Starting A Game

To start a game, type:
ldb -start opponent's-email-address
and everything is automatic from there. You may have to exchange several mail messages before you are ready to play, since your ldb has to do the initial roll with the remote ldb, and if there is a tie, the initial roll is repeated. Eventually, you will see a board drawn on the screen. This will look like:


Playing: Other Guy (otherguy@otherplace.com)
     Cur                     You: 167  Op: 167  (even)
     _____________________________________________________     You       (r)
     |                       |   |                       |   ----------------
 <-- |24  23  22  21  20  19 |<--|18  17  16  15  14  13 |<-   Roll  Move
     | w                   r |   |     r               w | |    5    UNUSED
     | w                   r |   |     r               w | |    2    UNUSED
     |                     r |   |     r               w |
     |                     r |   |                     w |
     |                     r |   |                     w |
   1 |                       |BAR|                       |
     |                     w |   |                     r |     Opponent  (w)
     |                     w |   |                     r | . ----------------
     |                     w |   |     w               r |/|\  Roll  Move
     | r                   w |   |     w               r | |
     | r                   w |   |     w               r | |
 --> | 1   2   3   4   5   6 |-->| 7   8   9  10  11  12 |--
     |_______________________|___|_______________________|
Messages:                                                     ------[ ]------
Sent:                                                         | Reset
                                                              | Send
Rcvd:                                                         | Board
                                                              | Next Game
                                                              | Concede
The commands are in the bottom right corner, and you perform them by pressing the first letter. The moves by you and your opponent are above that, on the right side of the screen, and the bottom of the screen contains a place for you to enclose a 2-line message with each move. This is useful for taunting, pleading, etc. To use a roll, press the number of the roll you want to use followed by the point you want to move from. For example, if you roll 5 2, and you want to move the piece on the 12 point 5, press 5 1 2. You don't need to hit return. After you use both dice, press "s" to send the move to your opponent.

Ldb checks your moves for all conceivable errors, and won't let you make an illegal move. See the section below on Cheating.

To move off the bar, merely select a roll. That roll will automatically bring you off the bar, since you have no other legal move anyway. To bear pieces off, you can either enter the point number like normal, or press "o" to have it bear off for you automatically.

When a move arrives in your mail, go into mail and save the message into a file. Delete the message from your mail, exit mail, and run ldb with the name of the file as an argument. There are easier ways to feed incoming mail to ldb; these are discussed in the manual.

For more options, read the manual.

Good luck! 

                                                Perry R. Ross
                                                pross@platinum.com