Parts and Accessories of a Backgammon Board

Before enjoying a game of backgammon we need to learn its parts. Then we can properly setup the backgammon board when we understand what its parts and accessories are for.

Probably the most curious looking and prominent part of a backgammon board are the steep triangles that line up the top and bottom sides of the board. They are called "Points." They are 24 in all. Points are where backgammon checker s move on or remain a while. Points can turn into blots, primes, or anchors, depending on the number of checkers on them.

Then there's the "Bar." The bar is the strip of thick line dividing the board into two equal parts—the left and right parts. The bar plays an important role in the game like the points. When a checker piece gets "hit" it stays on the bar until the next turn.

Talking of home boards, there are two types of "Home Board" on the board: the opponent's home board and our home board. We always start from the enemy home board and go to our home board. The idea is to take all our checker pieces to our home board each turn we make. When we setup the backgammon board we need to establish which is the enemy's and which is our home board.

The board also has "Quadrants." These are the 4 areas or divisions of the board. If there are 24 points and 4 quadrants, then we simply divide the 24 points into 4 to get that fact that each quadrant has 6 points. Because the bar divides the board into two, then it is easy to picture 2 quadrants on the bottom side of the board and 2 quadrants on the top side of the board.

Then we also have backgammon accessories. The first are "Backgammon Checkers" or pieces. These are flat round chips, 15 each player, with different colors each player. So there are two teams of checkers here, one white and one black. Who gets to play first is decided with a die roll. Checkers move at a time per turn. In the beginning of a game we may opt to move two checkers. But beyond that we are only allowed to move one point each checker.

Then there are the 2 sets of dice, the dice cup where we shake the pair of dice, and a doubling cube. To setup the backgammon board properly we need to understand the functions of the parts and the complete set of accessories.