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Bad news from Belgium

Posted By: Rich Munitz
Date: Friday, 8 October 2010, at 5:33 p.m.

In Response To: Bad news from Belgium (Daniel Murphy)

Yes, of course, all this is true.

By the same logic, investing in the financial markets should be illegal.

The presence of random elements must be argued to be incidental to the skill and not dominating the outcome. And the wagering must be argued to be incidental to the outcome (true for match/tournament play, untrue for money play).

It can be statistically shown that random play in backgammon is defeated close to 100% of the time in a single game over skillful play. It can also be shown that random play in chess does not lose 100% of the time to skillful play, so the question is how close to 100% is enough? The "close to 100%" test fails in casino games, sports betting, and poker. It passes in bridge. Thus the skill-based decisions made in backgammon overwhelmingly dominate the outcome. Furthermore, it can be shown that it is difficult for people to reach top levels of skill in backgammon (unlike tic tac toe), resulting in a wide range of competencies. For these two reasons, Backgammon is clearly a skill-game regardless of the fact that random elements exist within the game.

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