and click
to join that breakout session. Your partner and opponents would also
join the meeting, and you'd have video and voice chat available.
When the round changes, you would leave the breakout session you're
in, and join the next table where you're assigned.
It's possible that as a non-playing director, I could assign players
to breakout sessions as the game progresses. Maybe that would be the
easiest way. That's one of the things I'd like to figure out.
Let's have a real game, but a short one -- twelve boards. I want to
see this work, and I want to get feedback from the players.
To do this, you'll need to be good with minimizing Zoom and having
your browser open alongside for BridgeBase. The easier way to do it
is to have two screens, say a computer and an iPad. Log in
to Zoom on the iPad, and play BBO on the computer.
Who's up for trying this? I'll make it a free game -- I'll pick up
the sanction fee. Drop me a note and I'll make a list.
This will be an open game. (I'd play if I weren't trying to
orchestrate the whole thing!)