Backgammon Guide for Beginners - Introduction

Backgammon is a game of skill. Once you start playing you will find the game addictive, be hungry to learn new tactics and to improve your skill! It is easy to learn the rules and start playing backgammon. The more you play, the more you want to play and improve your strategies. Through my experience of playing with beginners, it is a game where you can get to a reasonable standard in a relatively short period of time. Plus, many believe that new players have beginners luck due to the rolling of the dice during the first match!

Backgammon is an obstacle race between two groups of 15 men each, moving around a track separated into 24 dagger-like divisions called "points". After the step of backgammon board setup, the game begins while the object of it is for each player to bring all his men into his home board, and then to bear them off the board. The first player to get all his men off the board is the winner.

Starting with the opening move, Part 1 of this article will help to teach beginning and intermediate players, though advanced players will also be able to benefit from reading it as it will help to sharpen their awareness of the opening phase of the game. Parts 2 and 3 build on earlier knowledge and gradually illustrate a greater challenge.

Please note the conventions below have adopted in the text:

1. When referring to dice rolls, we use no hyphens, and usually no commas or conjunctions to separate them. So, for example, 31 42 61 53 64 are the opening rolls that allow a player to make a point.
   
   
2. We abbreviate point to pt, placing it immediately after the point number. So, for example, 31 makes the 5pt, or 42 makes the 4pt, and so on.
   
   
3. The player at the bottom of the diagram (e.g., in Part 1 it is Red) is referred to as he, or occasionally you. The player at the top of the diagram (e.g., in Part 1 it is White) is referred to as she.