Backgammon Dictionary

To deliberately make an illegal play or otherwise take an unfair advantage.

A home board with several made points.

A play which makes a strong point.

To purposely leave a blot to be hit so it can be recirculated. The idea is to improve your timing or shore up your defense in the opponent's home board. Also known as a Hara-Kiri play.

Swedish Backgammon Federation.   Website: www.sbgf.se.

A backgammon variant in which players can win by arranging their checkers into specific patterns within their home board.  See: How to Play Swedish Tables.

The difference in score between winning a game and losing it.

The difference in your equity before a roll and after it, or the difference between rolling poorly and rolling well.

A position with many gaps and few adjacent made points.

A method of pairing players in a tournament. Under the Swiss system, players are not eliminated, no player meets the same opponent twice, and successive rounds match players with scores as similar to each other as possible. See post by Osman Guner.

To give up one point (2) to make another, usually in your home board.

The roll of 1-6 to escape a prime, usually from the bar and often hitting a blot.

Consolation flight.

Bias introduced in a rollout because of errors in checker play (2) or cube play (2).

An entire backgammon board.

One of the four quadrants of a backgammon board; for example, your inner table or outer table.

The English name for the Roman game Tabula.

A generic term for any game played on a backgammon board.

A system of betting where the players' stake in a game is limited to an agreed fixed amount. The idea is to protect the players from losing more money than they have at hand. It also evens the playing field when one player has more money at his disposal than the other.

A Roman game similar to backgammon in which players use three dice instead of two, and move around the board in the same direction. The game was also popular in England where it was known as Tables.  See: How to Play Tabula.

Short-term, calculable aspects of the game, as opposed to strategic considerations. Tactics in backgammon include: hitting blots, making points, clearing points, and avoiding unnecessary risks.

To start to throw your dice before the opponent has picked up his own dice to finish his turn; to roll prematurely.

Accept a double.