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Backgammon Books
Backgammon by Paul David
Magriel Jr., Renee Magriel
A professor of mathematics, Magriel organizes the principles and
strategies in a very logical manner. He writes in concise
non-technical language, breaking down every aspect of backgammon so
its easy to understand even when discussing advanced theories of the
game.
The definitive backgammon book. Can turn a beginner to an expert.
Well written, logically organized, with several examples and clear
explanations. It is very complete, covering all aspects of the game.
I particularly liked that it recommends to the beginner openings
that generally lead to uncomplicated games and later (once the
reader has become more experienced) switches to openings that lead
to more involved game play. I have read several backgammon books,
and this is by far the best. Definitely worth its price.
Starting Out in Backgammon by Paul Lamford
that this book is simply the best one available for players who are
seriously interested into
the game from beginners to advanced players.
it is not for someone who just wants to know about the rules
in order to play occasionally.
It contains a lot of important concepts and - contary to many other
beginners books - contains
nearly no errors. and - its rather cheap
The ideal reader for this book is someone who has already played a
lot of backgammon and has a
feel for basic checker play, and is now ready to become good. People
who don't yet have a feel
for the ebb and flow of the game will be better served by books like
Robertie's Backgammon for
Winners and Backgammon for Serious Players--those books are built
around annotated games.
Lamford takes a different approach, packing an exceptional amount of
useful information into a
slim volume. Lamford tells you things that experts know but that you
won't learn from any
moderate amount of over-the-board experience. It is a beginner's
book in the sense that he
tries (reasonably successfully) to distill the information into
maxims and rules of thumb that
are fairly easy to remember. The books is exceptionally clear, but
it says most of the
important things exactly once. One often wishes for more examples or
a more extended
discussion. Whenever you feel this way, you should reread--the
information was there, it was
just so concise that you didn't get it the first time.
501 Backgammon Problems by Bill Robertie
As the title suggests, it is a compilation of 501 problems, split
360 checker plays v 141 cube actions. (67 doubles 74 redoubles).
After the introductory chapters covering notation/probability/basic
doubling strategy etc, there are 26 chapters covering many of the
important concepts in backgammon from the opening to the bearoff.
The book manages to cram the 501 positions and analyses into 384
pages of a book measuring just 23x15cms. This is achieved by
squashing the diagrams with the effect of making the checkers oval.
The problems in each chapter are all bunched together first and the
solutions at the end of the chapter hence cutting down on the need
to avoid looking at the analysis.
It's target audience is everybody from beginner to expert level. The
only group that maybe wouldn't find many parts of this book valuable
would be world class players.
The problems are typical of positions that appear in everyday
backgammon and not unusual or tricky positions that an expert may
get wrong. The difficulty of the problems range from very easy to
hard with the majority in the intermediate/advanced level. My guess
is that the book would be suitable to players ranked up to elo 1900
on F.I.B.S. or Gamesgrid. Robertie has attempted to create a book of
reference positions whose characteristics the reader can hopefully
remember and apply and adapt over the board and for each problem, he
typically gives a succinct 8-10 line analysis.
The only major criticism on the book is that in some of the checker
play problems Robertie doesn't analyse all the potential choices or
rejects one when in fact the equities are quite close.
Overall an excellent book suitable for either beginners who have
learned the very basics or a good refresher book for more advanced
players.
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