Advanced Backgammon, Volume 1 - Positional Play (2nd edition)
by Bill Robertie
Volume 1: Positional Play
Advanced Backgammon, Volume 1 contains over 400 problems covering positional play and includes sections on the opening, middle game, blitzes, priming games, and back games. Two-time World Champion Robertie has drawn upon years of research, analysis, and experience to update this classic work for the modern era.
Advanced Backgammon (Volume 1: Positional Play)
Level: Advanced
Info: 288 pages, softbound
Price: $40 + S/H
Backgammon for Serious Players
by Bill Robertie
How do the top players create positions where they can outplay their opponents? They can’t simply drift with the dice into races and holding games that anyone can play well. Instead, they have to spot their opportunities for creating complex play which at the same time keep other options open. Using examples from recent master games, Robertie shows the secrets behind creating and winning the sort of complex, double-edged games that are the heart of modern backgammon. The book contains plenty of advice on handling double-anchor holding games, back games, and games where both sides are simultaneously priming their opponent while keeping backgame options open. You’ll learn how and when to recirculate checkers, the strengths and weaknesses of the outside prime, and proper technique after hitting a late shot.
Level: Intermediate
Info: 188 pages, softbound
Price: $20 + S/H
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Backgammon for Winners
by Bill Robertie
Backgammon for Winners is an introductory book, suitable for those with either no prior instruction in the game, or with just a basic knowledge of the rules. It teaches how to set up the board, move the pieces, and use the doubling cube. Three complete games are given, with annotations after every move, covering the basics of tactical and positional play. A great gift for friends who want to learn the game.
Level: Beginner
Info: 124 pages, softbound
Price: $13 + S/H
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501 Essential Problems
by Bill Robertie
31 chapters cover every part of the game, from the opening roll to the art of endgame play. You’ll learn when to attack blots, how to master the blitz, and all about anchors, primes, crunched positions, races, bearoffs, back games, and doubling.
Level: Intermediate
Info: 384 pages, softbound
Price: $20 + S/H
About Bill Robertie | Backgammon Books by Bill Robertie
Learning From The Machine: Robertie vs. TD-Gammon
by Bill Robertie
TD-Gammon is an experimental neural network program developed at IBM's research labs. TD-Gammon taught itself to play, starting only with a knowledge of the rules of the game. After playing thousands of games against itself, the program reached strong Open player level. Within months, it approached world-class. TD-Gammon plays like a strong human player in many parts of the game. In some areas, it plays quite unlike what has generally been accepted as "correct strategy," leading increasing numbers of top players to begin to experiment with TD-Gammon's unconventional plays. Here is your chance to see for yourself.
Bill Robertie played two long matches against TD-Gammon as part of its evaluation process. Learning from the Machine is the complete account of the 31 games of the first match, with annotations by Robertie.
Level: Intermediate
Info: 51 pages, softbound
Price: $20 + S/H
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Modern Backgammon
by Bill Robertie
For the past several years, the backgammon world has been undergoing a quiet revolution, led by the neural nets, Snowie and Jellyfish. Unfortunately for students of the game, the neural nets taught only by example. While they played extremely well, and could provide solutions to almost any individual problem, they offered no hints toward an overarching theory of the game.
Modern Backgammon breaks through that barrier to provide a look at the general concepts that lie behind the neural nets’ sometimes baffling and mysterious plays: efficiency, connectivity, non-commitment and robustness. These concepts are explained in clear and concise form, butressed with hundreds of examples. Playing well in the modern era requires an understanding of how these different elements of the position affect strategy as a whole. Modern Backgammon shows how to apply these simple ideas in all types of situations.
The last part of Modern Backgammon examines one of the most interesting matches of the post-neural net period, the 25-point struggle between Nack Ballard and Jerry Grandell in the great Istanbul Super-Jackpot of 1998. Besides explaining the reasons behind correct play and pointing out errors, Robertie explains how key plays could be reasoned out using the concepts from the first part of the book.
Level: Advanced
Info: 370 pages, softbound
Price: $45 + S/H
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