New game: TouchDown
Richard Hutnik
game like this, in the future, consider posting to rec.games.design
and rec.games.abstract, as this game fits there.
Secondly, consider adapting it to Zillions:
http://www.zillionsofgames.com
Your title looks like Aarima light actually, with chess movement for
the pawn pieces. I can see the potential for the game ending in
draws.
"Michael Jørgensen" <in...@ukendt.dk> wrote in message news:<3f2cff9d$0$76103$edfa...@dread11.news.tele.dk>...
> Hi Friends,
>
> I've invented the game of "TouchDown" and would like your opinion on playing
> stragey, etc.
>
>
> Rules:
>
> The game is played on a board with 4 rows and 8 coloumns like this (view
> using a fixed-width font):
>
> OOOOOOOO
> ........
> ........
> XXXXXXXX
>
> The pieces move like pawns in chess, i.e. move forward one square at a time,
> but capture diagonally.
>
> The winner is the first player to reach the opposite side of the board with
> a pawn.
>
> It is obligatory to move if possible. If a player has no more moves, the
> game is a draw (a tie).
>
> Variations:
>
> The number of columns may be increased and/or decreased as one pleases.
>
> Notation:
>
> The notation is similar to chess, where the columns are named "a...h" and
> the rows are numbered 1 through 4. The top right corner is thus named h4.
>
> Strategy:
>
> There is a good deal of "Zug Zwang" in this game, just like in chess. In
> other words, one quickly reaches a position, where the player to move is
> forced to give up the defensive position, and hence loses.
>
> Consider the following sample game on a 4x4 board:
> b1-b2 b4-b3
> c1-c2 c4-c3
> b2xc3 d4xc3
> c2xb3 a4xb3
>
> Now the following position is reached (with X to move):
> ....
> .OO.
> ....
> X..X
>
> and no matter which "X" the first player moves, he is lost.
>
> Consider the second sample game:
> a1-a2 a4-a3
> b1-b2 d4-d3
> d1-d2
>
> Now we've reached the following position (with O to move):
> .OO.
> O..O
> XX.X
> ..X.
>
> No matter what, O will now lose the game. In this position, if X were to
> move first, then O would win. So being the player to move may be a
> disadvantage for both players.
>
> Third example, this time on a 6x4 board. After the following two moves
>
> e1-e2 e4-e3
>
> the following position is reached:
>
> OOOO.O
> ....O.
> ....X.
> XXXX.X
>
> The first player now has one (and only one!) winning move. The correct move
> is a1-a2. This I've determined by conducting a brute force search of all
> move sequences on a computer.
>
> What I would like now is somehow to be able to grasp the intuitive nature of
> this game. Certainly, the fact that a1-a2 is the only winning move is not
> logical or intuitive to me. (Yes, I've verified the output of the program by
> hand, so I believe it, but I still don't understand it.)
>
> I would also like to be able to make some heuristics in order to avoid
> having to do a complete brute force search on the computer.
>
> Also, how to generalize these ideas so they become independent on the size
> of the board.
>
> Any ideas, suggestions, or comments are welcome.
>
> Regards,
> Michael.
Johnicholas Hines
the moment, but I recall seeing a game played with two rows of pawns
in there, as one of many variants of "splitting games". Is this
"TouchDown" inspired, related, or identical?
Johnicholas
Dvd Avins
news:<3f2cff9d$0$76103$edfa...@dread11.news.tele.dk>...
<< I've invented the game of "TouchDown" and would like your opinion on
playing stragey, etc.
Rules:
The game is played on a board with 4 rows and 8 coloumns like this (view
using a fixed-width font):
OOOOOOOO
........
........
XXXXXXXX
The pieces move like pawns in chess, i.e. move forward one square at a time,
but capture diagonally.
The winner is the first player to reach the opposite side of the board with
a pawn.
It is obligatory to move if possible. If a player has no more moves, the
game is a draw (a tie). >>
Michael Jørgensen may well have come up with this independently, but it is
very nearly a non-chess representation of a chess puzzle I developed and
have been showing at clubs and tournaments for the past 20 or so years. The
only difference in outcome would be that in the chess puzzle, if neither
player can move then the player whose turn it is loses.
The position is: White has its king on g1 and pawns on a2, b2, c2, d2, f6,
and h6. Black has its king on g8 and pawns on a7, b7, c7, d7, f3, and h3.
The queenside is exactly as Mr. Jørgensen, except that I'm not sure whether
he's accounting for en passant captures when he says the "pieces move like
pawns in chess". Any move on the kingside loses quickly for whoever made the
move, so the game must be settled on the queenside (which is the Touch Down
board). However if neither side can move on the queenside, in chess a losing
move on the kingside is forced.
The chess puzzle is a win for White. If the number of queenside columns with
pawns is reduced to three, then it is a win for Black. With Michael
Jørgensen's rule allowing a draw in the case of locked pawns, I suspect that
the game is a draw.
The winning strategy for White in the chess puzzle is to move a
'center-pawn' (i.e. the b- or c-pawn) two spaces, then in response to most
Black tries to move the opposite wing pawn (i.e. the d-pawn after the b-pawn
or the a-pawn after the c-pawn) on space, then to move the remaining
center-pawn two spaces.