One board, many games

Backgammon variants around the world

From Athens to Istanbul to Tehran to Moscow, “backgammon night” rarely means the same rules. Greece plays the tavli triplet, Turkey plays tavla, Iran plays takhteh nard (تخته نرد), Russia and the Caucasus play long nardy (нарды) — and each one changes how the game feels. All of the variants below are playable on Boardgammon in your browser and in the app.

Tavla

Turkish

The Turkish café classic — standard backgammon without the doubling cube, played as a multi-game series over tea.
Plakoto

Πλακωτό — Greek

Hitting is replaced by pinning: land on a lone checker and it is trapped beneath yours. Anchors become bunkers.
Fevga

Φεύγα / Moultezim — Greek & Turkish

No hitting at all. Both players race the same direction and a single checker holds a point.
Takhteh Nard

تخته نرد — Iranian

Persia’s beloved table game — standard rules, no cube, dice slammed on walnut, deeply woven into tea-house culture.
Long Nardy

Длинные нарды — Russian / Caucasus

All fifteen checkers start on the head, both players race the same direction, and nobody ever gets hit.
Nackgammon

by Nack Ballard

A shifted start with two deep anchors that forces complex play — more skill, less luck than standard.
Hypergammon

3 checkers

Only three checkers each, starting on the 22, 23 and 24 points. So short it has been solved by computers.
Acey-Deucey

US Navy

Everyone starts off the board, and rolling 1-2 unlocks any double of your choice plus another roll.

The Greek tavli session

In Greece and Cyprus, an evening of tavli is traditionally three games played in rotation — Portes (standard backgammon without the cube), Plakoto (pinning), and Fevga (no hitting) — with the match decided by points across all three. The same rotation, with local names and tweaks, is played from the Balkans through Turkey to the Levant.

Variant comparison

Variant	Cube?	Hitting?	Starting position	Heartland
Standard backgammon	Yes	Yes	Standard	Worldwide
Tavla / Portes	No	Yes	Standard	Turkey / Greece
Takhteh Nard	No (traditional)	Yes	Standard	Iran
Plakoto	No	No — pinning	15 on the starting point	Greece / Cyprus
Fevga	No	No	15 on opposite heads, same direction	Greece / Turkey
Long Nardy	No	No	15 on the head, same direction	Russia / Caucasus
Nackgammon	Yes	Yes	Modified (deep 23-anchor)	Tournament study
Hypergammon	Yes	Yes	3 checkers on 22/23/24	Theory study
Acey-Deucey	No	Yes	Off-board entry	US military

Cousins and curiosities

Gul Bara / Tapa — Balkan members of the tavla family with regional twists on pinning and bear-off.
Shesh besh (שש בש / طاولة) — the Levantine and Israeli name for the same family; the words are simply “six” and “five” in Hebrew-Aramaic and Turkish-Persian mix.
Sugoroku — Japan's historical tables game, played since the 6th century CE.
Duplicate backgammon — the same dice dealt to multiple boards, dramatically cutting luck; used in serious events.
Chouette — multi-player money backgammon: one player in “the box” against a captained team, every teammate with their own cube.
Royal Game of Ur — the 5,000-year-old ancestor, revived from British Museum tablets. See the history of backgammon.

Rule details for the games above come from how they are actually played on Boardgammon — where regional profiles keep their local conventions (cube off for tavla and takhteh nard, pinning in Plakoto, same-direction racing in Fevga and Long Nardy).