Random Opponents too often White?

Consistently when I put out a seek for a random opponent I am black much more often than is statistically probable.  Once I get more than 5 games as black in my stats I will force my seeks to play me as white until I am back to 50% white / 50% black in my games.  Once I go back to random colors ultimately I end up with more games as black.  This has happened over and over again without exception!  What is going on?

You need to go to Live Chess, then Settings and find the box labelled "Paranoid".  You should uncheck this box.

Well it looks like you do better as black anyway.

Wow, these message boards are really helpful...

I'm a statistician so I'm pretty familiar with the law of large numbers and the improbability of what I have experienced.  So let me elaborate on my post:

When I request a random opponent / random color, does chess.com sometimes match me up with a player that submits a seek to play as white?

I assume the game seekers that pre-choose a color to play request white more than black.  The logic being that white has a theoretical advantage and people seem to prefer to win (judging by the vast majority of players here that have won >50% of their games.)  

This would create a scenario where random seeks would get matched up playing as black more often than playing as white.

AndTheLittleOneSaid:

Yes, I do play better as black.  But my aim in chess is to improve and be a well balanced player.  So I strive to play 50% white and 50% black, as well as only play people rated higher than myself which gives me a win rate of less than 50%.  The only games I play against people rated lower than myself are personal friends of mine.  

Yeah, due to the frequency of 'whining' threads on these boards, I didn't really take your post seriously, so my apologies. And as per your second post - I don't think that random seeks get matched up with specific seeks, but I'm not certain.

I find that if I accept an open seek against someone I have never played before, where the colour is set to random, I almost always get white.  If the same player has a second open seek and I accept this as well, I almost always get black, so it seems to even out.

Thanks BaronVonMolden...If what you are saying is true I am on the receiving end of that (I place seeks, but don't accept them, and I only place one at a time), therefore it seems from yours and my observations that, without intervention, you will play more games as white and I will play more games as black.

It would be nice if a "random" seek really was random.  

Players like echecs06 (70% win rate) and DaveEwart (72% win rate) seem much more interested in inflating their egos by playing people rated lower than themselves.  I don't think they can relate to why I care about my white/black games distribution.

Back in Feb I got White eleven times in a row when I put out random seeks. I raised the improbability of this in a forum topic (Always White) and brought it to chess.com's attention. No one thought it was much of a problem but like you, I thought something might be wrong.

Shortly after I raised my concern, the colors started coming randomly. I don't know if there was a problem or not but my string of one color (11) ended and they have been pretty fairly balanced since then.

Perhaps put more than one seek out at a time?  I always try and accept two games against an opponent if I can.

Don't know the mechanics of it, and it's never really bothered me, but there are plenty of scenarios where the assignment could be random, but you could get 5 games in a row as white.

I guess if you really want to manage your 50/50 ratio precisely, best thing to do is set up seeks where the colours are fixed for you and the opponent from the off.

In Live chess?  I was talking about turn-based, where you can set up a rated game with yourself as white/black/random.

What sort were we talking about to start off with?

I am referring to turn based chess...

Hmm.  I just started two seeks, one with me as white, and the other with me as black.  Both rated.

i don't have this problem

looks fairly even.