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BGonline.org Forums
Clock play at Bg Live in London 2008
Posted By: Mike Main
Date: Monday, 1 December 2008, at 1:44 p.m.
Some weeks ago, when the debate about clock play was in one of its full swings, I promised a report on clock play as used at Bg Live in London. The event has now happened, I’ve recovered from the exhaustion of it and here below is my report. What I did miss out on was the results of the meeting that was due to be held in Las Vegas to discuss the future of clock play in ABT events so if anybody has that document I’d love to read it please.
Bg Live in London is not a big money players event – rather it is designed to bring more players into live bg tournament play. This was the 8th year we ran the event and every year we introduce things designed to make live play bg more popular. The big introduction this year was clock play. Bg in London is already equipped with 32 Excalibur Game Time 2 clocks (given to us by PartyGammon.)
Clocks were made available to players should they wish to use them on the Friday evening for the Weekend Long Knockout and on Saturday morning for the Singles Knockout but only 1 or 2 matches used them. I would have liked to made the entire Singles Tournament a clock play event simply because the window in which to play the event is very tight indeed (there’s a boat trip up the river Thames to see a fireworks display half way through the event which causes logistical nightmares for the management of the event but is popular with players so it’s a case of ce la vie.) However only 7 of the 62 players had played with clocks before and I decided that getting so many “clock play virgins” broken in in such a short time frame was probably folly.
On the Saturday evening we run a Doubles Tournament, clock play obligatory. 20 Pairings entered. I'd intended to set clock times to 30 seconds per move and a time bank of 10 minutes for the 3 point matches throughout – generous to say the least. However in the days preceding the event when I'd set up the time allowances on our 32 clocks I could only set the seconds per move to maximum 19 seconds. This seems a very strange feature of the Excalibur Gametime 2 clocks and if anybody has sussed out how to set it to more please do let me know. So I set the clocks to 19 seconds per move and a time bank of 15 minutes. Just before the draw I gave a quick introduction to clock play rules and advised players that there was really nothing to fear in using them. The draw was done and off they went to play. Everybody settled down and there were no early problems at all. I'm now struggling to find words to write about the players using clocks simply because they took it all in their stride - there wasn't a single problem raised. Sure, because they were 4 players per match of course the workload of donking clocks, picking up "the opponent's dice" dice and getting used to the rhythm of using clocks was shared about but a "no problems" situation was far more than I had expected. All in all it seemed to prove that the fear of using clocks is totally unfounded and purely based on "fear of the great unknown." Players can play backgammon to either side of the board and hence are equally adept playing right to left and left to right so why can't they play with or without clocks? It's just a new routine to learn.
On the Sunday we played a 32 player Swiss Tournament; 5 Rounds, 5 point matches, on clocks – 15 seconds per move, time bank 12.5 minutes. All 80 matches (even the dead-rubber) were played. No player timed out. No player complained about clock play. The Tournament ran to schedule apart from the fact that I hadn’t allowed enough time for players to eat.
There were also Blitz Tournaments available (10 seconds per move, 2 minute time bank, 5 point matches) which proved popular with those who had got into clock play and I’m sure would have been better populated had there been more time for players to play for matches.
So what’s all the fuss about clock play? Over 50 players used them for the first time, nobody was up in arms over their use, nobody said they’ll stop playing Tournament Backgammon because of them, nobody timed out and players took to using them as ducks will to water. Sure, the time allowances were generous so I never expected players to time out but the generous time allowances worked well to let players see the benefit of clock play. I also love the premature roll problem being knocked for six (oopps, mostly American audience here – that’s a cricketing term chaps – means being bashed right outta the ballpark up into the stands.)
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