Backgammon Rules
One of the most popular and earliest known games is backgammon. The history of which dates back to almost 5000 years ago. Yeah, it’s actually that old. The game was originally discovered in the archeological discoveries of the Middle East. The latest form of the game was adopted in the 17th century in England and is now played in most parts of the world frequently.
Backgammon is basically a gambling game (quite popular in casinos). Each player has 15 pieces known as checkers which tend to move between the 24 triangles (score) every time the two dices are rolled. The game is fairly easy to play. To learn more about backgammon rules and the game itself, keep on reading. Trust me, you’ll love it for sure.
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Equipment to Play Backgammon
The game Backgammon is play-acted on a specifically created and fabricated board which consists of only four tables of six thin triangles or points on every table. The points begin from the edges of the board close to the players and are pointed inwardly so that they develop two rows of 12 points opposed to each other. A bar bisects the board and the two tables on one side are assigned the “inner tables” or “home tables”, the others are described as the “outer tables”. Conventionally, the inner tables should be placed fronting the grandest and immense light source. There are fifteen white disks, fifteen black disks, two dice, two dice shakers, and a doubling cube. The doubling cube is a die having the numbers 2, 4, 8, 16, 32 and 64 inscribed upon its 6 faces.
Formulation and Purpose
Each and every player challenges to shift and step forward all his checkers into the inner table closest to him (his home table) and once that is accomplished, to step or “bear” the checkers off the board. The first competitor to do this succeeds. On the other hand, that is only half the story because backgammon is not playacted correctly unless it is being played for stakes. So the eventual and definitive aim of a Backgammon match is to win more bets than the foe.
How to Setup the Backgammon Board
Setup
The sequence in which pieces or the checkers are positioned is: 2 checkers on the 24th point, 3 checkers on the 8th point, while 5 checkers placed on the 6th and 13th point each. These pieces progress and move on points in an anticlockwise course in a horseshoe-shaped path, which mainly depends on the worth of the rolled dice. Mutually the players can have the same or discrete pair of dice.
Starting off
In order to begin the game, both the players will trundle a dice concurrently. The player who has a greater dice value will move his checkers primarily. In a situation where both the players have the same value, the players tend to roll again. The points that the player going initially is ascertained by value of both the dice that were rolled. The player has a possibility to move two checkers by the value that is present on each dice face, or a single checker to match the dice value whatever the player chooses. Players then take alternative shots to roll the dice and shift their checkers. In the event the doubles are rolled by a player in the course of the game, then the player has the possibility to move up to 4 checkers by points equal to the value of dice.
The Bar
A point which has one or no challenger checker is an open point. When a player’s piece lands on an open point, then an adversary’s checker, if one is present there, is marked and progressed to the bar, which is the part of the board that splits it in half. When a player has his piece marked, the only move that he is permitted to make is to get his marked checker back in the game. The position that a marked checker can presume after being back in the game will hinge on the value of dice from the rolled dice. The marked checker returns in the game from the home board. If a 1 is rolled, it will be the initiating point; if 2 is rolled then the 2nd point, and so on.
Objective of Backgammon
To win at backgammon it is necessary to shift your men around the board from your rival’s home board to his external board, onto your external or the outer board and into your internal board. Once all your pieces or checkers are in your home board you begin a process commonly called the ‘bearing off’ whereby you eradicate all the checkers from the board with a throw of the dice. The winner is the first player to eradicate all his checkers from the board.
How to Start off Backgammon
If there is any disagreement or quarrel among the players over the selection of color or direction of movement, the issue is resolute by both throwing one dice, the player throwing the greater dice has the pick of the color and direction of movement. In order to begin the game both the players throw one dice. If they both throw the same number the procedure is reiterated until one player throws a higher number than his rival, and he has the opening move.
Basic Rules to Play Backgammon
(a) Rules to Move Checkers
An imperative Backgammon tactic is to attempt to make a hit on the defenseless spot in an open point. This will proliferation the player’s odds of tendering out his rival the loss of a gammon or a backgammon. A player must try not to develop his own spots. This reduces the helplessness of his own checkers.
(b) Rule of Hitting & Entering
The point subjugated by a singular piece of whichever color is known as a blot. If a resisting piece lands on a mark, the mark is hit and positioned on the bar. Any time a participant has one or more pieces on the bar, his first agreement is to come in those piece(s) into the conflicting home board. A piece is arrived by prodding it to an open point resembling one of the numbers on the rolled dice.
(c) Rule of Bearing Off
The moment a player has progressed his fifteen pieces into his home board, he may begin bearing off. A player can only bear off one piece at a time by rolling only one number that resembles the point on which the piece exists, and then eradicating that piece from the board. Consequently, rolling a 6 allows the player to remove a checker from the six points.
(d) Rule of Doubling
Backgammon game is played by players for one agreed stake per point. Every game begins at a singular point. At the time of the course of the backgammon game, a player who feels he has an adequate benefit may suggest expanding the stakes. He might do this only at the beginning of his own turn and before he has rolled the dice.
Who Wins the Backgammon Game?
A player has to bring all 15 pieces in the play to his home board prior to bringing them off. The first participant to bear off all his pieces is the winner. When a piece is on the home board, the participant has to step and shift the piece by the lesser value between the numbers given on the dice. A victor does not add points, but a loser drops off points. A player experiences a regular defeat when he is able to show off some pieces prior to losing. If the player was incapable to bear off any pieces before losing, then he loses ‘a gammon’.
Variations of Backgammon
A simple game that involves no hitting designed for children who are just starting to learn to move the checkers.
- Blocking Backgammon: The tactic for backgammon is easy going as compared to other games of backgammon, so most of the time it is the initial game taught to kids in the Middle East countries.
- Eureika: A backgammon game of only luck taught to kids in the Middle East countries to make them familiarize with a backgammon board.
- Acey-Deucy: The form of Acey-Deucy has always been the top favorite game and the most played among the U.S. Navy, Merchant Marine and Marine Corps since the First World War era.
- European Acey-Deucy: The European is way different from an American game in that doubles are played on both sides of the dice.
- Greek Acey-Deucy: A distinguishing feature of backgammon game is that you can impulse your opponent to hit anyone of your blots.
- Mexican Backgammon: In this form of Acey-Deucy, a player is allowed of a maximum of five checkers on a game point.
- Middle Eastern Games Fevga: This game is quite similar to the Moultezim and Narde. It features no hitting and the players move in the same direction around the board.
- Gul Bara: This type of game is very much like Moultezim in that one piece or anyone of the checker influences one point. However, in Gul Bara doubles are always very powerful.
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