Tavla: the Turkish rules

Tavla is what Turkey calls backgammon. The board, the setup and the way checkers move are the same. Five rules differ, and they change how you play the opening and the score.

The five differences

1. The opening roll is rolled again. Each player rolls one die; the higher roller picks up both dice and rolls them again. So a game can open with a double, which never happens in backgammon.
2. The winner starts the next game. After the first game there is no opening roll: the previous winner rolls first.
3. A gammon (mars) is 2 points, and there is no triple. A win that would be a backgammon still counts 2.
4. No doubling cube.
5. Matches go to a fixed number of points, most often 5, with no Crawford rule.

These are the "Turkish style" (geleneksel) rules that WBF-Türkiye, the country's backgammon association, uses in its traditional events; the Turkish dictionary also defines a mars as two points. The same association runs "modern tavla" events under international rules, with the cube. On TavlArena, Tavla starts with the Turkish rules and you can switch to Modern in the game settings.

Words you will hear

Turkish players call a checker pul, a point hane, a made point kapı, a blot açık, a hit checker kırık and a roll that can't enter gele. Every roll has a name: 6-6 is düşeş, 6-5 şeşbeş. See the glossary.

Other games on a tavla board

Turkey has a few other games played on the same board. We don't offer them yet, and sources on their exact rules are thin, so here is only what we could confirm:

• Erkek tavlası ("men's tavla") is not a variant: it simply means ordinary tavla, as opposed to kız tavlası.
• Kız tavlası ("girls' tavla"): a simple game for beginners, only racing and bearing off, with no hitting (Turkish dictionary).
• Hapis ("prison"): a tavla game built on holding and blocking the opponent's checkers (Turkish dictionary), similar in idea to the trapping games known abroad as Tapa or Mahbusa.
• Gülbahar: listed as a tavla game in the Turkish dictionary. The version known abroad as Gul Bara has no hitting, a single checker blocks a point, and doubles cascade upwards. Turkish players may play it differently; we could not confirm the local rules.

Across the Aegean, Greek players use the same board for tavli, a match that rotates three games: Portes, which is nearly tavla, Plakoto and Fevga. See Tavli: Portes, Plakoto and Fevga.

By TavlArena. Updated: 25 October 2026