How many counters does each player have at the start of a game of backgammon?
Backgammon opening theory possibilities, over the course of many years, a consensus did develop among backgammon experts on what is the preferred opening move for each given roll. Following the emergence of self-trained backgammon-playing neural networks, the insights on what are the best opening moves have changed in some unexpected ways. The table below summarizes the most commonly preferred moves, for each of the 15 possible opening rolls, as selected by detailed computer simulations, referred to as "rollouts". There are no opening moves consisting of doubles, because at the start of the game, each player rolls one die. Whoever rolls higher moves first,
Backgammon the dice may determine the outcome of a single game, the better player will accumulate the better record over series of many games, somewhat like poker. With each roll of the dice, players must choose from numerous options for moving their checkers and anticipate possible counter-moves by the opponent. The optional use of a doubling cube allows players to raise the stakes during the game. Like chess, backgammon has been studied with great interest by computer scientists. Owing to this research, backgammon software has been developed that is capable of beating world-class human players (see TD-Gammon for an example). Backgammon