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Topic: New Game: Rin (Read 2136 times) |
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omar
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New Game: Rin
« on: Dec 25th, 2010, 10:42pm » |
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on Oct 24th, 2009, 11:03pm, omar wrote:Nice to hear from you Christian. Perhaps you should move this post to as a separate thread so it can be found more easily.
Can you give some examples of chains and what their scores would be just to make it very clear. Also why do you call it YvY (neat name)?
It's funny that you thought of this game yesterday. Because yesterday I also had an idea for a game. I usually try to avoid thinking about new games, but I just had to try this one because it's rules are about as simple as Go. So this morning Aamir and I did some play testing trying to see if there are any obvious flaws in the game. We didn't find anything wrong so far. Even though I am tempted to post the rules, I am going to hold off until I've experimented with it some more.
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The next step was to implement it in Zillions and experiment with it. Although I never did get around to doing that here are some notes I had made about it.
http://arimaa.com/README.go
The game is similar to Go, but players place two stones on each turn. Except on the first turn only one stone is placed. It is played on a square grid board similar to Go. Object is to enclose more empty space than the opponent. Players enclose space by building a connected lines with their stones to form a loop. Stones that are adjacent orthogonally or diagonally are considered connected. Once a connected loop is formed any opponent stones inside the enclosed area are removed and the opponent cannot place stones inside this enclosed area. A player may place one stone or pass the turn. If both players pass their turn two consecutive times or if either player cannot place a stone the game is over. Only the empty spaces inside the area enclosed by the players stones counts towards the players score. The player with the higher score wins.
What triggered me to think about this game was that I was reading about the first move advantage in Go and I couldn't believe that even in such a complex game the first player has an advantage http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Komidashi
Modern game designers have started using two move turns with the first turn having only one move to try and eliminate the first player advantage. This also helps to speed up the game, although it completely changes the nature of the game. So I thought it would be interesting to try this with Go. But you never know if that introduces some kind of flaw in the game. I'm guessing that it doesn't because a quick search for 'go variants' found a variant called Twin Move Go which is exactly like this. Perhaps Go players have already played this variation and found no obvious flaws. With two moves per turn the Ko rule
http://home.snafu.de/jasiek/korules.html
becomes a bit more complicated. But then I thought why not just eliminate the Ko rule all together by not allowing moves inside of enclosed areas. I looked around for such a Go variant, but did not find it online. So I made a note of it and started play testing it. Originally we allowed the edge of the board to be used in forming the enclosed area as is done in Go. But after some games this way we decided the edge of the board should not be used towards enclosing an area. After this change the games seemed more interesting, but definitely needed more play testing to make sure it wasn't flawed. That's where the fun of inventing ends and the work of testing begins and I never got back to doing it 
So the reason why I'm posting the rules without having tested them is because Zhen Wang independently also came upon this same game and has probably play tested it enough to know that it isn't flawed. He posted the rules here: http://www.littlegolem.net/jsp/blog/blog.jsp?blogid=32
and called the game Rin.
I think the only real difference is that I allow passing and playing only one stone and he does not allow passing or playing one stone. I don't have any particular reason for having chosen that other than I just went with the convention of Go. So maybe what Zhen has chosen is more suitable for this game.
Some things I like about this game are that it is probably equally balanced if played on an even sized board; the game goes faster and there is no Ko rule to deal with. But is it a flawed game where someone can play in a way to always reach a drawn position on an even sized board? The answer to this is most likely: yes there is a way to play to always reach a drawn position. But the game still may not be flawed because the amount of knowledge one needs to play this way may be beyond trivial encapsulation. That is, there are no simple principles by which to play the game and reach a draw; or always reach a win if allowed to pick which side to play. I am hoping Zhen has checked that there are no obvious flaws. However the game could still be flawed in a more subtle way if the percent of well played games that end in a draw is too high. Or if there is a significant advantage for first player or the second (even though you would think there isn't). But what is considered too high? These subtle flaws are something which a game designer can never check. I've come to the view that all games are flawed, it's just a matter of degree But I've also come to believe that there are plenty of games out there that have such a low percentage of draw or advantage for one player that within the limits of human mental capacity they are flawless. Maybe Rin is such a game. It is certainly quite simple and elegant.
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christianF
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Re: New Game: Rin
« Reply #1 on: Dec 26th, 2010, 7:39am » |
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on Dec 25th, 2010, 10:42pm, omar wrote:
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After this change the games seemed more interesting, but definitely needed more play testing to make sure it wasn't flawed. That's where the fun of inventing ends and the work of testing begins and I never got back to doing it
So the reason why I'm posting the rules without having tested them is because Zhen Wang independently also came upon this same game and has probably play tested it enough to know that it isn't flawed. He posted the rules here: http://www.littlegolem.net/jsp/blog/blog.jsp?blogid=32
and called the game Rin.
I think the only real difference is that I allow passing and playing only one stone and he does not allow passing or playing one stone. I don't have any particular reason for having chosen that other than I just went with the convention of Go. So maybe what Zhen has chosen is more suitable for this game.
Some things I like about this game are that it is probably equally balanced if played on an even sized board; the game goes faster and there is no Ko rule to deal with. But is it a flawed game where someone can play in a way to always reach a drawn position on an even sized board? The answer to this is most likely: yes there is a way to play to always reach a drawn position. But the game still may not be flawed because the amount of knowledge one needs to play this way may be beyond trivial encapsulation. That is, there are no simple principles by which to play the game and reach a draw; or always reach a win if allowed to pick which side to play. I am hoping Zhen has checked that there are no obvious flaws. However the game could still be flawed in a more subtle way if the percent of well played games that end in a draw is too high. Or if there is a significant advantage for first player or the second (even though you would think there isn't). But what is considered too high? These subtle flaws are something which a game designer can never check. I've come to the view that all games are flawed, it's just a matter of degree But I've also come to believe that there are plenty of games out there that have such a low percentage of draw or advantage for one player that within the limits of human mental capacity they are flawless. Maybe Rin is such a game. It is certainly quite simple and elegant. |
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I feel Rin is very Go like in actual play and yes, it avoids the ambiguities in the rules that Go is subject to. I also feel that maybe a co-inventorship may be in place, since you present such ample evidence of your alley of thought that resulted in basically the same game. But that admittedly is none of my business .
However, the absence of ambiguity in its rules comes at a price, not maybe in actual play, but as a matter of aesthetics: Rin employs an artificial safety mechanism, rather than one inherent in the mechanism, like Go.
The first example I know of a Go variant employing and artificial safety mechanism is Mark Berger's 'Rosette', basically Go played on the triple contacts of a honeycombgrid. The shortage of libeties pressed him to declare a 'rosette', six stones occupying a small hex, and all stones connected to it safe. This was up and above the inherent safety mechanism of having two eyes. Ko and seki remained possible too.
I used his find later in Medusa and Lotus, both of which can be found in the Pit at mindsports.nl.
Without discussing actual play I must confess that aesthetically speaking I value games that can do without any artificial safety mechanism higher.
Occam's Razor if you like  .
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| « Last Edit: Dec 26th, 2010, 11:53am by christianF » |
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omar
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Re: New Game: Rin
« Reply #2 on: Dec 29th, 2010, 11:23am » |
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Quote:| I feel Rin is very Go like in actual play and yes, it avoids the ambiguities in the rules that Go is subject to. |
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To get a feel for this game, I wrote a Zillions program and tried it out. It actually felt quite different than Go; at least to me. But than again I don't have that much experience with Go either. Also I played on a 9x9 board and I'm sure the size also has an impact on how the game feels.
If anyone else would like to try it out, here is the Zillions rule file:
http://arimaa.com/rin/Rin.zrf
Quote:| I also feel that maybe a co-inventorship may be in place, since you present such ample evidence of your alley of thought that resulted in basically the same game. But that admittedly is none of my business |
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The game is so simple that it felt much more like a discovery rather than an invention. If one know's about Go then Rin is not too hard to find. I'm sure that among the millions of Go players in the East, others have also tried this game. Since Go has such a long history it's possible that someone may have tried it long before us. It's just that we don't know about them.
Also similar to how we name and credit Arimaa setup positions, I feel that being the first to try the game shouldn't be as credible as being the first to test the rules and claim that they are good.
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gatsby
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This is very similar to Kropki (http://myweb.tiscali.co.uk/dashstofsk/kropki.html). You should check it out. Aparently, it's a very popular paper-and-pencil game in Russia (far more popular than Go, I suspect).
The main differences with Go are that, in Kropki, there is no double move, and only captured enemy stones count towards the score. Changing the latter into an area counting, as in Go, is something I've thought a million times. I guess the reason why it's not like that it is a bit slow considering that Kropki is mostly an informal game played with paper and pencil.
And, of course, the success of Kropki proofs the playability of Rin...
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omar
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Re: New Game: Rin
« Reply #4 on: Jan 5th, 2011, 1:03am » |
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Wow, I didn't know about this game. It is very similar to Rin except for the method of scoring. In Kropki it seems that one could anchor their stones and play so that their stones are never captured and not worry about trying to capture any opponent stones. Thus the board would eventually fill up and both players would have a score of zero. In Rin if you try to play this way the opponent can enclose area and get a higher score.
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| « Last Edit: Jan 5th, 2011, 1:05am by omar » |
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gatsby
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on Jan 5th, 2011, 1:03am, omar wrote:| Wow, I didn't know about this game. It is very similar to Rin except for the method of scoring. In Kropki it seems that one could anchor their stones and play so that their stones are never captured and not worry about trying to capture any opponent stones. Thus the board would eventually fill up and both players would have a score of zero. In Rin if you try to play this way the opponent can enclose area and get a higher score. |
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That's not true, I think. In Kropki, as in Rin, groups are only safe when connected to the board's edge. Capturing groups can itself be captured, and so on until the edge is reached.
Also, since passing is not allowed in Kropki, players will be forced to fill territories at the end of the game, so the score will be similiar to what it would be under Rin rules. Still, it's not exactly the same, as one will be often forced to claim an enclosed territory before it is completely filled with stones. Please note that enclosing a territory is not equivalent to claiming it. The latter can be done by the player at any moment, usually when all the spaces in the territory are occupied by enemy stones or when some stones in the enclosing chain are threatened.
Rin and Kropki are based on the same concept and I suspect they are pretty much the same in terms of gameplay (excluding the double move, of course). However, Rin manages to achieve the same design goal with simpler rules, which is a plus. In fact, you can't play Kropki with just a Go board and stones.
On a slightly different note, I think it would be best if Rin used an area scoring (stones + territories) instead of scoring empty territories only. That would produce a drawless game on odd-sized boards.
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