Capt SpaceBat

One of my few regular areas of interaction with other people is through playing backgammon online.  When I first started out, there were few live gaming sites about catering to backgammon and so I used to play by email - one roll & turn per mail - with all the frustrations that entailed.  Soon, I evolved to playing online against opponents in real time.  Since there is live text-based chat, one really does have to converse with another persons, one with whom one is entangled in a battle of wills & wits: a heady recipe for paranoia and avoidance.

The online board is a hint of the Borderline world - however obliquely viewed - in a microcosm.  Every roll you throw, every move you make, game that you will or lose, every word, every action is there to be studied in minute detail with everything impacting on everything else leading up to the match’s final result.  Just like real life.

Alliances, friendships and emnity may form, develop and change based on the holding power of 24 little triangles that contain everything that matters.  Obsessive behaviour may set in: for a long period I was averaging over 1000 matches per year to the exclusion of almost eveything else.  Runs of dice - good, bad or indifferent - will be interpreted as placing some value judgement on the thrower and runs of good and bad luck - randomness? - seem to be the work of an arbitrary, if not actively vindictive, higher intelligence.

Well, that’s how I feel - to some extend: for example, last week I could just not win, no matter how well or badly I played, leading to a run of 18 - yes 18! - losses.  Today was quite different: I started by feeling down on myself, certain that another well-deserved thrashing was on its way, when I remebered that I have resolved to be victorious and turned the match around with a few sharp moves, winning 5-4 from 4-1 down.  The next three matches were similarly victorious, often seemingly against the odds beating players ranked 9, 31 and 37th out of a field of around 500 bringing my standing to 40th highest.

The highs and lows, fears, mania, obsessions that might come with BPD may be helped to some degree by playing; I find it great thinking time for anything that I do not want to tackle headlong and the support and friendships on the way have more than made up for the worries, neuroses and obsessions; mostly by talking with people, being polite, amusing, helpful and at times downright contrary in a safe space.

I whole-heartedly recommend it as a means of a diverting form of interaction; also, I might not be the only one like me there. 

Just remember, the dice are fixed, but not always against you!

Links:

SafeHarbor Games http://www.safeharborgames.net/

BGL Backgammon Ladder http://www.myleague.com/bgl/

Randomness http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Random_Number_Generation

Generator used for dice http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mersenne_Twister