by Darius Kazemi, Nov 4, 2021
NOTE: This is mostly just notes so I can remember stuff, and send it to people I would like to play with as a reference. This assumes you know how to play Backgammon (with tournament rules like the doubling cube), and also that you know your way around a command line interface generally.
So, using the telnet program that comes on most linux distributions, you log in to the FIBS (First Internet Backgammon Server) using its address and port (you can use any Telnet client you like, though):
$ telnet fibs.com 4321
Put guest as your username when asked, which will then prompt you to register a user/pass. Do that, and you'll be dumped into the main lobby.
At the > prompt, type help to get a list of commands, help [command] to get help on the command.
There is actual helpful documentation on their website.
You might notice your terminal is being hit with notifications of people logging in, playing games, etc. You probably want to immediately enter the folowing commands:
> toggle report
> toggle notify
> toggle silent
> set boardstyle 1
The first three turn off spammy messages that clutter your terminal prompt when people start/end matches, log in/out, or shout to the server (which some of the bots do). The last command sets the board style to something a human can read. You can also try setting it to boardstyle 2 for an alternate human-readable board. The default, weirdly, is not human-readable, though I guess that might be for people developing visual clients who need a packed format by default instead of ASCII art.
Next type who and you'll get a list of who is online including bots. It'll look like this:
23 P BlunderBot_XI 1515.82 10025 16:49 0:04 47.199.51.61
24 P BlunderBot_VI 1517.63 12321 15:47 0:00 47.199.51.61
25 R BlunderBot 1523.95 13277 16:49 0:21 47.199.51.61
26 P BlunderBot_X 1530.96 12439 15:47 0:43 47.199.51.61
27 P BlunderBot_IV 1549.17 13111 15:47 0:08 47.199.51.61
28 P BlunderBot_VII 1550.74 12297 15:47 1:52 47.199.51.61
The second column is status, the third is the name of a person or bot, followed by their ELO-style rating (higher number is higher rating, everyone starts at 1500 and goes up or down with each game). The thing you care most about here is the status column: P means currently playing, R means ready to play. Pick a bot like BlunderBot who is ready to play and type invite [name] 1. The 1 means it's a 1-point match. This means that you can only earn a maximum of 1 point in the match, meaning the doubling cube can't be used meaningfully since any extra points scored are basically wasted.
After the invite command you'll see something like this (though this is resuming a saved match it'll be similar):
> invite BlunderBot_XII 1
** You invited BlunderBot_XII to a 1 point match.
>
BlunderBot_XII wants to resume a saved match with you.
Type 'join BlunderBot_XII' to accept.
> You are now playing with BlunderBot_XII. Your running match was loaded.
turn: tinysubversions.
match length: 1
points for tinysubversions: 0
points for BlunderBot_XII: 0
+13-14-15-16-17-18-------19-20-21-22-23-24-+ X: BlunderBot_XII - score: 0
| O X | | X O |
| O X | | X O |
| O X | | X |
| O | | X |
| O | | X |
v| |BAR| | 1-point match
| X | | O |
| X | | O |
| X O | | O |
| X O | | O X |
| X O | | O X |
+12-11-10--9--8--7--------6--5--4--3--2--1-+ O: tinysubversions - score: 0
BAR: O-0 X-0 OFF: O-0 X-0 Cube: 1 You rolled 6 1.
At the bottom it indicates that I rolled a 6 and 1. To move I'll type
> 13 7 8 7
This moves a piece from the 13 to the 7, and from 8 to 7. You have to enter both your moves at the same time (I think). Then the bot will autoplay a new turn. Me playing a move plus the bot playing a move looks like this:
> 13 7 8 7
+13-14-15-16-17-18-------19-20-21-22-23-24-+ X: BlunderBot_XII - score: 0
| O X | | X O |
| O X | | X O |
| O X | | X |
| O | | X |
| | | X |
v| |BAR| | 1-point match
| X | | O |
| X | | O |
| X | | O |
| X O O | | O X |
| X O O | | O X |
+12-11-10--9--8--7--------6--5--4--3--2--1-+ O: tinysubversions - score: 0
BAR: O-0 X-0 OFF: O-0 X-0 Cube: 1 turn: BlunderBot_XII
BlunderBot_XII rolls 6 and 5.
>
BlunderBot_XII moves 12-18 12-17 .
+13-14-15-16-17-18-------19-20-21-22-23-24-+ X: BlunderBot_XII - score: 0
| O X X | | X O |
| O X | | X O |
| O X | | X |
| O X | | X |
| | | X |
v| |BAR| | 1-point match
| | | O |
| | | O |
| X | | O |
| X O O | | O X |
| X O O | | O X |
+12-11-10--9--8--7--------6--5--4--3--2--1-+ O: tinysubversions - score: 0
BAR: O-0 X-0 OFF: O-0 X-0 Cube: 1 turn: tinysubversions
You roll 5 and 2.
Please move 2 pieces.
>
Some notes on the move command:
bar 22 13 1 (to move from the bar to row 22 and from 13 to 1, for example).24 off for that move.While I'm a lifelong Backgammon player, I only started playing on FIBS via Telnet today, so I'm sure I've missed lots of useful shortcuts and settings here. But this is the "get started playing a game" tutorial I couldn't seem to find for the Telnet client.