Beginners play backgammon one roll at a time: look at the dice, find a move that seems fine, repeat. Strong players play it one plan at a time. At almost every point in a game they know whether they are racing, building a wall, or keeping their checkers safe, and every roll is played in service of that plan.
There are three basic plans worth learning first: the running game, the priming game and safe play. This guide explains each one, how to tell which you are in, and how the rules of Funzigo’s Backgammon tilt the choice.
First, learn to count the race
Every plan starts with one number: the pip count. It measures how far your whole army still has to walk before every checker is off the board. Add up the point number of every checker, counting from your own side. Both players start at 167.
Counting fast is a skill. Do it in chunks rather than checker by checker. Five checkers on your 6-point are 30. Three on your 8-point are 24. A checker on the bar counts as 25. With practice you can count a whole board in under half a minute.
Then compare. A roll averages a little over 8 pips once doubles are included, which makes a lead of 16 pips roughly a two-roll head start. In a pure race, a common rule of thumb is that a lead of around 10 percent of your count is a solid advantage.
Plan 1: The running game
The idea is simple. You are ahead in the race, so you avoid fighting and get everyone home first.
- When it fits: you are clearly ahead on pips, or you have rolled big early, such as an opening 6-5 that carries a back checker from the 24-point clean through to the 13-point, the play often nicknamed lover’s leap.
- Get the back checkers moving early. The longer your two rearmost checkers wait in the opponent’s home board, the more chances it has to trap them.
- Break contact cleanly. Once none of your checkers has to pass an enemy checker, there is nothing left to hit, and the game becomes pure arithmetic.
- Bear in evenly. Fill every home point rather than building a tower on the 6-point. A well-spread home board uses every number on the dice; a tall stack wastes rolls.
Plan 2: The priming game
A prime is a row of consecutive made points, each holding two or more of your checkers. Six in a row cannot be crossed at all, because no single die moves more than six. Five in a row is nearly as good. The priming game builds that wall in front of the opponent’s back checkers, traps them, and wins while they are stuck.
- When it fits: you are behind or level in the race, but the opponent still has checkers back in your home board.
- The best points to own: your 5-point first, then your 4-point and your 7-point, the bar-point. Together with the 6-point you start with, these form the core of a strong blockade.
- Builders: place spare checkers a few pips behind the points you want to make. A checker on your 9-point reaches your 5-point with a 4 or your 4-point with a 5. Since a point needs two checkers, it takes two builders in range, or one builder plus a checker already there, and the more builders you have, the more rolls make the point.
- Slotting: put a single checker on a key point, planning to cover it next turn. It is risky against a sharp opponent, because a lone checker can be hit.
- Rolling the prime: once a wall exists, extend it forward by making the next point in front and releasing the one at the back, so the trapped checkers never get a gap.
Plan 3: Safe play
Safe play means limiting your exposure while you wait for a better moment. It is not a plan to win with on its own, but it stops you from losing games you should not lose.
The core skill is reading shot risk. A lone checker, a blot, within six pips of an enemy checker is in direct range, and it gets hit somewhere between about 30 and 47 percent of the time depending on the distance. Seven pips or more away, it is in indirect range, and the risk drops sharply, generally under 20 percent. If you must leave a blot, leave it far away.
- Prefer moves that make points, even small ones, over moves that leave two blots.
- If you must leave a blot, put it where getting hit costs least: near the start of its journey rather than close to home.
- An anchor, two of your checkers on a point in the opponent’s home board, is a safe base that cannot be primed easily and gives you shots later.
How to tell which plan you are in
- Ahead in the race and close to breaking contact: run.
- Behind in the race, but the opponent has checkers stuck back: prime.
- Behind in the race with your own checkers trapped: hold an anchor and wait for a shot.
- Position unclear: play safe, count again next turn.
How Funzigo’s rules tilt the choice
A few details of this version are worth building into your plans.
- No gammons or doubling cube. Every game counts as one win or one loss. In standard scoring, a big loss can cost double, so players avoid risky plans. Here, a bold priming game or a long holding game carries no extra penalty if it goes wrong.
- No rule forcing you to use both dice. If your first die leaves the second with no legal move, that is allowed. Sometimes the safest play is to choose an order that strands the second die rather than leave a blot.
- A computer that rarely goes out of its way to hit. It picks its play die by die, and its scoring does not reward hitting your blots much. That makes slotting and splitting cheaper than they would be against a human, which helps the priming plan.
- Undo takes back a single checker move, and only the last one. Picture both dice before you touch a checker.
- Doubles can come up on the first roll. An opening double is a gift for priming: 6-6 or 3-3 can make two key points in one turn.
Putting it together
For your next few games, say the plan out loud before each roll: run, prime, or safe. Count the pips every few turns to check the plan still makes sense. You will notice your moves start to agree with each other, instead of pulling in three directions at once, and the computer will find far fewer easy targets.