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Othello Quiz 2016
Posted By: Timothy Chow In Response To: Othello Quiz 2016 (othello)
Date: Wednesday, 12 October 2016, at 12:50 a.m.
1. White has some serious threats and I don't like exposing more blots that could get picked up in a blitz, especially ATS. At first I wanted to play 13/9 23/22 but stepping up looks wrong since it diversifies White's good numbers. I'm reduced to 24/23 13/9 and 13/8. Anchoring on the 2pt looks bad since White has a priming threat as well as an attacking threat. Even though it looks awkward, I will go with 13/8.
2. Well behind in the race, Black needs to contain White's straggler, and slotting the sixth point in the prime looks like the best way to do that. The blot on the midpoint doesn't look too serious because White's aces are duplicated, and besides, Black doesn't care about getting gammoned. 13/9.
3. The obvious move looks like making the bar, creating 5 out of 6 points. What else is there? There's 24/20(2) making the golden point while ahead in the race. There's 8/4 6/4 together with some fourth deuce, probably the bold 9/7. I don't think that anchoring is the right idea when such nice priming plays are available. I like making the solid four-prime and slotting the bar point, noting that several of White's sixes are duplicated. 9/7 8/4 6/4.
4. This time I don't like leaving a blot on the bar point because there's no (easy) way to re-make it. Breaking anchor just gives White lots of good rolls so I'm left with 6/4 6/2.
5. There are only two legal 5's and I'm not seeing the value of 6/1, so 12/7 is my 5. For the ace, the obvious play is to lift with 7/6, but leaving it there gives us a good 5 next time if we're not hit, and again we don't care about getting gammoned. Leaving the blot on the 12pt duplicates White's 2's, and I don't like undiversifying with 24/23, so that leaves 12/7 4/3.
6. I think we really need to give White 4's to play, so I'm moving off the 24pt. But with a 1 or a 6? 24/18 reduces backgammon danger but 24/23 gives White bad 1's. I think that bad 1's are more important, and then there's only one plausible 6. 24/23 15/9.
7. This one looks superficially like Problem 5 but there are many differences. First of all, gammon losses count. Also, Black is not as badly hemmed in here. I'd rather not volunteer a direct shot, so I play 13/9 and then have to choose between 12/11 and 4/3. 12/11 stays back for extra coverage and offers one fewer hitting roll. This seems too obvious so I'm probably blundering but I'm not seeing the motivation behind cleverer plays. 13/9 4/3.
8. Well, the first 3 is forced, and then I can't imagine why we'd pass up the hit. Then I'm tempted to cover with 8/5 but this breaks the 8pt and leaves a somewhat awkward distribution. I'm inclined to make a new point with 6/3(2); it looks strange but we have plenty of ammunition for a blot-hitting contest and White has no board. Bar/22 13/10* 6/3(2).
9. Our big asset is our stronger board so we'd like to provoke a blot-hitting contest. For that reason, I think that 24/15 and 13/4 are too passive. That leaves 13/9 13/8 and 13/8 24/20. 24/20 looks like it gives us better coverage of the board and better entering rolls from the bar. 24/20 13/8.
10. We're behind in the race and we have no way to attack, so our best plan is to counterprime. The first thing I'd note is that the 10pt is not very effective since it's six pips away from our 4pt, which we've already made. So the "safe" play of 13/10 13/11 doesn't look too appealing to me, especially since it leaves the equivalent of a direct shot anyway. Among point-making plays, making the 5pt is, as always, an option, but doing so breaks the valuable bar point and leaves us with only a three-prime, so it's worth looking further. Another option is 13/8, but it doesn't look better to me than making the 5pt. Alternatively, we could consider slotting with 8/5 and finding a deuce; 13/11 seems too loose but 10/8, 9/7, and 6/4 all look possible. I like 10/8 because we don't want the 10pt anyway, and it gives us good 3's, which are a troublesome number for us. So now I'm reduced to playing 8/5 for the 3 and choosing between 7/5 and 10/8 for the 2. I'm nervous about not making the 5pt but the bar point seems more valuable to me in this position, so I'll go with 10/5.
As an overall comment, I find it interesting that in five of these problems (3, 4, 5, 7, 10) I thought a lot about the bar point. And there are a couple of other problems where the bar point might turn out to be important and I just overlooked it.
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