It is currently a work-in-progress. So far it is able to play both independent games and tournament matches, evaluate and roll out positions, tune its own evaluation functions using either TD or supervised training, maintain databases of positions for training and other purposes, and more. See the following section for a more complete list.
It is driven by a command-line interface, and displays an ASCII rendition of a board on text-only terminals, but also allows the user to play games and manipulate positions.
It currently plays at about the level of a championship flight tournament player and is gradually improving; it should be somewhat stronger than this when released. GNU Backgammon can be played at numerous other online backgammon servers.
"Very challenging game that definately improves skill but have reservations"
As I do loads of travelling this is a great piece of software with very high skill levels for long flights or rail journeys.The hints are interesting too enabling me to wonder why one roll is better than another. Especially if the best roll suggested leaves me open to a take and GNU randomly throws the right dice for that to happen. However, I do have some reservations. I know that the AI will allow GNU to understand the probability of dice rolls at a much greater skill level than I can but having been interested in other users views on cheating dice I decided to track the rolls over a series of games. I do win individual games and I do win some 7 point games but when I see over a 7 point game GNU rolls a far higher percentage of doubles than I did I wonder what is going on. Over four 7 point matches i rolled 4 doubles over 18 to 36 move games whereas GNU rolled up to 9 doubles and always at least two more doubles than I ever did in the same match.
It is always interesting to see during a bear off when fairly evenly matched in pips that "randomly" GNU manages to roll three doubles on the trot to leave me more than 20 points behind. This has happened at least 5 times in the past 3 months, I have yet to roll three doubles in a row in any backgammon game I have ever played!
I will continue to play GNU backgammon as I have definately improved and have a much better understanding of the game since I have been using it.
Laws concerning the use of this software vary from country to country. We do not encourage or condone the use of this program if it is in violation of these laws.
