Backgammon is one of the most popular boardgames played around the world today. You can play on the traditional board, oron your p.c. against a computer opponent to see who will be the first to removeall of their pieces from the board. The backgammonboard layout comprises 24 points where players lay their pieces.  The red player starts with two counterson point #1, five each on points #12 and #19, and 3 counters on point #17.  White has a similar configurationmirroring the red player’s counter layout.

Each playerrolls one dice to start, with the highest scorer going first.  That player then moves their countersin an anti-clockwise direction corresponding to the spots, or pips on the dice.  For example, throwing a 5 and a 3 permitsthe player to move one counter five places, and another counter threeplaces.  Alternatively, the playercan add the 5 and the 3 and move one piece eight places.  Rolling doubles give the player theoption of moving four times the value shown on one dice.  Again, these moves can be single steps,or an amalgamated move as described above.

Players canonly land on empty points, or those occupied with their own pieces.  The one exception is landing on a pointoccupied by only one of the opponent’s pieces.  This is called a blot, and landing on one of these hits theopponent temporarily out of the game. Backgammon rules state that the bumpedpiece must sit on the middle section of the board, or bar, until it can bebrought back into play.

The gameproceeds with each player bringing all of their counters into the home base atwhich point they bear them off according to the pip count on the dice.  The first player to remove all of hiscounters from the backgammon board is declaredthe winner.