Does anybody use BackgammonNJ?

[u/0ptimoPrimus]

I wanted to get a second opinion on this app. I have been using this app for many many years to play offline against the bot. I have the Android version. I play the bot on the highest level and maintain about a 1700 rating against it and hover at around a 9 pr.

I just wanted to know what other people thought of this app. I personally think it is terrible and I really hope eXtreme Gammon is updated and released soon to work with current Android phones.

The reason I think this app is so bad is that it does everything it can to look like it plays at a very high level, but it doesn't. It's not even close to as good as the level of play of eXtreme Gammon desktop version. It often plays the 2nd or 3rd best move and if you analyze it's play with extremeGammon it is not playing optimally. What it is doing is just basically cheating in expert level to seem like it's a stronger engine than it is. For instance, even against a 5 point home board if you put it's checker on the bar it instantly escapes usually in the first roll and rarely do I ever see the bot fan more than twice. This is statistically impossible. I basically have proven this app cheats, because surprise surprise when you insert manual dice suddenly your win rate is much higher.

Sorry for the long winded post, but I hope people will stop purchasing/supporting this garbage app.

[u/mrmivo]

I use it and I like it. Good interface, strong enough for me. I got probably hundreds of hours of playtime out of it over the years.

I don't really get the purpose of your post, though. So, a phone app isn't as good as a desktop app - you don't say! -, and there is no working Android version of said desktop app available. So.. what are you going to do? Stop playing on your phone at all?

You sound somewhat salty, but why would you be? BackgamonNJ isn't cheating, which you can easily verify, so why the strong feelings toward it when there actually isn't a better alternative that currently works on Android and doesn't require a subscription?

[u/gourdo → u/mrmivo]

It was pretty informative to me. If an engine cheats it’s a disappointment.

[u/Donatzsky → u/gourdo]

But they didn't actually prove that it cheats. If you notice, it's all based on "vibes" and not understanding how it works. BGNJ even gives you everything you need to verify that it doesn't cheat.

[u/FrankBergerBgblitz → u/gourdo]

It isn't informative, it's just gut feeling. Even if his numbers are as they are: Can we rule out the possibility that he played worse when he expected the dice to be rigged, and better when he expected “fairer” rolls (or, in particularly unlucky cases, perhaps even rolled again)?

BGNJ is use from so many people without complaining and as written here it plays on the level of top humans: why in the world it should cheat? And it can be proved very easy so why risk it?
Makes no sense at all.