PLAYER 3bc is cheating by always winning in 4 or 5 seconds, never a higher score. Always number one
galterio
REGISTERED
Game: freecell
What would you like to see?
I would like to see that each participant has a unique name. If you are going to allow "Anaymous" to be a name, it must be unique to identify a participant. We are all anaymous anyway.
Comments
So, this is cool-I never had this result before-another anon having the exact same time and moves 17 minutes earlier than I did:
anonymous 2021/07/13 3:30pm 52 89 1m51s
anonymous 2021/07/13 3:13pm 52 89 1m51s
That's probably the first time I ever really noted my score.
Anonymous , I misspelled the word!
@galterio: I’m curious why there’s a complete disconnect between the title of this thread and your first post. The title is an unfounded and illogical accusation that 3bc cheats. The other is reasonable request regarding anonymous players—which, by the way, Jim +/or David has mentioned more than once that they are considering addressing under the hood.
Let me elaborate on why it's illogical to suggest that consistently winning the Freecell Game of the Day with a score of 4-5 seconds is some evidence of cheating. First of all, your assertion that 3bc's score is always 4 or 5 seconds is simply wrong. Within the last week, his best was 6 seconds [link], and it's scores as fast as 3 seconds or even 2 come along occasionally [e.g., 766777321 & 686960134] Note that the one second score in the latter game is not legitimate, as explained in this thread. You might also be interested in this thread.
In general, you're right that the fastest times, almost always from the incomparable 3bc, concentrate in the 4-5 second range. That's is actually to be entirely expected. Why? Because playing for maximum speed like 3bc and I and a few others do is almost all about the number of actions, or taps because all of us in the sub-10 second range are all playing on touch devices. The number of **moves **reported by the site is nearly meaningless because of the way we're maximizing the use of Super Moves. When you get really good at leveraging Super Moves, you can almost always find a solution that takes between about 10 and 25 taps. Within that range, the statistical distribution would define a bell curve, with the majority of games falling between about 14 and 18 moves. (I'm guesstimating here; I am not quite obsessive enough to have not kept records on the number of taps for each GotD in my history here!)
Now, once you've figured out a solution with a low number of actions and practiced it several times, you can execute it at a rate of about 3-4 taps per second. Let's take 4 as the average. If the solution involves about 12-15 taps, it will come to 4 seconds; 16-20 taps will take 5 seconds. That covers the center/top of the bell curve, which explains fairly precisely why the majority of fastest times fall in the 4-5 second range.
Occasionally, a game will take more than 20 taps, or the sequence of taps will be trickier so your average falls to 3 taps/second or there's a point where you have to wait a beat for a Super Move to run its course, any of which can push the fastest time to >5 seconds. And rarely the stars align to yield a solution with not only a very low number of taps in a simple, easy sequence, which is when you can break the elusive 3 second barrier or even squeak under the truly rarified 2 second bar (apologies for the mixed metaphor...). Jim or David can explain whether times are rounded down from n.49 or n.99.
More often than not, 3bc usually bests me by at least a second. I'd wager that's attributable to a combination of him routinely finding solutions that take fewer moves than mine and his fingers--and brain--being quicker. When I manage to tie him on time (to the nearest second, anyway), he always has an edge on the official Moves count. Which to me is the most remarkable aspect of his skills. In fact, for quite a while I was convinced that he could not legitimately achieve both the fastest time and the lowest Moves count (on the same play) because I thought that recording a low Moves score almost necessarily required more taps. Based on that erroneous assumption, I made a right fool of myself around here for months casting aspersions on 3bc, which still makes me blush in shame when I think of it.
For the record, these days I don't even think of myself as competing with 3bc, and not just because I almost never book a faster time. I'm obviously aware of the score he posts. But I'm not even trying to beat him, and it makes no difference to me how my time compares to his. I simply enjoy logging the fastest time I'm capable of (within a reasonable period of effort). If some of you dismiss this as bunkum, I won't hold it against you, but I speak the truth.
Apologies for the excessively long post. I hope it at least addresses the point at hand.
Haha, 3bc is a beast. And i'm assuming female. Not that that matters. Lol
Ha! @lasso you could well be right 😀 I assumed ‘he’ from the ‘quick as a flash’ 3bc video but on second scrutiny it isn’t really that definitive. Adds to the mystery. 🧐 I shall refer to them as they from now on.
Ah, the singular they. The boogeyperson of pedantic grammarians everywhere.
lol @Arborist The precedent to accepting ‘they’ as singular is of course ‘you’ which plays both roles 🙂
Late edit: found this interesting* history summary of the grammatical singular they
https://public.oed.com/blog/a-brief-history-of-singular-they/
*if you’re into this sort of thing
Hmm. I was going off of hand size in the one video 3bc posted. But without knowing what size the tablet is, that video is useless for assessing the scale of anything. And of course hand size is hardly the best indicator of gender, especially for a nitwit like me.
I confess I’m one of those pedantic grammarians of which you speak who can’t bring themself to use the singular “they.” Don’t get me wrong, I’m all for gender neutral pronouns for those who prefer them. But we can do better than changing the use of an existing word. And, yeah, I read that OED blog post—coincidentally stumbled on the same piece before noticing that it’s the same one that you provided a link to, @fingsaint. It’s okay: I’m accustomed to being hopelessly out of date...
I'm not "always winning in 4 or 5 seconds, never a higher score", but today's game ( #1769018601) is just an easy 4 seconds one:
1.*
2. ♠2
3. ♣2
4.♥J
5.♦A
6.♦8
7.♠Q
8.♦J
9.♠7
10.♠6
11.♠4
12.♣K
13.*
@DEM: "I mean, we all know that nobody could complete a game of freecell in two seconds without the software equivalent of performance enhancing drugs."
I just completed Game #686960134 in 2 seconds - for the second time. After a less than 5 minutes' - offline - practice:
1.♣8
2. *
3.♥6
4.♣7
5.♠10
6.♦4
7.*
8.♦6
9.♠6
10.*
Btw, I'm using an ASUS VT207N 19.5" Touch Monitor. And I've never used ReMouse.
@all: I'm a "he"...
Thanks @3bc for untangling the grammatically correct pronoun conflict web we’d weaved for ourselves.
I blame lasso 😂
I think it would be so cool if no one ever accused another player of cheating. I play on another site-where the scoreboard only shows that you won the game and keeps a count of how many games you won-if you check a box for that option. I don't even know if other people are playing-much less beating my score.
Competition is great (if that's what you want), but when it turns into paranoia and cheating accusations-very tedious.
And kudos to @3bc for his endless patience in explaining how he wins.
@3bc: great to have you popping in here on the forum and especially to have you sharing your solutions. But no fair using my old words against me like that. I mean that's gotta be some brand of fake news dirty tricks!!!
As expected, your 4-second/89 Move solution is several moves shorter than my 5-second/91/Move solution:
1. 6♥
2. 4♥
3. 2♠
4. *
5. 2♣
6. J♥
7. Q♠
8. A♦
9. *
10. 4♠
11. *
12. 8♦
13. *
14. 10♠
15. *
16. 6♠
17. *
I take full responsibility. Lol. And you are all so organized! I have no idea about my moves. A lot of frantic tapping for me.
When I’m practicing a particular solution to commit the series of taps to memory, I’m thinking much more about position than cards. But once the solution is burned into your memory—short-term memory, that is—it’s easy enough to step through them and take note of exactly which cards you’re tapping.
Nothing has been burned into my memory other than the lyrics to earworm songs.
I don't even know how one can cheat. Also,don't know what a super move is. Please inform me.
From the rules for Freecell:
The videos attached to the FAQ section about “impossible scores” are full of examples.
Well,well....you learn something everyday.I've never read the rules.Chris accuses me of never reading any instructions.Never mind.Play on!
@Fingsaint, I am very sorry for not being familiar with this blog network and/or offending anyone with my words "cheating". After reading all of the above posts, it reminds me of when I was in the US Army. I started bowling "on post" in a serious way after recognizing that my scores were high for a beginner. I could strike about 5 times in a row before getting a spare. Well over time, my best score reached 199 but I could not break 200. That became a frustration but it was very rare to see anyone score above 200. After trying to perfect my approach and techniques, to get one more point, I gave it all up, I never got 200. I learned to play chess in college but only got serious years later when I entered a chess tournament for the first time and my first opponent was making moves that did not make any sense but I beat her pretty quickly. I was scared until I read an article that the lady never wins. Then a top chessman from Oklahoma bought a new house next door to me in Dallas. He quickly found that I played and asked me to play with him. He beat me in a very few moves so I went to the library to read all about chess and learned a lot but still could not beat him. While I was at work, he called my wife to ask her to play chess with him for practice before tournaments. Well she soon beat him in practice, which really affected him and he could not take it. I really do not understand how you guys and gals can complete a game in just 2 or even 10 seconds or this Super Moves business but I will accept it now. That is a separate world for people like me who never were outstanding in competition. I ran track but never came close to setting a record. But when it came to life in general, I won in that I retired at age 50 without working for a company for 20 years, in fact, my longest employment was 4 years with any one company. I could have retired at age 48 but my wife suggested I work a couple of years more since I could save my entire salary. I started saving my money at an early age and it compounded until I had enough to quit working after struggling to put up with several incompetent bosses over the years. I still have the funds I retired with after 31 years of retirement. I live off of my social security with no retirement package and I still save money. Now my great grandkids mean much more to me than any competition in the weird world we live in. I hope you all stay safe.
Hi @galterio glad that you found the link back to this thread and could see the conversation generated by your earlier post. There’s certainly a lot of talent about.
Also, great to read that you are enjoying your life in retirement. Take care.
for crying out loud, will u ever learn to just ignore what u don't like or do u not possess the strength of character to do so, barzy?
LOL, i see she deleted her post ROFLMAO
This thread needs a name change. (Original post-accidentally deleted.)
Hi @3bc, I read your post above responding to my previous post and then I copied down the 13 steps to finish game 1769018601 in 4 seconds but it still took me the better part of 2 minutes to find where each card was. I am sure with practice I could manage it in less than a minute but I have no intension of attempting a few seconds.
I now see what is happening but I am far away from seeing the logic or best method in playing the game, I never read or understood the rules and other information there. This game is way over my head and I venture to say for most people playing it. Someone should post in the rules an explanation of what this game really is for people like me who actually take a deck of cards to play solitaire so we don't see cheating in the game. I still do not understand why anyone would choose the name Anonymous which means nothing. All players be identified in some manner. You have a talent that surely could be used somewhere to benefit you? Good luck with whatever you do.
Hi @barzonymous On balance I think the title should remain, only because I think the title of the thread is probably what generated the interesting conversation that followed. Any edit would remove the atmosphere that prompted the original response from @DeusExMachina . The impetus of the thread was a defence of the attack made in the title. So I’d be inclined to leave it, unless @3bc as the person most impacted by the title requests a change.
My comment on "quick times" - I'd finish some of my games faster if my eye-brain connection chose to work better. Sometimes I simply cannot "see" the individual cards & have to use my cursor to go over cards one by one, to find the one I'm looking for, a la @galterio. Sometimes I can see every card distinctly and whiz through. I don't know why that happens, Either way, I enjoy my card sessions on Greenfelt. Thanks for your explanations, and good nature, @3bc.
The current title is fine. We try to have a light touch here, moderation-wise. But on that topic, @tucsonsky, I deleted your comment—it was off-topic and over-argumentative. Taking someone's private correspondence public is generally not cool—the only time I can think of when it's justified is if someone is being egregiously abusive, harassing, or threatening. That did not seem to be the case here.
to all, my apologies for crashing in on your party .. .. .. to david, thanks for unringing those bells
Thanks y’all for explaining about how one does things in such a small amount of time. It doesn’t make much sense to me but that’s just the way my mind works. We all enjoy it for how we enjoy it. But I’m going to try and do what DeusExMachina and 3bc were explaining and see if maybe I can understand it someday. Until then I’ll keep playing with moves vs times. I’ve been #1in moves a few times albeit mostly for a short time but hey….
Heck I am excited when I finish in fewer moves than other players. Sometimes it is the same group playing for awhile and there will be another player that I feel I’m in competition with. That’s fun. But mostly I play to take my mind off the world! Which brings up another small point: couldn’t we stay with names that are not politically ugly? What’s the point?
I really enjoyed all the comments; thanks for a nice evening.
This is way too much effort being put into Freecell in my opinion. I play it when I have time to kill or I can't sleep.