ho like tu play I am new here and dont now how at works

Thom27: thanks for the advice Thom, i didn't realize that, good to be aware of that. the issue is solved now.

speachless: Please always give the move number in such cases, so that the situation in question can be easily found later, when the game has been played on.

Aganju: OK thanks, so i guess it's a single error. Hope the admins here will react, no answer since 3, 4 days...

speachless: I don't see a reason why bar-5-7 would not be a perfectly legal move for white.

Hi
i'm the meaning this is an error. in the game bellow the system wants me to move 1-6 and 5-7. But I wan't to move bar-5 and 5-2 but the system forces me to move 1-6 / 5-7.... Is this an error?

I'm asking 'cause usualy when a game has an error i only need to contact fencer and he deletes the last roll or whatever, but i didn't get an answer since 2-3 days... so am I maybe wrong and it is not an error?

Cloning Backgammon (speachless vs. ljubisa popovic)

thanks for your support...

coan.net: very good point as well. Based on your question as well as playbunny's comments, it seems my most recent scenario that I posted does not qualify for the rule in question.

cd power: Are the "official" rules for the game somewhere on the internet? Just kind of curious on the different "interpretations" of that rule.

For example, in the game - lets say that ALL your pieces except for 1 is already past the prime on the "1" space on the bottom of the board, and only ONE piece is trapped by the prime - would you still interpret the rule the same way?

".... but if opponent has collected all his checkers onto the one point behind player's prime, the player must unblock a point in his prime to allow the opponent a chance to move."


***Update - I started to post this before I seen the previous 2 posts ****

playBunny: I think this is the best response I have read on this topic. Thank you

Carpe Diem: I'm involved in a game where all of my stones but one are behind a prime - the other stone is on my 1 spot, so also can't be moved. I would think the spirit of the rule would mean that my opponent should unblock, but since I haven't collected ALL of my checkers behind his prime, I can see how a literal translation would suggest that he doesn't need to unblock. Does anyone know with certainty how this should be handled?

The same rule is given on Backgammon Galore as "Limitation on primes: You may not build a prime (six consecutive blocks) in front of all of the opponent's checkers; at least one opposing checker must be in front of your prime".

The rule is about building a prime. So if a certain move would inappropriately complete the prime then it is illegal. The rule prevents the move in question.

The rule whose spirit you're suggesting would be about forcing a player to break a prime that's already been made. That's a very different thing and may not actually be possible at the point at which it becomes applicable.

The rule would be have to be something like "If your opponent cannot move and all their pieces behind the prime are stacked on the single point immediately behind then you must open a point within the prime at the first opportunity". This rule would force the given move or small set of moves that break the prime.

This is unlike the prevention rule in several important ways, as can be seen above. The similarity is that they are both concerned with not allowing a prime in their respective contexts.

To be honest I'm not sure what the spirit of the original rule is unless it's to give the trailing player more chances to prevent the prime happening in the first place. Each turn that the leading player cannot close the prime is an opportunity for the trailer to claim that point themself and retain a link, however tenuous, to the forward territory. Once the prime has been made then it's tough buns, they didn't make it.

I think a rule that extended the spirit of the rule as it appears to me would have to ban primes altogether - and that's quite a game changer.

Pedro Martínez: Again, it is the interpretation of the rule. I have one checker that was able to pass her prime (6 consecutive pieces) and has moved as far as possible, to the "1" on the bottom of the board. All other checkers are stacked on the 2... there are no possible moves to make at this point.

I think what you are getting at is that one checker was allowed to move as far as possible so now it is ok to block the rest, because the rule does not state "collected all [REMAINING] checkers..." so this is where different interpretations come into play.

cd power: Where exactly have you “collected all [your] checkers onto the one point behind [your opponent]'s prime”?

cd power: It's happened to me a couple of times and if they don't accept the rule I just stick them on myblocked users list.

Well, it happened again. I politely wrote and pasted the rule, but I guess she didn't understand me and wrote back to me in Czech (which I don't understand) and didn't comply with the rule.

Fevga (japajka vs. cd power)

Carpe Diem: i think it should be interpreted 'if you cannot move any more with any dice roll, he needs to open up'. But I have never played Fevga over a real board, so maybe someone who has should answer this.

There was some discussion a few weeks ago on the main Brainking board about this rule that isn't software enforced:

• It is allowed to build a prime (six consecutive blocked points) anywhere else (not in the player's starting quarter), but if opponent has collected all his checkers onto the one point behind player's prime, the player must unblock a point in his prime to allow the opponent a chance to move.

Pedro Martínez: Wow! And a pass too.

Gotta love games like this…
Hyper backgammon (Nyumi vs. Maxxina)

moistfinger: Program is wrong? ;)

Thom27: It seems we just have to accept the questionable dice rolling here. We may play here for fun, but for serious play one should go elsewhere.

That's not so. You have to accept it or go elsewhere. I, we don't have to do anything of the sort until you prove your case. It's like someone saying that they've see seen the Yeti but have no tissue sample, no photo, not even a map showing how to get to where you saw it. The Yeti may exist but it can only be treated as an interesting but unconfirmed story. Aganju claims to have met the Yeti and had a chat with it . That makes it more interesting but the story still needs more to become real.

moistfinger: The only truly dishonest and unnatural backgammon dice on the web is found on DailyGammon:

Lol. Now you've got me wondering which of the DailyGammon dice whingers you are.

Resher: thanks!

the opening roll can be used to predict your opponents roll in case your won or lost the first roll (i dont remember which)

I think the most helpful posts about the non-random rolls (including stats) were posted on this DB in July 2010. For example see:
http://brainking.com/en/Board?bc=26&bscx=1066337#1066337


The particular issue discussed there may have been fixed by now - does anyone know?

Re: taking advantage - I think I remember Nabla posting a set of opening moves that took advantage of the unusual opening roll distribution, but again - this might no longer apply.

Hrqls: You are of course right that statistics is required, but it is a) considerable work, and I don't want to bother if fencer seemingly is not interested anyway, and b) it is not always possible. One can't tell afterwards in which order the dice in different games have been rolled. So there is no way but recording during play. I once tried to create a tally sheet counting the equal and the different rolls when going from one BG game to the next, but I quickly lost track ... and see point a) above.

Ananju mentioned there is a way to reproduce the opponent's roll with higher probability than normal. This might be proven by analysing many old games, but if only few players know about this method and use it only in few situations, the statistical effect is very small and difficult to detect.

It seems we just have to accept the questionable dice rolling here. We may play here for fun, but for serious play one should go elsewhere.

moistfinger: I have played on Dailygammon for some time, and didn't notice any strange or unnatural behaviour of the dice. Also, they have documented their dice rolling, and this method, if implemented correctly (bugs are always possible of course) should give fair and statistically correct rolls.

Thom27: i always am fond of your second reason :) ... but you probably also know that humans tend to remember bad things more than good things .. therefore there always seem to be more bad rolls than good rolls

your third reason: i think i was the one who came up with that, and i did come up with it by counting all games and record in which the bug happened and also in which games it didnt seem to happen, after that i let some friends on here know about it to verify my thoughts, and after that i posted it on the board to ask for more statistics ...

to claim any random number generator is bad you need to collect statistics, without statistics you will only have your second reason and that one doesnt really count

so, could you please write down your games and keep the statistics (all games on this site remain here forever, so you can show it at any point in the future to everyone) .. once your have the right statistics we can discuss it for real

Thom27: Thanks for that. Overall I find the dice on Brainking to be quite natural, they feel random and honest enough; it would be nice to always win but that's not the way it goes with a dice game, however good a player one is. The only truly dishonest and unnatural backgammon dice on the web is found on DailyGammon: Play there for a week and you will come to cherish the odd dice idiosyncrasies on Brainking!

playBunny:
Аз не използвам никакви средства за влияние върху числата, които ми се падат на заровете, но веднъж на този сайт хвърлих поред първо дюбеш, а после дюшеш в края на играта и противникът се разсърди за това, че съм такъв късметлия. Разбира се, това може да бъде и просто случайно, макар и само с вероятност 1/1296.

Aganju: if the randomness is not good, it slowly makes a different game out of Backgammon - for example, if there are less doubles, or incorrectly often two doubles in a row, you can adjust your strategy to take advantage of it.

I suspect that any such effect would have to be quite sizeable for it to change people's strategy. Their strategy can be highly resistant to change even when you teach them to improve their game.

Aganju: It is still a fair game, but it is not 'standard' Backgammon anymore.

Aganju: However, I found a high chance of reproducing your opponent's roll by clicking in specific sequences. So when the game comes up, and he had a 5-5, and I want one too, I do that sequence of clicks, and have a higher-than-1/36 chance to get it too (it does not work all the time, but maybe 1:3; still, pretty useful feature); whereas if he has 1-2, I will not do that typically.

I'd say that if you're doing that then it's still standard backgammon but it's no longer a fair game. :-/

playBunny: You are right of course. It does not make it easier to win, if you cannot predict the 'bad' rolls. However, if the randomness is not good, it slowly makes a different game out of Backgammon - for example, if there are less doubles, or incorrectly often two doubles in a row, you can adjust your strategy to take advantage of it. It is still a fair game, but it is not 'standard' Backgammon anymore.

However, I found a high chance of reproducing your opponent's roll by clicking in specific sequences. So when the game comes up, and he had a 5-5, and I want one too, I do that sequence of clicks, and have a higher-than-1/36 chance to get it too (it does not work all the time, but maybe 1:3; still, pretty useful feature); whereas if he has 1-2, I will not do that typically.

Thom27: How, exactly, have you taken advantage of these issues with the dice?

moistfinger: The first reason is: there seemingly is still the bug causing to repeat the same dice roll with too high probability, when you go from one Backgammon game directly to another (with "submit and go to next game of this type").

Second reason: many players have the impression that the dice "just feel wrong" on this site. Me too. (That can be mistaken, of course; it is difficult to tell without statistical analysis.)

Third reason: there have been other bugs in the past, concerning dice rolling. At least one was proven by statistics: the first and second roll in a game have too often been equal. This bug is removed, however, but it shows that the implementation of the dice was erroneous from the beginning, and it still is not ok yet (see first point above). That thing seems overly complicated or inherently bad and therefore difficult to fix.

Fourth and most important reason: the random number generation is not documented, so that the players don't know what they are using. It is as if someone brought a bag full of self-made dice to the Backgammon world championship and claims these are better than any other existing dice (or at least not worse), and the tournament director decides to use them without testing. I think you agree that this would be a bad idea.
It is possible (and not very difficult) to create a cryptographically secure random number generator to roll the dice, that uses for every game a secret key which can be published after the game is over, and the generator code can also be public, so the players know the mechanism and can test it for it's general quality and as well for it's correct implementation, because once the key is known, the dice rolls can be re-calculated with own implementation of the generator. The rolls are however not predictable as long as the key is secret.
Such a method would IMO be required for serious online play of games with random.

Thom27: 'Serious play of Backgammon - or any other game with dice - is not possible here'
Why is that, in your opinion?

Aganju: You are right about the match length. There is a reason why serious BG tournaments go for, typically, 21 points.

But the dice rolling of BK is questionable, to say the least. Serious play of Backgammon - or any other game with dice - is not possible here.

Aganju: Not only do one pointers have a large luck element, the rating system grossly penalises the stronger player. Players who value their rating should avoid them unless they are the underdog.

As for whether you're alone in the opinion, here's one player who agrees and takes it to the other extreme. ;-)

Aganju:
И аз мисля, че късметът в таблата е доста важен и затова е желателно мачовете да са по-дълги; дублиращият куб също увеличава вероятността да победи по-добрият, а не по-големият късметлия.

It seems the majority of people create Backgammon tournaments with the setting '1 win match', be it in round-robin or 1-1 play. That may be the best way for most games, but for BG I think the better choice would be at least '5 points with doubling cube' or even higher.
The reason is that BG has a significant factor of luck, and even as the world champion, you could lose a match against Joe Schmoe if the dice roll unlucky - but not so easily a match for 5. Whatever, anyone who seriously plays BG, knows what I talk about.
For me, this discourages me from joining any of those tournaments, especially when they are 1-on-1, as it is mostly luck deciding who wins the tourney.

Here my question: Am I alone with that opinion, and all others are happy with how they are offered?
if yes, then fine. I can always make tourneys the way I prefer them if I want. No hard feelings.
If no, then I wanted the tournament creators to know that; so they can create them as '5 point with doubling' (or more) and get more players. Maybe they are just not aware of it?

Aganju: Hmm, it seems some of what you say is true. I've known that he is less interested in Backgammon, or at least appears to me to be.

I think the pieces on the bar at the start of the game in Crowded Backgammon and I suppose Backgammon Race, though I've not played that game, that do not have to be brought in on the next turn should be marked or segregated in some manner so as to differentiate them from pieces hit later in the game. This would facilitate playing the game as it would be obvious when returning to a game that you have a piece hit, instead clicking to move and wondering what's wrong with the site or game.

And a piece on the bar no matter how it got there should give you a backgammon if you can bear off all your pieces and your opponent has not taken one off.

Walter Montego: oh, and Fencer has mostly stopped caring about issues and bugs (and wishes) on this site. He might fix it if he feels in the mood, but chances are small. A lot of people have already discussed that and attacked him for it, but well, that is his decision, and this site is not a priority for him.

Walter Montego: both games have in common that there can be pieces on the bar that you don't have to insert immediately, but can whenever you want. Those are the ones that have the bug.

Aganju: I am not familiar with Cloning Backgammon, but it sounds like it is a completely different kind of Backgammon. Crowded Backgammon is supposed to be exactly as regular Backgammon except for the extra pieces added to the game.

So it is a bug. It should be a simple fix. So what's the deal Fencer?

Walter Montego: it is a known bug. If the pieces on the bar are 'extra' pieces and not pieces you hit earlier, the system does not consider them for backgammon (not even for gammon).
The same happens in Cloning BG, when you hit someone and get an extra piece on your bar - it does not count against backgammon or gammon.

I have taken all off my pieces of the board in a game of Crowded Backgammon. I was awarded 2 game points for a gammon. I am wondering why I did not receive 3 game points for a backgammon instead of a gammon, as my opponent still has two pieces on the bar. Nowhere can I find that having pieces on the bar, whether sent there or from the start of a game, does it say that I do not score a backgammon and get 3 game points.

So what gives?

CurrentRiver: Guess i'm going blind.I [..] never did see the one piece.

You're not the first to not see pieces. Still, you can always change the board to a friendlier colour scheme. Oh, hang on, there never was one. :-/

But you can make the board bigger, if that would help :-)

Thanks, I went to my game just a few min. ago and made my move. Guess i'm going blind.I tried to make my move several times yesterday and never did see the one piece.

Have a good Thanksgiving!!!!!

CurrentRiver:


you are referring to this game : Backgammon (WHY - CurrentRiver)

i think you missed your back piece at 24 ... as Vikings says your only possible move is to move that back piece forward

normally ongoing games wont be discusses, but as there is only 1 possible move here i think there is no problem :)

CurrentRiver: You have only one option for moves 24-18,18-12,12-6,6-off

I need some help and didn't know where to go. Please could someone look at this Game ID# 6463275, and tell me the problem ?? It's my move and I have double 6's.

Thanks so much to anyone that can help.

Орлин: Yes, it was most probably a bad (automatic) translation of my original message.

You're welcome. ;O)

That was actually the corrected translation. ;-) I would have gone further but I wasn't sure whether you meant Crazy Narde or not and hence wasn't sure what to do with "pairs"..

I used to play Crazy Narde at VogClub as well as Narde and Tapa. From what I remember, I found that the craziness - the sequence of doubles to be played or given away - often resulted in a game that came down to whoever was luckiest in the bearoff at the end, no matter how much of a lead the lead player was. I preferred ordinary Narde.