Backgammon & Tavla

How do you play backgammon?

Each side has 15 checkers on a board of 24 narrow triangles called points. You move your checkers around the board toward your home board, which is the last six points, and the first player to bring all 15 home and bear them off wins. Two dice decide how far you move: each die is a separate move, so a roll of 5 and 3 lets you move one checker 5 and another 3, or one checker 8 in two steps. Doubles are played four times.

White moves from the 24 point down to the 1 point and Black moves the opposite way, so the two armies run into each other. A single checker alone on a point is a blot. If an enemy checker lands on it, it is hit and goes to the bar in the middle of the board, and you must bring it back in on the enemy home board before you can move anything else. A point with two or more of your checkers is closed to your rival, and building closed points in a row, a prime, is the main way to trap them.

You must play both dice if you possibly can. If only one can be played, you must play the larger one. When all your checkers are in your home board, you bear them off with exact numbers, or with a higher number from your highest point. Our board shows every legal destination when you pick a checker, so the forced-move rules are handled for you.

Which backgammon and tavla games can I play here?

Backgammon (international rules) is played with the doubling cube, gammon and backgammon scoring, matches to 1, 3, 5, 7, 9 or 11 points, the Crawford rule, optional automatic doubles and, in unlimited money play, the Jacoby rule.

Portes is the Greek name for standard backgammon without the cube, and it is how Tavla is normally played in Turkey: the same set-up and rules, with 1 point for a win, 2 for a gammon (mars) and 3 for a backgammon. Plakoto is the pin game, Fevga is a race game where nothing is ever hit, and Narde is Long Nardy, the Eastern relative of Fevga.

What is not built: Moultezim and the many regional house rules. If you play a version with a rule we do not have, the closest match is usually Portes for anything with hitting and Fevga or Narde for anything with a shared track.

• Backgammon: cube, gammons, match play, Crawford, Jacoby, automatic doubles.
• Portes (Tavla): the same board without the cube.
• Plakoto: land on a lone checker to pin it. No bar, no hitting.
• Fevga: shared track, no hitting, a wall of six is not allowed, one early checker at a time.
• Narde (Long Nardy): shared track, one checker per turn from the head.

How does the doubling cube work?

The doubling cube is a die marked 2, 4, 8, 16, 32 and 64 that sits in the middle of the board at the start. Before rolling, the player on turn may offer to double the stakes. The rival must either take, which doubles the value of the game, or pass and lose the stakes as they stood before the double. A player who takes now owns the cube, and only the owner can double again, which is called a redouble.

The cube turns backgammon from a pure dice game into a game of judgement. A common guide is that you should double when your chance of winning is roughly 70 percent to 80 percent, and your rival should take if they have at least 25 percent. Our computer on Hard uses a win-chance estimate from its evaluation to decide, so you will see it double sensibly and sometimes pass when you double it at a bad moment.

In match play the cube changes with the score. The Crawford rule says that when a player first reaches one point short of the match, the next game is played without the cube. After that game doubling is allowed again. You can switch the Crawford rule off in setup. See the Learn article on the doubling cube for practical examples.

How is backgammon scored? Gammon and backgammon

A normal win scores 1 point times the cube. A gammon, where the loser has not borne off a single checker, scores 2. A backgammon, where the loser also has a checker on the bar or in the winner's home board, scores 3. In Plakoto, Fevga and Narde the equivalent double win is called mars and scores 2.

In a money game without a match score you can turn on the Jacoby rule, which says gammons and backgammons count only after the cube has been turned. It stops a player from sitting on a big lead without doubling. Match play ignores Jacoby, because in a match only the score matters.

How do you play Plakoto?

Plakoto starts with all 15 checkers on the rival's ace point, your 24 point, and every checker runs round to your home board. There is no bar and no hitting. If you land on a point with exactly one enemy checker, that checker is pinned under yours and cannot move until you move every one of your checkers off that point. A point with two or more enemy checkers is closed.

The aim is the same as in backgammon, to bear off first, with a mars (2 points) if your rival has borne off nothing. Pinning an enemy checker early in your own home board can lock a rival's army down for the whole game, so the fight is about timing. In rare positions both sides can pin each other and no checker can ever move. In that case this game awards the win to the side with fewer pips left.

How do you play Fevga and Narde?

Fevga and Narde (Long Nardy) share one track. All 15 checkers of each side start on a corner point and run counter-clockwise round the entire board, so both players travel the same road. Nothing can be hit. A point is simply closed while an enemy checker stands on it, and you can block your rival by holding a run of points in front of their checkers.

Two safeguards stop the game from being a plain race. In Fevga your second checker may not leave the starting point until your first has reached the third quarter of the track. In Narde only one checker may leave the head each turn, except on the very first turn where a double 3, 4 or 6 lets you take two. In both games, building six points in a row is illegal unless an enemy checker is already past the wall. You win by bearing off all 15, and a mars scores 2.

What are good backgammon opening moves?

Most strong players have a fixed answer for each opening roll. With 3 and 1, make your 5 point by moving 8 to 5 and 6 to 5. With 4 and 2, make your 4 point with 8 to 4 and 6 to 4. With 6 and 1, make the bar point with 13 to 7 and 8 to 7. With 5 and 3, make the 3 point with 8 to 3 and 6 to 3. With 6 and 5, run one back checker all the way with 24 to 13, which is called lover's leap.

Doubles are even stronger: 6 and 6 makes the bar point and your 8 point; 5 and 5 moves two checkers from 13 to 3; 4 and 4 moves two checkers from 24 to 20 and two from 13 to 9; 3 and 3 makes the 5 point and the 3 point; 2 and 2 can slot the 4 and 5 points. These are the classic choices, not the only good ones, and the Hint button on our board suggests a move for any position when you are playing the computer.

If you want a longer plan, read our strategy guide: build points in front of your rear checkers, avoid leaving blots where many rolls hit, and count pips so you know whether you are racing or holding.

What is a pip count and why does it matter?

The pip count is the total number of pips each side needs to bring every checker off the board. At the start both sides have 167. A checker on your 24 point counts 24, a checker on the bar counts 25. After every roll the player who rolls the dice effectively gains the average of about 8 pips, so when the sides have passed each other and no more contact is possible, the player ahead in the count is the favourite.

Our board shows both pip counts live. If you are behind in the race, do not run, look for a hit or a block. If you are ahead, simplify and get your back checkers out before your rival can build a prime.

Can I play backgammon against the computer?

Yes. Easy plays any legal move and is a good way to learn the rules. Normal weighs blots, points made, primes, anchors and the pip count, and uses a reasonable doubling cube. Hard looks two turns ahead over all 21 possible dice rolls (an expectiminimax search) and decides cube actions from an estimate of its winning chance, with each move taking well under two seconds.

You can choose White or Black, and the board turns around when you play Black so that your home board is always nearest you. Undo any step in your turn before you finish it, switch on move hints for a suggestion, and your game is saved if you leave.

Can I play backgammon online with a friend?

Yes. Choose Online, create a room and send the room code or link, for example on WhatsApp. Your friend taps it and they are in. The host's browser rolls the dice for both players and sends the values over, and the guest's browser never rolls, so neither player can influence a roll. If either of you refreshes or loses the connection, you drop back into the same game with the same link.

Two players can also share one screen. The board stays in one position, and the dice and cube work exactly as in an online game.

Board options: flip, mirror and colours

Players sit differently at real tables, so the board can be turned around, and mirrored left to right so the home board is on the side you prefer. Point numbers can be shown or hidden. Four board themes (Walnut, Ebony, Marine and Paper) change the wood and the checkers. On a phone the board turns upright so the checkers are big enough to tap or drag.

Τάβλι online: παίξτε Τάβλι δωρεάν

Το Τάβλι είναι το πιο αγαπημένο επιτραπέζιο στην Ελλάδα και την Κύπρο. Εδώ παίζετε Πόρτες (το κλασικό τάβλι), Πλακωτό και Φεύγα δωρεάν, χωρίς λήψη και χωρίς εγγραφή, με τον υπολογιστή σε τρία επίπεδα, με φίλο στην ίδια οθόνη ή online με φίλο μέσω κωδικού δωματίου. Μπορείτε επίσης να παίξετε διεθνές Backgammon με το κύβο διπλασιασμού.

Στις Πόρτες το μαρς (γκάμον) μετράει 2 πόντους. Στο Πλακωτό ακινητοποιείτε το μονό πούλι του αντιπάλου πατώντας πάνω του, και στη Φεύγα δεν υπάρχει χτύπημα, μόνο μπλοκάρισμα. Το ταμπλό γυρίζει και αντικατοπτρίζεται ώστε να παίζετε όπως σας αρέσει.

Tavla oyna: ücretsiz online Tavla

Tavla Türkiye'nin en sevilen masa oyunudur. Burada ücretsiz, indirmeden ve üye olmadan Tavla (Portes kuralları) oynayabilir, bilgisayara karşı üç seviyede, aynı ekranda arkadaşınızla ya da oda koduyla online arkadaşınızla maça çıkabilirsiniz. İsterseniz çifte zarlı (katlama küpü) uluslararası Backgammon, Plakoto, Fevga ve Narde da oynanabilir.

Zarları oda sahibi atar ve değerleri arkadaşınıza gönderir, yani kimse zarı kendi tarafında atmaz. Tahta yan çevrilebilir, aynalanabilir, hamleleri geri alabilir ve yardım ipucu isteyebilirsiniz. Mars (gammon) 2 puan sayılır.