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An immortal rule of thumb revisited.

Posted By: Stick
Date: Tuesday, 19 June 2012, at 6:10 a.m.

In Response To: An immortal rule of thumb revisited. (higonefive)

Per usual, when trying to understand general concepts of safe v. bold play I would remove any score from the equation unless it's relevant.

I have never put my bold v. safe thoughts down on paper, I don't think anyway, but there's a lot to add to Magriel's fine work. One of the first things I always note is the race. If you're ahead in the race it will lean you towards a more quiet play. The more you're ahead the more the race may matter.

Another thing to keep in mind is how the roll otherwise plays. This is often a factor. In our example here the roll plays quite nicely by unstacking the mid and putting a spare on our otherwise stripped midpoint.

We also need to keep in mind what the roll rips apart when we do hit in certain situations like this one. If we hit here we give up the bar point and may never get it back. That may or may not be a risk worth taking depending on the position but something to keep in mind.

I don't believe there's any *master list* of safe v. bold play that can be created, referred to, and if X amount point to bold or safe then play thusly. I think we can point out the major factors we should be paying attention to and try to weigh them properly according to each individual position. For example in this position if we already had a spare from the midpoint moved to our bar point there is no question that everyone would hit yet the answers to all your safe v. bold Magriel questions would remain the same.

A last point worth mentioning is when hitting, how much is the tempo part of our play worth? That could be phrased many ways, but how many good rolls or chances to improve his position does our opponent have if we do not hit? The posted example works well again to get a little better understanding of this. If we play quiet, 13/6, how likely is our opponent to improve his position and how much do his improvements hurt our game plan(s)?

Worth noting here is if we hit and get away with it, aka we're not immediately hit back, our numbers are ever so nicely diversified. We would have 3s and 5s to cover the 4pt, 2s and 6s to remake the bar point, and 4s to make the major split of the back checkers. The number of shots/blots has to come in to play also and will depend heavily on the position at hand.

Stick

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