Hi all,
I know that this post is doomed to stay sterile, but I have nothing to lose. This will be my first and last post of this type.

I was wandering about a wonderful experiment called "Three times backgammon", for tournament backgammon only.

I propose: "During each game of a match, any player, for a maximum of three times, can make the opponent or himself re-roll"

So for example if you open 3-1 I can oblige you to re roll. You roll 5-2 and we can continue the game. Later, I roll 66 in the race and you make me reroll and I have to do so. After a while I make re roll you so I have only one re-roll left. At the last roll of first game (we play a 25 point match) I roll a 2-1 ****. I make me re-roll and I finish my possibility to make me or my opponent to re-roll."

Obviously you can't make me re-roll 3 time the same roll, this isn't the spirit (you can't make re- roll a re-rolled roll, lol)

What is the aim?

Backgammon is a fair game. Yes. But ONLY AND ONLY in the long run: and this explain why any year there is a new world champion, and why only I guess the 0.01% of people can play BG for a living even if you can find people that play very well. I live in Italy and if I want to play a serious BG tournament I have to travel for at least 600km and I have to pay for hotels, travel and so on. I heard that even a BG giant said that in the beginning it was hard to breakeven with tournament earnings even if it was clearly better than most of the players in the tournament. If you play cash at the local club you play to few games on average to reach the long run.

Why don't we make BG fair (=variance reducted) even in the short term? Why pros don't even try to experiment that?
At least explain me why you don't try!

I tryed it in my small club and effectively if you are PR 6-9 against PR 15-17 there is almost no contest because average player won't even recognize when they hit a joker!

You are less revolutionary than you think. See my very first post at twoplustwo, though I find the importance of a different board setup questionable at present. My latest idea is to experiment with 16 checkers, which also makes online cheating very difficult.

To quote Robertie from the Backgammon Master Sticky of this forum:

"How to take the luck out of backgammon. If you’ve been losing lately, and you think backgammon has too much luck, and a small rules change would fix the game and allow the better player (you, of course) to win much more often, you’re wrong. Like poker, backgammon is an almost perfect blend of luck and skill. Alter the balance and the game disappears. Need more skill and less luck? Play chess."

The problem with playing chess is the home preparation on the opening and the never ending study of final part of the game, After you are a candidate master. And thats the boring part of that game, its too nerdish.

I dont want how ever to win more, i just want to reduce variance and that is very much different

Fllecha, the toppart of the backgammon community has been toiling to create a memory base of cube reference positions, which will become pretty useless if you are going to change some rules. The problem with the phenomenon of change is that the elite ows it's superiority to the old rules of the game, and therefore will resist change. The old system will only break up when crisis breaks out, which we see happening at the present day. Fortunately in the world of backgammon there is no crisis, so maybe you could set your hope on the flexible mindset of the backgammon player.

Has it ever occurred to you that the variance is a huge part of the attraction of the game?

Exactly. In poker, PLO is quite popular despite having a big variance component.

If this is your goal, you might enjoy playing at Safe Harbor Games. It uses some screwed up dice in its Red Rooms that do not roll as many doublets as regular dice. The result is fewer jokers.

You can read more at Backgammon Galore!

Safe Harbor Games dice
SHG still uses the dice in question in the social rooms ("Red dice" Rooms).
These dice generally have a probability of a double being thrown at about
9.2% to 9.6% (rather than 1 in 6).

Source: http://www.bkgm.com/rgb/rgb.cgi?view+1605

Beware! If you play too much there, you will mess up your backgammon instincts. At BgOnline there have been discussions of positions where the best play using the Red Dice from SHG is not the best play with regular dice.

For the record, Safe Harbor Games does offer regular dice in its Yellow Rooms.

Mike

Most poker players will agree that no limit hold'm is the real thing. Players who feel they are better in reading body tells than in poker strategy will go for PLO.

Nonetheless, my statement still holds true.

You won.

But how can it Be? You are a math graduated and a chess player how can you like variance? This screws up things because most of the Times Logic diasappear and an opponent Wins more than what he deserved. I think that the best player in the world against 6 PR player would win not more than 65-70% of games and thats unfair imo, because in chess the difference is more marked.

I liked yogy statement and i looked at mike's link: interesting site btw.

But just to know: how many here likes the fact that bg is a high variance game?

Just my two cents, but I think backgammon is constructed perfectly.

I love the combination of skill and luck. I love the variance you decry. I think these are a major part of the reason backgammon, except for the introduction of the cube, has not changed in centuries. Even its forerunners, perhaps going all the way back to the Roman twelve-line game, exhibit a balance of skill and luck that allows the not-so-good to have a chance against the experts.

Mike

Life is often much more about character than skill. True tests of character only really exists in games with the introduction of high variance (and high stakes) and the resulting vagueness/cruelty that it brings to any walk of life.

The skill of backgammon/poker/investing and other vague, high stakes, counter intuitive and high variance problems is much deeper in nearly all respects than low variance pursuits, and is something to to be embraced: in virtually all the great, meaningful callings in life how you deal with adversity is much more important than how you win.

"But how can it Be? You are a math graduated and a chess player how can you like variance?"

Maybe try to improve your mean instead of worrying so much about variance. You'd be surprised how much equity you can dribble away on suboptimal plays during the course of even a single game.

Backgammon is truly the cruelest and most enjoyable game because of the 1/36 jokers and amazing turnarounds that both you and your opponent encounter. Even when I lose a basically gin position in one of those "wtf happened?" moments, it's still exciting as hell.

Trying to put kneepads and bowling lane bumpers on backgammon isn't doing your long-term improvement any favors.

How are we defining "variance" for this entire exercise anyway? It seems like your general gripe is variance of outcomes around

Pr(Player A with long-term PR=x wins 1 game against Player B with long-term PR=y>x)

Also, it seems fairly difficult to calculate, and I'm not that good in statistics to tell, but does your proposal actually decrease overall variance for a single game?

If it wasn't for variance, I'd never win.

Its quite simple to prove that three Times backgammon is huge skill oriented and almost no luck. On average a player recive between 3 and 5 jokers in an average game so with 3 bonus they almost cancel out; but most important an average player cant even spot a joker. Even a 66 last roll ftw or a 17-1 shot that turn around a game, a 5 time dance in a 3 board etc many "good and skilled" player say that "can happens" and they think that a joker is a 3-1 or 6-1 opening. I tried it and with a 200 elo rating difference there is almost no contest as it should Be

There are many games right now that have little or no variance: chess, go, and contract bridge stand out. If you hate the idea that a weak player can roll a good number and upset your applecart, those are the games you should be playing.

The variance is a huge part of what makes backgammon a fun and exciting game.

Fllecha: as with yogi's idea, I would be willing to try it. But I would point out a couple of your statements that I think are ... shortsighted.

This is not at all what "fair" means.

First, logic remains. Second, it is not only the opponent who sometimes wins more than deserved - sometimes it is you!

I have seen you post at the 19x19 forums for Go. If you don't like luck, that game is definitely more suited to your taste. Oddly enough, I have a tried a similar variant in Go: once or twice per game, you can reject your opponents move. Mostly this had no effect: atari on 30 stones, connect, reject, capture, reject, and we're back where we started. There were a few times it mattered, but overall we decided against it.

Although, I am curious. This would really drastically alter cube decisions, with additional huge effects based on who has more "rerolls" left. The changes to doubling in bearoffs alone is making my head spin. I can hardly imagine the rest!

Go is pure skill. I really cant immagine anything more meritocratic game. I approached that game and its an artistic game, something delicious. Only a big big big problem: you cant Be above average with out a tutor, a master i mean. Yes, with very hard work and reviews you can. But its a really tough game, more than one thinks. And above all its a too long game. It takes too long to finish and in my life Now i havent too much time to waste, challenge irl.

I played chess in my youth and i have a good experience in live tournament and im a decent player but a big big problem of chess is home preparation. Its pretty boring to play 20 theoretical move (otherwise you fall in a inferior position) and then study the main Lines and tons of gm games.

Bg finally is exiting because you need only knowledge and experience with out too much opening preparation and with an aesthetic sense and math calculation, but wow If you like its variance that very often crush the Logic of meritocracy i raise my hands up

Yes, pure skill, and somewhat time consuming. I find 45-90 minutes about typical for a casual game, which is not too much for me but obviously more than gammon.

Totally agree, this is exactly why I quit chess many years ago. Too much memorization needed to advance to the next level. Go does not suffer from this anywhere near as much.

I think many people do like exactly that about gammon.

If you want something skill oriented and also faster, try bridge. You can log into BBO anytime and play just a few hands. The big distinguishing factor with bridge is the partnership aspect - you can't play alone.

Also, I greatly enjoy custom board/table games, sometimes called Euro-style or German-style games. Puerto Rico might suit you; the luck factor is low. On the downside, the duration might be too long. Also you need 3-4 players. Anyway, there are many titles designed for many tastes, probably you can find something that works for you.

So... you don't like games with little variance because they take lots of time to master, and you like BG because you can win even if you're the worse player?

Wow, being a world class player at a game is hard, who would have thunk it?

I still don't see a cogent argument on how your variation reduces variance. Remember, your opponent gets to "neutralize" your good rolls too. Waving your hand and saying the worse player can't recognize a joker doesn't cut it unless your opponent has a >30 PR.

Just to point out: the aim of three re roll is to reduce the Number of jokers overall and NOT because i think i get always bad luck. Im one of the few players that HATE to WIN with jokers. Of course i hate to lose with jokers but i hate jokers overall.

Its clear that this kind of game is more meritocratic: clearing jokers the game stays more on the tracks of Logic and this its better for the better player.

The fact that average player dont recognize jokers is just a plus, not the point. And Belive me that you dont need a pr>30 opponent: even 10-13 pr player cant even immagine how sometimes they get absurdly sequences of good roll or only-roll to survive or completely turn around the game or the match. They dont analyze with XG but i do, and i see.