Why we blame the dice

You lose a game and the words are out before you've thought about them: unbelievable. Did you see what they rolled?

You win the next one and nobody mentions the dice at all.

We all do it. It's one of the small comedies of backgammon, and it tells you something about how people keep score of their own lives.

The pattern has a name

Psychologists call it the self-serving bias: we tend to credit our successes to ourselves and blame our failures on circumstances. The exam went well because you're clever; it went badly because the questions were unfair.

Backgammon is unusually good at bringing it out, because for once the circumstances are sitting right there on the table with two numbers on them.

Backgammon makes it easy

In chess there's nowhere to hide. In backgammon, every single loss has a plausible alternative explanation, and it's rattling in a cup.

And the explanation is sometimes true. Over one game the dice really do have a loud say. Which is exactly what makes it so easy to lean on: you can never be completely sure you didn't deserve better.

It's not all self-flattery

There's a kinder reading of it too. Blaming the dice is a way of keeping a game friendly.

"The dice were ridiculous" is a much nicer thing to say than "you played better than me", and your opponent gets to agree without either of you having to rank yourselves. It's a shared joke that lets a loss go by without anybody losing face.

The useful version

Blame the dice out loud by all means. Then, privately, ask a different question: were my decisions sound?

Sometimes they were, and the dice went elsewhere, and there's nothing to learn. Sometimes they weren't, and the dice get the blame for something you did. Telling those two apart, honestly, is most of what improving at this game involves.

The test is simple: can you point to the moment it went wrong? If you can, that moment is probably yours.

Also worth noticing

The bias runs both ways, and the other half is less obvious. When you win, try crediting the dice once in a while. You'll find it surprisingly hard, which is the whole point.

And when your opponent blames their dice after losing to you, let them. You'll want the same courtesy by Thursday.

The short version

• We credit ourselves for wins and the dice for losses. That’s a self-serving bias.
• Backgammon makes it easy, because the dice really do matter over a single game.
• Blaming the dice keeps things friendly.
• Privately, ask whether your decisions were sound rather than whether the rolls were fair.
• If you can name the moment it went wrong, it was probably yours.