Credits
XG skin design by Rain
Analysis
The first few rolls of any game can quickly throw up tough decisions. With this 54 roll your main options include:
22/18 13/8 - giving up your home-board anchor for the bar point and playing safely elsewhere
18/9 - bringing your blot round to the 9pt and preparing to build your board, while keeping a secure anchor within White’s home-board
22/18 5/1* - the tempo hit on the acepoint so you can move up to the barpoint with fewer shots aiming at your home-board blot.
What’s your plan, and what guidelines are you following? You’re behind in the race, and White has more threats than you, so you may either want to keep the security of an anchor, or consider a more volatile play like the tempo hit to distract your opponent. But it turns out the only correct option is 22/18 13/8. White’s lack of any home-board strength means it’s not so important to keep a home-board anchor, and switching the bar point neutralises White’s main current threat of an outfield prime. You want to move into a holding game, which means you really don’t need or want the threat of a second checker sent back