Understanding how to play the opening rolls, the replies to the opening rolls, and the next one or two rolls is absolutely crucial to succeeding at backgammon. The reason is simple: the opening occurs in every game, but other types of position may not. While it’s nice to be a skilled backgame player, a true backgame might arise only once every 50 or 75 games. But you’ll have to play the opening every single game, so spending some time mastering opening ideas has a huge payoff.


The Opening Position

Diagram 1 shows the opening position with the points numbered from Black’s point-of-view.



Refer back to this diagram in the discussion that follows.


Basic Opening Goals

Correct opening play is dominated by a few key goals. In no particular order, here they are:

Advance the back men. In the starting position, you (Black) have one big strategic weakness: your back men (the two checkers on the 24-point in Diagram 1) are a long way from the rest of your little army, which forms a little group from the 6-point to the 13-point. That’s a big problem, and you have to address it as soon as possible. One way to address the problem is to try to run your back checkers as far as possible into the outfield (points 14, 15, 16, and 18); a second (and more practical) way is to move the back checkers up a bit and try to make a defensive point that can’t easily be blocked. This is called an advanced anchor, and making an advanced anchor before your opponent usually guarantees you a solid edge. The best points for this purpose are the 18, 20, and 21-points. From a good anchor, your back men are ready to make a leap to safety when a good opportunity arises.

Block your opponent’s back men. Your opponent (White) has the same goals as you. Thwarting his goals is just as important as advancing your own. So making key blocking points (Black’s 5-point, 7-point, and 4-point in the diagram) is a high priority. The more blocking points you make, the less chance White has to mobilize his back men on your 1-point.

Prepare to block your opponent’s back men. There are only a few rolls that actually make a blocking point on the opening rolls, so bringing down builders from the midpoint is a way of creating more blocking rolls on subsequent turns. This strategy is double-edged, since these builders will usually be unprotected blots, subject to being hit with a lucky throw.

Hit your opponent’s men. Backgammon is basically a race. If you can hit one of your opponent’s men, sending him back while gaining ground yourself, it’s usually critical to do so. Hitting is so strong that it’s unusual for a hitting play in the opening to be a major error. Of course, neither side has a blot in the opening position, so hitting only comes into play on later rolls.

Unstack. Theoretically, the ideal number of checkers on a point is three: two to hold the point, and one to serve as a builder for additional points. In the opening position, however, you have five checkers each on your 6-point and your 13-point (midpoint). We call these heavy concentrations of checkers stacks, and they’re strategic weaknesses, because the extra checkers on the points do no extra work. Activating these extra checkers is a key goal.

Create problems for your opponent. If you’re choosing between two plays, and you think the plays are about equivalent objectively, choose the play that presents your opponent with more difficult choices.

well said - its good to understand why you are making the opening moves. Here is a list of my opening moves, they actually become quite easy to remember

12 13/11 24/23
13 8/5 6/5
14 13/9 24/23
15 24/23 13/8
16 13/7 8/7
23 13/11 13/10
24 8/4 6/4
25 24/22 13/8
26 24/18 13/11
34 13/9 13/10
35 8/3 6/3
36 24/18 13/10
45 24/20 13/8
46 8/2 6/2
56 24/13

Isn't if far better to play 24/18 13/9 or even run 24/14?

Or is your play now the modern approach (perhaps more so when you need a gammon)?

~ Rick

4/6 moving to 8/2 6/2 used to get a lot of stick for a variety of reasons but with the advent of bots it can be seen that it actually does pretty well. When i ran the rollouts on the opening moves a year ago these 3 moves all turned out pretty well in terms of equity (spread of ~ .15%) and i believe that 24/18 and 13/9 was marginally better. 24/14 was the worst and i guess preferences all come down to the type of game you are best at (or opponents are worst at) and which you prefer. Generally the guys i play against tend to leave their back checkers too long so there is some added equity in nudging the game in this direction. In general running with you back checker early on leads to a race more frequently so the gammons (received and given) tend to be lower so that move has the lowest variance. Taking the 2point leads to a slightly more complex game with higher gammons and 24/18 13/9 is a good compromise.

the three plays are i think about even, with i think making the 2point as the slightly weakest. But it is fun to play against opponents that don't know how to play against it.

I think at Gammon-go scores making the 2 point is best.
At gammonsave i think 24/14 is best.

at other scores you are on your own, and all three variations are playable, i play all 3.
I usually play 24/14 against stronger opponents.
I usually play 24/18 13/9 against weaker opponents.
I sometimes play 6/2 8/2 against opponents i think are somewhat skilled but might not know how to exactly play against this opening.

This makes sense since it reduces the complexity of the game, something you should want to minimize your skill disadvantage.


Makes sense for the same reason; you want to increase complexity (when the plays are close) against people who don't understand positions


The interesting thing about this move is that it was NEVER considered in the better books prior to about 1984 or so. In fact it was often provided as an example of bad play!

~ Rick

Hi guys

46 8/2 6/2 i think is sick opening move in many ways. You put 2 checkers out of play, you make point too deep in early stage if you start waisting checker too early you will have no checkers to block and make normal points.

running with one checker i think also bad is does nothing conscructive and even if you not hit you must run again with this to safety. Run and try to survive is bad strategy for backgammon

a

I just picked up the game and have been playing alot at work on the MSN Zone app on Microsoft XP. I've been playing 64 (24/18, 24/20). I find almost everyone playing there runs out the gate (ie would run 62). All I find the move vulnerable to are the naturals (61, 31).

Given that you guys don't even have it in the discussion, it must be an abissmal play. Could anyone please explain why? Thanks.

nice post, well written.

however, I disagree that opening moves are some of the most important aspects of bg. for 1, they r easy to remember and 2, most opening rolls have multiple moves with similar equity results. for instance, if u make the right play u may win 54 percent while the second bst play is 52 percent. also, playing an unorthodox strategy by making equity loss plays may induce ur opponent to make mistakes for the remainder of the game as he is not used to playing the board uve developed while u are accustomed to this unorthodox style.

2 things.

1. I think opening moves are important. Reading the discussion i had to think about snooker matches, where it's being said that you can't win the match in the opening sessions, but you can lose the match. + u don't want to give up any equity at any time, so having to chose between 54% and 52% is easy (unless you have a very good reason to go with a play that has slightly less equity)

2. I think the remark about making the 2 point with an opening 64 when u need a gammon is a very solid reason to do so which i had never considered before (even though I do play it every now and then, but more because i just feel like it then for a decent reason. i think that will change now)

It is a bad play, but it takes a good opponent to exploit it properly, so if your opponents are weak you may not notice any difference.

The basic problem is that you've put your checkers on the very points your opponent wants to make, so the rolls where he hits two men are extremely strong. There are a lot of these rolls: 33, 22, 11, 62, 21, 63, and 61. That's 11 of his 36 rolls that hit two men and leave you gasping for air. (Note that with 61, his best play is 13/7* 6/5*, not making the bar-point!)