User:Crisloid

Crisloid , Crisloid backgammon sets, this individual is a highly-skilled backgammon player. Crisloid ,Taking the name from Crisloid backgammon sets, this individual is a highly-skilled backgammon player.

THE HISTORY OF CRISLOID GAMES Established in 1948 in the industrial belly of Brooklyn, NY, Crisloid quickly built a reputation on unrivaled, American-made, premium quality products. Company founders and backgammon enthusiasts Alfonse and Lucky Lodato believed that quality materials and painstaking engineering were tantamount. Their execution of this philosophy swiftly propelled Crisloid into its global position as a worldwide gaming supplier. Today, Crisloid relentlessly maintains and improves its standards of quality within our well-equipped 25,000 square foot facility. Wood shop, resin casting, case department, silk screening, design dept. and much more all jiving under one roof. We always welcome custom work and fully respect the entrepreneurial spirit, so don’t hesitate to make an inquiry. The company has many classic gaming needs, from Backgammon sets to dice, dominoes and checkers. From quiet-cork playing surfaces to our hallmark hand-crafted and polished checkers, every detail is designed and built with the finest workmanship right here in Providence, Rhode Island USA.

Backgammon is a board game for two players. Each player has fifteen pieces or men which move between twenty-four triangles (points) according to the roll of the two dice. The objective of the game is to be first to bear off, that is, to move all fifteen men off the board.

History

The ancient Egyptians played a game called senet, which resembled backgammon,with moves controlled by the roll of dice. The Royal Game of Ur, played in ancient Mesopotamia, is a more likely ancestor of modern tables games. Recent excavations at the "Burnt City" in Iran showed that a similar game existed there around 3000 BC. The artifacts include two dice and 60 pieces, and the set is believed to be 100 to 200 years older than the sets found in Ur.

The ancient Romans played a number of games with remarkable similarities to backgammon. Ludus duodecim scriptorum ("game of twelve lines") used a board with three rows of 12 points each, and the pieces were moved across all three rows according to the roll of dice. Not much specific text about the gameplay has survived.Tabula, meaning "table" or "board", was a game mentioned in an epigram of Byzantine Emperor Zeno (AD 476–481). It was similar to modern backgammon in that a board with 24 points was used, and the object of the game was to be the first to bear off all of one's checkers. Three dice were used instead of two, and opposing checkers moved in opposite directions. In the 11th century Shahnameh, the Persian poet Ferdowsi credits Burzoe with the invention of the tables game nard in the 6th century. He describes an encounter between Burzoe and a Raja visiting from India. The Raja introduces the game of chess, and Burzoe demonstrates nard, played with dice made from ivory and teak.

Rules Backgammon is a simple game with complicated strategic elements. It does not take long to learn to play, although obscure situations do arise which require careful interpretation of the governing rules. The playing time for each individual game is short, so it is often played in matches, for example the first to five points. Game and match are used in Backgammon to refer to these distinct elements, as in, "I won two games in a row, but then he won three in a row and I lost the match, 3 points to 2." In short, players are trying to get all of their men past their opponent's pieces. This is difficult because the pieces are scattered at first, and can be blocked or captured by the opponent's men.

Backgammon throughout the Middle East and Central Asia Backgammon is played a lot in the Middle East and Central Asia, particularly in cafes. There are four main variants played in the Middle East: 1) the European game as described above and known as ifranjiah (meaning Frankish in Arabic); "Takhte Nard" is the Iranian version. 2) shesh besh (Shesh means six in Persian & Hebrew and Besh means five in Turkish) in Azerbaijan, Israel, and Uzbekistan and tavla in Turkey; 3) mahbusa (meaning 'imprisoned') 4) maghribiyya.

The most popular of those is probably mahbusa. In this game each player's 15 men are all initially positioned on his 24-point. When hit, an isolated checker is not placed on the bar. Rather the hitting piece sits on top of the hit piece forming a block, i.e. the same rules apply as if the point was occupied by two or more pieces of the same colour. The checker which has been hit is 'imprisoned' and cannot be moved until the opponent removes his piece: hence the name of the game. Sometimes a further rule requires that a player must bring his first checker to the opponent's home board before moving any other men. Whether or not this rule is applied, a rapid advance to the opponent's side of the board is desirable as imprisoning the opponent's men on his home table is highly advantageous. An interesting feature of backgammon as played in some Arab countries is that Persian or Kurdish numbers, rather than Arabic ones, are called out by a player announcing his dice rolls.