This page is an extract from Michael Schell's Cribbage Forum 2005 Mailbag and is presented here with permission.

Board strategy questions

We'll close with a couple of questions about board strategy, one general, the other more specific.

"Chambers' board position par figures are the same whether you are pone or dealer.   Colvert's, however, differ depending on whether you're first pone or first dealer.   In Cribbage Forum analysis, when you refer to being "+" a certain figure as dealer or pone, or "-" a certain figure by dealer or pone, I'm not immediately understanding the base number from which the positives or negatives are being derived".

- Scott Johnson (Fairfield, CT)

Scott, this is a good question.   Let me start by summarizing the differences between Colvert's and Chambers' schemes:

Chambers refers to four positional holes (not counting the game hole), whereas Colvert refers to par holes.   Colvert uses "+" and "-" to denote both players' position relative to the par holes (what I call positional standing).   Chambers does not.   As you note, Colvert has two sets of par holes, one for first dealer (the player who deals first) and one for first pone.   Chambers' positional holes are the same for both players.   As I explain below, this is really only a difference in nomenclature.   Colvert's is a "pure" 26 theory.   He counts back 26 holes from 121 to establish 95* as dealer's penultimate par hole.   Chambers' corresponding positional hole is 96*, though his three preceding positional holes are 26 points apart.   A full explanation of modern board strategy as I teach it will need to await my book, which, alas, is some years from materializing.   Briefly, though, I can tell you that my system draws on both Colvert and Chambers, with adaptations designed to make it easier to use, handle skunk situations, and better reflect the realities of expert level play as well as the results of recent computer analysis.

Since one set of positional holes is easier to remember than two sets of par holes, I use the former, though I've adopted Colvert's " + and - " notation to denote positional standing.   Although 26 points represents average scoring for a two-deal cycle on First through Third Streets (holes 1 through 90), the experience of modern expert players and programmers has established 25 points as a more realistic figure for average scoring on Fourth Street.   This gives us the four positional holes of 18, 44, 70 and 96.   In this regard I agree with Chambers, though accidentally so, since Chambers' rationale for placing the Fourth Street positional hole at 96 is actually based on a mathematical error.

In my terminology, pone has the positional advantage if she has reached, or is within ten points of reaching, a positional hole that dealer has not yet reached.   Otherwise dealer has the advantage.

If you have the positional advantage, your positional surplus is the difference between your score (or your score plus ten if you're pone) and the last positional hole.   Your opponent's positional deficit is the difference between her score and that same positional hole.   If your opponent is pone, add ten points to her score.   If she is now at or beyond the positional hole in question, then her deficit is the distance to the next positional hole.   All this is reversed if your opponent has the positional advantage.   Note that the ten-point adjustments are based on the average amount pone will score in one deal.   Based on this you can see that after allowing for the one-point shift from 95 to 96, Colvert's par holes correspond exactly to the positional holes used by Chambers and myself.

You apply this information as follows:

• If your positional surplus/deficit is greater than your opponent's positional surplus/deficit, you should generally favor defense.   The greater the disparity between your and your opponent's standing, the more you should emphasize defense over offense.
• If your positional surplus/deficit is less than your opponent's positional surplus/deficit, you should generally favor offense.   The greater the disparity between surplus and deficit, the more aggressively you should play.
• If your positional surplus/deficit is about the same as your opponent's, try to balance offense and defense.