Backgammon Masterclass

 

It has been a good year for backgammon books, with entries into the canon by Nick Blasier, Bill Robertie, James Vogl, and Dirk Schiemann. Perhaps the most anticipated is Backgammon Masterclass, the collaboration of Marc Olsen and Masayuki “Mochy” Mochizuki. The result does not disappoint. It is a handsome book, with clear graphics. Neither author is a native speaker of English, so they enlisted Alec Barr to ensure that the writing was as clean as the print. The book is based on a series of lectures given by the two. I never attended them, but assume that the material was expanded, as each section is roughly one hundred pages. It would seem impossible to cover any of them in a single lecture. The authors alternate sections, Mochy covering “Strategic Visualization: Priming or Blitzing,” and “Backgame Strategy” in parts one and three; Marc handling “Game Plan Dynamics” and “Cube Action In Undefined Positions.”

 

Mochy’s approach in part one is visual, helping the player decide what sort of plan is appropriate, and then choosing the tactics, or counter-tactics, for that plan.

 

The top four candidates include: 13/7; 24/20, 13/11; 24/18; and 13/11, 13/9. Two are clearly priming plays, one is a running play, and one is a bit of both. What sorts of games are the players in? At the moment, both are playing priming games. Black’s is better. A useful observation from Mochy is that in a priming game, it is usually an advantage to trail in the race. Black is down eighteen pips before the roll. Both players have broken four primes, but White has two gaps, to Black’s one, and the three points he holds in his inner board are weaker than the three owned by Black. White’s two builders on the 6pt are also less than ideally placed for filling in the prime; White would prefer them diversified to aim at the 5pt.

 

We are already leaning toward a priming play, but there is another factor. White is ahead in the race, which is a common factor in blitzes, and has ten men in the zone, which makes his blitz especially dangerous. All he needs now is an opponent without an anchor, so he can pounce. It turns out either split play is more than a double whopper. Of the priming plays, bringing two builders down is much better than the alternative. It leaves four shots, instead of thirteen, and thirty numbers make the 9pt, barpoint or 3pt. Perhaps that was easy? Each section has a fifteen-question quiz, so they will get harder.

 

It is much more difficult to summarize Game Plan Dynamics. This section is an overview of the major game plans, with a look at the strategies behind each, and some of the appropriate tactics. You want hard? Perhaps this problem is hard.

 

The inclination for most of us would be to play 11/7. That isn’t a large error, giving up only 32 millipoints, but it isn’t the best play. The key to this position is that we have one superior game plan available, while White currently has none. The race is fairly even, both sides have holding games (or what Marc calls “Contact”) available, and neither has a blitz going. But Black has a priming game he can focus on. Because White’s position is so disjointed – four men back, deucepoint made, inner board blot – while Black has a partial prime and an advanced anchor, he can make a bold play. His top choice is 16/15, 16.13. It leaves twenty-five shots, but few which hit and cover. Meanwhile, it keeps Black’s builders in play for the points he most covets: the 10pt and 9pt.

 

The Backgame section has its share of tricky and difficult plays, but it also has some extremely worthwhile tips addressing fundamentals. For instance, there is a table of pip counts for various backgames, showing how many pips you should be trailing for each to be viable. (Caveats duly noted.)

 

There are also useful comparisons.

 Black is on roll in these positions. What is the proper cube action for each? With four points left to clear, Black is eleven millipoints short of a double. In the second, with only three points to worry about, White is only twelve millipoints away from a pass, and not cubing would be a blunder.

 

The last section attempts to set clear guidelines to doubling in unclear positions. It has plenty of useful advice, but I am sceptical of the “clear” guideline, which strikes me as more art than science, even if it would like to be more science than art. In a nutshell, Marc has modified the PRAT (Position, Race, Threats) method to come up with the Olsen Point count. If you have two points, that is a clear advantage in more than one game plan, and threats, you should double.

 

Black has a racing advantage of sixteen pips, worth one point. He has a definite priming advantage, worth another. He threatens to make his bar or 3pt, to greatly improve his prime, or escape, letting him capitalize on his racing edge, or if he rolls 66, both. He has a clear double, though White still has a take.

 

What about here?

 

Marc still assigns two points, for priming and blitzing advantages. Perhaps, but are they full points, or nearly full points? Later, he will introduce half points, so we know some points may be worth less than a full 1. The real key here is the volatility, which adds oomph, and perhaps some fractional Olsen points.

 

Despite these quibbles, this is an excellent book. It is an expensive book, but for those willing to pay a premium price, it should be worth the money.