Playing Doublets: Backgammon Puzzles to Improve Your Checker Play Paperback – May 4, 2013

Based on the enthusiasm shown by the 5 star reviewer I decided to purchase this book as I am always looking for ways to improve my game.Just one small little problem: for each of the positions there is zilch, nada, null, absolutely no commentary about WHY the answer given is the best option.Anybody can run a position through XG, GNU, or Snowie. But it's authors like Walter Trice, Jeremy Bagai, Bill Robertie and Paul Magriel that help your game immeasurably because of the ANALYSIS they provide of a board position. Should you run, anchor, hit, stay back, prime, put checkers out of play and why?This should not be your first advanced backgammon book, not even your second, third, fourth or fifth. Try "Backgammon Boot Camp" or "Classic Backgammon Revisited" instead.Two stars instead of one because the problems given *are* interesting.

This is a great book to learn Doublets. I can recommend it to anyone and is a great addition to my Backgammon library of 17 books.

I enjoy backgammon problem books like this. I think it is a great way to learn.All positions are taken from master level matches. You are given the match score, pip count and cube position. But I think all, or nearly all problems would be the same at money play. It shows what play was made over the board, who the players involved were and gives a line or two about one of the players, which is cool.The positions are mostly mid-game which I like. This is where most games are won or lost and where the toughest decisions are. So far, so good. But...There are a couple things I do not like about this book. 1) Some of the problems are just too easy. This is only a minor issue as this number is fairly low. 2) Even just a couple sentences of expert analysis would make a BIG difference. Backgammon can be a mysterious game at times. A number of times I got the play wrong and did not understand why my play was inferior. The computer can tell me that my play is wrong. But only a human can tell me why it is wrong. This book lacks that human insight as to how to analyze a position. And is its biggest weakness.

This is an excellent collection of 180 backgammon problems from expert matches. In order to improve at something, one needs to engage in deliberate practice. This book provides the deliberate practice necessary to improve one's ability to make the best move when rolling doubles.You roll doubles one-sixth of the time so improving your playing of doubles is important to improving your overall game. Also, rolling doubles often results in potential significant swings in equity so it is important to capitalize on these situations by making the best move. Furthermore, rolling doubles may change the game plan that best maximizes your equity (e.g. rolling large doubles may result in your best game plan changing from a holding game to a racing game). So you need to pay particular attention when you roll doubles to maximize your equity.The book uses gnub for its rollouts but provides a comparison of the rankings of the plays with that of eXtreme Gammon in an annex. Both programs agree on the best move for all 180 positions in the book and agree on the rankings of the top four moves more than two-thirds of the time. This is a best practice that I have not seen in any other backgammon book.One caveat: this book provides no annotation as to why the best play is better than the other options and thus is suited to a player with a firm grasp of the principles of backgammon.One quibble with the book: the positions are rolled out at the match score at which they occurred. While this gives one the ability to compare one's play to that of the experts who faced these positions, it makes it unclear how much the match score influenced what checker play was best, especially for plays where one or both players are close to winning the match. A note on whether a different move would be best in money (or unlimited) play would be useful. Perhaps this can be incorporated into a future edition or provided by the authors separately to interested readers.All in all, this is an excellent book and well worth its modest cost.

I am a professional backgammon teacher and I recommend this book to all my students. Even if you are a highly experienced player you will learn much from this book. It is laid out well, but I also loved reading the tidbits of history about the game and major players. It was a real treat.

The idea and format of this book is good, however, as we know, the tournament checker play depends on the match score and the cube position/value, and unfortunately, the former is not provided for any position. The book still could be helpful if you assume that the match score did not affect the top 4 plays.

Playing Doublets is a well written, well organized book divided into six chapters, one chapter for each of the possible doublets. The book is full of illustrated diagrams, where an expert or top ranked player made a blunder playing doublets. i consider this to be one of the best backgammon books of all time. Doublets are usually favorable, but also offer the greatest opportunity for your opponent to misplay them. I now try to be more cautious in playing doublets correctly, and in going through the book I started seeing certain patterns such as if you must leave a blot, try to position it so you have return shots from the bar. For the technically minded, the rollout data is also available as a separate download. Also included is the response to the opening roll if you roll a doublet. Strong buy recommendation to improve your game. Maurice Barie

This book provides 180 positions (30 for each double) where a world class player made an error. Yes, there is no analysis but you should be able to reason it out yourself. The process of doing that will make you think and remember the ideas better. The issue of scores not being there has been addressed and these have been added. I will probably roll them out for money to see the difference but the positions themselves are fascinating.Definitely worth the price which is very inexpensive.

Top Class. Improved my game ten fold.

Great!

So interesting to see how the automatic or obvious moves can be an error or a blunder ! Very instrucyive for at least beginners ! Great book, thx !!