Hi!
A few more improvements has found its way to Backgammon Studio:
Perhaps the most interesting part is the new type of search:
It is perhaps a bit obscure as to what you can do with this but you can try to start a match and at the opening position click 'Search' then 'Toggle all' and then 'Go!' You now have a list of all the possible opening moves at different match types that are found on the server.
You can also set up a specific formation (using 'Edit'/'Clear board' and then place out the formation you're looking for) and then set the pegs that need to match the positions and those who can be different. Or you can base your search on an existing position and select the pegs you want to match (as displayed in the above image) and then search for positions that matches.
New challenges are always fun! I have added:
- Backgame checker! backgame checker play.
- Slot machine! Double slot or not?
in this release in addition to a few 'warmup' challenge types. These are based on positions that were played correctly which might be easier than the ones that were played incorrectly.
- Hitman warmup
- Bar brawl warmup
- Payback warmup
- Bearoff bingo warmup
- Backgame bliss warmup
- Backgame checker play warmup
In your private database (requires an upgraded account) there is now a couple of more tracks on your training ground:
- Cube track - improve your cube handling by revisiting past cube errors.
- All track - Improve your skills by including all past errors regardless of position type.
the number of errors found in each error range is also displayed:
Bookmarks now has a few more commands in order for it to be easier to use:
You can toggle all bookmarks on/off and then perform an action on all of them: Browse/Play or delete in addition to the old one 'create challenge'.
You can also view your bookmarks by date which sometimes can be practical if you have enabled automatic bookmark generation of positions where you have answered incorrectly:
so you can check the errors you made today/yesterday etc.
When playing through a match you can now swap the players:
This is useful if you are playing through matches in your private database and want play it from your own viewpoint.
I also added support for counting the number of hitting throws there is in a position:
I suspect I'll add a 'Greatest hits!' challenge where you have 10 seconds to answer how many hitting throws there are in a random position at some point once I am convinced there aren't any problems with this.
Organizing your private match archive is now made a bit easier when it comes to merging/renaming player names. Often you end up with full names and aliases and combinations of these when importing matches but ideally you want all of them to be displayed as the same player:
In the play matches dialog you can click edit (in your private database) and then click on the player name you want to merge/rename. It will then display some alternatives that it thinks might be correct. Select the ones you like or enter a new name in the rename input field. Then you'll see an alias dialog where you can set what should be done when these names are found again when importing. Click on the checkbox beside those alternatives you like (and ignore the ones that look bad) and click 'yes'.
A few bugfixes has also entered the server perhaps most notably some fixes for firefox in connection with moving pieces on the board, comment input and moving dialogs.
I have also added matches from three of the tournaments in the 'Backammon Masters Series' (Austria, UK and Denmark) along with pretty much every tournament that is announced here...
Worth a try! :-)
Best regards,
TP