Swedish Tables

Would you like to turn the tables on your backgammon playing pals? The game to use to throw them for a loop is called "Swedish Tables", a backgammon variant that has players running in the same direction and has more than one way to win the game. The object of Swedish Tables is to move all of your checkers around the board to your "finishing table," and then go for the win.

Each player starts with fifteen checkers, just like in Backgammon, but they are placed on the rightmost of the far side of the board. Each player starts at diagonally opposite corners from one other, and they move in the same direction, counterclockwise.

A dice roll gives the number of pips, or points, that a player has to use in a move. The rules are:

1) A player may only move a checker to an open point (defined as a point with less than two opponent checkers)
2) Dice points are added for one move, or used as two separate moves, just like in backgammon
3) Doubles are played like in regular backgammon - in other words, as four separate moves.

Hitting is the same, except it is called a "blot". The real trick comes in moving checkers to the opponent's side of the board - you can not have more than one checker on a point except on your "head", the leftmost point on the opponent's side of the board.

Other differences - you can hit a closed opponent's point if they have six in a row, called a "prime", sending all checkers on that point to the bar. You must bear off where possible, you can not waste pips when bearing off if it can be avoided. You can win by bearing off or with a "Handsome Win", which means arranging checkers on the finish table one of four ways:

• Single crown game: Three checkers each on the last five points
• Double crown game: Five checkers each on the last three point
• Staircase: Seven checkers on the last point, five checkers on the second to last point, and three checkers on the third to last point
• Tower: All fifteen checkers on the last point.