How to play backgammon online: rules, gammon and backgammon scoring

Backgammon is a two-player game: 15 white and 15 black checkers each. The goal is to bring all your checkers home and bear them off before your opponent. Here are the rules you need before you play backgammon online.

Setup and the first roll

The board has 24 points. Each player starts with 2 checkers on the 24-point, 5 on the 13-point, 3 on the 8-point and 5 on the 6-point. To decide who starts, each player rolls one die; the higher die starts and plays both dice. A tie is re-rolled.

Moving

You roll two dice and move checkers by those numbers; you may also use both dice on one checker. Doubles (4-4) are played four times. If you can play both dice you must. If only one can be played, the higher one has to be played when possible.

Hitting and the bar

A single enemy checker on a point can be hit: it goes to the bar. A point with two or more checkers is closed and cannot be landed on. With a checker on the bar you must enter it first, into an open point of your opponent's home board; if all six are closed you lose your turn.

Bearing off

When all 15 of your checkers are in your home board you may bear off. A die removes a checker from the point of that number; if there is none you have to move a farther checker, and if none is farther you may bear off the farthest one with the bigger die.

Scoring

• Normal win: 1 point.
• Gammon (mars): the loser has not borne off any checker: 2 points.
• Backgammon (tavla, "Turkish mars"): the loser has borne off none and still has a checker on the bar or in the winner's home board: 3 points.

On this site those values are the defaults and the administrator can change them. A match is won by the first player to reach the chosen number of points.