Playing By e-Mail

Backgammon

I enjoy playing backgammon by e-mail. In the early days of the web, before browsers were common, it was less expensive than playing online - and if you played a number of games at the same time, you could still see a lot of action. Actually, playing someone in the same timezone, the e-mail server is snappy enough to make the game close to realtime, and you can finish a game within one workday ;)

E-mail obviously gives room for chatting, and I really enjoy the online friendships I've made. Sometimes they even step into the real world. Here's Ramberg and Katty, caught on the fly at Kastrup airport, Copenhagen January 1998:

Ramberg & Hartwell at Kvamskogen And in turn Hartwell visited Rolle in Gothenburg, and then Ramberg and Katty in Bergen on his EuroWell® Tour 98.

Well, if you're interested in playing board games by e-mail, you can visit Richard Ronglie's Play-By-e-Mail Server ...or simply start by sending an e-mail to pbmserv@gamerz.net with Subject: help

Backgammon is also played in these variations:

Nackgammon
Deadgammon (antigammon)
Hypergammon (speedgammon)
Grandgammon (AceyDucey)
Moultezim (Fevga)
Plakoto

The first version of the backgammon game on the server was implemented by fellow dane Søren Pingel Dalsgaard.
...and this is what a backgammon board looks like in an e-mail message:

Date:    Mon, 22 Feb 1999 12:15:42 -0500 (EST)
From:    "Richard's PBeM Server" < pbmserv@gamerz.net >
To:      cschou@yahoo.com
Subject: Backgammon Board 26133 christian **


Summary of Backgammon Board 26133

It is christian's turn.

Ohs: hartwell
Eks: christian

Eks Move 10: Roll: 6,4  Move: 1-5,5-11
Ohs Move 11: Roll: 6,3  Move: 22-16,23-20
Eks Move 12: Roll: 6,3  Move: B-3,11-17
Ohs Move 13: Roll: 6,1  Move: 20-14,14-13

 ___________________________________________________
|                       |   |                       |Ohs: hartwell 126/15 
|12  11  10   9   8   7 |   | 6   5   4   3   2   1 |    
| X               O   O |   | O           X   O     |    
| X               O   O |   | O               O     |    
| X                     |   | O                     |    
|                       |   | O                     |    
|                       |   |                       |
|                       |BAR|                       |HOME  64
|                       |   |                       |
| O                     |   | X                     |      .-----. .-----.
| O               X     |   | X                     |      |o   o| |o   o|
| O               X   X |   | X       X             |      |o   o| |     |
| O           O   X   X |   | X       X             |      |o   o| |o   o|
|13  14  15  16  17  18 |   |19  20  21  22  23  24 |      `-----' `-----'
|_______________________|___|_______________________|Eks: christian 131/15 


************************************************************

hartwell writes:
>> > http://www.geocities.com/chrschou/bg/
>> > 
> > that's pretty funny ... i love the spilled candles
> 
> exactly!

and the cat watching (or is it a dog?) the "amazed pet"


> >...the JellyFish backgammon game is now free??

> yeah e.g. JellyFish Light 3.5: 
> http://jelly.effect.no/download/

cool thanks

Standings - following every game the winner gains a few points and the loser gives up much the same number, which affects their standings.

Example:

Date: Fri, 7 Apr 2000 14:21:52 -0400
From: "Richard's PBeM Server" 
To: cschou@yahoo.com
Subject: Backgammon Standings


                Established
                ===========
Rank Name             Rating  Won Lost   Active/Limit  Seeking
---- ---------------- ------ ---- ----   ------------  -------
  1  lunkin             2043  134   82       4        
  2  dts                1999   45   15       2 / 2    
  3  csg                1961  850  775       8        
  4  king               1935  236  167       4        
  5  ejs                1910  452  472       6     
.....
 12  ramberg            1885  577  455       8 / 10         17
 13  absinthe           1884  224  220       5        
.....
 25  sydsad             1855  133   96                
 26  rrognlie           1855 1069 1063       8        
.....
 46  lard               1822   97   99       4    
.....
 50  christian          1817  190  213       7 / 7    
.....
 98  hartwell           1763  664  740       6        
.....
376  .....

at 376 players - backgammon is the most popular game on Richard's PBeM Server

Tournaments have been organized in both backgammon, nackgammon, moultezim, and plakoto.

Ronald Lokers organized: The longest running backgammon tournament [in ze wörld?!] started January 1998 ...and ran for over 3.5 years!

And a nackgammon tournament. A round-robin, where all players played all the others (40+) in one go.

A short but sweet One Point Match backgammon tournament organized by David B. Schmidt ran in spring of 2002.

dshort's Second One Point Match ended November 19th 2003.

dshort's Three Point Match was started November 27th 2003.

A TwoTourney moultezim/plakoto tournament was started September 2002 by Douglas Zander.

I started a 7 point Tourney July 2003.

I started a 5 point Tourney February 2004.

PBeM bg tourneys:
7 points
5 points
3 points
Hypergammon
TwoTourney
Nackgammon
10 points
1st 1pt'er
2nd 1pt'er