Backgammon Online

23-May-2010
10:53 PDT

http://zooescape.com/backgammon.pl?v=200&gid=174901

Was there any way to avoid this?

23-May-2010
17:27 PDT

Besides not playing, which is the suggestion my opponent gave me!  

24-May-2010
01:02 PDT

Sometimes you take your chances on leaving blots and are unlucky. Happens to all of us I think, but this must have hurt. But on your move 3 (roll 6 and 5) I might not have played 1 to 12 as you did but removed the blot on 11 by playing 11to 17 and 12 to 17). But it is a matter of mood and style.

24-May-2010
07:16 PDT

I agree with manutius: sometimes you're just unlucky. There aren't many places where you could have done something different -- most of the time you were on the bar -- but I would have made a different second move. Instead of coming in on bar/11, I would have moved bar/5 and then probably 12/18.

It's risky -- it creates a third blot -- but he can't hit all the blots at once and the 5 point and your bar point are both important so it sets you up to make one or both of them next time. I therefore think it's worth the risk, especially since at this point he has only one point in his inner board. In this case it would have worked out. He would probably have hit on 18 with his next 6-5 and you would have made the 5-point coming back off the bar. With the 5-point made, you would have been less vulnerable to being closed out, and you had possibilities of making a powerful second point in his board.

But that's just my 2 cents worth. I'm sure other players would do something different.