Bearing Off in Backgammon

admin · Site Admin Joined: 15 May 2007 Posts: 862

Bearing off in backgammon can be confusing at first, but once you understand the basic concept, you'll be on your way to become a backgammon winner. Backgammon is a race to get all of your backgammon checkers off the board before your opponent does. If you don't know everything there is to know about bearing off in backgammon you will never become a true master of the backgammon game. Bearing off in backgammon is the part of the game where you have all of your checkers inside your home board. It is then time to bear off, the process of removing checkers from your home board.

To do that, you roll the dice each turn, and remove any checker of your choice that is placed on a point that is equal to or less then a number shown by a single dice. Once you remove such a checker from the backgammon board, you cant use that dice anymore in that turn, even if you had additional points to move with on that dice. If you have no checkers that can be borne off, or if you simply wish too, you can still use the dice for movement, but a dice that you move with cant be used to bear off in that turn. This presents us with the reason why bearing off in backgammon is such an art. The goal, as always, is to finish before your opponent.

But to accomplish it, do you advance as many checkers as possible as far as you can before bearing them off, or bear off any checker that you can as soon as possible? If you choose the first option, you can reach a point where literally any throw automatically bears off two checkers. But of course, getting there means wasting valuable time. If you choose the second option, you run the risk of reaching a point in the game when your opponent is neck to neck with you, but while he is bearing off at least two checkers a turn, you'r stuck moving some of your checkers around the backgammon board when you should be moving them out of it. Which tactic should you choose if your opponent is ahead? Or behind? Knowing the answers to all those questions is a prerequisite to becoming a backgammon professional.

For that reason, it is important that you spend as much time as you can reading up on backgammon strategy in general, and bearing off strategies in particular. Look on line, buy books, talk to other players, do what ever it takes to become a backgammon pro.