Prime or Blitz?

A new book to end the year - ‘Backgammon: Pure Strategy’ by Marc Olsen, which attempts to explain how the bots play backgammon and what we can learn from them.

The position isn’t particularly related to that theme though - it’s looking at when it’s right to play a priming game and when to go for the blitz.

In this position we’re a long way behind in the race, and we still have two back checkers that are partially trapped behind White’s not-terrible blocking structure. That suggests we need to think and play purely, which in turn should lead us to a priming play - and hopefully to 18/7*, which is stronger than the alternative 13/8 13/7*.

This is a finely-poised position, and the cube position matters (you noticed you’d already cubed, right?). If the cube was still in the centre then the blitzing play of 13/7* 6/1* would be right, giving you lots of options to cube White out (or even play on for the gammon).