grenv: The reason to finish a jigsaw is to look at the picture I assume, perhaps show to others?

No, the purpose is merely to discover the position of the pieces. The finished article doesn't matter at all. It's meaningless and therefore pointless to waste time putting the last few pieces in place. If you want to see the picture then look at the box. it doesn't have all those quiggly lines on it for a start!

Anyway this is clearly an aesthetic endeavor, whereas a game of backgammon is a contest.

Ah, I see. So there's no possiblity that someone else could find backgammon to be anything other than a contest which has a rigidly defined ending point?

Admit it, grenv, this is your way and not the only way. What do you gain by refusing to see other people as individuals not from your mould?</i>

Andersp: If you do something against the wishes of another it's very convenient to imagine that they won't take offence. Very convenient indeed.

Czuch Czuckers: I think it is wrong for someone to get upset about me doing anything within the rules of the game!

The rules, the rules. Yes, the traffic warden mentality blossoms wherever there are rule books. Being human needs much, much more than the ability to following rule books, Czuch.

Andersp: Would your opponent think it rude?

AbigailII: your opponents play will not take gammon considerations into account.

Is that really true? Do you start playing doolally moves if your opponent has already lost or do you continue playing consistently? If you continue playing consistently, how many times are the moves the same between gammon go and merely winning? It's not zero percent, is it?

It's fun when playing a bot to see if you might get a backgammon but, unfortunately, if the match is already lost then they move randomly and don't seek to avoid the backgammon. A human opponent is very unlikely to do so. They will move out of your home just because they can - because it avoids the virtual backgammon. Yet if they leave the pieces there and lose by a backgammon, it will still tend to be intentional. People don't often do random.

Conversely if a human opponent is playing on, even if they have won, there's a high chance that they will play to see if they can get the gammon, just as the loser is playing to see whether they can avoid it. It's a mini competition above and beyond the game itself. Call it fun, call it foolishness, call it what you like. Bots don't give a damn about such things, they can't understand the point. So, it would seem, is the case for certain humans. The bots, however, don't feel a need to argue that the funsters are wrong!

Even if you avoid the gammon, it does not mean you would have avoided the gammon if the gammon had mattered (because your opponent might have made different moves).

Granted, they might be making different moves. In a bearoff situation that's how likely? But anyway, if they might then they might not, and might not is more likely if you're playing a human of the kind outlined above. And if they might not then the exercise is not fruitless.

Czuch Czuckers: Also, wouldnt it be to my competitive advantage to not let you know how you would have done against the gammon?

A daft point like that deserves a daft response. Eat my shorts.

Czuch Czuckers: my point is that it is not unreasonable or impolite to resign a game whose outcome has already been determined, even if my opponent doesnt like it.

For you it's not unreasonable or impolite to do something that someone else doesn't like. Yet someone getting upset about your viewpoint is wrong.

I think your position is pretty clear. Czuch, Czuch, Czuch. First, last and always.

DarwinKoala: Me too. For instance I often continue play to see if I would have beaten the gammon, had it mattered. Although totally irrelevent to the score, I find it satisfying and also instructive (for future play) to see about beating the gammon.

Czuch Czuckers: You didn't say anything about the explanation of jigsaw analogy. I take your silence as 100% agreement given that you're vociferous when you disagree..

You disagree with my use of the word "ridiculous". It was grenv's word but you echoed his sentiment with your "derive pleasure from a meaningless activity".

You talk about people getting upset about your viewpoint. Czuck, you live for those moments! Even so, it doesn't have anything to do with the points that I was making or the questions I was raising.

Finally, you claim that the point is about how a game ends. No, that's not what this discussion is about. Look at the title. "Etiquette" not "Defining the end of the game".

As usual, a debate with you is .... [looking fr a good euphemism] .... the discovery of "challenge".

Andersp: I notice that you didn't answer my question. Would you care to do so? Your own can then receive due attention.

Czuch Czuckers: It's the perfect analogy and your own logic can prove it.

A jigsaw is finished when you've discovered where each piece goes. That's just like a backgammon game is finished when the final score is known, right? Your idea. There's no point continuing to slot pieces into holes once you know where all the remaining pieces go? Why bother? You know where they go, so pack the thing away and go read a book. It doesn't have to be the last piece either; it could be the last dozen.

I hope you disagreed with that because you understand that the logical view of simply knowing where the pieces go isn't all that there is to it.

It's the same with backgammon. For some people the game ends when one player has all their pieces off the board. There's mathematically complete and there's humanly complete. Do you find it hard to understand? Yet you think that slotting known pieces pointlessly into a jigsaw makes sense?

It's the same principle but in different games. The outcome, as regards the score, maybe different from the completion. Some people see it one way. Some people see it the other.

Who are you or grenv to say that this viewpoint is ridiculous? That is simply a declaration that you have no understanding and acceptance of this difference between people. Your way is the one true way? Sure. And I wonder how many of your ways should be the one true way. [Shudder at the thought]

But the point of this discussion is not about what's the "proper" way to determine the end of a game, it's about whether you would deliberately go against the wishes of your opponent. Do you respect your opponents as people or are they just machines here to provide you with a set of postions to play?

Andersp: But what if you knew that your opponent likes to finish by taking all the pieces off? Is it rude to resign despite that?

grenv: Not to mention it wastes my opponents time

Lol, indeed not to mention it. Given that they get pleasure from the final move, it wouldn't be a waste of their time, it would be time well spent! It's a waste of your time because you derive no pleasure from indulging them. Indeed, it would seem that you fail to recognise their pleasure at all.

I'll be as polite as you like

If you knowingly resign when your opponent would like to finish then you're not being as polite as they'd like. In fact, to those for whom it's important enough to block a resigner, adding a FU smiley to the resignation move may not make that much difference!

Of course, to you, deriving pleasure from moving the last piece off is ridiculous enough, so people who value it that strongly can only be ridiculous squared in your eyes, and thus deserve all disrespect due them, right?

In fact it's boorish and impolite in my opinion to keep going,

If someone doesn't care either way and knows that you're impatient to move on but deliberately plays on just to spite you (and not for some other reason like not really understand the resigning system or being sure that they can trust it) then, I'd agree, they'd be the ones being rude to you. Of course most times it'll be because people aren't aware of your preference or didn't think in time before they hit roll. Resigning is a more deliberate action so it's perhaps less likely to be done accidentally/unthinkingly.

to demand that others keep going in order to satisfy your own ridiculous need

There's a difference between someone expressing their preference and you denying them that pleasure, and someone demanding it. Making demands is rude but surely a knowing denial is rude, too?

Kind of like needing to have the last word... :)

Maybe. It depends on what need it serves. Getting the last word is probably** more a competitive thing wanting to take the last piece off is probably more a completion thing. Like putting the final piece in a jigsaw before breaking it up and putting it in the box, it's logically unnecessary but it has a tangible psychological value.

**I say "probably competitive" with regard to getting te last word because I've played people who like to get the last word because it feels rude to them not to respond. With two such people they can go on doing smileys at each other for ages! Eventually one gets up enough courage to be "rude".

grenv: It wastes your time to indulge someone and be polite, grenv? I think it shows disrespect and a lack of caring but if you want to be boorish about it that's your prerogative. Nobody can dictate how you value people here.

kaluza: I applaud your sensitivity. I wouldn't go as far as to block someone!, but there is a definite pleasure in taking the last peieces off the board. If you know that that's the case for someone, it's poor etiquette to resign when there are only a couple of moves to go.

That is, unless you're playing against ....... (Fill in the name to suit yourself!) , in which case they don't deserve that respect.

alanback: How? Like you said, It satisfies monkey curiosity. But you said it was only monkey curiosity, which value cuts your off from understanding it's experiential benefit. I love knowing what my opponent's dice are when I play at Gold Token and DG (when the move-ahead hasn't stopped on my turn). But, then again, I am a very curious, er, bunnkey!

Another reason, though it wouldn't apply to many people, is that feedback is of most benefit when it immediately follows a behaviour. Thus, by seeing the dice immediately, you can tell if your spell or sacrifice to the Dice Gods worked or not.

alanback: What, the one where a match is a match is only a game even if it's a match with a million games?

Or the one where a match is a match is a CHESS match?

alanback: When I used to play at Vog they had an Auto-roll switch which was very useful. This was the case even though these were live matches. When you thought the game was moving into a phase where you might like to double then you'd switch off the auto-roll and take it a bit more slowly. On a turn-based site, especially against opponents who take 7 days per move, taking it a bit more slowly isn't the best default!

One disadvantage, though, is that automatic rolliing removes the opportunity for skilled psychokinetic dice rollers to concentrate on getting the dice that they need.

"An unusual pair of dice. One has sides 1,3,4,5,6,8. The other has sides 1,2,2,3,3,4. ..."

The piece says that the odds of rolling any of the totals is the same, and I'll take their word for that, but it also says that "any game that you can play with a normal set of 2 dice can also be played with a set of Sicherman Dice, with no difference in the outcome". That's only correct for games where the total is used, not the individual dice.

Allowing that we want the different doubles behaviour, there's also a marked change to the odds of single dice - an additional 3 and the loss of both a 5 and a 6. That, along with and the appearance of an 8, no less, would affect the game more than the changed odds of doubles.

I think it would make quite a difference in the way that the game was played. For instance, in the home table, closing the 3-point would be more important than before due to the three 3s - odds of 16/36 instead of 11, while the 5-point would be slightly less useful because the odds of re-entry there would be 6/36 instead of 11/36. (The change would only be slight because the 5-point has other considerable strategic value)

Jumping primes would be harder with the loss of a 5 and a 6 so the value of smaller primes would go up - except that the 8 would make even a 6-prime escapable!

The increased long-arm potential would make for some very unexpected hits - an opponent's backrunner that escapes to your 9-point could be knocked back by one of your own backrunners with an 8-6 from your opponent's 4-point!

fakar10: That's partly why I posted it here. It's so blatant that it's almost amusing.

He was involved in a previous occurence. I guess it's an irresistible game to him.

http://brainking.com/en/Ratings?tp=23&bms=0


http://brainking.com/en/BKRGraph?df=1&mf=8&yf=2007&dt=25&mt=8&yt=2007&submit=Submit&u=43955&tp=23


Finished: http://brainking.com/en/Profile?op=53326&u=43955&p=1


Yet to come: Iana Florin

Andersp: You rolled 1-1, 5-5, 5-5 and 2-2 in a row and later 1-1 and 3-3. Anyone who knows the "Law" of Averages knows that to have such doubles can only mean that you're cheating. Either you're doing better sacrifices to the Dice Gods (which is unfair) or you've got Fencer in your pocket or you've got a hacker to make BrainKing roll whatever you like.

Oh hang on .... HE was the one with all those doubles .. and he still didn't win.

Pason69: shouldn't the discussion be more golbal, since the [timeout/resign] problem affects every game.

It's much more of a problem in a Triple than in ordinary round-robins because of the special scoring. In a standard round-robin a timeout in a match is a single match. That's not good but a single resignation or timeout in a Triple tourney is worth 5 ordinary matches. If you had experience of the real thing (ie. TTTs) then you'd know that that's major.

Only way would be to make one timeout spread and let the player lose all his/her games

.. which is what nabla said: "he or she automatically forfeits all games with maximal scores, even the already finished ones" .. which is what I posted in the first place as the official rule: "the TTT rules remove a player who ... they and all their games are no longer part of the tournament (whether that's total removal or just not contributing to the scoring)", except that the scored outcome is zero rather than maximum. But the player does get to play the remaining matches. They are not forfeited, only the score.

Stop woory, be happy!

Lol. There's no need for you to worry about my happiness. I play TTTs at DailyGammon and they work well for the "just for fun" players and also the "competitive for fun" players. I'll continue to enjoy those. My aim here was to report the problem and explain it in sufficient detail that people can begin to understand it. That's done as far as I'm concerned.

lovelysharon: No worries, me lovely. These things happen and it's not a question of blaming. And certainly I'd cut off my paws before even considering that you'd do something like this deliberately.

But it is a problem with the format that it's vulnerable to upsets of this nature. Your busyness has brought the matter to light, that's all. It's going to be a concern in future Triple until it's addressed.

And it's a definite problem. In a TTT or Triple, coming second, third, etc, does mean something (for all but the most competitive of players). Resignations and timeouts can thus change the outcome for many of the players in the tourney, not just who wins.

Ivaylo: lovelysharon's unfortunate timeouts have awarded several players with a backgammon. That 5 points is a considerable advantage to the subset of players who got it. In contrast, just_for_fun timed out in all his matches and everyone got 5 points - but no advantage.

General note: The fact that I and Alan are the only ones lost to lovelysharon is immaterial. (well done, Sharon, dammit! ) This isn't a personal complaint but a concern for the format. If could affect a prize tourney and that won't do any good.

alanback: There are no TTTs here. A player who resigns matches or times out can change the whole outcome ... - is how it works in the Triple Gammon tournaments. The TTT rules that I described are how that problem is dealt with in a TTT.

A player who resigns matches or times out can change the whole outcome of a Triple Gammon tournament.

It's okay if they do it for everyone but when they only do with a selection of players it adds 5 points to the lucky ones (or the friends in the case of manipulations), whereas those whose matches with them have finished will have gained nothing, a single point or maybe 3 or only rarely, the backgammon's full 5.

Timeouts cannot be prevented but resigning matches is not an option in TTTs unless the player withdraws completely.

To prevent a player from spoiling the tournament, the TTT rules remove a player who inadvertantly or deliberately adds dollops of points to people's scores in this way. They may continue to play out the remaining games if they wish, but they and all their games are no longer part of the tournament (whether that's total removal or just not contributing to the scoring).

Hrqls:

A single 1 followed by single or double 1      10/36 * 11/36 = 110/1296
Or a double 1                                   1/36         =  36/1296
Or no ones followed by a double 1              25/36 *  1/36 =  25/1296
                                                               ========
                                                               171/1296 = 13%

AbigailII: It's hardly anti-backgammon if it's over in less than forever.

nabla: That's sounds like of someone who's afraid of pure checker play! You shouldn't hide behind the cube! lol

Fencer: It's "Tric Trac Tourno". TTT is just a handy abbreviation, not the name of the format. As a purposely designed format, I think it would be appropriate to honour the name that the inventor gave it and unseemly to change it.

Hrqls: Bug. I suspect that the program was thinking of 5/4*/off, which maximises the dice usage. That code probably hasn't been tweaked for Cloning backgammon and doesn't takes new clones on the bar into account.

AbigailII: I would use autopass if one of my opponents would actually let me. So far they don't (which means I won't move in their games until I'm about to time out; don't expect that 21-point cloning backgammon tournament to finish for the next couple of years...)

When I was a kid, some boys knocked over some bins and wouldn't own up. As a reult the whole class got a slap across the hand with the Strap. Decades later I still hate the unfairness of that. I'm glad I don't play in your tournament.

playBunny: Regarding how you know whether a game is played using auto-pass.. If it is then it's shown in the blurb with all the other match info.

I believe Fencer sets tournament games to auto-pass but others are a joint decision. This is fair enough, though frustrating if you want it and your opponent doesn't. The trial for auto-pass was hexkid's service and one of my opponents used it. That was good for a fast plaer like me as he was (still is, and will be for a long, long time, yaaaaawn) a tortoise, but then he switched it off saying that he preferred to see each move, including the blocked moves. I understand that but personally I'd prefer auto-pass to be automatic for everyone and for people to get used to it, which they would pretty quickly.

Family Man: I want to play my turn in auto pass games through until it is not my turn again

That's how it works at GoldToken and DailyGammon and it's a very natural way to play. I second the idea of being returned to the game if an auto-pass occurs but not as a where-to-go-after-moving option. It would be better as an independant setting alongside the main auto-pass one. http://brainking.com/en/Settings?p=3

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?

alanback: Lol. Did you get or not get the gammon?

For the curious - http://brainking.com/en/StartedGameList?tp=92

grenv: The cube is already effective on the extra pieces - a whole cube per piece. You want gammons and backgammons as well?!

hexkid: The White Flag!! And I was so looking forward to the War of the Whizzes. :-(

Thad: I can't see any advantage for Fencer in doing it but it's possibly by blocking the IP address of hexkid's server. But there are ways round that blockage and ways round the ways so we could see a technowar between the two whizzes as hexkid tries to fire his autoplays into Fencer's server while Fencer tries to bat them away into the null regions of cyberspace.

Andersp: All the more to see the adverts! I guess you could enjoy it while it lasts. Who knows, if we capture a fairy and squeeze out a wish, maybe Fencer might even take hexkid's method as a simple but effective way to implement autopass within the BK server. ;o)

fakarten, Andersp: Doh! Silly me. Yes, the AutoPlayer action is done by Hexkid's server and the user's OS and browser don't matter when it's in use. It's the other BK goodies that he's developing for Firefox. Thanks for reminding me. Your browser does need javascript for registering. There's a bit more information in the FAQ.

There ya go, Anders! Hexkid's got you covered!

alanback: LOL. Especially when you *are* the winner! I've just seen your bug report. ;o)

Andersp: If you're a FireFox user and would like the next best thing to a BrainKing Autopass ... there's the AutoPlayer which does forced moves (passes or where there's only one move possible) on your behalf (unless there's a message from your opponent or other reasons why the game needs your attention). For instance

alanback: Subject: You are not the tournament winner

Lol. I quite agree. Why not pour cold water on me while you're at it!

I think it should be
Subject: Woohoo! You came second in a tournament.

Well done, Alan. You came second. ;o)

Hrqls: That's a good idea. They do that at Vog for one of their tourney types. It's done as the percentage of the track that you succeeded on, so the winner gets 100%. The percentage for the rest depends on the number of rounds. A semi-finalist in a 4 round tourney will get 75% (25% for each of the three wins), a 2nd rounder in a 5-round tourney gets 20%, etc. As there are automatic byes you can still pick up points even if you lost your first (but 2nd round) match. It's not a flawless system by any means but it does add to the competition.

That points for tourneys. A rating for tourney play would be the average position (percentage0 reached. Over 50% is good, while 70% is phenomenal.

LionsLair: You mean your brain's gone bald like a tyre? You've worn down all the little squiggley indentations which channel the thoughts away when you're thinking very hard so that you don't go into a mental skid?? Wow, that's a heavily used brain! ;-)

xmas is soon: Lolol. You'd have to join DailyGammon to understand that one. ;o)

Come on in, the water's fine.