Hrqls: are there also positions in which its better to move only 1 piece into you home because it covers an empty spot (and leaving 1 outside your home)

Most definitely. It's more about the distribution than simply leaping over the bar. As nabla says, the 6-5-4 points are the most important. If you're stacked on 6 and 5 or 4 are empty then a roll that stacks the 6 higher is no good to you. You'll only waste rolls later unstacking it (unless you get 6-6). As you'll have no control over those later rolls but right now you have a known roll, why not place the checkers usefully.

Here's an example that I've just made up:
http://www.gellie.plus.com/DG_Extras/MakeBoard/ShowBoard.htm?MatchId=cIkmAAAAAAAA&PosnId=3HauAADc/CUBAA


With the 5-1 you could add two more men to the 6-point. Of the 20 moves shown in GnuBg, the 11/6 7/6 stacker is 17th and a Bad move (-0.48). It's much better to do 7/2 6/5. Putting one on a low point is greatly preferable to stacking. But the best move (it just edges it out) is 9/4 6/5. This builds on the 4-point, which is important because it's very weak in relation to the 6-point, and unstacks the 6-point a bit.

One additional point about the 4-point compared to the 3-point. If you roll a 3 and there's a hole on the 3-point then 6/3 will fill it. The next 3 will thus take a man off. If you have a hole on the 4-point and roll a 4 then you have to move a man deep from 6 or 5 and there's still a hole on the 4-point. The next 4 would thus waste another half a roll. The same applies to the 5-point but it's somewhat less troublesome. When the 6-point is cleared then a hole on the 5-point disappears automatically but a hole on the 4-point will still need the 5-point to be cleared before it disappears.

Hrqls: When bearing in it is best to aim for the points 4, 5 and 6. The low points can very well remain empty. The reason is that all dices below 4 will play fine even if the low points are empty (e.g. with a 3 you play 6/3, keeping a fine distribution). By contrast, an empty 4-point (for instance) is a nuisance, because all fours have to be played 6/2 or 5/1, accumulating checkers on the low points, that are likely to waste pips later.

So in your example, the move is definitely 8/6 8/4.

playBunny: thanks :)

although it seems like a waste of pips it might win me a move which is important

are there also positions in which its better to move only 1 piece into you home because it covers an empty spot (and leaving 1 outside your home) than moving 2 pieces into your home (and leaving that spot empty ?)

for example you all your pieces in your home except 2 .. those 2 are both on 8 while 2 is empty .. you 4+2 .. would you move 1 piece to 2 and leave the other at 8 .. or would you move 8/6 and 8/4 leaving 2 empty ?

Hrqls: I would definitely do 6/4/off.

If you do 6/1 2/off then a 2-1 on the next roll would leave an odd number of men and therefore be a wasted roll. That would be an unnecessary gift to your opponent.

If there had been one more man on the ace point (or one less) at the start of the 5-2 then it would make no difference which you did. The 2-1 would reduce your bearoff requirement by one roll whether one man came off or two.

Hrqls: With only 6 or so pieces left on the board, I personally would do what you did.

If I has many more pieces left, I would have probable tried to spread out my pieces.... nothing worse then getting double 4's and you can't even move 1 piece off because you have nothing on the "4" spot, but plenty left on the 5 or 6.

..... but then again, I'm far from a backgammon expert.

nabla: thanks ... i always move my pieces off as fast as possible (using as many pips as possible) .. but that doesnt seem to be the best way sometmimes

in this case it wont matter much though ;)

Hrqls: I think you are right, but that there is a difference only if you roll 2-1 or 1-1 with your next roll. If you roll 2-1, 6/4/off will likely win a roll in comparison to 6/1 5/2. If you roll 1-1, 6/4/off will likely lose a roll. Since 2-1 happens twice as often as 1-1 and you are way ahead (so after 1-1 you are very likely to win anyway), 6/4/off seems clearly better.
It is probable that if your opponent was ahead and you desperately needed doubles, 6/1 5/2 would be the correct move. I doubt there is much equity at stake in any case.

i rolled 5+2 in this position

what would be the best way to move ?

i moved 6 to 1 and 2 off

but i think it would have been better to move 6 to 4 and then 4 off .. that way i would have 1 piece off as well but i would have spread my remaining pieces more evenly (i would still have a piece on 2)

any opinions ?

There are still 6 players needed in this Backgammon Single Elimination Cube tournament: Gammon Elimination w/ cube

If you want to put some Brains at risk and gamble, this tournament might be for you: http://brainking.com/en/Tournaments?trg=27075&trnst=0&u=18197


If you want to take a shot at winning Brains without losing some, have a look at Backgammon For Brains

coan.net: Ah ok... thanks !

Gordon Shumway: Triple gammon is different then a normal cubed game - where points go towards the tournament result (not the game result)

http://brainking.com/en/Help?ht=70

* 0 points for a loss
* 1 point for a normal win
* 3 points for a gammon win
* 5 points for a backgammon win

coan.net: OK, I just thought that a backgammon would result in 3 points, not 5... at least that's how I understand the rules:

* Single game (1 point) - the winner's opponent has borne off at least one piece.
* Gammon (2 points) - the opponent hasn't borne off any pieces.
* Backgammon (3 points) - the opponent hasn't borne off any pieces and still has some pieces either on the bar or in the winner's home area (the six pipes where the winner bears off own pieces).

Or did I miss some extra modifications or something that affects the amount of points?

Gordon Shumway: Well it is 5 points for a backgammon win.

When a person times out, the computer checks for the worse possible position you could be in if the game went on. (not the position of the pieces when the game times out to prevent people from cheating and purposely timing out to avoid a lose at a worse position)

I'm guessing the computer checks to see if you have a piece moved out yet, which you did not - so decided that the worse position would be a backgammon lose.

Even though looking at the position it is obvious that you would have never lost as a backgammon - or even gammon, but the computer is not setup to check like that.

I wonder how my opponent could get 5 points for this game: Nackgammon (netvenus vs. Gordon Shumway)

alanback: Yessir! And for Cloning Backgammon, too, it would be helpful to differentiate between the cloned checkers on the bar and the ones sent there by being hit.

Maybe it's also time to do something that will allow Backgammon Race and Crowded Backgammon players to distinguish between pieces on the bar that started out there, and pieces that have been placed there after being hit.

coan.net: Yeah, I noticed. This is good, since I was born without a memory. I need my games history to remember what was going on.

jryden: It looks like it is fixed now - it shows all past 5 games between you 2 to show the correct score.

coan.net: Yep, this game is from that tournament...okay, so I guess the score is right but the games are just missing from the history. Strange mistake...I hope fencer gets on it soon.

jryden: Looks like some sort of bug - but when I look at the tournament, it shows a similar bug that is being reported on the BrainKing.com board

BackGammon - Cardinal's Masters #1 (>2300)

My guess there might be more games not showing up - maybe got archived in Fencers recent work. Hopefully once Fencer gets on next, he will fix things.

Can anyone explain the score in this match?  I'm playing a number of games against this opponent so I'm not sure but this score doesn't even look familiar and makes no sense based on the games history...

http://brainking.com/en/ShowGame?g=2977234

Gammon Elimination w/ cube

alanback: I think at one time, it was discussed and it was decided on if someone times out, they lose the max amount of points (backgammoned) since they could still possible be in such a bad position that they will be put into that position and you would not want someone to time out on purpose just to be able to save a point or so.

NOW in this case, once a checker is already borne off, if a time out occurs, I agree that it should only be a 1 point lose.

You should add it to the Bug Tracker: http://brainking.com/en/BugTracker

Timeout

My opponent timed out, having already borne off 1 checker.  (Let's ignore my incredibly hopeless position for the moment.)  I was trailing in the match 1-0 before that happened. Now the match score is given as 3-1.  It appears that the server awarded me 3 points when I should have had at most 1. 

Puckish: I don't think using a guide is cheating at all. It wouldn't be if you'd read and memorize it, so why not have a look at one from time to time? I think cheating starts where guides aren't capable of covering the complexity of situations, and where you have to make different calculations for individual situations - and use software for that, because it exceeds your own capablities. Every information which fits on a piece of paper is legally usable, I'd say. But I don't know ;-)

What are the thoughts about using an opening move guide in games here? Is that cheating?

playBunny: You are right that a bot should also play unrated. I didn't think of mentioning it because of the BK rating system being *ahem* as soon as different match lengthes are possible.

Puckish: Frankly, I am rather touchy (who said paranoid?) about computer use, and I find it highly unlikely that computer help is widespread here in backgammon games. As I said, I rather think that the case I disclosed is an unique one. It is certainly a very different story on sites where money can be won.

The behaviour you described would also fit me. Like alanback, when facing a tough move, I often like to get a night of sleep over it, and my ideas are sometimes clearer the next day. Or I see that the move requires a lot of counting, and keep it for when I have the time and availability to conduct the whole calculation.

Moreover, the way GnuBg works, it is a bit tedious to enter a specific position, while it is very easy to open saved games and enter moves one after the other. So a cheater is more likely to consult the bot for every move, even though a "clever" cheater would make himself tough to detect by introducing enough mistakes to stay with a "human" error rate.

I see that my made-anonymous accusation is likely to open speculation. So I will at least say that I have had a PM conversation with the cheater about it quite some time before posting here, so he/she know about it, and nobody else should feel that he/she could be targetted.

nabla: I'd tend to agree that a bot should be clearly labelled as a bot. At Fibs it's not always clear but, as there's a clearly established bot ethos, it doesn't really matter too much, especially as there's a full range of abilities exhibited by them. "Bot" doesn't mean perfect by any means.

As for tournaments, well, you know my interest in getting DG "bot standardised", but here, where the rating system is *ahem*, there is no value in that. Even if there were, tournaments wouldn't be ideal anyway as the players are self-selected and so uniformity of the pool is absent. And so I'd agree that there's no need for it to play tournaments. I'd almost suggest that a bot should only play unrated except that people could have fun playing one-pointers against it and sucking points out of it! ;-)

puckish: I agree completely with wetware and alanback. Getting a bot's-eye view of a position only takes a few minutes, if that, so the longer someone takes the more likely they are to be having a personal ponder. I've sometimes visited and revisited a game several times over a few days (DailyGammon time controls permit this), each time deciding to defer the decision until it becomes clearer (or rather for me to become clearer, lol. It's amazing how one day's foolish "Yeah, I'll get the rolls" optimism becomes another day's "That would be madness!" rational thinking. )

Puckish:I think it's a little paranoid to assume that's the only possible explanation. I will often put a game aside when there is a difficult decision to make.  That's frequently the occasion for me to go to bed and think about it when I'm fresh.

Puckish: I think that cheating is far from obvious in the case you described (compared with the evidence nabla was able to provide).  You probably wouldn't like to play against me--I often take a lot of time to evaluate tough double offers, or when deciding to make such offers.  I spent nearly an hour on one this morning, and would hate to think that anyone would conclude that I'm obviously cheating.  Some of us just work hard.

nabla: Forms of cheating are probably more widespread than we realize too!

I think you would hear more of an outcry over what you have uncovered if other people were not doing the same thing themselves, even if maybe to a lessor degree.

For example, I was recently involved in a couple of games with a certain player, and we were both making moves consistently one evening, and in one game I offered them a double. I was able to see that they were viewing this game, but they never made a move, and then they were off the site, with their last action of "viewing this game".

Now, coupled with this recent claim of cheating fresh in my mind, I wonder if this person has taken this game to a program to determine if accepting a double is the right move or not? It seems quite obvious to me that is what has happened.

So, I am sure in my mind that even if people are not cheating by playing every move by the aid of a program, that many people are surly using these aids to assist in certain tough move situations or like the one I just described

playBunny: That is a consistent point of view, too

But I would add two further conditions in order to be a proper bot :
- It should be advertized as such in a very clear manner (even more accessible than the player profile).
- It should not enter tournaments, because no one should be forced to play against it.

I think it's wonderful!

Not everyone has a bot at home. At VogClub there is a room just for playing bots (there are three, varying from walkover to mean, cruel bastard) and it's well attended. At Fibs there are anything between half a dozen and a dozen bots and they get a lot of attention. This place needs a bot!

A programmatic interface makes the most sense but if some human fancies typing in moves for the bot then that's great. Three cheers to Botman!

Mind you, a proper bot should accept all invitations from any player, rated or unrated, and for any match length or type.

alanback: I guess the goal would be for him/her to only get resignations - the only way to get him/her to change his/her ways or leave....

I'd resign because I am already playing more than enough live games against GNU, I don't need to log on Brainking for that. But if you would still enjoy playing, that is OK with me too.

As for that person's ego, frankly, I don't know how it works. It is true that I would be more ashamed to achieve a high rating by being GNU's proxy than by having everybody resigning to me.

nabla:  Why resign and give him the ratings boost he wants, if this is true?

Binabik: I agree, except that nobody should resign against him/her before the information has been double-checked. I am sure of what I am saying, but I don't expect to be trusted automatically.

rod03801: The PM to Fencer has indeed been my first action. He didn't have the time to investigate the case by himself, and we all know how fond he is of backgammon. So he agreed with my proposal of seeking for confirmation by other players on the backgammon board.

Quite possibly I misunderstood him for naming the accused player, but I hadn't thought of any other way. Remember that ********** is mainly playing private games and that only his/her opponents are able to see them. OK, now maybe there is another way. Add the instruction 0) : PMing me to know the handle of the player.

nabla: The most appropriate action to take is to PM Fencer. You are certainly welcome to have a discussion about the specific player in a fellowship, if the big boss allows it. It just isn't fair to bring these accusations to a public board. I sympathize, I have no patience for cheaters myself, and it is frustrating when you are a true game lover to play people that you suspect are cheating.

Good luck.

nabla: I for one am glad you shared this knowledge with us. I would propose that we resign or decline games with him, or anyone else known to cheat - not out of nastiness, but as a message that on BK we like to play with ourselves.... I mean BY ourselves!

nabla:  I am not! Oh, nevermind, I thought you said "with" ...

coan.net: I apologize, I realize that I should at least have given a link to the player's profile instead of naming him or her. This way, everyone could have chosen to click it or not. But I guess it would not even have been OK this way.

The question is what we do about it. Nobody cares ? I shouldn't even have told ?

By the way, this is definitely not a general talk about cheating. It is a very specific one about one isolated case. On a general and more positive note, I would say that I am pretty convinced that all the other people I played backgammon with here were playing by themselves.

Puckish: Even though general talk about cheating is OK on a public board, accusing a person of it is not. A private message to nabla would be best since there is no restriction like that in private chat.

nabla: who is he?????

alanback: He does ! Never trust the BK rating :-)

nabla:  If he's using a bot, why doesn't he play better?

Unfortunately I found out that ********** was using a bot to play his moves in Backgammon and Nackgammon games. As Fencer understandably won't to act on it until it has been confirmed by other users, and as ********** has mainly played private games, I appeal to his recent opponents that are acquainted with the usage of GNU backgammon (the best free program and the one that ********** uses). Here are the steps to reproduce :

1) Choose a recent finished private match that you played with ********** .

2) Click "download MAT code" at the top right of the game screen and save the file to your disk.

3) Start GNU backgammon.

4) Go to Settings / Analysis and choose the "Expert" level for both checker play and cube decisions.

5) Click the Import button, choose the .mat format and your saved .mat file.

6) Go to Analyse / Analyse match. GNU will analyse all played moves.

7) Go to Analyze / Game statistics - and not match statistics, because there is a bug in the BK import format that swaps players every two games. Browse the games. In each of them, I bet that you will see one player with a human error rate (you) and one with an error rate of virtually nil ( ********** ).

Before jumping to the logical conclusion, you should know that the world's best players have an "Equivalent Snowie error rate" around -2 on a good day. You can check that for yourself by downloading world-class matches from here : http://www.hardyhuebener.de/engl/matches.html

On a last note, "expert" is a lowish standard in GNU backgammon, and I have seen ********** play a move that was also played by the expert level, but discarded as a big blunder by the "world class" level (which analyses 2-ply instead of 0-ply).

Thanks by advance for your input !

********** Edited out users name. **********