FFM19 Game 1 Move 40: Herd to play 32

[Julia_H]

Christopher danced with a 44; the Herd might like to try to sneak one man home now, or put off the fateful decision one more time...

[ah_clem]

Spoiler

Classic pay-now-or-pay-later.

8/3 leaves seven shots or about 20% and if we're missed we'll almost certainly be able to clean up the straggler next roll.

4/1 3/1 is safe for now, but will leave a lot more shots if he enters and we roll poorly next time.

If we pay later:

• he has to enter
• we have to roll poorly
• then he has to hit

That's a lot of conditionals.  Seems to add up to less than 20%.  Seven shots seems like a lot to risk when we can leave none. I'll pay later.

4/1 3/1

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[diane]

Oh great - this is a wonderful position to look at, and exactly the kind of move we should all be looking to learn how to handle in this forum!

Spoiler

My head says move one in now, my heart says 'STAY SAFE', but what does my heart know of all this?

There will be some fancy counting behind this one, but my rational is something like...what is there to be gained long term from the safe move now...well, another agonising 'roll with your eyes closed' next time - that's what. This situation is deteriorating, soon there will be nothing safe to play, running the risk of a much worse forced move later on. I will move to safety one, then close my eyes and cross my fingers 

[close]

[dorbel]

Spoiler

8/3 is clear and the alternate play is a big mistake. While your opponent is in the air is the time to take the risk, because on the next roll the problem will only be the same or worse! Not an isolated case, this is the normal technique. Incidentally why was 8/6*, 7/6 wrong last turn? Because it creates a point that that you have to then clear later.

[close]

[ah_clem]

XGR++

Spoiler

I have to say that my  intuition said to bear one in instead of the chicken play, but I somehow managed to talk myself into the chicken play.

It's awful.  The obvious right idea is to partially clear the rear point while he's occupied on the  bar.





XGID=aDaFC---B---------abbbbbb-:1:-1:1:32:0:0:0:5:10

X:Player 1   O:Player 2
Score is X:0 O:0 5 pt.(s) match.
+13-14-15-16-17-18------19-20-21-22-23-24-+
|                O |   | O  O  O  O  O  O | +---+
|                  |   | O  O  O  O  O  O | | 2 |
|                  |   |                  | +---+
|                  |   |                  |
|                  |   |                  |
|                  |BAR|                  |
|                  | O |          6       |
|                  |   |          X     X |
|                  |   |       X  X     X |
|             X    |   |       X  X     X |
|             X    |   |       X  X  O  X |
+12-11-10--9--8--7-------6--5--4--3--2--1-+
Pip count  X: 50  O: 97 X-O: 0-0/5
Cube: 2, O own cube
X to play 32

    1. XG Roller++ 8/3                          eq:+0.510
      Player:   73.38% (G:5.65% B:0.06%)
      Opponent: 26.62% (G:0.73% B:0.01%)

    2. XG Roller++ 4/1 3/1                      eq:+0.341 (-0.169)
      Player:   67.39% (G:4.35% B:0.02%)
      Opponent: 32.61% (G:2.59% B:0.05%)




eXtreme Gammon Version: 2.10, MET: Kazaross XG2

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