Backgammon – Three Main Strategies
by Caden on June 17th, 2019
In astonishingly simple terms, there are three basic plans employed. You need to be agile enough to hop between game plans quickly as the action of the game unfolds.
The Blockade
This is composed of building a 6-thick wall of pieces, or at least as thick as you might manage, to block in your opponent’s checkers that are located on your 1-point. This is judged to be the most suitable strategy at the start of the game. You can create the wall anyplace inbetween your eleven-point and your two-point and then shuffle it into your home board as the game continues.
The Blitz
This involves closing your home board as quick as as you can while keeping your competitor on the bar. i.e., if your opposer rolls an early two and shifts one piece from your one-point to your three-point and you then roll a 5-5, you can play 6/1 six/one 8/3 8/3. Your opponent is now in big-time trouble considering that they have two pieces on the bar and you have closed half your inside board!
The Backgame
This strategy is where you have 2 or more pieces in your competitor’s inner board. (An anchor spot is a point consisting of at a minimum two of your checkers.) It needs to be used when you are extremely behind as this action much improves your chances. The best areas for anchor spots are close to your opponent’s lower points and also on adjoining points or with a single point separating them. Timing is integral for a powerful backgame: at the end of the day, there’s no reason having two nice anchor spots and a complete wall in your own inner board if you are then required to break apart this straight away, while your challenger is getting their checkers home, owing to the fact that you do not have any other spare pieces to shift! In this case, it is better to have pieces on the bar so that you might preserve your position up till your opponent gives you a chance to hit, so it can be a wonderful idea to try and get your competitor to hit them in this situation!
Posted in Backgammon | No Comments »

Leave a Reply
You must be logged in to post a comment.