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BGonline.org Forums
Neil's errors in OLM play
Posted By: Jason Lee In Response To: Neil's errors in OLM play (Timothy Chow)
Date: Wednesday, 11 February 2015, at 2:22 a.m.
Timothy Chow: I would, however, like to ask for some clarification about the way the OLM is conducted, because I think it's good to have all the facts on the table.
Finally, a voice of reason to ask some pertinent questions that have some real bearing on things. Plus, I'm happy to see that you asked your questions in an unbiased way -- you're clearly just trying to gather information without being judgmental. I appreciate that.
Was the no-bot policy explicitly stated or just tacitly assumed?
I can't imagine it was ever stated explicitly.
Is it acceptable to look at bot info about a play that has already been made (and hence obviously cannot be changed) but before the game has concluded?
Here's the big one that people aren't really taking into consideration. I post rollout results of plays of games in progress. I'm pretty sure Neil does look at these. I know some of the voters are looking at rollouts. This almost certainly has the effect of lowering error rates. If you know what you're doing (and many of the voters do), looking at win/gammon rates in rollout data of moves already gone by is a big deal.
This, right here, makes it not a real backgammon match, and not directly comparable to what happens OTB.
If we thought of this as a REAL match like we play in a tournament, this would never ever happen! We'd NEVER release bot information until the match was completely over. But not one person has questioned this practice -- in fact, people are looking for the bot data.
What happens if, sometime during the course of the OLM, I happen to run across bot information about a position that is similar to the position I am facing in the OLM? Maybe I see a third-roll position on BGOnline or I'm engaged in my usual daily backgammon study routine. Do I have to recuse myself?
No. There are no stakes here. The goal is to have fun and learn something.
May I look up reference material? Either a book or some reference material that I've created for myself?
This seems a bit beyond the pale.
May I pull out a backgammon board and examine any position on the board that I want, perhaps doing pencil-and-paper calculations as well?
I'd rather not see paper and pencil calculations done. It's my opinion that in an OLM, one should be allowed to do whatever one wants with a physical board. That includes...
May I perform a hand rollout of a position and tabulate the results with a pencil and paper?
I'm ok with this, but it seems a bit much. This ISN'T Denmark vs. the World. It's Neil vs. the USBGF for funsies. If you do a hand rollout, you do it to learn something, not necessarily to "get the play right."
There was a discussion of doing manual rollouts in the BGO OLM, and quite a few people seemed a bit taken aback by the idea of doing manual rollouts. My guess is that nobody is doing manual rollouts. I know Neil is definitely setting up the position on a real board and moving checkers in the exact same way one might do over the board to look at the result of candidate moves. A 1-ply board analysis, essentially. To the extent that we want to mimic real backgammon, of course this is acceptable.
I'm willing to entertain the idea that manual rollouts should be banned.
JLee
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