FIBS Board backgammon forum

I'm utterly new to backgammon... much more familiar with a Scrabble board.....

playing gnubg & trying to figure out what's what, it seems that if I have a man on my 9-point
and opponent has blots on my 7-point and 4-point (and assuming that these are the only
checkers on the board), does a roll (by me) of 32 actually NOT allow me to hit both opponent
blots? If so, is there a wording for this rule that really nails it? I cannot get it from what I've
found online, so far.

Thanks. [Probably THE most basic question ever asked, right?]

You can move the lower number first - and yes hit both blots if the numbers allow you to.

How you do that is interface dependent.

With gnu, right lick on the checker, and it will move the lower number. You can also click the dice - and they will switch, so the lower number is played first.

GL with learning this game, I will watch out for you - and maybe we can play a game of scrabble too sometime.

there are a few scrabble enthusiasts on Fibs.

The standard rules:

You are allowed to play the numbers in any order. 
You must play both numbers if you can (and sometimes the only way to do this is to play the smaller number first). 
If you can only play one number you must play the higher of the two.

So to answer your question, yes you may play the 2 first and hit both checkers.  To accomplish this is gnu, right click on the checker you want to move instead of left-clicking and it will use the smaller number.  Or you can right click on the dice to swap them so that the smaller number will be used first.

Full rules at: http://www.bkgm.com/rules.html

Note that there are some regional variations of the standard rules.  gnu, FIBS, tournaments etc use the standard rules. 

Note also that there's a FIBS client (cocoaFIBS for the MAC) that misunderstands this rule and makes you play the higher number first so it won't allow you to make certain legal moves.  Avoid that client.