Minimalist Backgammon Trainer - My Positions, Beginner Mode and Other Features

[u/Careful-Comedian9510]

Hello everyone,

It’s been almost a year since Minimalist Backgammon Trainer was released. It has evolved significantly since its first version in an effort to provide the best training experience possible. Today’s update keeps us on track :)

As a reminder, MBT (completely free and ad-free) is pure training powered by GNUbg. No matches, no games. You tap “Play,” and GNUbg will simulate a realistic game in a couple of seconds and pause at a specific position. It’s then up to you to make the best decision. Still available for the web and Android.

So let me introduce the “My Positions” section.
The idea is simple: you’re playing and come across a position that you find interesting, relevant, or intriguing, in short, something you’d like to review later.

From the “Hints” screen, you can mark this position so you can find it again in the “My Positions” section.

From there, you can then tag it, add a note, and, of course, replay it whenever you want.

So, as positions arise, you can build your own database to revisit later (save up to 501 positions per cube or checker play mode).

In addition to this, there are several new features:

- I’ve added “Beginner” mode. Unlike “Master” mode, which only includes the most difficult decisions, “Beginner” mode will only present positions to the players where the difference between the best move and the second-best move is at least 0.04. For the cube, the difference between the correct and incorrect decisions must be at least 0.08.

- In the settings, you can now select different blunder thresholds so that the "Blunders" section isn’t limited to errors of 0.08 or more.

- I’ve added an option to alternate between CW and CCW (clockwise and counterclockwise) with each game. You have the default setting, which will be used for “Blunders” or “My Positions.” And there’s an option to enable the alternation, which reverses the orientation with each new simulation in the game modes and in the evaluation.

- In "Custom Position," you can now paste an XGID, and I've added an "invert board" button to easily switch to your opponent's position (or in case the board is imported upside down ^^).

- The first letter of GNUbg or Me is underlined in black (or white, depending on the theme) to indicate who has the black (or white) checkers when playing the cube, counting pips, or evaluating the position.

- Small arrows allow you to quickly navigate through blunders or marked positions, so you no longer have to go through the menu and the dedicated section every time.

Finally, to celebrate this first anniversary, MBT is offering 4 board styles. I’ll say right away that there won’t be any colors, the minimalist. Grayscale look is here to stay! You’ll find these options in the settings.

I hope you enjoy them, and if you have any comments or feedback, please don’t hesitate to share them :)

And I’ll wrap up this long post by thanking everyone who’s left comments here or elsewhere, and of course all the players who enjoy and use Minimalist Backgammon Trainer.

See you soon!

[u/Pro_Bleach_Taster]

Hi and thank you for this. It is truly a great piece of software. I've been training on it non-stop since june

[u/Careful-Comedian9510 → u/Pro_Bleach_Taster]

Thank you so much, feedback like this makes me very happy :)

[u/Neat-Holiday6658]

I know there is a browser-based, but is the an ios app in the future?

[u/Neat-Holiday6658 → u/Neat-Holiday6658]

*there

[u/Careful-Comedian9510 → u/Neat-Holiday6658]

Unfortunately, no. The fees charged by Apple are far too high. MBT is (and will remain) free. And since this is a personal project, I prefer to keep costs down to ensure I can continue maintaining it.

I'm not sure I understand what you mean by “browser-based.” But as it stands, MBT is a PWA that you can add to your iOS home screen to get an experience that’s as close as possible to a native app.