We had a tremendous turnout for today’s event – 16 people showed up to play, and a couple of others showed up to either watch or just to register for next month’s “big show” (hint, hint, go to http://pdxbg.club/2018-portlandia-open/ to register!). I decided to split us into two brackets in order to make sure we got done in reasonable time, and we played from 1:00 until a bit before 4:00.
We had 7 first timers, although only 6 if you count the time James came to a chouette. Ok, so 6 first timers, although I’m not positive that maybe Joel came to one last summer. There were definitely at least 5 first timers.
In bracket one, Brian ended up winning the main flight, with possibly first timer Joel taking second. Jarom (who arrived a bit late but got us to the perfect bracket numbers) took the consolation bracket. In bracket two, absolutely for sure first timer Stephen beat me out for first, and Dick took the consolation bracket.
Here’s a position that came up in my second round match against Justin. I am up in the match 2-0, but had been in some trouble and aiming for a backgame. My previous roll, however, was a double-6, pulling all my checkers off the ace point and leaving me with this weird position. Justin stared at it for a while, and offered me the cube (I’m red in the picture below). What would you have done?
According to GnuBG, black is only 54.6% to win here, with 33.2% gammons. At a score of 0-0 or 1-0, this is a no double/take. But at 2-0, this is a double/take!
Extreme Gammon disagrees – putting black at 59.75% to win, with 42.4% gammons. According to Extreme Gammon, this is a double/take at scores of 0-0 and 1-0, but a double/pass at 2-0!
So one way or another, the match score is critical to the cube action right here. I’m going to go with Extreme Gammon, because after all it’s supposed to be the stronger program, and also because over the board I did in fact drop.
We have our monthly chouette next Saturday, and possibly (possibly) another chouette in early/mid March, but the next tournament event will be the Portlandia Classic. Registration is starting to pick up, and I’m hoping we’ll have 60+ players. See you there! (hint, hint, go to http://pdxbg.club/2018-portlandia-open/ to register!)
-Mark