Backgammon
Backgammon is a board game for two
players in which the playing pieces are moved according to the roll
of dice. A player wins by removing all of his pieces from the
board. There are many variants of backgammon, most of which share
common traits. Backgammon is a member of the tables family, one of
the oldest classes of board games in the world.
Although luck plays an important role,
there is a large scope for strategy. With each roll of the dice a
player must choose from numerous options for moving his checkers
and anticipate possible counter-moves by the opponent. Players may
raise the stakes during the game. There is an established
repertoire of common tactics and occurrences.
Like chess, backgammon has been studied
with great interest by computer scientists. Owing to this research,
backgammon software has been developed capable of beating
world-class human players.
Rules
Paths of movement for red and black, with
checkers in the starting positionBackgammon playing pieces are
known variously as checkers, stones, men, counters, pawns, or
chips.
The objective is to remove (bear off)
all of one's own checkers from the board before one's opponent can
do the same. The checkers are scattered at first and may be blocked
or hit by the opponent. As the playing time for each individual
game is short, it is often played in matches, where victory is
awarded to the first player to reach a certain number of
points.
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