The most embarassing extracts from the worst match I played in a long time

With the reasoning "if these positions were too difficult for me to find the right move they might also be interesting for you to see" I'm herewith showing you a couple of interesting positions from an embarassingly poor 5pt match I played against True Backgammon (iOS) on BGBlitz-2 (ie superhumanly strong) level.

Enjoy :-)

 

Blue to move 21

Things started out poorly in game 1, where I made my first 0.15 blunder in move 2 already. What should I have played here?

I wanted to play 13/11, staying out of direct hit range from his checker on the 4. So I entered on 24, playing BAR/24 13/11. 

Obviously, given that white has only a 1 point board, I should have played bold and hit on the 4, accepting the >50% risk (I counted 19/36 hitting numbers) of being hit for the chance of making the 4 point in the next roll. XG2 says the correct move is BAR/24 6/4*, followed by BAR/23, 6/5 (-0.074) and my AR/24 13/11 (-0.145)

Lesson to be learned: play very bold against a 1 point board.

 

Blue to play 43

My next blunder came two moves later, and it's a bit related to the previous one.

I played 24/20 11/8, trying to establish an anchor and not fearing the bot's 11 checkers in the zone due to the 1 point board. But the danger of these 11 checkers is very high, I should have stayed behind and played offensively 13/9 8/5. Honestly, I find this play VERY loose, but the logic is fine - he only has a 1 point board, and a move he invests in hitting my chackers on 5 or 9 or 11 is a move he can't use to build an overwhelming prime or blitz with his strong 11 checkers.

 

White doubles. Should blue take or pass?

 

e voila! my next blunder immediately after - after my move, white doubled. Should I take or pass?

 

I passed. Wrongly. Again. (a 0.105 blunder). My reasoning was that I have absolutely nothing while he has a strong attack with said 11 checkers in the zone, so the likelihood of being blitzed is high, making this a perfect "early double/pass".

Seems with only a one point board even 11 checkers don't pose such a grand threat after all, and it's likely that I survive and make an anchor. And he has a checker on 24.

So I finished my first game with a wonderful 44.7 PR!

Let me finish with an interesting blunder from the final game:

 

Blue to move 41

 

The race is fairly even, so the question is: to hit on 9 or to cover on 4?

 

Answer: I hit, wrongly. I played 24/23, which made pressure on his blot on 14 and made it harder for him to e.g. slot the 5 or 4 point, and 13/9. XG says this is a 0.12 mistake, and suggests to play 24/23 8/4. The reason is probably that although a two point board is not very dangerous, a double hit by e.g. entering on 4 and hitting on 24 might be the start of a lot of trouble for me. And since there's still white's blot on 1 it's not terribly urgent to hit now if I can build my board.