ocked point. The
points in the home tables count for this purpose as 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6,
beginning from the ace-point. A player is not allowed to move any other man
while he has one to enter. It is, therefore, an advantage to have made all
the points in your own board, so that your adversary, if you take a man up,
cannot enter; and you can then continue throwing until a point is opened.

The game proceeds until one of the players gets all his men into his inner
table or _home_. Then he begins to take his men off the board, or to _bear_
them, _i.e._ to remove a man from any point that corresponds in number with
his throw. If such a point is unoccupied, a move must be made, if there is
room for it, and a move may be taken, instead of bearing a man, at any
time; but when six is empty, if six is thrown a man may be borne from five
and so on. If, after a player has commenced throwing off his men, he should
be hit on a blot, he must enter on his adversary's inner table and must
bring the man taken up into his own inner table before he can bear further.

Whoever first takes off all his men wins the game:--a single game (a "hit")
if his adversary has begun bearing; a double game (a "gammon") if the
adversary has not borne a man; and a triple game (a "backgammon") if, at
the time the winner bears his last man, his adversary, not having borne a
man, has one in the winner's inner table, or has a man up. When a series of
games is played, the winner of a hit has the first throw in the succeeding
game; but if a gammon is won, the players each throw a single die to
determine the first move of the next game.

In order to play backgammon well, it is necessary to know all the chances
on two dice and to apply them in various ways. The number of different
throws that can be made is thirty-six. By taking all the combinations of
these throws which include given numbers, it is easily discovered where
blots may be left with the least probability of being hit. For example, to
find the chance of being hit where a blot can only be taken up by an ace,
the adversary may throw two aces, or ace in combination with any other
number up to six, and he may throw each of these in two different ways, so
that there are in all eleven ways in which an ace may be thrown. This,
deducted from thirty-six (the total number of throws), leaves twenty-five;
so that it is 25 to 11 against being hit on an ace. It is very important to
bear in mind the chance of being hit