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Endgame cube action

Posted By: Matt Cohn-Geier
Date: Thursday, 7 January 2010, at 1:05 p.m.

In Response To: Endgame cube action (Timothy Chow)

Position 1:

I am working on a set of rules/guidelines for estimating wastage and EPC. At the moment it is in the procastinary stasis stage.

But, pretty simply, to get Blue's epc, 2 checkers waste a base of 5 pips. A checker on the ace point wastes somewhere between half a pip and a pip. Since Blue has 3 checkers left instead of 2 it is a bit over 5, so let's call his wastage 6. So his epc is 18.

A 2-roll position is an epc of 15. So if White misses (with 31, say) that would leave Blue a favorite, but not an overwhelming favorite (an epc difference of 4 would make it about 50-50). Enough to recube? Maybe, but it isn't exactly efficient.

So, first let's note that Blue wins almost 2/36 right off the bat (a little less since 44+ gins White). Figure White has 10 misses (all 3s except 33) and Blue wins about 60% of those for 6 wins, possibly with vig of recube, plus the two others for 8+ wins. If White rolls 21 then he is not in good shape, and there is also some vig when White rolls any other 2. So all in all this looks like a pretty easy take, but should be a recube since any two numbers bigger than 4 are ginnish and 2s are market losers as well. Even 21 isn't terrible so it's only the 3s that White really hates.

Conclusion: Huge recube, huge take.

Position 2:

Well, we glanced at this in the last part. Blue's epc is about 3 less than White's and he is a smallish fav but volatility is sky-high and he won't get many more rolls in so he should probably recube. I don't have any good rules for this.

Conclusion: Close recube/trivial take.

Position 3:

Umm...recube, numbnutz. Not recubing this is a stuper-blunder. By recubing you basically double your equity, with the only catch being the 21-miss-21 mega-parlay.

Some people get scared when the cube gets high but in that case you really shouldn't be playing. Holding the cube here is absolutely atrocious. If White had recubed maybe the game would have been settled. Since Blue is a 22-14 dog to get off a fair settlement is close to 8/36 times the cube but a bit higher since White gets off 5/36 of the time...so 31 x 14 = 434 / 1296 which is very close to 432/1296 or 12/36 or 1/3...so 1/3 of 16 is about 5 1/3.

Conclusion: ask White if he would like to play HU sometime.

Messages In This Thread

• Endgame cube action
  Timothy Chow -- Thursday, 7 January 2010, at 1:29 a.m.
  • Endgame cube action
    Stick -- Thursday, 7 January 2010, at 1:32 a.m.
  • Endgame cube action
    Phil Simborg -- Thursday, 7 January 2010, at 4:43 a.m.
  • Endgame cube action
    misja -- Thursday, 7 January 2010, at 9:10 a.m.
  • Endgame cube action
    Matt Cohn-Geier -- Thursday, 7 January 2010, at 1:05 p.m.
    • Endgame cube action
      Timothy Chow -- Thursday, 7 January 2010, at 3:12 p.m.
      • Endgame cube action
        neilkaz -- Thursday, 7 January 2010, at 3:48 p.m.
    • Question about EPC
      Timothy Chow -- Thursday, 7 January 2010, at 4:00 p.m.
      • Question about EPC
        Jason Lee -- Thursday, 7 January 2010, at 4:06 p.m.
      • Question about EPC
        Matt Cohn-Geier -- Friday, 8 January 2010, at 1:14 p.m.
  • Endgame cube action
    Chuck Bower -- Friday, 8 January 2010, at 6:25 p.m.