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Norm Wiggins (edited by Danny Kleinman) 2001 136pp
Self
Published
Norm produced a number of positions analyzed by Jellyfish rollouts, targeted
at the experienced backgammon player with an already establised base knowledge
and desire to become an expert player. Wiggins claims that this book will help
you develop "the ability to see and evaluate all the pertinent features of a
position and decide which goals in the corrent position must take priority over
which others".
Norm gives you a little info on how he analyzed the
positions as well as some notation and terminology and then gives you some
excellent general strategy advice. Wiggins then gets to the meat of his efforts,
129 problems rolled out by Jellyfish and analyzed. Most of these problems are
delightful, demonstating key points and showing you what you should be thinking
about in various situations. Note however that this is a collection of checker
play problems and teaches you nothing about the cube.
One of the
downfalls of this book is that the positions analyzed are not in any particular
order or demonstrate any common ideas or themes making it a little haphazard.
the analyses are interesting, clear and informative and certainly not without
merit. One concept that was hammered home to me was the importance of
"boardage". Boardage amount to some of the tactical criteria that help you
decide whether to make a safe or bold play first introduced in Magriel's "Backgammon". In the examples shown by Wiggins, boardage
is a powerful determinant of how you should move your checkers.
I liked a
lot of the problems but there were several that were relatively useless showing
"no brainer" plays and seemed like filler. There were also a couple fo
intriguing examples that showed radically different checker plays with near
equal equity. They were interesting but since both plays were considered
"correct" by Jellyfish, I'm not sure what I was supposed to learn from them.
This was a decent collection of problems but I wouldn't really call it a
book. As a collection of problems I thought it was valuale and I certainly
learned something from it. I just wish it was more organized around central
themes and concepts or at least into stages of the game. You know.. table of
contents, an outline, chapters, headings... a book.
| Level: Intermediate-Advanced |
Ease of read: 7 |
Quality of material: 8 |
Overall: 8 |
Price: Available from cjc |
Martin Short, 03/16/02
Other book reviews welcome! Email them to DocMartin@Gammoned.com
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