Season 2 of Multiplayer Competitive Matchmaking!

Wow, that went by fast! Here we are in Season 2 of Competitive Matchmaking, and it still feels like the first season started yesterday. Before I jump into some changes/tweaks in Season 2, I want to take a moment to congratulate the top players of the first season, and of course go over what they won for their prize. Congratulations to everyone who made it into the Top 50 Leaderboard for Competitive Matchmaking! A particular congratulations to the top 3 players, kb92129, PegSurfer and our top finisher Nytric456!! Each of the top 3 also reached the final CR Level of Grand-Master! I know many have worked very hard to get to where they placed, so congratulations to everyone no matter where you ended the season for such a great competitive season. If you didn't make the Top 50 this time, now is your chance to start fresh and go for the gold!

Speaking of "gold", everyone who finished the season in the Top 50 ("Recent" list, not "All Time"), were awarded both a special in-game "board peg" as well as Cribbage Pro Gold that can be used in the Cribbage Pro Contests system and then redeemed for cold hard cash (awards must be used at least once in a Contest to be cashed out to USDC, see the full terms and conditions for details). The top finisher, Nytric456, is awarded the "crown" board peg, and all others in the Top 50 are awarded a "star" board peg. These pegs are shown to everyone when playing in online multiplayer games, so if you see your opponent has one of them you can know that they have earned it by finishing in the Top 50 in competitive play. The Cribbage Pro Gold awards are as follows (not cumulative):

• 2 Gold for Top 50
• 4 Gold for Top 25
• 10 Gold for Top 10
• 20 Gold for 3rd Place
• 30 Gold for 2nd Place
• 50 Gold for 1st Place

The first season included many thousands of players competing from all over the world, and the number of players grew every single day up until the very end. Season 2 is certainly going to be even more competitive than before, so hang in there and work hard to improve your game - and of course, have fun! With that said, here are some important changes in Season 2:

• This new season will be a little shorter, at 90 days
• All competitive players must play a minimum of 10 games per week to avoid a reduction in ranking. This is not really a "penalty", but it is a reduction in the systems confidence level of your rank if you don't play enough to calculate a rank accurately. The more time that you do not play, the less we know about how well you would perform relative to those who are playing. This 10 game minimum is likely a commitment that not everyone can make. However, this is "the big time" intended for the serious cribbage player, and the system simply has to have enough game play information to get rankings as accurate as possible. If you play just a few games per day, you will have over 10 in a week very quickly. I strongly recommend not waiting until the last day.
• Starting in Season 2, we have "tweaked" the formula used in calculating the ranking change you earn when you win or lose a match (what you will see as your CR going up or down). These changes were done to try and more accurately represent the nature of the game of cribbage, and the inevitable "ups and downs" players can go through, so that the ranking can be a bit more fluid (although, probably just slightly more). These were not big changes, just some "tuning" that we think will help. I expect we will continue tuning this system for multiple seasons to come as we see how each change performs in the real world.

Those are the biggest changes coming in Season 2. We never want to change too many things all at one time, as doing so would make it hard to know what changes were having what results in the game, but if you have other suggestions that you have not shared with us yet, please do let us know.

I hope you all enjoy Season 2 of Competitive Matchmaking in Cribbage Pro!

UPDATE 2:

The Leaderboard for Competitive Matchmaking will now show win/loss/totals for the current season only. You can view the lifetime totals in the individual stats for each player.

UPDATE 1: 

Here is what the score box area and pegs awarded look like for those who were awarded them:

  

  

Also as requested, here was the final Top 50 for Season 1:

1	Nytric456	26	PALONSO
2	PegSurfer	27	scout3
3	kb92129	28	12floz
4	Br1Guy	29	fisher17
5	iPeg	30	c3polerud
6	TC2	31	akeigwin
7	dubbinit	32	Geofred1
8	jmath714	33	flashmatt
9	dixietix	34	HeadNinja
10	nob4one	35	642sas
11	flyangler	36	Menks02
12	VGKnights	37	BOShag
13	dcpastore	38	Cmoney421
14	Dpac	39	MonkeyGod
15	james500	40	infinity
16	CzarMark	41	conelson
17	Moondog44	42	steelock7
18	19thhole	43	ski01
19	29ffrey	44	Yompopo
20	duke62	45	mbhenjum
21	BigD4Life	46	jeffcoull
22	habsgoose	47	Freddie69
23	Cgardin	48	sheepman
24	picklejew	49	gsosin
25	CT398	50	godawgs13

As a refresher, the levels are simply a breakdown of the CR value like this:

Bronze - 1 - 1499 CR

Silver - 1500 - 1999 CR

Gold - 2000 - 2499 CR

Platinum - 2500 - 2999 CR

Diamond - 3000 - 3499 CR

Master - 3500 - 3999 CR

Grand-master - 4000+ CR

Increased Contest Prize Amount!

Contest Prize Amount Now 97%

We are pleased to announce that effective immediately, Cribbage Contests (games played for real cash prizes) will now award the winner 97% of all entry fees collected (previously 85%)! This is the largest prize awarded for any online cribbage game anywhere!

We have recently made several changes to our Contests system to help streamline it and make it more efficient. These changes significantly lower our cost to run and maintain the system, and so we are passing that directly to you. You will not find any online cribbage contest system anywhere that can give you a higher cash prize amount. If you have been thinking about trying out the Cribbage Pro Contest system, now is a great time to start!

Multiplayer Competitive Matchmaking!

After a lot of hard work, and great support and feedback from the community of Cribbage Pro players during "beta testing", we are excited to announce the full release of Online Multiplayer Competitive Matchmaking in Cribbage Pro!

The game of cribbage has often faced challenges in calculating player skill levels in both real world physical games and online digital versions. Accurately ranking players by their skill is a challenge in any game that involves a degree of chance/luck. We have tried many different ways of doing this in the past, and through that experience we have learned a lot. With that history as a teacher, and algorithms now available that have improved dramatically since we started, we are happy to announce our new Competitive Rank - CR (or "Cribbage Rank" if you prefer) ranking system.

Here are the new basic elements of Competitive Matchmaking:

• Best-Of-3
• Automatic Counting
• 10 Sec. Turn Limit
• No Chat
• Start Automatically
• Disconnect/Quit is Always a Loss
• Classic (non-competitive) XP Level of 5+ Required
• 5 Placement Matches Required for Ranking

We chose these criteria to make competitive matchmaking the best it can be. First, it is a matchmaking system so that it avoids players selecting only newer players to try and easily win points against, while also providing fun and challenging games. We went with a "Best-of-3" series as a good way to remove some of the chance/luck from the game (alternating dealer as expected). There are also other things our algorithm does internally to help offset the chance/luck factor. Automatic Counting was chosen because, although counting and math is certainly a skill, the skill we want to measure here is playing cribbage. We have found that although new players may miss points from time to time, a skilled player will win against an unskilled player in a best of 3 series no matter if manual counting and muggins is enabled or not. The automatic counting option enables us to set a shorter time limit of 10 seconds, which makes a best of three games series more practical. The shorter time limit helps move the game along so that the entire match can still complete in a reasonable time frame. We removed the chat for the same reason - to keep it fast and competitive without unnecessary distractions.

This new Competitive Matchmaking is also a "Season" based system. We will be having "Competitive Seasons", just like you would see in a professional sports season. This means that on a regular basis (currently about 3 months; Quarterly), a new season will start and give everyone a chance to come in and participate on equal footing to see if they can take the title of the best player of the season! We are also planning on awarding a special prize to the top finishers of the season! The specifics of that prize will be shared at a later time and may be unique for each season. You must play games every week of the season (2 per week minimum), or you will see a reduction in your CR as a result. This happens because of an increase in our uncertainty of your actual skill if you don't keep playing regularly against other players. Stale players will not be able to sit at the top. Make certain you are regularly playing competitive matches to hold on to your CR.

When you complete your placement matches, you will be given a CR value, and a corresponding named CR Level. The levels are simply a breakdown of the CR value like this:

Bronze - 1 - 1499 CR

Silver - 1500 - 1999 CR

Gold - 2000 - 2499 CR

Platinum - 2500 - 2999 CR

Diamond - 3000 - 3499 CR

Master - 3500 - 3999 CR

Grand-master - 4000+ CR

The system that is used to calculate your CR, and to adjust it when you win or lose (and as part of the matchmaking itself), is similar to the "Elo Rating System" but a bit more complex like a derivative of that called the "Glicko Rating System" (to clarify, it is NOT just the Glicko system). We have taken the ideas of those systems, and others that are derived from them in modern games/sports, and created our own customized system for cribbage games. Instead of repeating what you can read in each of those links to those systems, just know that we have a system that is very much like them that includes a "confidence factor" (or sometimes called an "uncertainty factor") and a few other adjustments specific to what we felt was needed after running various simulations/tests of the system. We will almost certainly make further tweaks and adjustments to those things as we review how the system is working from time to time.

There are some questions that are common with a system like this, so I'll clarify a few of them here. First, you will see situations where someone's win percentage may be lower than you (and/or have fewer games played than you), and yet they are ranked higher. This is because a skill ranking system like this is significantly concerned with the skill of the opponent you are facing when determining how many points you win or lose from each match you play. Someone who has faced many highly skilled players, and won, will not have to play as many games to move up. Similarly, if they are relatively lower skilled and play higher skilled, they will lose very little when they lose games. This system can then account for people who play a lot of games, versus someone playing fewer total. As long as you are playing games every week, that is enough for the system to calculate your skill with a high enough degree of confidence (just don't miss too many days). You will also notice that in your stats there will not be any "skunk" related stats for competitive matchmaking games, as currently all "best of 3+" series style games have no concept of a skunk in them. You always win or lose by the same minimum games in a series based system like this, for instance a best-of-3 is always won by whoever wins 2 games, a best-of-5 by whoever wins 3, etc. You can never win a a best-of-3 series by more than 2 games, or less than 2 games, so as such there is no way to "skunk" someone in a series.

Lastly, a disconnect or forfeit in a competitive game, of any kind, will count as a full loss in every respect. There is no mercy here in competitive play. Consider this like a professional sports league, and there will be no exceptions beyond the rare case where we can accurately determine that there was a bug of some kind in our system that caused the disconnect/forfeit (which you must fully report to us for investigation). To be clear, this does NOT mean that you will avoid a loss if you try to show it was your internet connection failing - that will still be a loss as there would be too many ways to cheat the system otherwise. We will determine independently if it was our code itself that caused the problem, and only then will a loss be reversed if needed.

This new Competitive Rank system continues to extend our goal of making Cribbage Pro the best option for serious cribbage players. We hope you all enjoy this new mode of play as much as we have during our testing of it. You should find the matches to be against similarly skilled players, so that the matches are both challenging and fun! As always, if you have any questions or suggestions, please let us know through email to support@FullerSystems.com

Online Multiplayer Competitive Matchmaking Beta, with New Ranking Points System!

We are thrilled to announce that a new "beta" version of the game is available on both Android and iOS devices that includes a new game mode for online multiplayer games: Competitive Matchmaking! To join the beta, [UPDATE: BETA IS NOW CLOSED]

This is the much anticipated change for online multiplayer that introduces a new points/ranking system for this new game mode as well, so it also includes a new "Top 50" Leaderboard for competitive matchmaking. You will still have all of your points from the "old" multiplayer points system (and that system continues unchanged here), those points are just now called "XP" (basically, experience points). Similarly, your old level in multiplayer will now be called your "XP Level". The name for these games is now called "Classic", to show the difference between that and the new game mode called "Competitive Matchmaking". We have also removed the "Lobby Chat" tab, as frankly it was rarely used and taking up valuable space.

In competitive mode games, you will now see your Competitive Rank (CR) and the corresponding level for that (CR Level). Before you can rank in competitive play, you have to be at least an XP Level of 5, and then play at least 5 competitive matchmaking games (placement matches) to earn your rank. Once completed, you will be awarded a rank and level based on your performance in those placement matches against others of similar CR/CR Level.

Some of this may change as we go through the beta, but right now here are the basic rules of Competitive Matchmaking.

All Competitive Games Are:

• Best-Of-3
• A single game is just not enough of a sample to determine your skill versus your opponent
• Automatic Counting
• Your skill with selecting discards and playing your cards is what we care about
• 10 Sec. Turn Limit
• Shorter than anything possible through the classic games, so think fast
• Start Automatically
• Nobody is responsible for "starting" the game, all automatic
• Disconnect/Quit is Always a Loss
• Don't try to get away with quitting, dropping your connection, etc. It won't work, and you will lose as a result
• Classic XP Level of 5+ Required
• You have to play in the classic mode for a little while to familiarize yourself with the game before you jump into competitive play

Finally, we will be having "competitive seasons" with this as well, just like you would see in a professional sports season. This means that on a regular basis (actual timing TBD), a new season will start and give everyone a chance to come in and participate on equal footing to see if they can take the title of the best player of the season!

We are very excited to get this release out to you for beta testing, and really want your feedback and suggestions if you try it out. We do need enough players to join the beta so that we have enough players to regular do the matchmaking with as well, so if you join please also encourage your friends to join and give it a try too. We plan on running the beta for a little while to gather as much feedback as possible, before we release this out to everyone in the general release.

Multiplayer Points System 2019 Revisions

Beginning on October the 8th, 2019, there are some necessary and exciting changes coming to the Cribbage Pro Multiplayer Points System. Previously, you would lose points based on how much you lost a game by. There was also only a relatively minor penalty if you were to quit or disconnect, which made it possible to quit and lose fewer points in some circumstances. That loophole has now been fixed!

The biggest benefit to everyone from these changes is that now when you lose a game, you will not lose any points! However, if you quit, forfeit or disconnect for any reason before the game is over, you will lose points. If a player disconnects (not a forfeit, but loss of connection), there will also be a five minute wait time before you can create or join a game.

These changes have been made for many reasons, the primary being keeping play “fair” and encouraging those who have been playing for a long time, but have had minimal “leveling up”. A loss will still be recorded in the statistics for play, but won’t be a point loss on your Top 50 Leaderboard standings.

The loophole of disconnecting has been unfair, and we are excited to have improved the fairness of the game for everyone through these changes. Technology is generally good enough now to keep a connection, but as always, be sure you have a solid connection before a game is started.

Thanks to everyone for their great suggestions which we have used here to implement these changes. Keep the suggestions coming and best of luck in all your cribbage games!

UPDATE: Thanks to those who have contacted us with your suggestions for improving the system. Please know that we are actively working on developing and testing a new true ranking system that we hope will work alongside the existing points/level system. Stay tuned!

Gold Purchases Switching to Cryptocurrency

Starting Monday September 23, 2019, We Are Switching Cribbage Pro Gold Purchases for Contest Play From PayPal to a Cryptocurrency Based System

Much Lower Costs!

If you have used PayPal in the past to purchase Cribbage Pro Gold, then you will know that we had to include some of the PayPal fees in the purchase price. That cost was not small, but now it is gone! For example, you had to previously pay $5.95 to purchase 5 Gold with PayPal. This change eliminates that purchase price difference entirely!! If you want 5 Gold, you pay $5 USD in cryptocurrency (USDC). The only fee is a small transaction recording fee imposed by the cryptocurrency itself (around $0.06 to $0.10 currently).

Why Cryptocurrency

The world of cryptocurrency has grown and matured significantly over the last few years, and it is now ready to form a stable means of exchange on the internet. Cryptocurrencies can nearly eliminate all the fees and many have significant improvements in privacy for all parties involved while also providing quick transaction times. The new system we are using for payment processing is also not an intermediary, so they don't participate in the transaction in any way and have no control over it. This means that your purchases can now be directly with us, and it eliminates the excessive fees.

How to Get Started

You will need a few things to get started before you can purchase any Cribbage Pro Gold, but essentially it is just these steps (using Coinbase as an example):

1. Create or sign in to your Coinbase account
2. Convert USDC at a ratio of US$1.00 for 1 USDC with no fees
3. Purchase Cribbage Pro Gold, send elsewhere, or convert back into dollars on Coinbase

Breaking it All Down

If that list above all makes sense, you can stop reading here. For those that want more detail before jumping in, continue on.

For this initial release, we will be accepting only the USDC Cryptocurrency. This is what is known as a "stable coin" that is tied directly to the United States Dollar. This is an important distinction from some other cryptocurrency, in that every amount you deposit will hold its value and not fluctuate. In the future, we may add other stable coins or cryptocurrencies as they become supported.

First, you need a Cryptocurrency Wallet that can hold USDC. It is important to know that not all wallet services can hold USDC, so you need to choose one that does. The wallet linked above is provided by Coinbase, which is one of the most reputable and easy to use services for cryptocurrency available. We strongly recommend you consider their services, particularly if you are new to cryptocurrency.

Once you have a wallet ready, you will need to purchase some USDC Cryptocurrency to place in that wallet so you can use it wherever it is accepted for payment. You will want to be sure to purchase enough to have the balance you expect after any fees are paid as well. At Coinbase you can buy USDC with no fees using a bank account transfer, but there may be a fee from your credit card company if you select that purchase option. If you are looking for a recommendation, then go with a Debit Card for the fastest processing and relatively low fees, or use a bank transfer method for no fees (at Coinbase) if you can wait a week or two for processing. Most services will also require that you verify your identity prior to purchasing. This is because these are regulated financial services, and they are required to do so, but the process is usually pretty quick (an hour or two for them to process it usually) and selecting a reputable company will also make sure it is properly secured. If you have used PayPal for purchases in the past, then you probably went through a verification process with PayPal at one point or another as well, and this is pretty much the same thing.

Once you have your wallet and some USDC in it available to use, you can use the regular purchase option provided to you in the game to purchase Cribbage Pro Gold. You will see that all purchases are now listed with an exchange rate of exactly one to one - meaning 5 Cribbage Pro Gold will now cost exactly $5. That said, there will be  a small processing fee imposed by the cryptocurrency itself when you actually make the purchase. This is usually just a few cents (around $0.06 to $0.10 currently for 5 USDC), so you will need just slightly more than 5 USDC in your wallet if you want to purchase 5 Cribbage Pro Gold. These fees collected by the cryptocurrency are what keeps the cryptocurrency alive and viable/working (it is the cost of recording the transaction).

Once you have started the purchase process, you will be shown a wallet address to send the cryptocurrency to. Every wallet may handle this step slightly differently, but essentially you copy that address into a "Send to" in your wallet app/service and enter the amount that you wish to send (if you are using a mobile app for your wallet, you may be able to scan a QR code instead of copying it). The amount you send must be as much as the amount shown. Many wallets will handle the fee calculation and show it in the total, but be sure that the total amount sent out of your account can cover both the fee and the purchase amount. The service will wait for all that to complete before the transaction is finalized. The process to finalize the payment and finish the transfer is usually just a few minutes (expect around 5 minutes for USDC, but it depends on how busy things are at the time). Once it is completed, the Cribbage Pro Gold will appear in your account in the game.

As always, if you have any questions, please let us know by emailing us at support@FullerSystems.com We probably can not help with specific cryptocurrency service questions, but will always try to assist in whatever way we can. Change is never easy, but we do hope that you will find these changes an overall improvement for everyone.

Update On Deck Shuffling Randomness Audits

All the way back in 2010, I did a post on our company blog about the shuffling used in the game, and the audits that we conduct to help make sure the game is being fair to everyone all of the time. Over the past few months, we seem to regularly be getting emails and other communication from those that play Cribbage Pro, that they feel something has changed in the way the decks are shuffled and the overall fairness of the game in that respect. We do regular audits of the system to make sure it has not been compromised in any way (either by a bug we somehow introduced, or some malicious act by someone else for example). The output of those are generally really boring and just show the exact same thing we posted about back in 2010. Still, it has definitely been a while since that post and I felt it was time to both expand our audit and report on it again publicly. I understand that for many this will not change their feelings about the fairness of the game, but for those who like to see the data it can be helpful. Our hypothesis that we test when we do these audits is: If the deck is shuffled fairly, then a given card will approach being equally represented (have an equal chance of appearing) in any position in the deck when sampled over a sufficient size of decks and grow to a balanced representation as that sample size grows closer or exceeds the maximum possible decks in a 52 card set. In other words, if that doesn't happen in our testing of this hypothesis, we have a problem.

In order to do this most recent audit, I decided to expand the amount of data we pulled in (the sample size) as well as to present it here in some improved and easier to understand terms. To the first goal, instead of looking at hundreds of thousands of decks (which is still quite a lot), I wanted to get to the "millions" level. This sample then was pulled from all decks used in online multiplayer game over the end of the year and into the new year (end of 2018 into start of 2019), and represents around 3 million shuffled decks (2,902,476 to be exact). The shuffling used in multiplayer is identical to single player, but we use that because we don't have your device upload your shuffled deck to us every time you play. To do all that work, I had to rebuild how we pull the data in and process it for the audit, as this is quite a large amount of data to sift through and analyze and the old method simply couldn't handle it.

Just as before, the idea is essentially the same. We take a "marker card", and analyze how it shows up in each position in the deck over this sample. Using that information, we compare it against what would be expected of a random and fair shuffle. This sounds harder than it actually is in practice, as once you have all the data at hand it is just a matter of doing a lot of basic math. You can do more complicated math of course, but honestly I have not found it helpful (if you have something you want done, let me know). This time around we stuck with using the Ace of Hearts (abbreviated as "AH") as our marker card, because, well, we have used it before and any card is technically as good as any other in this type of study (we spot checked several other cards to make sure there was not some sort of crazy anomaly with the AH as well).

The first thing we do in these studies/audits, is to total up the number of times a card is found in each possible position in the deck. This means asking how many times the AH show up in deck positions 1 through 52. That provides us with a total count of each occurrence for each position. Using that number, we can do several things, but the most helpful and easiest to do first is a simple average. If you take each of those "counts" as individual numbers in an average across the 52 positions, you should get a number close to the middle of the deck if the cards were shuffled in a balanced and fair way (on average). Since this is an average, and we are studying a very large maximum possible combinations of decks which is 52 factorial (mathematically that is represented as "52!" - which means 52 * 51 * 50 * ... * 3 * 2 * 1), the resulting average will likely not be exactly the middle of the deck unless you get very close to your sample at least matching if not exceeding that 52! number. Since I have never written that out long hand in a blog post I will do it here, because it is important to understand how big it is. 52! is:

80,658,175,170,943,878,571,660,636,856,403,766,975,289,505,440,883,277,824,000,000,000,000

Click here for a decent further explanation of exactly how amazingly huge that number is.

OK, so now that we have established that although 3 million decks may sound like a lot, it is actually very small in comparison to that much larger number. Still, the result is very encouraging. Our average for this sample came out to exactly 26.5022 That is very close to exactly what we expected, and honestly I could probably just leave the audit there and call it done. Still, it is sometimes easier to spot differences and variances when viewed in a graph, and this also shows us each independent position in the deck and the total count for each. An average doesn't show if possibly we have a problem where this card always falls in the middle or always on each end of the deck for example. Here then below is the graph of each possible position in the deck (1 through 52), and the count/number of times that marker card (the AH) was found in each position. Note that the yellow line indicates the "middle" which is the total number of decks divided by 52 (2,902,476 / 52 =  55,816.85) in order to have a reference point in this large scale.

I think that graph pretty much summarizes the entire audit. Feel free to zoom in and spot the fluctuations. In the entire set, there is no statistically meaningful variance between each position in the deck and the "middle" - which is of course why the average is so near to the middle of 52. There are certainly still small movements from position to position. The final take away can be summarized as so: On average, there is an equal chance of any card appearing in any position in the deck. This is how we are defining a fair and random shuffle, and our hypothesis has been confirmed by our experiment. If anyone would like to see something different about this data, feel free to drop us an email at support@FullerSystems.com with your suggestion and I will see if we can find a way to get it to you or update this post here.

Upcoming Cribbage Pro Minimum Version Changes

It has certainly been a little while since I have written very much on our blog, but there are some important changes coming to our online multiplayer system that I want to get the word out on.

To improve security, increase reliability and build on a platform that will allow us to introduce more features in the game going forward, a new minimum version of the game will be required for online multiplayer games around the first few weeks of February 2018. This is a completely new online multiplayer server system, and although we have tested it for a while to get it as good as we can, I do expect there will be some bugs that will need to be squashed when it hits the real world. If you get this update (version 2.6+) and see any problems with the online multiplayer system, please let us know by sending a screenshot of the problem to support@FullerSystems.com We will be working as quickly as possible to address any issues that come up. Please don't assume a problem is already known to us, but instead send in whatever problems you see.

If you use a device running an older operating system, it is likely that you will not be able to see this update. When we publish updates to the various app stores, there are direct (explicit requirements by the app stores and platforms) and indirect requirements (requirements of the tools to create the update) to use certain minimum device operating system versions. Due to those minimums, we are not able to provide an update to devices that are running old iOS versions below iOS 9, and older Android versions below 4.0.3. If you have a device running iOS 9 or above, or Android 4.0.3 or above, you will see this update and continue without any interruptions after you install it. If you are using a device that has an older version of iOS or Android, try and update to a newer version if it is available on your device so that you can receive this game update when it is released.

The older versions of the game will still function on older devices, but for the online multiplayer feature most all other players (over 99% of all players) will be updating and moving to the newer system when it is released. As a result anyone still on the old version will not see those other players who are using the new version of the game when you play multiplayer games. Players running the new version of the game will be able to play against others on the new version only. After that change is completed and the use of the old multiplayer system drops off, we will determine if we can keep the old system running or if it should be shut down completely if there are not enough players to keep it going.

If you have any questions, just send us an email at support@FullerSystems.com

Sincerely,
Josh Fuller, CEO
Fuller Systems, Inc.

Spread the Love Promotion!

I love this time of year here in the US. Spring is just around the corner, and on February the 14th we celebrate love with Valentine's Day. We also love our Cribbage Pro players, so in that same spirit, from now through the end of February we are "Spreading the Love" by increasing the prize amounts for the Cribbage Pro Online Multiplayer Contests.

For a limited time only, now through the end of February (11:59pm UTC on February 28th), all winners of Contests with an entry fee of more than 10 Gold (11 through 20) will earn 90% of all fees collected for that Contest (5% more than normal). For Contests with entry fees more than 20 Gold (21+), the winner will earn 95% of the collected fees for that Contest. That is a full 10% more, The largest prize possible anywhere*!

Be sure to read through the explanation of Contests if you have not done so already, and also make sure that you are eligible to play in your area by reviewing the full Contest Terms and Conditions. If you have never tried a Contest before, there has never been a better time to play. Happy Valentine's Day!

*Largest prize possible anywhere that we know of. If you play somewhere else that has a larger prize percentage for online cribbage contests, contact us and let us know.

5s, 10s, and Face Cards

This week we're talking about the most common type of cribbage hand: one five with three 10s or face cards (like 5-10-J-K, or 5-Q-Q-K). These make up about 5.7% of all hands. In fact, 5-10-J-Q is the most commonly held hand in cribbage, followed closely by 5-J-Q-K.

Today we're going to go over the most profitable ways to play these hands. Most players have a good intuitive understanding of the proper way to play these hands, and you're probably doing pretty well with them. But we'll go over the data a little, and give some advice that we think will help the average cribber.

Note that all the advice we give is designed to maximize your net pegging points: your points pegged minus your opponent's points pegged. Usually this is the right approach, but if your board position demands offense or defense (for instance, if your opponent is about to peg out and win the game) then you won't necessarily want to follow this advice.

What to lead as pone

Pone’s strategy depends on the composition of her hand. Does she have a pair? Does she have three of a kind? We'll talk about each of those scenarios separately.

What to lead when you don't have a pair

Of course you don't want to lead the 5. So which of your other cards should you lead? The good news (or is it bad news?) is that it doesn't make a big difference which card you chose. But if you want to score every last point you should choose these leads:

Pone's Hand	Best Lead
5,10,J,Q	J
5,10,J,K	10
5,10,Q,K	10
5,J,Q,K	J

Choosing your lead from this table will score you an extra 1/20th of a point, on average. Why are those the best leads? I've got no clue, but that's what the data shows. In each of these cases we've got 10s of thousands of samples, so this appears to be reliable. Is it worth memorizing this table to score your extra 1/20th of a point? Maybe not, so let's get onto something more useful.

What to lead when you have a pair

Lead from your pair if you have one. If you're holding 5-J-Q-Q you should lead a queen.If you're holding 5-10-10-K you should lead a 10. No matter which hand you're holding we've seen that leading from your pair gives you more points, and cuts down on dealer's pegging. Altogether you'll average an additional 0.5 net points by leading from your pair.

What to lead when you have three-of-a-kind

If you've got a 5 and three 10s or three matching face cards (e.g., 5-10-10-10, or 5-Q-Q-Q) you've only got two choices: lead the 5, or lead from your three-of-a-kind. Don't lead the five. Lead from your three-of-a-kind: you'll almost always peg more, and dealer will almost always peg less.

How to respond as dealer

When you don't have a pair

If you don't have a pair, you can choose your response from this table:

Pone's lead	Best Response
A	J if you have one, otherwise the K
2	K if you have one, otherwise the 5
3 or 4	K if you have one, otherwise the 10
6	Q if you have one, otherwise the K
7	K if you have one, otherwise the Q
8	K if you have one, otherwise the 5
9	K if you have have 5-J-Q-K, otherwise the 5
10, J, Q, K	Play your 5

We don’t show any advice for the 5 lead since our sample size is too low (since players rarely lead a 5).  In every other case our suggestions are based on the results of thousands of hands.

These results are confounding: they don't show an obvious pattern (at least to me), but once again the results are consistent across a ton of data. Maybe in a future article we'll dig a little deeper to explain why these results are the way they are.

When you have a pair

You're holding a hand like 5-J-Q-Q or 5-10-10-K. How should you respond to pone's lead?

Pone's lead	Best Response
A, 3, 4, or 6	Play from your pair
2	Play your 5
7,8	Play your highest card, whether or not it's part of a pair
9	Play a queen or king if you have one, otherwise play your 5
10, J, Q, K	Play your 5

Once again our sample size was too small to make a suggestion about how to respond to a lead 5.

When you have three-of-a-kind

If you're holding a hand like 5-Q-Q-Q you don't have a lot of pegging options, but the rules for how to maximize your pegging points are interesting enough to deserve their own table:

Pone's lead	Best Response
A, 3, 4, 6, or 7	Play from your three-of-a-kind
2	Play your 5
8	Play from your three-of-a-kind unless you have three 10s, in which case play your 5
9	Play from your three-of-a-kind unless you have three 10s or three Jacks, in which case play your 5
10, J, Q, K	Pair the lead if you can, otherwise play your 5

Your two biggest mistakes, and how to fix them

If you're like most Cribbage Pro players you're probably playing these hands correctly most of the time. In fact, most Cribbage Pro players are playing this hand in the optimal way. But there are a few common situations that most dealers don't play quite right. Here are two pieces of advice you can follow to give your game a quick tune-up.

Don't pair pone's lead, even if you have a pair

You're holding 5-10-10-J and pone leads a 10. Most players assume it's safe to pair the lead in this situation, but on average the 5 scores better. Play the 5 and you'll average an additional 1.6 net points.

Don't play a jack on a lead 9

Pone leads a 9, you're holding 5-10-J-J. Most players play a Jack here in this situation. Maybe they're trying to save their 5 for later? You'll net an extra point if you dump your 5 instead of giving pone the opportunity to play a 10 for a run of 3.

Note that you shouldn't play your queen on a lead 9, either, unless you have three queens. When you're holding 5-10-J-Q you'll net an extra 0.4 points if you play your 5 on a lead 9, rather than playing the queen.

Hey peeps, ask us some questions

You've got cribbage questions, and we've got the cribbage data to answer those questions. Just leave a comment below and we'll see about answering it.

Editor's Note: This is a guest post by Aaron Harsh continuing the series on cribbage strategy and tips. Aaron lives in Portland, Oregon with his wife Stacy and daughter Audrey. He spends his evenings analyzing cribbage strategy for Fuller Systems, and his days analyzing television viewership for Rentrak Corporation's Advanced Media & Information group. You can play him on Cribbage Pro Online as user "aaronhars", or in person at American Cribbage Congress grassroots club #28 (Oregon's Finest).

Cribbage Strategy Discard Quiz - Dealer Edition

Mid-August has arrived, bringing with it the Cribbage Pro dealer discard quiz. Same rules as last week: we show a common hand, and you (playing as dealer) guess which discard gives the best results.

Just like last week the crib is often the deciding factor, so you might want to take another look at the Cribbage Pro discard table before starting the quiz.

We rate each discard by its net effect on dealer’s points:

    points pegged by dealer
    + points in dealer's hand
    + points in dealer's crib
    - points pegged by pone

We don’t take into account the points scored in pone's hand or the points scored due to heels (cutting a jack), since dealer’s discard doesn't affect those points.

A♠ 2♥ 3♦ 4♣ Q♠ K♥

Most players discard Q-K in this situation, probably to keep the A-2-3-4 run together. About 5% of players discard the 2-3 in this situation, probably because our discard table shows that the 2-3 discard gives particularly good cribs.

Here’s a breakdown of the average points scored for each of the two discards.

Discard	2♥ 3♦	Q♠ K♥
Dealer points pegged	2.99	3.95
Dealer points in hand	6.99	7.84
Dealer points in crib	7.02!!	3.49
Pone points pegged	1.56	2.45
Dealer's net points	15.43	12.83

Dealers who discard Q-K actually peg more and have higher scoring hands, but the 2-3 gives dealer a significantly larger crib and keeps pone from pegging as much. Executive summary: discard the 2-3 and on average you'll net an extra 2.6 points.

2♠ 3♥ 4♦ 5♣ 9♦ Q♥

This hand poses a similar dilemma. Keep the run of four, or give yourself a gift in the crib? Once again most players keep the run, and once again that doesn't work out very well for them. Our discard table shows why: Q-9 is the second worst discard (after K-10), and discarding Q-9 instead of Q-5 weakens dealer's crib by almost 4 points.

Discard	5♣ Q♥	9♦ Q♥
Dealer points pegged	4.00	4.59
Dealer points in hand	8.08	8.18
Dealer points in crib	6.56!!	2.81
Pone points pegged	1.80	2.69
Dealer's net points	16.83	12.90

2♠ 3♥ 4♦ 5♣ 7♠ 9♥

Have you figured out the pattern? Most players keep the 2-3-4-5, but about 10% keep 2-3-4-9. You would do well to emulate those 10%: discard the 5-7 and you’ll net an extra 2.1 points, primarily due to your superior crib.

Discard	5♣ 7♠	7♠ 9♥
Dealer points pegged	4.09	4.64
Dealer points in hand	8.01	8.28
Dealer points in crib	5.77	3.82
Pone points pegged	1.63	2.61
Dealer's net points	16.24	14.13

2♠ 3♥ 5♦ 7♣ 9♠ J♥

Hopefully by now we've convinced you to put good cards in your crib. Sometimes you've got a lot of good cards and you’re not sure which should go in your crib. When dealt this hand (2-3-5-7-9-J) we’ve seen some dealers discard 2-3, some discard 5-J, and some discard 7-9. Which one should you go with? Once again, the discard table comes to the rescue: 2-3 gives the best results of any of our possible discards, and gives dealer about 2 more net points than the 7-9 discard.

Most players discard 7-9 in this situation, probably to keep the 2-3 and the 5 together with the Jack. An interesting fact about cribbage is that your hand (or crib) is guaranteed at least two points if it has a combination of cards that add up to 5 (see the Wikipedia Cribbage Statistics page for an explanation why). So even though discarding the 2-3 means you lose your 15 for the 2-3-J combination you’re guaranteed to make it up with at least 2 points in your crib.

Discard	2♠ 3♥	7♠ 9♥
Dealer points pegged	4.51	3.72
Dealer points in hand	5.40	7.28
Dealer points in crib	7.02	3.78
Pone points pegged	2.22	2.02
Dealer's net points	14.70	12.76

A♥ 2♠ 3♠ 5♣ 6♠ 9♥

The best discard here is 5-6, with 2-3 a close second. But two thirds of Cribbage Pro players are sabotaging their cribs by discarding 6-9. Sure 6-9 gives a guaranteed 2 points in the crib, but we’ve already seen that a 2-3 or a 5 in our crib will guarantee us 2 points. Discarding 5-6 also leaves us with A-2-3-9 in our hand for a 15 and 2 points. You can bring your game up a notch by discarding 5-6 instead of 6-9 in this situation.

Discard	5♣ 6♠	6♠ 9♥
Dealer points pegged	3.67	4.67
Dealer points in hand	7.88	6.66
Dealer points in crib	6.40	4.77
Pone points pegged	1.82	2.67
Dealer’s net points	16.13	13.42

A♥ 5♠ 6♠ 7♣ 8♠ J♥

Half of the Cribbage Pro players toss the A-J; the other half toss the 5-J. Keeping the 5 in your hand helps a little with pegging (an extra 0.8 points on average), but tossing the 5-J raises your crib’s value by 3.3 points. The correct discard from this hand is 5-J.

2♠ 3♥ 4♠ 5♣ 6♠ 9♦

It’s tempting to discard the 2-9 (to keep the 3-4-5-6 run), or 6-9 (to put a 15 for 2 in your crib), but the best discard here is 2-3, which nets dealer an extra 3 points over the 2-9 or 6-9 discards..

2♣ 3♥ 5♠ 6♣ 9♦ J♠

Tossing 6-9 guarantees us at least 6 points (two points each for 2-3-J, 5-J, and 6-9). But our cribbage math also tells us that 2-3 guarantees us six points (5-J, 6-9, and at least two points in our crib, since 2-3 add to 5). Since you've read this far you've probably already guessed that we recommend discarding 2-3. The 2-3 discard gives you an extra 2 point net over the 6-9 discard.

2♥ 3♥ 4♣ 5♦ 10♠ K♠

The most popular discard from this hand is the 10-K, but our discard table shows us that a 10-K gives dealer a lower average crib than any other pair of cards. Discard the 5-10 instead and net an extra 3.1 points.

A♠ 2♦ 3♣ 6♣ 8♠ 9♥

Fewer than 10% of players get this right. Most players keep the run of three and discard the 6-8 or the 6-9, but let’s consider the 2-3 discard. Putting the 2-3 in your crib leaves you with A-6-8-9 in your hand, for a total of 4 points. We know that a 2-3 in the crib guarantees at least 2 points, guaranteeing us a total of at least 6 points. That’s better than the 5 point guarantee for either the 6-8 or 6-9 discard. The 2-3 discard scores best here.

A♠ 2♥ 3♠ 4♣ 5♠ 6♦

We've suggested discarding 2-3 so many times in this article. This has to be a trick question, right? Nope, once again the answer is to discard 2-3. Most players discard A-2 in this situation, but the 2-3 discard gains dealer an extra 1.9 net points.

A♥ 2♠ 4♥ 5♦ 8♣ 9♠

This one's a little puzzling to me, but the data shows a clear winner. Put A-4 in your crib and you’ll average 0.8 net points more than you would if you'd discarded 5-8, and 1.0 more than if you'd discarded 2-4.

3♠ 4♥ 5♦ 6♣ 10♠ Q♥

Don't be afraid to split up that run. Keeping 4-5-6-10 instead of 3-4-5-6 gives you an extra point in your hand (an average of 10.3 instead of 9.3), an extra half a point in your crib, and lowers pone's pegging by 0.7 points. Putting the 10-Q in your crib seems like it opens up the possibility of a straight, but our discard tables show that open-ended straight draws rarely pay off.

We want to look at your hands

Here’s your opportunity to improve your cribbage skills. Just leave us a comment below telling us about a hand that’s troubling you. We’ll comb through our database and let you know which play gets the best results.

Editor's Note: This is a guest post by Aaron Harsh continuing the series on cribbage strategy and tips. Aaron lives in Portland, Oregon with his wife Stacy and daughter Audrey. He spends his evenings analyzing cribbage strategy for Fuller Systems, and his days analyzing television viewership for Rentrak Corporation's Advanced Media & Information group. You can play him on Cribbage Pro Online as user "aaronhars", or in person at American Cribbage Congress grassroots club #28 (Oregon's Finest).