FOUR/FIVE DIFFERENT WAYS TO SCORE CASUAL GAMES IN BBO

[skip the square brackets for a faster read]

• IMPs: (elsewhere known as Cross-IMPs or IMP Pairs) Your score is compared to each of the other pairs in the same direction playing the same board that day. [Suppose you score +620 while there are two other pairs in the same direction who scored +650 and +170, respectively. You win 10 IMPs from the +170 pair and lose one IMP to the +650 pair.] So this is akin to Teams.
• Match Points: (the duplicate scoring used on Wednesday F2F) As above your score is compared against other tables playing the same board that day but only takes account of the relative positions and not of the size difference. [Scoring an overtrick in 3NT is huge if the rest of the room is in 4 of a major or 3NT making exactly.] So it is duplicate as we play it.
• Total Points: This is essentially Chicago scoring. 50 is added for a part score, 300 for a non-vul game, etc. There is no comparison with other tables. Some people play the four rounds of a Chicago game as a match in itself, so after say 12 boards, i.e.three matches, the score might be 2:1 or 3:0 rather than X total points vs. Y total points. [The rationale is that it allows a fresh start every four boards rather than opponents' grand slam made doubled vulnerable at the start (-2980) dominating the rest of the boards.] Helpfully BBO has a function to reset the scores, so both forms of Chicago scoring can be accommodated.
• Rubber bridge: BBO does not support this, as such, offering only the three options above. But, there is nothing to stop players keeping their own rubber bridge scores on a pad as the match progresses and ignoring the BBO calculated score.