Tablut

Tablut (also known as King’s Table) is just one of a family of games collectively referred to as “Tafl” games. They are all very similar asymmetrical games popularized by -- get this -- the Vikings. If that doesn’t bode awesome for these games then I don’t know what does.

The games are all essentially the same, but played with different sized boards and number of pieces. They are not entirely abstract, but the games are cool enough that I’m willing to look the other way on this one.

The rules for this game are extremely debated. Although Tablut is the best understood of the Tafl games, there is still no complete, satisfactory account of the rules (it’s a pretty old game). I’m presenting the “best” rules that I have found, which I’ve assembled from many reading tons of different accounts of the game. These are what I believe to be the most authentic, fair rules -- that is, the game is pretty evenly balanced between the two players.

Like all asymmetrical games, though, it’s always best to play the game in multiple rounds, switching off each time.

Pieces

The board used is a 9 x 9 rectgrid, usually with a few squares decorated in some way, although this isn’t really necessary. The game can be played on the interesections of a standard chess board but, since I think most people are averse to that, here is a dedicated board that you can print for free. Note that the squares are a bit small, so you might want to use dimes for this one.

There are 25 tokens total -- 16 of one color, 9 of the other. The latter need to be eight ‘pawns’ and one ‘king,’ so distinguishable in some way.

Rules

Setup is a bit complicated, so refer to the picture. The king always starts in the center, surrounded by the rest of the defenders, with the attackers on the edge of the board.

The game consists of the “attackers” (traditionally called the Muscovites) trying to capture the king of the "defenders” (traditionally, the Swedes) before he can escape from the board. The defenders move first.

Pieces move like rooks in Chess -- orthogonally, any number of spaces, unable to move through another piece. They do not capture like rooks, however. Instead, something called “custodial capture” is used: if a player surrounds an enemy piece on two opposing sides with his pieces, that piece is captured and removed from the board. Although it is possible to capture up to three enemies in a turn, you can’t capture “groups” of adjacent enemies.

Custodial capture

Pieces can still move between two enemy pieces without being captured, as long as they don’t land directly between them. However, if there is a configuration like black-white-space-white, and a black piece moves between the two white pieces, it would be safe -- it would capture the white piece “before” the white pieces have a chance to capture it.

There is a special case in capturing: if the king is still in the center square, it must be surrounded on all four sides by enemy pieces. Once it has left the center, however, it can be captured normally. The king can participate in capturing enemies just like any other piece.

Finally, there are a couple of restrictions on movement: no piece can enter or pass through the center square after the king has left it, including the king, and once an attacker has left its “camp” (the group of squares that the pieces started in), it cannot return, although it may move around within the camp before leaving. The defenders can never enter or pass through these camps (thus the king cannot escape through them).

Movement for two pieces indicicated. Note that if the defender moves
to the red square, the adjacent attacker would be captured.

If the defender’s king has a path to escape, he must say “raichi,” which is basically like “check,” to warn his opponent. If there are two paths, or if there is no way that the other player can block his escape, he says “tuichi,” which is essentially “checkmate.” You could just say check and checkmate if you want. I don’t even know how to pronounce those words correctly.

The game is over either when the king escapes from the board or the attackers manage to capture it. There are a few extra rules to deal with potential stalemates -- if the king moves to a raichi position, then is blocked, then moves to a new raichi position, and is blocked again, it cannot move back to the same position if that position is still raichi (that is, if the same attacker that initially blocked the king had moved to block it in the new position). You probably won't encounter that very often, though, and there's no real consensus on the rules.

Tuichi

Maharajah

Maharajah (more commonly known as Maharajah and the Sepoys) is just one of many Chess variants. However, of all the variants I’ve seen, this is the most interesting -- it’s an asymmetric game, which is very unusual for Chess, and extremely simple to learn. The game is from India, like Chess itself, so it’s got some cred. Or something.

Pieces

You’ll need about half a Chess set in order to play the game. This is great if you lost some pieces, I suppose. All the black pieces are intact, but the white player only needs one -- you can use a king or a queen or whatever. If you don’t have a Chess set, you can print and assemble one for free here.

Rules

If you don’t know how to play Chess, go learn first. The game is essentially the same -- both players are still trying to checkmate their opponent’s king. The only real difference is the Maharajah.

The Maharajah is every chess piece rolled into one. However, since a normal queen is basically a bishop, rook, pawn, and king rolled into one, it could be said that the Maharajah is just a queen fused with a knight. It still has all the restrictions of a king, however -- it can be checked, and must do something to remedy the situation immediately. It also cannot move into check.

 The Maharajah’s movements. Note that it can still “jump” like a knight

The game is setup as shown in the first picture, with the Maharajah where the white king should be. The only other differences between the game and Chess are that black cannot castle and there is no pawn promotion.

 Checkmate of the Maharajah

Fox Hunt

Dead simple game for you today: Fox Hunt (also known as Box the Fox or Fox and Hounds) is a variation of Halatafl, a more complex and less approachable old Scandinavian game. It’s also asymmetrical, which is always interesting and, like all hunt games, it isn’t entirely abstract. We’ll let that slide for now, though.

It’s one of the simpler games I’ve seen that uses a full chessboard, so get excited.

Pieces

Apart from the chessboard, all you’ll need are one token for the “Fox” player and four for the “Hounds.” Get a free chessboard here and find something to serve as tokens. I have faith in your ability to do so.

Rules

 No, I couldn’t be bothered to model new pieces for this game. Get over it.

Like Draughts, this game takes place only on the black squares of the board (or white, if you want). The hounds start on one edge of the board, and the fox starts anywhere on the opposite edge (the fox player can choose where to start).

The Fox

The fox is trying to cross the board and get to one of the hounds’ starting positions. He can move diagonally in direction, one space per turn. He cannot jump over anything. He wants to avoid being “pinned” by the hounds -- he loses when he cannot move.

 A picture says both of the surrounding paragraphs

The Hounds

The hounds are less mobile than the fox, but they are greater in number. The hounds’ goal is to trap the fox somewhere so that he cannot move -- this could be against the edge of the board, in a corner, or by surrounding him on four sides. Only one hound can move per turn, and they can only move diagonally forward. They also cannot jump, and if they reach the other edge of the board, they’re out of luck.

 Victory for the hounds

If you like this game, you might want to check out Bagha Chal, a slightly more complicated take on the hunt genre.

Halma

This is a fantastic, simple game that’s only about 120 years old. It was invented by George Howard Monks and Thomas Hill, and was a modification of an old English game called Hoppity. However, Hoppity has apparently not survived in any known form, so I’m not sure just how similar it is. The name Halma comes from the Greek word for “jump,” which is pretty fitting given the gameplay.

Although you’ve probably never heard of Halma, I’ll bet you’ve heard of Chinese Checkers. That game is a direct spinoff of Halma, which which is playable by up to six people and takes place on a hexagonal grid. Halma is simpler and can be played on a standard chess set, making it far, far superior to Chinese Checkers. Seriously, that game is from Germany and has nothing to do with Draughts. I’m not a fan.

Pieces

The game can be played on any size square grid board, although you might have trouble with less than a 6 x 6, and even sizes are recommended. Each player also needs a number of pieces depending on the size of the board -- 10 for the 8 x 8 version presented here.

If you want a longer game, play with a larger board and more pieces. The game was originally designed to be played on a 16 x 16 board with 19 tokens each, which you can create by arranging four standard chess boards in a square. Or you can just play with a normal chess board. It won’t hurt at all, and will make the game easier to learn and more approachable for beginners.

I’ll be using a standard 8 x 8 board here, because it makes for a decent length game. You can download and print one free here, and use coins or whatever as the pieces. Although the board in the pictures has the starting position highlighted, this isn’t at all necessary. Just thought it would look pretty.

Rules

 Initial configuration

The game is very simple: you’re trying to get all of your pieces to the opposite corner, in the same configuration that your opponent’s piece start in. Pieces are arranged filling each corner (although different starting arrangements are possible with larger boards).

Each turn you either move one of your pieces one space into an adjacent square (orthogonally or diagonally), or jump over other pieces on the board to get somewhere. Jumps can be in any direction, and you can jump as many times as you want in a turn, even changing direction in the middle of a jump. You can jump over friendly or enemy pieces, and it does nothing to either -- there is no capturing in this game.

 A series of valid jumps

The game is over when one of the players manages to fill in his opponent’s starting squares (his "camp") with his pieces, at which time he is victorious. Once a piece enters the camp, it cannot leave, althoughit may move around inside it.

The game has a potential flaw: if one player doesn't move his pieces out of his camp, the other player is in trouble, and this can lead to stalemate (a player can just move one of his pieces around while keeping the rest of his pieces safely in his camp). To prevent this, a common rule is imposed: if any of a player's pieces are still in his camp after 50 turns into the game, he loses. However, most people don't want to count moves, so I play with a different rule: if there are no empty spaces in your camp, you must move a piece out of it. So if you've moved three pieces from your camp, and those three spaces become filled with your opponent's pieces, you must immediately free another space. This prevents players from keeping pieces in their camp indefinitely while eliminating the need to count moves.

The game can also be played by four people, each controlling one of the corners and striving to fill in the opposite corner. Bigger boards are recommended, although small ones still work. It’s also recommended that you play with a reduced number of pieces to keep the game from taking too long and the board from getting too crowded.

Shut the Box

Shut the Box (also known as Canogo, Plug the Leaks, Tric-Trac, Batten Down the Hatches, and many others) is an old dice game for any number of players. It’s a common “pub game” and is often played for money, although this of course isn’t necessary to enjoy it. There are many variations on the game, but I will be presenting the most common rules.

Pieces

The game is typically played with some sort of contraption -- the titular “box” -- with the numbers 1-9 presented in such a way that they can be covered up. There are many mechanisms for doing this, some quite elaborate, and all completely unnecessary. You can print a free board here and simply cover the numbers up with tiny animal skins and tree bark (or whatever else you have handy). Or you could just make one yourself. It’s really not that hard.

Add two standard dice to that and you’ve got yourself a game. Maybe a dice cup if you want to get fancy, and a dice tray if you’re really up there. Or not.

Rules

The game can be played with any number of players, who will take turns rolling dice and covering numbers (or plugging leaks or what have you). Players roll the dice until they cannot cover any more numbers, at which point they receive a score based on the number left uncovered and pass the dice to the next player, who starts the process over. The lower your score (that is, the more numbers covered) the better.

Now, how you decide which numbers can be covered depends on what you roll. You must cover numbers in such a way that the sum of all the numbers covered is equal to the sum of the two dice. That’s an ugly rule, so let’s try an example: say the dice showed 4 and 1. The sum of that is 5, so you would have to cover a set of numbers that add up to 5. Any of the following would be valid:

• 5
• 4 + 1
• 3 + 2

If you rolled a 6 and a 4, you’d have a slightly wider range of choices:

• 9 + 1
• 8 + 2
• 7 + 3
• 7 + 2 + 1
• 6 + 4
• 6 + 3 + 1
• 5 + 4 + 1
• 5 + 3 + 2
• 4 + 3 + 2 + 1

Note that there’s no partial covering -- you either cover numbers to add up perfectly to the value of your roll or you don’t cover any numbers at all. If you can’t cover enough numbers to make the proper sum, you’re out of luck, and your turn is over. Whatever numbers you were unable to cover are summed and added to your score.

 The only available choices are 8 and 3 + 5

If you’ve already covered up the 7, 8, and 9, you can choose to only roll one die instead of two. You don’t have to, but it might be useful depending on your situation. Note that if any of those haven’t been covered, you must roll two dice.

The game is played for a certain number of rounds, and at the end of all the rounds the player with the lowest score is the winner. For a group of people this could be as few as one round; for two players you could do as many as ten -- it just depends on how long you want the game to last.

The game can also be played as a solitaire game -- just see how low you can get the score after a certain number of rounds, or see how quickly you can shut the box.

Surakarta

This is cool, bizarre game from Java, of all places. It uses one of the most interesting boards of any game I’ve seen, which looks like a freaky cloverleaf highway system sort of thing. It’s also called Roundabouts by some, although Surakarta is the more “authentic” name.

Pieces

Each player needs 12 tokens, and the game is played on a freaky board. It’s basically just a 5x5 square grid, but the intersections are connected in a way that I really don’t know how to verbalize. Just...you can see in the pictures. Stop being so needy. You can download the board here, and use little bits of wood and pocket lint for the pieces.

Rules

The pieces are setup in a fairly standard position, with each player filling their closest two rows. Like most games, the pieces occupy the intersections on the board.

 Initial Setup

Each turn you can either move one of your pieces, capture one of your opponent’s pieces, or pass. Movement is pretty basic: pieces move one space orthogonally or diagonally, and cannot move across the loops.

Capturing is bit more complicated. When performing a capture, you can only move orthogonally, and can move as many spaces as you want. However, you must move around at least one of the loops surrounding the board, and you cannot move through a path that is blocked by another piece. So, for example:

 A valid capture move for either piece.

Whoever captures all of their opponent’s pieces first is the winner. Alternately, if you pass and then your opponent passes, the game is over, and whoever has captured the most pieces wins. (If there is a tie, a draw is declared)

Weird game, right? It will help if you don’t think of the board as a grid with extensions, but rather as a system of loops:

The board re-imagined. OR DID I JUST BLOW YOUR MIND??

Taabel

Another incredibly simple game -- this one with a bit less strategy than the last. This is probably the simplest game I’ve ever played. It’s essentially the Scandinavian equivalent to Tic-Tac-Toe: incredibly simple, unwinnable for skilled players, not really that strategic, easy and quick to play. But it’s interesting, I suppose, so here goes.

Pieces

All you need is a simple board and two distinct tokens per player. This game really doesn’t merit a printable board, as it can be drawn so easily, but because I’m awesome I’m providing one anyway.

Rules

  Initial setup position

Players take turns moving on of their tokens along a line to an empty space. The goal is to block both of your opponent’s pieces so that they have no possible moves. And that’s it. There is only one position that allows this, reflected on either side of the board. The trick is pretty much to hope your opponent doesn’t know the one victory configuration. Very deep.

Victory for white. Wow, this game is really, really simple

Tabla Lusoria

This is an incredibly simple game dating back to ancient Rome. The name is a minor anglicization of the Latin tabula lusoria, "tablet for (playing) games," a name by which it is sometimes still known. It’s a great concept, but it suffers from a fatal flaw: like Tic-Tac-Toe, the game is so simple that, once mastered, offers no real challenge. Games can basically continue forever if neither player makes a mistake. But you aren't that good, and neither is your friend, so play it anyway. It really is a fun game.

Pieces

The board is a little weird, but very simple. You can just draw it on a piece of paper -- it’s just a circle and four lines -- or, as always, print it free here. Each player needs three tokens, so use pawns or coins or checkers or whatever.

Setup

The game starts with all the tokens on the board arranged as shown:

There’s nothing I can really add to that to make it any clearer. So. Moving on.

Rules

The gameplay couldn’t be simpler: players take turns moving their tiles along a line to an adjacent space, trying to get all three of their tokens in a row. This can be along the center lines or around the edges. The first player to do so wins. There’s no jumping or anything fancy, just moving to adjacent spaces.

 Victory for white

Nine Men’s Morris

This game has like 200 different names -- Mills, Merelles, Nine Man Morris, Marky Mark -- but I think Nine Men’s Morris is the most popular (even though it’s by far the worst name). It’s a really simple, short game for two players that’s been around since ancient Rome. You should get really good so if you ever travel back in time to 37 AD you can beat Caligula in a match for your life. It has happened.

Pieces

The game is played on kind of a weird board, which you can print out for free here. Each player needs nine pieces, and that’s it. As usual, pennies and nickels will work fine.

Rules

The game starts with the board completely empty, and consists of two phases of play.

In the first phase, players take turns placing pieces anywhere on the board, always on empty intersections. After all nine pieces have been placed, you switch to moving them around.

During the movement phase, you can move one of your pieces in any direction along a line to an adjacent, empty intersection. There is no jumping or anything else allowed, just one-line moving.

If at any point in the game you manage to line up three of your pieces in a row, either by placing them that way or moving them into a line, you get to remove one of your opponent’s pieces from the board. A line of three pieces is called a "mill." Unless there is no other option, you cannot remove an opponent’s piece from a mill.

You can still move your own pieces out of a mill, and even move them directly back into the same one, which does count as the formation of another mill.

If pieces are taking during the placement phase, you can’t place them back on the board. Players can only place nine pieces total, regardless of how many are off the board due to capture.

The game is over either when a player can’t move any pieces, in which case he loses, or if he manages to capture seven of his opponent’s pieces, in which case he wins.

 Victory for black

Mia

Mia is a neat, simple little dice game. It’s a bluffing game that’s best with a group of people. Although luck is something of a factor, it’s mostly about lying, which is always fun.

Pieces

All you need are two standard six-sided dice and a dice cup (or something with which to hide the dice). Also, some kind of counter for players to keep track of their lives. Or each player can just use a die, which works. Or pennies. Whatever.

Rules

You should decide before the game starts how many lives you will play with. The number should depend on the number of players you have -- for a lot of people, starting with 3 lives will keep the game shorter, but for only a few, you might want to go with 6. This all just depends on how long you want to play.

The game starts with one player rolling the dice and looking at them, making sure that no one else sees. He then announces a score to the rest of the players -- not necessarily the score shown, though (more on scoring later). You can lie and announce a higher or a lower score if you want.

The dice then pass to the next player. He has a choice: he can either believe the previous player and re-roll the dice or call his bluff and look at the dice. If the dice show a lower score than he announced then the liar loses a life. However, if the previous player wasn’t lying, or if he declared a lower value than the actual roll, the accuser loses a life.

If you choose to believe the previous person and re-roll the dice without looking, you must declare a higher score, even if it means lying. You can still declare something lower than the actual amount, so long as it’s higher than the previous roll (or supposed roll).

But there’s one other choice that adds some strategic subtlety: if you think that the previous player was lying with a lower number than he actually rolled, you don’t have to re-roll the dice at all. Just declare a higher number without looking or rolling and hope for the best. You are still responsible for the number you declare, however, so if the next player calls your bluff you’re the one losing lives.

Now, when someone declares a “Mia” (described below), things change a little bit. Mia is the highest roll possible, so there’s no way the next player could beat it. They instead must accept the call, losing a life, or call the previous person a liar. If they’re right, the liar loses two lives. If they’re wrong, however, they lose two lives.

After someone loses a life, either by rightly accusing, wrongly accusing, or getting Mia’d in the face, a new round starts, and whoever was up to play next gets to start it. Once a player loses all of his lives, he’s out of the game. Play continues until there is only one man standing.

Scoring

The trickiest part of the game is probably the scoring. You don’t add the dice up, instead the score is formed with the higher of the two dice as the tens digit and the lower as the ones digit. So a three and a five would be 53, a six and a one 61, two threes 33, etc.

But it isn’t just about getting the highest score. Rather, the scoring works like this: doubles come first, with lower doubles beating higher doubles. So a 22 beats a 66. Then come the “mixed” numbers, which beat all lower mixed numbers. So a 64 beats a 53, but any double beats any mixed number.

But there is one exception: a roll of 21 (a two and a one) is called a “Mia” and it beats every other roll, period.

So, just for example: 11 beats 53, 44 beats 55, 66 beats 43, 43 beats 32. Everything beats 31. Nothing beats 21. Or if you prefer it more precisely:

21 > 11 > 22 > 33 > 44 > 55 > 66 > 65 > 64 > 63 > 62
> 61 > 54 > 53 > 52 > 51 > 43 > 42 > 41 > 32 > 31

And there you have it.

A gratuitous dice shot. Oh yeah. Check out the pips on that one.

Bagha Chal

Bagha Chal, also known as Bagh-Chal or Jumping Tigers, is a fairly unique game from Nepal. It’s a descendant of Alquerque, but it’s quite different. First off, it’s an asymmetric game, which is cool in itself. Secondly, the pieces are goats and tigers. Like, the animals. Yes.

Like in real life, tigers kill goats by jumping over them, and goats protect themselves by fencing in the tigers so they can’t jump anywhere. I saw it on Planet Earth.

Pieces

The game is played on an Alquerque board with twenty "goats" and four "tigers" -- basically just different tokens. Grab a board here and use coins or any other token as goats and tigers.

Setup

The game begins with the four tigers in the corners and all the goats off the board. Pieces are placed on intersections of lines, not in the squares themselves, just like Alquerque.

Rules

Each player moves differently, with players alternating turns. Like every other board game. Kind of unnecessary to tell you that. Goats go first.

Goats

The rules for goats are broken up into two phases: in the beginning of the game, the goat player places one goat on any empty intersection each turn. After all twenty goats have been placed, they can begin moving. Goats, once captured, can’t be placed back on the board (even if they’re captured during the placing phase).

Goats move one space at a time along the lines. They can’t jump over anything. Stumpy legs.

The goat player wants to block the tigers so that they have no legal moves. Once all the tigers are fenced in, goats win (if you're missing five or more goats, this is impossible, and tigers win).

Tigers

Tigers can move along the lines one space at a time. If they are adjacent to a goat, and there is an empty intersection beyond it, the tiger can jump the goat, removing it from play. Once five goats have been captured, the tiger player wins.

There is some contention about the specifics of jumping. There are three possible rules:

1. Tigers can only jump one goat per turn.
2. Tigers can jump multiple goats, but only if each jump is in the same direction as the last.
3. Tigers can jump multiple goats in any direction.

Players should decide the rules to play with before the game. From my understanding, the first rule is the most "traditional," but it does make the game a little unbalanced in favor of the goats for more experienced players. Consider playing with the second or third rule if you find the game a little unfair. Or if you’re just whiny. Or if you’re playing tigers and your friend doesn’t know the alternatives.

Victory for the goats

Alquerque

Alquerque is the original "jumping" game, the ancestor of Draughts (Checkers, as we called it), Bagha Chal, and many other "jumping" games. Originally from Egypt, Alquerque is one of the oldest known games for which the rules survive. It's a simple, fun, short game for two players.

Pieces

To play, you'll need 2 distinct sets of 12 tokens and an Alquerque board, which you don't have. Just, trust me on that. It's a weird one. If you have an Alquerque board lying around the house you might want to re-evaluate a few things in your life. I don't even have one.

Anyway, you can get one for free here! Then just use pennies and nickels (or anything else) as your pieces and you’re set.

Setup

The game starts with half the board filled with white and half the board filled with black, in kind of an L shape with the center left empty (just look at the picture. I don't know how to explain that verbally).

Play

The goal of the game is to capture all of your opponent's pieces by jumping them. Pieces live on intersections and move along the lines connecting them. Each turn, players can either move one of their pieces along an line into an empty intersection, or they can "jump" one of their pieces over an opponent's piece, provided there is an empty space beyond it on which to land. Any "jumped" piece is removed from the board.

Multiple jumps are permitted, and pieces can change direction mid-jump (although, like most jumping games, different people feel differently about this).

Huffing

If you've played Draughts before, you should be familiar with "huffing." If not, here's a quick rundown of the two possible interpretations:

1. If you can take one of your opponent's pieces, you must. You can't choose to pass up a possible capture.
2. You can choose to pass up a possible capture, but if you do so your piece can be "huffed," and removed from play by your opponent.

Additionally, some people play with the following rule:

If you have multiple possible moves that would result in a capture, you must choose the move that results in the most captures.

Some people play Alquerque without huffing, which is fine, although huffing does add a lot of strategy to the game. Makes me sad, though, when I have to make bad moves. But so it goes.

The game is over when either one player has no pieces left or both players agree that no more captures will occur. If the latter, the player who has the most pieces left wins. If the player's have equal pieces, the game is a draw and you guys suck.

Konane

Konane is a very simple traditional Hawaiian game. It's sort of like peg solitaire for two people: the goal is to make your opponent run out of moves without running out of moves yourself. It’s a little like Alquerque as well, although the two are not related.

Pieces

The game can be played on any square board with an even number of tiles. You then need enough tokens to fill the entire board, half black and half white. It can be played on any chess board, go board, or just without a board at all, if you make sure to accurately move your pieces.

I recommend just using a chess board and coins (you'll need a lot, though -- be wary). You can just mark off some squares of the chess board and make it 6x6 for a shorter game, if you want. Or add squares. Whichever.

Setup

Figure 2: The Board Setup: Strike of the Alternating Pattern

Whoever goes first (traditionally black) removes one of their pieces either from one of the corners or one of the center spaces (the 2x2 square in the very center of the board). Then the other player removes one of their pieces adjacent to the piece the first player removed, and the game begins.

Play

Players take turns jumping their opponent's tiles to remove them from the board. Multiple jumps are permitted, but changing direction is not. (although there is some contention on those points). All jumps must be orthogonal. Pieces cannot move except by jumping.

The game is over when one of the players can't make a legal capture, at which point are losetorious.

Black has lost the game

Chess

Chess is perhaps the most widely known board game in the English-speaking world. If you’re reading this blog, you’re probably familiar with it, whether you played it as a kid, joined a Chess club, or collect original Nathaniel Cook sets.

But I am not going to assume that everyone is familiar with it. You might have lived a sheltered life, or been one of those kids who “played sports” and “had friends.” If this is the case, and you are repentant for your ignorance of the Immortal Game, you’ve come to the right place.

Pieces

A Chess set consists of an 8x8 checkered square board and a total of 32 individual Chess pieces. Each player has the same pieces -- eight pawns, two rooks, two knights, two bishops, one queen, and one king -- but they are different colors, conventionally called "black" and "white" regardless of the actual colors used.

A pawn is the smallest piece, usually a short little thing with a ball on the top. Rooks are also short, and look like kind of like towers or turrets. Or…cylinders. Knights are horsies. Bishops are like the pawn’s older brother, but with a slice cut out of their heads for some reason. Kings are the tallest piece and have crosses on their heads, and queens are the second-tallest, topped with some kind of crown-ish sort of thing.

Got it? Okay, good. That’s all you need to know. (That is not all you need to know. And there will be pictures later, so that description was pretty much unnecessary. Carry on)

If you don’t have a chess set but would still like to play, point your internet machines here, where you can find a downloadable board and complete set of pieces. Assembly instructions for the pieces are on that page as well.

Setup

The board is positioned between both players, and should be rotated so that each player has a white square in right-hand corner closest to them.

The pieces are a little tricky looking at first, but it’s simpler than you might think. The rows closest to each player has rooks in both corners, knights next to them, then the bishops, then the king and queen. The queen is always positioned on the color of the player, so the white queen should always start on a white space, and vice-versa. The next row up is filled with pawns.

The setup of a Chess game. From left to right on the nearest row the pieces are rook, knight, bishop, queen, king, bishop, knight, rook.

Play

Players alternate moving their pieces, one at a time, in pursuit of checkmate (explained below; could be very crudely summed up as “killing the king”). White moves first. Always. Letting black move first is a class C misdemeanor in the United States (it’s an older rule).

Pieces can capture their opponent's pieces by moving into their space. When a piece is captured it is removed from the game, and the piece capturing it assumes its previous position (with one exception, en passant, explained below).

Each piece moves differently. Understanding the movement of the pieces is probably the most important thing to know, so here goes:

Pawn

Although it is perhaps the most basic piece, the pawn has the most complex movement. It can move one square forward (relative to the player who controls it), unless it has never moved before, in which case it can move two spaces forward (when moving two spaces, you can’t “jump” over another piece -- the way must be clear).

Unlike every other piece in the game, it doesn't capture like it moves. It can only capture diagonally forward, as shown. It still moves to occupy the space.

Rook

The rook has the simplest movement of any piece. It can move as far as you choose in any orthogonal direction, and captures the same way.

Like all pieces with "long" movement (the rook, bishop, and queen), the rook can't jump over or move through another piece, be it friendly or not. When capturing, the rook moves to occupy the opponent's space and must come to a stop there.

Bishop

Bishop is like the anti-rook: it can only move diagonally. Each player has two bishops, one that can only traverse white squares and one that can only traverse black squares.

Queen

The queen is the most powerful piece. It can move as far as you choose in any direction, orthogonal or diagonal. Like a rook and a bishop got it on. Or maybe the rook and the bishop are like the dizygotic twin children of the queen, each one having absorbed a different power from their estranged mother.

King

The king is like a much, much weaker queen, with a less complicated family history. It can move in any direction, but can only move one space (maybe the offspring of a queen and a pawn? Anyone?).

Knight

The knight is a little tricky. Think of it as moving two squares forward and one to the side, so two squares up and one square to the right, or two squares to the left and one square down, etc. It essentially moves in an "L" shape.

The knight is unique in that it is the only piece that can "jump" over pieces. While other pieces can't move past an obstruction, knights can jump over both friendly and enemy pieces (definitely adopted, if you ask me).

Capturing

Pieces can capture their opponent's pieces by moving onto the square they occupy. When this happens, the captured piece is removed from play.

Kings cannot be captured, only checkmated (explained…right now!).

Check and Checkmate

When a player is "attacking" his opponent's king -- that is, if you move a piece in such a way that it could take the king on your next turn -- then your opponent is "in check." It is customary to say “check” when you check your opponent to alert him to the fact.

If a player is in check, he must get out of check instantly (on that turn), either by moving his king to a safe square, taking the piece that has put him in check, or moving a piece between the king and the attacker (the last not applying if he is being checked by a knight).

If there is no legal move that will get the king out of check, it's called Checkmate and the player who effected it wins the game. It’s customary to say “checkmate” if you manage this. It is then customary for the loser to flip the board and run off crying.

An example of checkmate: white is being checked by the rook and has no way to get out of it. He can't take the rook, as it's being guarded by the bishop; he can't move to the side, because of the knight; and he can't move diagonally forward, as that would put him back in check from the rook. Oh, the checkmanatee!

It is against the rules to put your own king into check. You cannot move your king into check, and if there is a piece blocking your king from check, you cannot move that piece in such a way that it exposes your king to danger.

Confusing Things

While everything listed above should be enough for a simple game between friends, the rules of Chess don't stop there. There are a few more that you should be aware of.

Note that only the first two listed here are actually that important. You probably won't have to worry about the rest for a while. Or maybe you will. Better bookmark the page for future reference just in case. And tell all your friends about it. Maybe get the logo tattooed on your chest. Set it as your home page. You know, whatever.

Castling

Castling is a special move that players can do once per game. It basically consists of the king and a rook breaking all the other rules of Chess, and it can be extremely useful. However, it can only be performed if all of the following conditions are met:

• The king is not in check.
• Neither the king nor the rook have moved.
• There are no pieces between the king and the rook.
• There is no space between the king and rook that is "under attack" by an enemy piece.

Okay, so here's what happens: the king slides two spaces over towards the rook, and the rook jumps over to the other side of the king.

For a king-side castle (castling with the rook nearest to the king), the king will be next to the rook, and the rook will just jump to the other side. For a queen-side castle, castling with the other rook, there will be a space between the king and rook, and the rook will have to move further to get to the other side of the king. He can handle it, though. Don’t worry.

An example of a legal king-side castle

Castling takes up a turn just like any other move.

Furthermore, although this will probably never come up, you cannot castle with a promoted pawn. Even if the pawn has just become a rook and the rook has not moved, and the king is not in check, and everything else holds true, this is against the rules (this sounds obvious, but it wasn't an official rule until 1972, when someone spotted this loophole).

Promotion

If a pawn is able to cross the entire board and land on the furthest row from the player who controls it, it can be promoted to any other piece (besides king) of the player's choosing.

Almost everyone picks a queen, and it's usually the best choice, but very occasionally an extra knight can be more useful. You are technically allowed to pick a rook or bishop, but there's absolutely no reason to -- the queen is completely superior to both.

En Passant

So in case pawn movement wasn't confusing enough already, just wait: they have another oddity.

If a pawn is positioned in such a way that it is two squares away from the opponent's pawn line, and your opponent moves a pawn two squares forward, so that it is now next to your pawn, you can take it by moving your pawn diagonally forward so that it is behind your opponent's pawn, which is then captured.

Wait, what? Think of it like this: even though your opponent moved his pawn two spaces forward, you can capture it like it had only moved one space forward, provided you have a pawn handy.

If black moves his pawn forward two spaces, white can capture it with his pawn as shown.

This must be done on the turn immediately following your opponent's movement of his pawn. If you don't take it immediately, you forfeit your right to use en passant. Also, only pawns can do this -- you can’t use en passant with a bishop and expect to get away with it. Not in my house.

So, why on earth does Chess have such a bizarre rule? Well, back in the day, pawns couldn't move two spaces forward on their first move. They had to move one. But when the two-space movement rule became popular, which allowed games to get started faster, people realized that pawns could slip by other pawns by moving two spaces ahead, and they didn't like this (caused some icky promotion issues or something). So they came up with en passant, which is French for "in passing." The basic rationale is that the pawn isn't "jumping" forward by two spaces, it's moving forward one space, and then moving forward one space again. So it's like a two-step movement process. Thus the pawn that is performing the capture is capturing it when it's only "half done" with the full movement.

Draws

At the beginning of a turn, if things aren't going very well, a player can offer a draw to his opponent. If his opponent accepts, the game ends in a tie. If not, play continues as usual, with one player a little more bitter than before.

Now, you don't offer a draw because you're about to lose and would rather tie -- that's really not the point of it. Draws are rather agreed to if neither side has a clear path towards victory. For example, if no one has enough pieces to force an effective checkmate, they may choose to draw the game rather than continue playing.

There are some other circumstances that can force a draw without the other player necessarily consenting, as discussed below.

Resigning

If a player's defeat is imminent, he can choose to resign, traditionally by knocking over his king. This results in a victory for the other player, of course.

Stalemate

If a player isn't in check but doesn't have any legal moves -- that is, any possible move would put the player into check -- this is called a stalemate, and results in a draw.

An example of stalemate for Black. Neither pawn can move, and any move the king would make would put him in check.

Stalemate generally occurs near the end of the game, and should be avoided by a skilled player. In the above example, white would have been wise to avoid stalemate -- he could have won, but will instead have to accept a draw.

Fifty-Move Rule

If no pawn has been moved and no piece has been captured in the last fifty moves, the game can be declared a draw. You probably won't have to worry about this -- ever -- but it is a rule that players recognize in tournament games. By the time you get to that level, however, you should probably not be relying on this site for your Chess info (note: ignore that. Don’t forget me when you’re famous).

Three-Fold Repetition

If the same position is repeated for three turns, one of the players can declare a draw, although this is not required.

For example, if a rook moves to check a king, and the king moves away, and the rook moves to check him again, and the king moves back, and the rook moves back, etc.

Tournament Rules

This article leaves a few things out of the rules. For example, the use of clocks and different timing rules, notation, touch-move, Chess terminology, etc. These aren't things you have to know to play with a friend, but they are important if you ever move into tournament play. Maybe a future article can address that.

Strategy

More has been said on the topic of Chess strategy than perhaps any other board game (note: I made no attempt to even almost confirm that statement. In fact, now that I think about it, that honor probably goes to Go, simply because it's been around so much longer. Whatever. Disregard that). The second book ever printed in the English language, after the Bible, was The Game and Playe of Chess, by William Caxton. Chess is an Olympic sport (although so are Korfball, Orienteering, and Lifesaving. Like, saving lives. Is a sport.).

Anyway, like I was saying, Chess strategy is a big deal. I can't even breach that thin, nasty film thing that develops when you leave the strategy sitting out too long, but I can offer a few general pointers for the absolute beginner:

• Most importantly, develop your pieces as soon as you can. This means that you should bring a lot of pieces towards the center of the board, rather than just bringing out a few and moving them around a lot. More pieces out on the board means more options, more guarded pieces, etc.
• It’s a good idea to start by moving your king’s pawn forward two spaces. This opens things up for your queen and a bishop, and will let you castle in only a few moves, giving you a head start on the rooking. Queen’s pawn forward is also good, if you prefer.
• Don't bring out the queen too early. Overvaluing the queen is a very common beginner's mistake -- it’s easy to spend the whole beginning of the game running your queen around trying not to get it killed while your opponent develops all of his pieces. In general, it's better to bring your knights out first, then bishops, then finally queen and rooks -- while not neglecting your pawns! It’s like my mother always said, “no queens until you’ve finished your pawns.” She never said that. Segway...
• Maintain a good pawn structure. You should try to make sure that all your pawns are being guarded by another pawn. Don't move pawns forward undefended; keep them in diagonal lines, so that each one is being guarding by the one behind it.
• Try to control the center of the board. There is a four-square hot-zone in the very center that you should, as a general rule, strive to control. Pieces in the center can reach more squares on the board, and thus are more strategically powerful.
• Always remember that the goal is to checkmate the king, not to take pieces. Although early on capturing pieces and gaining territory will be your main goals, always be on the lookout for opportunities to move towards mate once a few pieces are out of the way. Novices often focus more on getting the opponent's queen than king, which is simply naïve strategy.

Although Black might appear to be losing, look again: he is one turn away from victory. The white knight takes his queen (this is the only legal move) and black moves his bishop in for checkmate.