Forum Archive :
Opening Rolls
Opening 1's: Split or slot?
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> This has been discussed on Gammonline recently, and it seems like the
> strongest players have pretty much come to a consensus that slotting is
> slightly better at even match scores/money for 2-1, and slightly
> inferior for 4-1, 5-1.
I don't think there is a consensus. One of the recent threads there
asked about 3-away 3-away, and according to long rollouts
slotting is more right with 2-1 at 3-away 3-away than for money,
perhaps by enough to call splitting an error at 3-away 3-away.
For money, though, I think people would be surprised if one of
the alternatives were clearly better than the other.
> The reason is the ideal placement of the builder
> on the 11, 6 points away from the slotted 5, vs. on the 9 which is such
> a powerful builder that there is a lot of duplication, or the 8, which
> leaves you only a bit better than 50/50 to cover if not hit.
After slotting with 5-1, in addition to 1s and 3s (20 numbers)
you can also cover with 8s (4 additional rolls, though covering
with 2-2 is inefficient), 5-2 makes the 3 point, and sometimes
5-4 makes the ace point. That's up to 28 numbers making use of
the slot to create a new inner board point. Other numbers
(6-4, 6-6, 5-5, 5-6, and 4-2) leave the point slotted, and if it was
reasonable on the first roll, it usually isn't so bad on the second
roll.
Slotting with 5-1 gets hit on all 4s except for 1-1, which is better
played elsewhere, but 3-1 and 4-2 are duplicated. This
duplication is more important than most players think. I still
tend to split with 5-1, though.
> Slotting is a gammon-hunting play on 4-1 or 5-1, best only when behind,
> or gammons are more valuable than usual. Slotting at 2-1 stands quite
> well on it's own, except at scores where *losing* the gammon is more
> problematic than usual.
I think the slot with 4-1 is fine at DMP.
I don't think slotting wins as many gammons as people expect,
since getting a third checker sent back makes blitzing extremely
difficult.
It is clearly wrong to slot if your opponent has a free drop,
at post-Crawford 2-away or 4-away, for example. Then
slotting means that your opponent will have a huge take if
the slot is hit, and probably a big pass otherwise, rather than
a close decision most of the time after a split.
Although people argue that slotting makes the game more
complicated, I think this argument is far stronger in other
situations, such as for making the deuce point on an opening
6-4. People rarely make significant errors on the response
to a slot, but _most_ players misplay several responses to
8/2 6/2. Although Snowie 4 dislikes making the deuce point
on the level of evaluations, its rollouts say the play is fine,
and that Snowie consistently undervalues the blitz in the
opening.
Douglas Zare
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Opening Rolls
- At different match scores (Louis Nardy Pillards, July 2002)
- Average advantage of winning opening roll (Chuck Bower, Oct 1998)
- Choosing a strategy (Daniel Murphy, June 2001)
- Early game rule of thumb (Rich Munitz, Feb 2009)
- Factors to consider (Kit Woolsey, July 1994)
- How computers play (Kit Woolsey, Mar 1995)
- Magriel's Chapter 5 (Hayden Alfano+, May 2006)
- Mloner vs Jellyfish (Kit Woolsey, Dec 1995)
- Nactating a whole game (Nack Ballard+, Jan 2011)
- Nactation (Jim Stutz+, June 2010)
- Nactation overview (Nack Ballard, Oct 2009)
- Nactation--Why use it? (leobueno+, Jan 2011)
- Opening 1's: Split or slot? (Douglas Zare, Dec 2003)
- Opening 21: Rollout (Stick, Mar 2006)
- Opening 21: Split or slot? (Dick Adams+, Dec 2003)
- Opening 32: Rollout (Stick, Feb 2006)
- Opening 43: In GOL online match (Raccoon+, Feb 2004)
- Opening 43: Pros and cons (Stick+, Jan 2006)
- Opening 43: Which split is better? (Peter Backgren+, Aug 2000)
- Opening 43: Which split is better? (Michael J. Zehr+, Mar 1996)
- Opening 51: Rollout (Stick, Feb 2006)
- Opening 52: Merits of splitting (Peter Bell, Apr 1995)
- Opening 53: Magriel's recommendation (George Parker+, July 1997)
- Opening 53: Split to 21? (Alex Zamanian, Aug 2000)
- Opening 53: Why make the three point? (Kit Woolsey+, Feb 1996)
- Opening 6's: Slot the bar point? (Chuck Bower+, Feb 2000)
- Opening 6's: Slot the bar point? (David Montgomery, June 1995)
- Opening 62: Could running be best? (Gary Wong, Sept 1997)
- Opening 62: Split, run, or slot? (Chuck Bower, May 1997)
- Opening 63: Middle Eastern split? (Mark+, Apr 2002)
- Opening 63: Slot the four point? (Dennis Cartwright+, Mar 2002)
- Opening 64: Make the two point? (William Hill+, Jan 1998)
- Opening 64: Make the two point? (Darse Billings, Feb 1995)
- Opening 64: Rollout (Peter Grotrian, Jan 2006)
- Opening 64: Split to 20? (Peter Bell, June 1995)
- Opening 64: Three choices (Brian Sheppard, July 1997)
- Opening 65: Becker on lover's leap (Jeffrey Spiegler+, Aug 1991)
- Opening 65: Computer rankings (Chuck Bower, Jan 1997)
- Opening rolls ranked (Arthur+, Apr 2005)
- Rollouts of opening 21 and replies (Alexander Nitschke, Oct 1997)
- Rollouts of openings (Tom Keith+, Jan 2006)
- Rollouts: Expert Backgammon (Tom Fahland, Aug 1994)
- Rollouts: Jellyfish 3.0 (Midas+, Sept 1997)
- Rollouts: Jellyfish 3.0 level 6 (Chuck Bower, Feb 1999)
- Rollouts: Snowie 4.1 (Rene Cerutti, Apr 2004)
- Slotting the four point (Joe Loria+, Oct 1999)
- Snowie's openers and replies (rcerutti, Feb 1999)
- Splitting versus building (Dave Slayton+, Aug 2000)
- Splitting versus slotting (Daniel Murphy, Apr 2001)
- Splitting versus slotting (Daniel Murphy, Sept 1997)
- Trice's rankings (Marty Storer, Feb 1992)
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