I have often thought that if you merged chess and poker together that you would end up with the game of backgammon. It is no coincidence that some very good poker players and chess players have become top class backgammon players. People like Dan Harrington, Gus Hansen and Bill Robertie to name but a few. Any novice player could beat a world class player over a very small number of games and this is where the variance in backgammon is similar to poker in many ways.
In backgammon then you are playing against someone heads up while in poker then you are nearly always seated at a table with other players. Although in poker then you are also playing heads up as well both in heads up games and also when hands end up with only two active players which also makes it heads up. If you played a world class player over the first to 10 points and you were a novice then you would be a favourite to lose the match.
However your chances would be a long way from being nil and you would actually stand a far better chance than you perhaps first thought of actually winning. The shorter the match then the greater the chances for the novice! In poker then even a world class player cannot overcome powerful hands as their opponents hand is so powerful that whatever the world class players does, they cannot win the hand. They cannot win on hand strength and they cannot bluff because their opponent will not lay the hand down.
So in these instances then whatever you do you simply cannot overcome the variance that is flowing against you. A top backgammon player needs to be aware and they are aware that they will lose a high percentage of their hands to even novice players.
