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BGonline.org Forums
New Baffle box at local tournament
Posted By: Colin Owen In Response To: New Baffle box at local tournament (Christian Munk-Christensen)
Date: Tuesday, 13 March 2012, at 9:05 a.m.
Christian, With respect, I disagree with your approach to the use of a baffle box.
Firstly, I do not think it's a good idea to try to maximize the randomness of the rolls: I think it's extremely desirable - particularly in the relatively formal environment of a public tournament.
The point you make here, and elsewhere in this thread is: why use a baffle box if it doesn't do what it says on the tin? But they all do! - even some of those ones that were in use at the Cavendish West club back in the 70's that proved susceptible to manipulation, as Bob Glass has described here and also a couple of years ago in a very long thread (along with fellow witness Joe Russell).
Clearly, baffle boxes help to generate randomness. If you pick up the dice with your fingers, then drop them straight onto the board from a low height you will hardly get a random roll (though some surfaces would be much better than others, like marble/granite). You may not get a 'roll' at all, strictly speaking! But if we were to do this into a baffle box the roll would be much less suspect, especially if we dropped them in rather than fed them in, deep into the box. The more slopes the box has the better. If it has things (frets/vanes as on a roulette wheel) that deflect the dice, even better. The higher it drops the dice from the better, and so on.
If we use a baffle box as a replacement for the usual randomizing process, then we might perhaps come a cropper - as seen at Cavendish West. Baffle boxes can vary in their susceptibility to manipulation. Some may not need cups. But others may produce a pseudo-random roll without lipped cups and perhaps also some shaking. The best approach, IMO, is to use them to supplement lipped cups, proper and thorough shaking, not looking in the cup, not touching with the hand after release etc. Clearly, they will then ASSIST in the desired outcome, ie a true random roll.
I also disagree that a baffle box will give a signal to beginners that players will cheat. The signal it - along with lipped cups, a requirement to shake etc - should give is that SOME players MIGHT cheat! Better for newcomers to be alert to possibilities than blissfully ignorant.
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