I wish the system made it easier to gather the data that would demonstrate the severity of this problem.  As I've said elsewhere (I think), it could also help pinpoint when the problem began (or was it always this way?), which should help identify what changed to cause it.  I also wish the problem occurred 100% of the time, which would make it impossible to dismiss.  As it is, we have only the beginnings of statistical support for our claim, and gathering the aggregate data that would provide more solid support is a daunting task...for us the members.

Fencer is quite correct about the groundless wailing over poker or dice cheats.  There's plenty of that online; such complainers are easy to find, and the vast majority deserve our scorn and satire.  But the genuine exceptions (in online poker especially) that have come to light should give one pause.

Hats off to those who stood their ground in such cases, labored to gather the data, and revealed the truth at last.

(added comment Wednesday evening / Thursday morning):  I plan to make one last good-faith effort to present some useful data.  I plan to examine all of my backgammon (but no variants) games stored here from 2009--that's 13 matches, and a total of 137 games in which at least 2 rolls took place.  I have no reason to believe that that year is appreciably better or worse than any other year of mine.  I'm sorely tempted to separately track the opening rolls that I "won" and "lost", but I don't plan to do so for this exercise.  If I'm understanding the situation correctly (and there are good "numbers" people here who will be able to correct me if I'm wrong), the responder's roll should theoretically match the opener's roll 1 in 18 times (or 5.555_ %), on average.  I'm also going to report the percentage of responder's rolls where both dice differ from the opener's roll.  Theoretically, I think that should happen 4 times in 9 (or 44.444_%), on average.  But I think the actual observed value is going to shock and convince even the most diehard skeptics here.


Average expectation of opener's and responder's both dice exactly matching out of 137 played = 7.6111_ games.  Observed number=38 games (27.737%)

That's about 5 times the expected frequency!

Average expectation of responder's dice both differing from opener's dice out of 137 played = 60.888_ games.  Observed number=28 games (20.438%)

That's less than half of what's expected.