Is anyone else having trouble seeing the left hand die? I can only see one die, though I can guess what the other die is by observing which moves are legal.
jryden: actually once you join stairs, the games keep popping up,never ending, I can never knock down my game total thus leaving less time to join new tourneys
Gr☺uch☺: Thanks for the link (I was lazy) ...the tournament has started now. If anyone else likes this torunament format I have another set to start Feb1. If it is popular, I'll set one up each month.
The goals of the format are: Multi point cube matches with at least reasonably skilled players with a rating. Interestingly I've found it very difficult to find these criteria in the tournaments set up by others...thoughts?
joshi tm: As soon as I get some experience I will form an opinion about scoring...by the moment I respect opinions from those who already experienced the game.
joshi tm: I agree 100% with what you said and with returning to the standard scoring system. For the few games I played, CG looks like a great variant to me. Only could it benefit from a good auto-pass feature :-)
Anyone interested in the score system of Cloning Backgammon: At first, you totally right when you say the scoring is not correct. It is already a big advantage to have extra pieces on the board, and even 21-point cube matches can be (will be) completed in one single game if played correctly. In the past, I thougt that cloning makes a disadvantage, but playing the game here at BK showed otherwise. This has to change.
In fact, the game is invented by me, so a rules change cannot be done if I don´t agree.
My proposal is:
Score only for games, gammons, or backgammons (multiplied by the cube). Don't score for anything else.
Anyone agreed? Post it on the boards. Anyone disagreed? Post it on the boards, but please MOTIVATE your disagreement or give ideas for improvements. So don't post that CG sucks, but post WHY it sucks (and what could be done to make it better).
gogul: They are no longer playing on the site, but a 21 point match just completed giving him another rating. Just wait 30 days, and they will again drop from the ratings list (like all inactive pawns do)
Gr☺uch☺: I dont like anti because it can last way too long, and this new variant can be even worse! Plus i am frustrated that I had was only a couple moves from a decisive victory in one game, and now just like that there is no end in sight to this game!
Gr☺uch☺: Cloning is bad unless it serves some purpose. So in many cases you try to avoid hitting. But in some cases as in the game that I posted somewhere on here, I think it is advantageous to hit. Still a bit early to tell all the unique intracacies of the game.
As for variants, hyper could work but it seems that it would just turn into a match of complete luck. Race or crowded could work as could nackgammon. However, anti is not an option as games would never end.
alanback: Heh heh. Just a guess. I couldn't translate it from Russian either, lol. I could ask AlliumCepa. He's Bulgaria's contribution to the Best of Europe team. Would you like to know the literal meaning?
The translation website that I used couldn't handle any of the words, but after a spell check returned: "Truly, pork is full." I think it lost something in the translation.
rod03801: i've never played anti so I'm a bit new at it all. I'm not one that likes variants much. Loop chess is fun but that's about it for chess. I like backgammon race and hyper but beyond that, I'm not much on the other games. ;)
Gr☺uch☺: Sure. Of course I understand. I was just hoping there was more to it than that. I guess I was expecting more from a new variation. Just because I love backgammon. I'm not saying there is anything wrong with it, though. It just probably won't be one I'll play a lot. I'm not a fan of anti backgammon, and the "leaving open pieces as bait" strategy sounds too much like anti and it turns me off a bit! lol..
rod03801: OK. I think I understand your question. I think it's a disadvantage to clone. That's the beauty of the game. You can leave a piece exposed where normally you wouldn't.
OTOH, if you have most of your home base covered, and you can put your opponent on the bar, he/she can't get that piece out becasue there will be no slots to land on (of few choices). And your cloned piece can get out (assuming opponents home base has openings) and so the cloned piece is not a disadvantage to you.
Another advantage to cloning might be to build up a wall in your opponents home base thereby keeping him from getting all his pieces home. But the downside of that seems to be that you still have a gauntlet of your own to navigate and every time you land on an opponents piece, you add another one of yours to the bar. ;)
So the biggest advantage I can see is only really available if you have your homebase covered so that an opponents piece on the bar has no place to go :)
does that make sense? I should probably learn the exact terms of the board and pieces! lol
rod03801: It seems to me that the strategy is to sometimes avoid hitting an opponent when in a normal game you would hit them? Then, sometimes if you are behind, you might want to leave many pieces uncovered, to force your opponent to hit you? I think it is less of a hazard to have men left open, especially in the early positions, and try extra hard to make a block by your home base, then force your opponent to make a hit on you and back them up, something like that. But then sometimes, i try to play it a lot like a normal game, and get it to a race as soon as possible!
Gr☺uch☺: I'm wondering why someone wants to clone. In the cubed version, I can see why, because if you have lots of pieces and manage to get them all off, blah blah blah, then you can get lots of points.
In the non-cubed games, I just don't see the point of wanting to clone. Yeah, I've played backgammon long enough to know why you want to knock your opponent to the bar. lol.. jeez..
I'm wondering is there some sort of extra advantage the cloning business has for someone??? Or is it one of those things where: maybe you won't always choose to knock your opponent to the bar, since it gives you an extra piece to have to take all around the board.
I just haven't gotten far enough in the game to see the point of it all. I was just looking for someone to enlighten me a bit.
I'm still in the very early stages of my first few games of this, and I'm not sure why this is a variation?? What is the incentive to take advantage of the new rules in non-cube games? Or is the point that you want to avoid when you can, having to clone? I'm not getting why we want to play this, but probably only because I haven't gone far enough to see it yet. lol..
If someone could help me see, I would appreciate it.