pedestrian: I got a response "It's a visual bug. Player names should be switched in the message." I have no way of verifying it now!

pedestrian: > I won this match. How come I lost rating points? It was a 7 game match, which I won 4 games to 3
>
> Game ID: 4914333
> ennukene00 is the winner.
>
> ennukene00: old BKR = 2256, new BKR = 2264 (+8)
> pgt: old BKR = 2245, new BKR = 2237 (-8)
>
> Game type: Hyper Backgammon

Hyper Backgammon (pgt vs. ennukene00)

How come I lost rating points in this match when I won it? I resigned the 7th game because I had already won four!

tonyh: Why worry about the opponent agreeing to auto-pass? There is practically no opportunity to use auto-pass in a game with the cube, and why ANYBODY who plays backgammon would want to play WITHOUT the cube beggars belief.
(This is not the best site in the world to play Backgammon on, and that's a FACT!)

Yes, the system is rubbish. I just checked out a waiting game, and I stood to lose 83 if I lost the game, and get 1 point if I won. Why would I even bother? What encouragement is there for good players to play against novices.
And winning (or losing) by a gammon or backgammon should involve a premium. It's ridiculous that the same points are used when on wins by a backgammon, and when there is just one point difference at the end

AbigailII: Life's too short to drink bad wine or play cloning backgammon!

pedestrian: Whatever the reason, somebody has screwed up!

grenv: Great idea. I have made an appointment with my lawyer and will do the update on Thursday morning.

AbigailII: My last move in this tournament was in March 2006. I am collecting a pension now. In those days I could afford to be a Brain Rook. I might not even be able to afford an internet connection by the time this tournament is over (lucky I have been eliminated already)

pedestrian: I just did the same exercise on currently open games and 7 out of 15 had identical rolls for the first move

Pedro Martínez: I think we should leave gammon out of this in case the swine take offence.

playBunny: It's absolutely clear to me. We should not be eating the eggs of battery hens.

playBunny: What I am MORE mystified by is why anybody would want to play ludo in the first place :-) (It's such a shame - since I gave up my paid membership I can't add smilies, and I can't edit my posts, so if I make a spelling mistake it stays for all thyme)

Pedro Martínez: If it had NOT been the Crawford round, it would have been (theoretically) possible for me to double on any move, and we would have had to play out the moves, tediously, one by one, over perhaps 10 days. Get it?

Pedro Martínez: It was because that was the Crawford round, when no doubling was allowed!

grenv: Exactly!

Thad: You are correct. Fencer will implement what he wants to implement. Two years ago I gave up my paid membership and promised to renew it when there was a decent autopass facility. Despite a lot of great suggestions (at the time) as to how this should be done, there has been absolutely no action And I have saved 2 years subscription!!

playBunny: I would have thoughtb people like you would offer carrots :-)

Puckish: Thanks for your kind words, but I don't want anybody to buy a membership for me. (I will quite possibly purchase a membership again when there is a decent autopass feature implemented, but for too long we gammon players have been regarded as second-class citizens on BrainKing, and until that changes, I have already provided enough financial support and encouragement.)

grenv: I agree! If you have avoided the gammon, and can't possibly win even by thowing 6-6 in every subsequent game, what is the point of throwing out the remaining dice? It could take three weeks!! (or more if you're playing against ....... ) (Fill in the name to suit yourself!)

AlliumCepa: Looks fine to me now too! Perhaps it was just you taking a peek! It went funny about two weeks ago, I went on vacation for a week, and it was still funny when I got back. I have not (intentionally) emptied the cache.

Backgammon (pgt vs. SMART ALX)

Has anybody ever seen this many checkers in a BG game?

Plleae Please Please Please can we have an option to say "skip all my turns until I can make a legal move." It is so frustrating having to roll the dice (for absolutely no good reason - whatever you throw, you can't move) and then pass. This is the biggest weakness on this site. It needs to be fixed!

joshi tm: I made a similar suggestion about a year ago. Rather than a "permanent setting", I suggested a check box on the specific game which allowed something like "ignore doubles at this time, and autopass until I am in a position to actually move a piece."

AlliumCepa: I suggested something similar quite some time ago. I second this suggestion. My suggestion was to had a box or similar to check saying "autopass on my behalf until I can make a legal move, ignoring doubles" or something similar, so that it could take effect meaningfully in cube games
,

skipinnz:  I know what you mean.  I am almost 66 years old, and wonder what will happen when I leave permanently!  There are a couple of games withe a couple of players which have already been running 2 years.   Is there a feature to advise permanent demise, or do one's games all have to time out when one shuffles off this mortal coil?   (It would serve some opponents right!)

AbigailII:  Separately, it would be nice to have the option to resign the entire match - not just for backgammon, but for all games.

That would seem to be taking a rather defeatist position?  As Yogi Berra said, "The game's not over till it's over"

nabla: I disagree. There are many situations where one needs to play a dozen or so moves to avoid a gammon, where autopass would notb help at all. If one could resign "normal" without the need to move the dozen moves to avoid a gammon, that could potgentially reduce the time of a one-move-per day game by two weeks!!!

Andersp:

Family Man: I don't see what the problem is. Whether it comes back straight away or drops to the bottom of your pile, it's still a game for you to play - and you turn comes around again a lot faster than it would if your opponent has been off line.

Czuch Czuckers: No! I remembered it because I WON it!

Czuch Czuckers: Remember this one?

Backgammon (pgt vs. Czuch Czuckers)

Walter Montego: Iagree with Walter. We should see the initial message in the game, it is a bug, and it should be fixed! (Are you here, Fencer?)

But you make a very good point. How can you remember and carry on a meaningful conversation about a game - let alone a multi-game match - if you are playing 100+ games concurrently? I remember the game position of almost every game I play (except for one very boring game - with a fellow countryman - who moves about once every 2 weeks) because I never have more than about 30 or 40 games running concurrently. I think BrainKing is a brilliant site, and love meeting and chatting with people from all over the world, but if all they can say is "gl" and "gg" the I suggest that they get a life, reduce their quantity of games, and concentrate on quality.

jryden: I agree that the "gg" thing is overdone. In the situation you describe, I usually say "Thanks for the match" or something similar - it highlights that I have won, and "suggests" that perhaps my opponent should resign.

Personally I really dislike "gl" and "gg" - if my opponents can't write out a some real words, I'd rather have silence - though I do make allowances for non-English speakers. And not all games are "gg's": a good game is one which was either close, or had some special interesting feature about it - like dramatic changes in position or fortune - probably less than 50% of games. If one player - and I don't care whether it's me or my opponent - has had two pieces blocked on the bar for a dozen moves, no auoto-pass, and an elapsed week or two against a slow opponent to actually resume "playing", then by no stretch of the imaginagtion could it be called a "gg". Likewise an opponent who strings out a lost game for a dozen unnecessary moves without resigning does not deserve a "gg".

And I like Grenv's tennis match analogy - let's not "shake hands" between individual games in a multi-game match.

alanback: And do you wish your opponents "good luck" (or the even the worse "gl" for the typing-inhibited), not really meaning it, and hoping that you yourself actually get all the good luck? (I now respond to "Good luck" with "Have fun" or some similar friendly greeting. Anybody who wishes me "gl" simply get "tfwmgl" or similar decipher.)

Hannelore: That's amazing. (I also won a game ages ago from a similar position, and I should have recorded the details for posterity.) I NEVER resign until it is IMPOSSIBLE for me to win!!

Jules: I've even offered to do the programming! No. it's more than that. Fencer (I believe, for some obscure reason) thinks that you should possitively see and respond to every move, however meaningless. The programming is trivial!!

whopper: I think to get this implemented requires a lot of creative grovelling to Fencer. Nobody has managed to achieve it so far, despite many attempts. I'm not sure exactly what it is that is necessary to do, but I am willing do do anything (almost) if we can discover what the secret is.

BIG BAD WOLF: I thought that was exactly what we had already concluded!

Walter Montego: I did not misread the question Walter. I believe my response was correct for BG as currently implemented. I guess I could have expanded it to cover some hypothetical variation which may or may not be implemented in the future.
Should a variation be implemented, I believe my response would be the same for an "n wins match", but hopefully, for an "n points match" then 2 points would be awarded for a resignation in a gammon position, and three points in a backgammon position. Ideally, the resignation should be able to specify whether the resignation offered a 1, 2 or 3 point resignation, and the other player could accept or reject the resignation accordingly (but this last point has all been discussed in the past, I believe.)

Czuch Chuckers: You opponent wins one game

Rose: You must move 11 to 10, and then 6 to 1
This is part of the new rules recently implemented - correctly - that you MUST move both pieces if you are able to. And unfortunately for you, if you move 11 to 6, you could not use your 1-spot!

Czuch Chuckers: That's not exactly rocket science!!

grenv: The really SIMPLE solution would be for players to sign up for only the number of games which they can savour and enjoy, and think about.

Fencer: Could I suggest the following:


"A backgammon match with the doubling cube must specify the number of points a player must reach to win the match. The doubling cube value is initially set to 1 for each game in the match, and is displayed on the right edge of the board. The number of points allocated to the winner of each game depends upon the value of the doubling cube at the end of the game, and the winner of the match (which may comprise several games) is the first player to reach the initially agreed number of points. The following sections describe all of the rules in detail:"

Fencer: I stand corrected. I plan to transfer exactly the same philosophy to my own business starting tomorrow!

alanback: I think Fencer's time is best spent on making his paying customers happy

Walter Montego: I couldn't agree more. I've been clicking "autopass" for a week now in one game at the rate of a couple of moves a day, and to be blunt, it pisses me off!

Fencer: Then my opponent must have really offended the dice God to have lost that confidence - or maybe didn't enjoy playing against me.

I haven't been game to try resigning so far, but I will give it a go one day soon. I hope you are right, but if you are wrong ..... (you wouldn't be wrong though!)

Marfitalu: I am basically happy to win 8 points, which I did. I believe that my opponent did not realise that he/she would lose 8 points by resigning, which is why I feel bad!! I understand the rules perfectly. But thanks for your concern.