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Title: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by omar on Mar 8th, 2009, 11:39am I've known Christian Freeling for several years now and am very fond of one of his games; Havannah. I really admire his talent for inventing abstract strategy games. If I am a dan 1 on the ASG inventing scale, Freeling is a dan 9. His writings are also very interesting to read. He recently wrote an essay titled "How I invented games and why not". http://mindsports.nl/index.php/how-i-invented-games-and-why-not Very insightful views from someone who has been close to ASGs longer than most of us have been alive. We are lucky to still have his company. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by Fritzlein on Mar 8th, 2009, 6:30pm I'm intrigued by Freeling's claim that he (unlike normal people) can tell from the rules of an abstract strategy game whether or not the game will be good. He explicitly says that he doesn't need to be able to play at a grandmaster level to know what it will feel like to play at a grandmaster level. He begs us to take his word on four or five of his games that haven't yet been proven to be excellent games, and offers us Havannah as evidence because he knew it was a great game decades before a serious gaming community embraced Havannah and uncovered the glory that he knew all along would be waiting. I have argued in other threads in this forum precisely that one can't tell a great game just from its rules. You must play to know. Arimaa is fabulous because of its emergent complexity, and by definition, emergent complexity can't be obvious from the start. If you can see something on the surface, it is not emergent. I can't believe that anyone, even a "game whisperer" could have foretold the intricacies of the camel hostage strategy from the bare rules of the game. The way we play and talk about Arimaa today would be impossible without the accumulated experience of the community. On the other hand, Freeling has so many acute insights into why rules make a game good or bad that I can't quite dismiss his claim to supernatural powers. Just because I can't judge a game from its rules (and just because I have read a ton of trash from self-styled experts trying to judge a game based on its rules) doesn't mean that it is wholly impossible. Given that Freeling will not profit monetarily if we believe him or suffer if we disbelieve, I am convinced that his motive is exactly what he says it is: he wants to leave his mark on the world by sharing what he knows. I'm surprised he doesn't call himself Cassandra, gifted with prophecy but cursed that no one will believe him. But he does put his faith in generations. He believes that time will tell. I suppose prophesy is like emergent complexity: if other people could judge your claims to be true at the time you made them, then you wouldn't be a prophet. I recall that Don Green, the inventor of Octi, told me by e-mail that he had invented several other games before, but nothing as special Octi. This poses a dilemma for us non-prophets. If I believe Christian Freeling about the games he invented, am I not also compelled to believe Don Green about Octi? Freeling excoriates hype that often surrounds superficial games that get quickly played out. What enables me to know that his word is more reliable than that of the next game designer? Merely that he has not been commercially successful and that he has Havannah? Let me say right now that I hope Freeling is flat wrong in at least one respect. He says that Havannah was doomed to commercial failure, not by any flaw in the game, but simply because it was a great abstract strategy game. If he is right, then Arimaa will be a commercial flop because it is a great strategy game. Z-man is a great guy with a great reputation, but he has nowhere near the resources or reputation of Ravensburger, the company that pushed Havannah. If Freeling is right, then marketing is futile, and only time can make a great abstract strategy game popular. I think that if we are going to prove Freeling wrong for Arimaa we need to pay special attention to this point he makes: "A strategy game requires more than isolated players can bring to the table: clubs, books, teachers, a whole infrastructure." The reason Arimaa has succeeded so well to this point is all the infrastructure that Omar created: the game room per se, the presence of on-line bots to play when there was no human community, the ability to comment games, the Forum to exchange ideas, the bot ladder to give newcomers a graded challenge, etc. The community is key. Everyone who writes a bot and enters it into the Computer Championship contributes to the infrastructure. Everyone who gives beginners a helping hand in the chat room is part of the infrastructure. Commenting games with possible improvements; commenting tournament rules with possible improvements; writing up event game summaries; bashing bots in unusual ways; and just pain playing Arimaa as well as you know how are all contributions as well. Thank you to everyone who does these things and so many more similar activities. As I look to the future, I have a glimmer of what must be built to allow Arimaa to reach its full potential. My book has been such a hassle to write that I shudder to ask anyone else to go through the process, but Arimaa will need more books than mine. The Continuous Tournament has been fun, but there will need to be more on-line tournaments, run by players other than me or Omar. There will have to be local Arimaa clubs, and before there can be local clubs, there will have to be individuals who want to found local clubs. IdahoEv hosted the first-ever live Arimaa tournament in a gaming convention; there will have to be more live tournaments like that both inside gaming conventions and standing on their own. The commercial release of boxed Arimaa sets isn't going to make any of this happen by magic; it will only enable it to happen. I'm excited by the potential that is there, and excited by Adanac's prediction of multiple 3000-level players by 2015, but we're not going to get there just because Arimaa has the depth locked up inside of it. There will have to be an organic and vibrant community in which players can take root and grow. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by Arimabuff on Mar 9th, 2009, 12:02am I don't think that there is any sure fire way to predict the future of a game no more that one can predict the evolution of the stock market or the weather in the long run. All these things are similar in that they involve countless parameters and that they are subject to the butterfly effect. Of course that doesn't mean that promoting Arimaa is useless, advertising and striving to develop a community around this game increase the probability to make it perpetual but the complexity of the situation can't even give us a hint as to what that probability might be. For all we know, 30 years from now Arimaa will have expanded to a level of popularity comparable to Go or it will have been completely forgotten, or something in between. In my view, it would be as impossible at this point to tell what will happen, as it would be to give the state of the world economy at that time. What well-known pundit predicted the crisis we're in only a mere three years ago? NOBODY. Commercial success doesn’t always reward excellence; in fact, I suspect that it only accidentally does that once in a great while. We all know for instance that Betamax was superior to Vhs or that Microsoft is a mere shadow of the system it stole from. Monopoly is a stupid game that I got sick of after playing it a couple of times as a kid. Sometimes what prevails is mediocrity… we can’t help it. The strength of Arimaa is that in spite of its great potential, it has very simple rules and can be learned and played by people of diverse backgrounds, and that may be the most important characteristic that will decide of the durability of the game, but who knows? |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by Fritzlein on Mar 9th, 2009, 7:42am You are right, Patrick. We can try anticipate events and we can try to shape then, but the future remains essentially unpredictable and out of control. Just hang on and enjoy the ride! |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by Ciribot on Mar 16th, 2009, 8:11am I'm currently in the process of designing a board game, I found that without play testing the game design process would have gone no where. I've played about 200+ games of it online, and refined the rules as I discovered weaknesses in the play. However, the net result is the rules are not as simple as I originally planned, but I cannot see how one can simply look at a board, create a game, and never revise it. With or without some gift for board game making. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by clauchau on Mar 18th, 2009, 5:39am I have some doubts too. Rules and games are like formal systems and their expressive power. However small they are, however enlighted you are as a mathematician, it's often hard to say whether they end up modelling anything interesting, let alone anything at all, without any tedious exploration and research. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Mar 24th, 2009, 2:56am Hello Omar, all, Omar, thanks for your kind introduction. I certainly hope Arimaa will prove me wrong with regard to strategy games being difficult to market. I think you do a terrific job! I'm not sure how far the strategical insights of the players have grown, but my guess is that by now the difference between top players and the lesses echelons is considerable. Tactics will largely have been sorted out, and positional aspects may by now have begun to dominate the top players' strategies. That's a good development. Fritzlein, thanks too for a fair comment and argued scepsis. I can understand that. Allow me to clarify a few points. "The way we play and talk about Arimaa today would be impossible without the accumulated experience of the community." I agree. Arimaa is by no means the easiest game to 'predict' in this sense, and my insights - limited to symmetrical abstract perfect information games in the first place - don't apply to every game equally. My insight isn't so much about specific tactics and strategies, the ones you can have endless discussion about, but about the fact that you can have these discussions, now, in the first place. Not all games provide the ever deepening intricacies that are a prerequisite for that. Arimaa does. And I don't need experience to see that, just silent reflection. In fact I would start out as poor a player as the next guy - every new game is like trying to ride a bike for the first time. It is something in the structure of the game, the 'organic' quality, that reveals how strategies eventually will solidify, and though Omar uses the Chess comparison, I'd rather see he didn't. Arimaa is not a chess game and it is in fact far more 'organic' than chess type games. I don't think the comparison is useful or necessary. "If he is right, then Arimaa will be a commercial flop because it is a great strategy game." That may indeed be the case, though I hope not. It's difficult to predict because the online community plays such a big role, quite apart from the 'commercial succes'. We may not even need boxed games in the future. A strong point of Arimaa however, is its low treshold and the fact that beginners soon have some 'grip' on the proceedings. Naive strategies are a lot better than no strategies at all, for beginning players. "I'm surprised he doesn't call himself Cassandra, gifted with prophecy but cursed that no one will believe him. But he does put his faith in generations. He believes that time will tell. I suppose prophesy is like emergent complexity: if other people could judge your claims to be true at the time you made them, then you wouldn't be a prophet." Healthy scepsis, and very accurately put! ;) Finally, all my games have been playtested, some modestly, others extensively. Most of it was done at the games club 'Fanaat' at the University of Twente. So it's not as if I put my insights above playtesting. It's more of a prediction of what playtesting will eventually reveal. And the intuition is of course guided by simple common sense. We all know that simple mechanisms can lead to mindboggling complexity. So, in a nutshell, if a new Draughts type game allows incredible combinations (the norm being set by 10x10 International Draughts) and has a solid and balanced set of rules. it is not that difficult to predict how its strategical behaviour will be. "I don't think that there is any sure fire way to predict the future of a game no more that one can predict the evolution of the stock market or the weather in the long run." Quite right Arimaabuff, and I hope Arimaa will be a commercial success. But my particular insight doesn't have anything to do with that. I judge a game by what it is, not by the measure of its success. Nor can I predict that measure, I wish I could ;). |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by Fritzlein on Mar 24th, 2009, 1:20pm Hi, Christian. I'm glad you are not offended by my inability to know whether or not you are right. :) Quote:
Yes, sorry for my implication that you prognosticate on intuition alone. In fact I also read something you wrote about the play testing of Havannah. The fact that a new player could come along with a different strategy (first stone in the center) and beat all the old hands served as a very persuasive argument for the excellence of Havannah as a game. For Arimaa a similar process of new players and new strategies forcing deeper insights has occurred several times. Quote:
The whole history rating system designed by Remi Coulom has recently been implemented for the Arimaa server by Herve D'hondt. It shows the human players already have a skill range of more than 1400 Elo points. I consider this measurement of skill difference more reliable than the game-room ratings, which are often distorted by bot-bashing. I have a strong hunch that there are at least another 500 Elo points at the top of the scale that we haven't discovered yet. Quote:
That's a good point. It doesn't take forever to get some kind of a handle on Arimaa. I once beat a beginner who said after the game that he saw what I had done to him and he would beat me next game. I felt he was being overly optimistic about how fast he could rise to world-championship level, but I agreed with his sentiment that he would have a much better strategy already on his second game. One can start learning Arimaa right away, without tremendous up-front investment. Quote:
In case you really are a prophet, your opinion of Arimaa is reassuring for those of us who love the game. :) |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Mar 26th, 2009, 4:52am on 03/24/09 at 13:20:34, Fritzlein wrote:
Hello Fritzlein, I tend to agree, but climbing that scale would require a massive effort by as yet non-existent grandmasters. There's a big difference between a recreational game and a 'mental sportsweapon'. Many games, including Arimaa, may have the intrinsic qualities required, but whether or not it will happen depends on the acceptance as such, and the emergence of a broad and eventually professional playerbase, national and international associations and the like. Even then, a game, however great, may eventually reveal a flaw. The kind of flaw that only massive scrutiny by hundreds of masters and grandmasters can reveal. 10x10 International Draughts is a great game, but a flawed 'mental weapon'. In matchplay the world's top hundred or so will usually draw. That's not a flaw of the players, but a flaw of the game. In the lower echelons the game does all right, because the measure of mistakes is higher. In my essay you will find some 'Bashne bashing'. I argue that it is a bad game, but actually it's fun to play (just started at iG Game Center). As a 'mental weapon' it is self-hampering and extremely volatile, but as a rollercoaster ride it is great. So a game's qualities may be rooted in the sheer pleasure of playing, even if the strategic summits will never be tested to the limit. The only thing I regret is that the world of 'mental sportsweapons' is monopolized by a limited number of admittedly great games. I'd welcome any game (including Arimaa) able to conquer that bastion - but it's extremely well defended. That's why the opening sentences of MindSports are: Quote:
::) |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by Fritzlein on Mar 26th, 2009, 10:24pm on 03/26/09 at 04:52:12, christianF wrote:
I quite agree. Your statement is an extension of my experience that I can't judge a game from its rules, and must play it to know what it will be like. It is possible that, after much further study, Arimaa will be "played out" in some respect. At present, however, when the Arimaa community makes claims such as 1. Optimal play in Arimaa is not drawish 2. The first-player advantage (or disadvantage?!) is insignificant 3. There are many levels of expertise 4. Good strategy can compensate imperfect tactics 5. Playing to win doesn't require everyone to play in the same style 6. Positional tension may be maintained for many moves before it resolves into obvious advantage for one player or the other; it can be clear what each player is fighting for without being clear which objective is superior. we are in a relatively good position to substantiate these claims. I don't know of any other game that withstood as much scrutiny before its commercial release as Arimaa has. Just this month we passed one hundred thousand games in the database! Quote:
I think it must be so. It is rational behavior on the part of gamers not to put their faith in a game that hasn't withstood the test of time. Why waste effort on a new game when it is very likely to prove flawed in the long run? I also quite sympathize with masters of established games not wanting to walk away from the thousands of hours they have invested honing their skills at one game if their reward is to be a beginner at another game. Admittedly it creates a nearly-closed circle of great games, because one needs gamers to prove that a game is great, and one also needs to prove that a game is great before it will attract gamers. The circle is not entirely closed, however, and I think Arimaa should aim for the heart of it. The market we need to try to break into is the chess market. People should love Arimaa for the same reasons they love chess, only more so. It's a crazy quirk that the people who will give Arimaa an audience at the moment aren't the best long-term audience. Innovators love Arimaa for the improvements it makes over chess, but innovators want to keep innovating rather than plumbing the depths of an established game. We've had a number of attempts to fix or improve Arimaa, which is surprising given that Arimaa doesn't have any obvious flaws. It must be a function of the talents of the people the game has attracted. Other early adopters may love Arimaa because it is new and cool. But how long can Arimaa be considered new? Next year there will be something else cool, and some of the people who jumped on our bandwagon will jump off to get on the next one. The people who will stick with Arimaa in the long haul and be the future grandmasters are, to a large extent, the people we can hardly convince to give Arimaa a try in the first place. Nevertheless, I think that is the crowd to which we must address ourselves. Yes, Arimaa is innovative; yes it is new and cool. But if we sell it on those grounds, it seems more likely to flash and burn out like so many games before it. Instead we need to sell Arimaa's strength: It will not be exhausted before we are. We need to emphasize that it is a game worthy of clubs, worthy of world championships, worthy of annotated collections of games, worthy of strategy books, worthy of simultaneous exhibitions, etc. Oddly, I think humility serves us well in this pursuit. We should freely admit that we don't know and can't know whether Arimaa is as good a game as chess is. We should merely claim that Arimaa shows promise to be as good as chess by comparison to the merits of chess. We want to win the hearts of people who consider their favorite game to be a discipline, a source of self-improvement in addition to a source of entertainment. This requires not just enthusiasm for Arimaa, but a sort of reverence for the way it transcends us. Let us storm the chess citadel. Into the breach! Our cause is just, because chess is too drawish, too unbalanced in favor of white, and not sufficiently computer-resistant. That is not how or why we will win, though. Our victory will come if and only if Arimaa is more chess than chess ever was. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Mar 27th, 2009, 1:12am on 03/26/09 at 22:24:47, Fritzlein wrote:
In the case of Draughts, that's not entirely fair. There were millions of Draughts games played without the game giving any real indication of a problematic draw margin. To reveal the kind of bugs that playtesting is used for, a couple of thousands of games are usually considered sufficient. Draughts, were it a new game, would have passed such scrutiny with flying colors. on 03/26/09 at 22:24:47, Fritzlein wrote:
Unlikely, I think. How would it be 'played out'? Not by a computer (by the current standards or those of the foreseeable future), and not by grinding into drawishness. on 03/26/09 at 22:24:47, Fritzlein wrote:
I totally agree with your analysis, but putting your faith in what people should do may lead to some frustration, I fear ;) . on 03/26/09 at 22:24:47, Fritzlein wrote:
Here I politely disagree. Arimaa is a race game and its connection with Chess is at most superficial. Checkmating a king is an existential theme, winning a race is not. In my opinion themes do matter, and Chess isn't called 'the royal game' for nothing, regardless of whether one agrees or disagrees with such a qualification. Kind regards, christian |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by Fritzlein on Mar 27th, 2009, 8:36am on 03/27/09 at 01:12:54, christianF wrote:
Very interesting; I did not know that. Having such a real-life example increases the probability in my mind that Arimaa will eventually prove broken in exactly the same way, i.e. by being inherently drawish. We have seen occasional positions that tended toward stalemate and piece shuffling, although only two or three I am aware of in the whole history of Arimaa, and none that were completely blocked. I consider it unlikely that playing to win at Arimaa will drive us toward such corners of the position space, but one never knows. Quote:
Well spoken. :) Quote:
Perhaps we agree, and are merely using the word "superficial" in different senses. Seen in one light we could list Superficial similarities: Board, number and type of pieces Profound differences: Move mechanic, capture mechanic, objective, strategic themes. Yet from another perspective we could say Superficial differences: Move mechanic, capture mechanic, objective, strategic themes. Profound similarities: Both games are mental sportsweapons. I am not entirely sure what you mean by mental sportsweapon, but you must have invented this term for a reason. What are the characteristics of games that qualify? Is chess in that class? Might Arimaa be as well? If they are both in the same class, are they not profoundly similar? Themes are admittedly important, but is the theme of a game at all related to whether it is a mental sportsweapon? When I consider why I like Arimaa better than chess, it has nothing to do with the theme. I do not inherently prefer race games to capture games. I am not more drawn to wildlife and wrestling than I am drawn to royalty and mideval warfare. (Evidence: I loved Tolkien and Dungeons & Dragons in my youth.) Admittedly, a great factor in my love of Arimaa is that I am good at it. But this is circular: I wasn't good at it in my very first game. Why did I love the game enough to engage it seriously enough to get good at it? Why I have I spent as many hours of my life on Arimaa as only a tiny handful of people have done? I did study chess too, by the way, in high school and in brief stints as an adult. What attracted me to chess was not the battle, not the checkmate, but the basis of excellence. Top performance at chess doesn't come from mere familiarity, mere attentiveness, or mere calculation. Top performance arises from understanding. How else could the master play twenty opponents at once? I love Arimaa because of the learning curve. I can feel my understanding of Arimaa steadily deepening. That's what I felt a little bit for chess, and the feeling is much stronger for Arimaa. That's what I mean when I say, "Arimaa is more chess than chess ever was." The essential feature of chess in my experience was not checkmate, it was the process of coming to understand, and Arimaa has given me more of that process. I don't expect everyone to enjoy games for the same reason. Surely even chess players are not all identically motivated. Still I believe that if you take lovers of chess who play no other game seriously, ask them why chess deserves such devotion, and distill the most prevalent themes in their answers, you will get criteria that Arimaa also meets or has a good chance to meet in the future. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by Fritzlein on Mar 27th, 2009, 10:15am Christian, your services as a game whisperer are probably much in demand, so I understand if you decline this invitation, but you would honor one member of the Arimaa community, John Herr, if you would give a considered opinion of his abstract strategy game Rekushu, described in this thread. (http://arimaa.com/arimaa/forum/cgi/YaBB.cgi?board=other;action=display;num=1185322156) |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Mar 27th, 2009, 10:18am on 03/27/09 at 08:36:31, Fritzlein wrote:
I see your point with regard to themes. Yet in the international sports arena, certain themes dominate. Checkmate: Chess, Shogi, Xiangqi Elimination: Checkers, 10x10 Draughts, Shashki Territory: Go, Othello For the main part these games are based on an existential theme - either eliminating the 'heart' or, in absence thereof, body and limb. The one co-existential theme is territory. Connection, race, breakthrough, configuration are all peripheral. Mancalas are widespread outside the western world, but barring an occasional local tournament, these too are played mainly recreationally. So apart from my personal opinion, it's hard to deny themes do seem to matter. on 03/27/09 at 08:36:31, Fritzlein wrote:
Yes, all above games are in that class. Is the theme relevant? To a degree, I think. Pente, the simple, beautiful and deep Pente, is not a mental sportsweapon. It's like comparing tennis to tabletennis. However much energy is required to become a world class tabletennis player, the game itself lacks the charisma to captivate the masses. One could become a Pente master, I assume, but a grandmaster? Dedicating one's life to arranging 5 stones in a row or capturing 10? Hardly. A mental sportsweapon must be a strategy game, as opposed to a tactical one. We mention the difference in our homepage: Quote:
As you can see I argue Othello into both categories, and inherently, the dividing line is is less than clearcut. Next to being a strategy game, a mental sportsweapon must be 'inexhausible' in human terms, and preferably in programming terms. Checkers is still Checkers, and people still may enjoy it for another hundred years, but the mere thought that after each game you can consult Chinook about your mistakes is a bit of a bummer. Far more games qualify than currently dominate the sports arena, including Arimaa, the six games I mention in the essay, and Hex. To really become recognized, a game must captivate the imagination of a large audience. Paraphrasing Emanuel Lasker, a friend if mine put this in his member profile at iGGC: Quote:
Hex has all the qualities required wrapped up in utter simplicity of rules. As a game it is quite big, as a mental sportsweapon it is peripheral, because dedicating one's life to connecting opposite sides seems so futile, though of course it is no less futile than playing Chess, as every grandmaster will tell you in his or her darker moments. For a mental sportsweapon, the hardest thing is to become what it is. Havannah and Arimaa both qualify, but I'm sceptical about their chances. For one thing they don't seem to have the right themes. My best all around weapon is Dameo, and my strategy to immortalize it is to keep knocking on the door of 10x10 Draughts with the message "You're playing the wrong game". Not so much the conquering of a new audience, as turning around an existing one because their beloved game is flawed and they know it. But it won't happen in my lifetime I fear. cheers, christian |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Mar 27th, 2009, 10:23am on 03/27/09 at 10:15:05, Fritzlein wrote:
I came across it at iGGC, but I will need a couple of hours to let it sink in, so I'll reply in a couple of days if that's all right. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by Janzert on Mar 27th, 2009, 12:00pm Quote:
It's always interesting to me how much our view of games is shaped by our local culture. It's my understanding that had this conversation been taking place in China it wouldn't be far fetched for the above statement to be made, only with the sports reversed. Janzert |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Mar 27th, 2009, 1:51pm on 03/27/09 at 12:00:04, Janzert wrote:
Guilty as charged ;) . My argument remains however in that the games are comparable in terms of the energy required to become a world class player (and indeed the fact that a game allows players to become world class). The difference is in the measure of appreciation by the masses, one way or the other. And indeed, in this case, one way in the 'west' and the other in China. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by Fritzlein on Mar 27th, 2009, 2:46pm on 03/27/09 at 10:18:31, christianF wrote:
What is the international standing of Othello? I know it is quite popular because I see it in Walmart, but then again one can also find Monopoly everywhere. How does the strategic literature of Othello compare to that of draughts? Is there a professional playing/teaching class? I find it unaccountable that the intense man vs. machine drama from chess and from English checkers didn't develop for Othello. Is that because Japanese play it, and they have (witness shogi) a different sense of the honor at stake when playing machines? Or is it because Othello gets no respect, just like nobody would care if a computer could play Monopoly well? Quote:
This interpretation truly surprises me. First, Pente was definitely embraced by the masses, at least in the United States. We played it at church camp when I was in high school. You could find it everywhere. There were clubs, there were books, there were tournaments including a World Championship. Then suddenly the fad was over. What happened? I don't know exactly how fads are made and how they end, but it seems highly implausible that we collectively woke up one day and said, "What were we thinking? Checkmate is grand and five-in-a-row is silly!" I would be much more inclined to believe the public's change of heart had something to do with the World Champion declaring that the rules of Pente were broken, the first-player advantage was unacceptably large, and proposing everyone should start playing by alternate rules. In other words, we didn't know at first whether Pente was a good mental sportsweapon or not. It only became a "fad" after the fact when the game proved unbalanced. The end of the craze was not the fault of a fickle populace that can't tell a good game from a flashing light, it was the fault of the game itself. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Mar 28th, 2009, 3:45am Hello Fritzlein, I truly appreciate an exchange of opinions that forces me to rethink ideas and concepts, so thanks for that :) . on 03/27/09 at 14:46:19, Fritzlein wrote:
The volume of Draughts literature is dwarfed by the volume of Chess, Shogi and Go literature, but it surpasses the volume of Othello literature by about the same ratio. This isn't at all surprising. Draughts has been around much longer and has been played far more extensively, although the USA played only a very modest role. Here's a complete list (in dutch) of worldchampions. Closest to the USA is the Canadian Marcel Deslauriers (1956): http://nl.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wereldkampioenschap_dammen on 03/27/09 at 14:46:19, Fritzlein wrote:
First of all, Omar created Arimaa explicitly to make it hard for computers, by using mechanics that lead to an exploding branch density. Havannah is implicitly hard for computers, because there's hardly anything to build an evaluation function around. In 2012 a 10 game match will take place between me and one or more Havannah programs, one of which will be a joint effort by two German universities, under the supervision of Prof. Dr. Johannes Waldmann, Leipzig (http://www.imn.htwk-leipzig.de/~waldmann/) and Prof. Dr. Ingo Althofer, Jena (http://www.minet.uni-jena.de/www/fakultaet/iam/personen/althofer_e.html). The program(s) win if they can beat me once. See also: http://senseis.xmp.net/?Havannah The point being that not all games are equal in terms of programmability. I'm no expert, but I'm pretty certain that 6x6 Othello could be solved brute force, the way Checkers and Oware were solved. That is: perfectly. The size of the tree is such that 8x8 is currently out of reach, but as far as I'm aware the evaluation functions of Othello are fairly strong too and I don't know what the outcome would be if a really strong program would be pitted against the world champion. But who cares about a really strong Othello program? You mentioned what I think is at the core of the issue: "the intense man vs. machine drama from chess and from English checkers". Drama, that's what's absent in Othello, in Hex, in Pente. The drama of a deep combination, resulting in checkmate, or a breakthrough or wipe out in Draughts, or the capture of a really large group in Go, at the cost of minor losses. Dramatic tactics that can be understood, not only by strong players, but by an audience of laymen too. I mentioned Marcel Deslauriers. He became world champion in 1956 and lost the title to the Russian player dr. Iser Koeperman in 1958. Please have a look at the link below, displaying a combination named after him, the 'Coup Deslauriers'. The position is from a 1956 game against his future successor. http://mindsports.nl/index.php/arena/draughts/60-coups?start=5 That's drama. And that's what's missing in Pente, Othello, Hex. on 03/27/09 at 14:46:19, Fritzlein wrote:
Yes, you're right, only I didn't need a 'proof' of that. First of all, there are deepening intricacies in Pente, but ever deepening? Pente is just too small for that. The whole 5-in-a-row concept suffers from first player advantage, and variants like Pente, Renju and Ninuke Renju seek to balance it one way or another to 'safe the game'. Good games don't need to be 'saved'. Pente, however elegant and deep, was playing outside its league. Games with strategies that are either 'fairly obvious' or 'fundamentally obscure' are not strategy games but tactical games. Pente is in the first class, Othello in the second, although strategic insights into it are still evolving. The main characteristic of such games is that it's hardly possible to distinguish between strategy and tactics. There are strategic goals, but hardly any more or less permanent sub-goals to be achieved as calculable signposts along the way. Tactical games are mental toys, not mental sportsweapons. Hex on the other hand is a strategy game: it's strategy is neither obvious nor fundamentally obscure. It's tactics are clearly distinguished within the framework of its overall strategy. The swap rule serves perfectly to eliminate any first move advantage and a flexible boardsize makes it inexhaustible in both human and machine terms. Hex is a perfect 'mental sportsweapon' for those who are familiar with its intricacies - indeed 'ever deepening'. Hex only lacks the kind of drama that seems to be required to captivate the mind of the masses. Laymen have no way of knowing what's going on in any given position, and no dramatic turns of events ever happen. This is considered boring. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Mar 29th, 2009, 2:53am on 03/27/09 at 10:15:05, Fritzlein wrote:
Hello Fritzlein, John, John, I've refelected a bit on this. I find the idea of occupying vertices to claim regions of squares excellent. There's a simple logic behind it, yet I cannot immediately think of a game that employs it. Usually one claims what is occupied: like vertices in Go or squares in Othello. The actual mechanism is not very 'organic' though, so reflection alone poses its limits here and its not easy to see all the way though. What I do note however is that it is not at all easy to score in the first place. As Adanac remarked: on 11/26/08 at 05:43:26, Adanac wrote:
Which led Fritzlein to: on 11/26/08 at 07:34:27, Fritzlein wrote:
And your riposte: on 11/26/08 at 09:34:53, The_Jeh wrote:
Boldly spoken, but they may have a point there, don't they? Allow me to ask a few questions: 1. Can there be reasons to decline claiming a region, other than preventing the removal of its four corner stones? 2. If a region is not claimed, and the opponent does not, on his next move, place a stone on its edge or inside, or claim a tile inside, can the player still claim it after that? Or is it only the act of completing a rectangle that gives the right to claim a region? 3. If a rectangle is completed, but the opponent has a stone on its edge or inside it, the region cannot be claimed. Why can't a player claim a completed rectangle if a friendly stone is on its edge or inside? 4. The obligatory removal of the four stones that constitute the basis for the claim is a good idea. If point 3 is considered, you might also consider the optional removal of the friendly stones on the edge or inside 5. If a rectangle is completed, but the opponent has a claimed tile inside it, the region cannot be claimed. Why can't a player claim a completed rectangle if a friendly claimed tile is inside? I ask this because generally speaking a mechanism should not hamper itself. Then there's Adanac's suggestion: on 11/26/08 at 05:43:26, Adanac wrote:
on 11/26/08 at 09:34:53, The_Jeh wrote:
Is that so? If I place two stones on adjacent vertices, then obviously my opponent cannot prevent both threats to claim one triangle. Why forbid that? Would you forbid a beginning Go player to secure a small group where bigger issues are at stake? If the stones are farther apart on the same line, cannot the opponent defend against both threats by placing a stone in between on the same line? You may want to reconsider some of these aspects, because though the idea is very good, there may be a better and more 'organic' game there, with possibly even less rules. The current game won't run away by reconsidering ;-) Kind regards, christian |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by The_Jeh on Mar 29th, 2009, 9:34am Quote:
Of course not, but there is more than one reason for wanting to keep the stones on the board. If the stones are removed, it may unblock your opponent from scoring. Alternatively, you may want to keep the stones in place because they are part of a larger threat on which you are working. Of course, the game may work with the claiming of tiles being mandatory, but so far I have no reason to dislike the rules as they are. Quote:
The player can still claim the rectangle at any point in the future if all the conditions are still satisfied. It is not the act of completing the rectangle that gives the right, only the existence of the individually necessary and jointly sufficient conditions. Quote:
Quote:
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These are all interesting variations, and I have thought of them. I'm not sure what their consequences would be; I'd have to play them. Admittedly, I have become fond of and have not found serious flaw with the rules as they currently are. That and the fact that I have no companion to help me playtest has thus far taken away my incentive to experiment with possible "improvements." Quote:
No I would not. And in fact during the middle of a game of Rekushu such situations do occur, where one must abstain from securing a little territory in order to prevent one's opponent from taking much more. However, I do not like the idea of a player knowing with certainty from the opening position of a blank board that he can forcibly score, regardless of whether his opponent can cancel it by scoring himself. Quote:
Sure, but then one plays where one would have anyway, and while you cannot claim the triangle, since there is a stone on the edge, you now have two threats of the same magnitude as before, provided the board is large enough. So I do not see a way of making offense non-trivial without making defense trivial on a triangular grid. Quote:
I am not averse to experimentation, but I would like to be convinced of the flaws/deficiencies of the current rules before making the momentous decision to scrap them. My challenge from above may be bold, but it still stands. Perhaps you would like to play a game sometime to get the feel of it? I do appreciate your sage comments and help. It would be great if I could someday gain a somewhat substantial player pool. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Mar 29th, 2009, 11:48am on 03/29/09 at 09:34:43, The_Jeh wrote:
That's fair enough, and an option is indeed preferable. on 03/29/09 at 09:34:43, The_Jeh wrote:
Neither have I. But you may know the Shogi proverb 'if you've found a good move ... look for a better one' ;) on 03/29/09 at 09:34:43, The_Jeh wrote:
Yes, the character would be that of an 'offensive race' and it might be difficult to catch up for the second player. One might even consider a swap with regard to the size of the first triangle. on 03/29/09 at 09:34:43, The_Jeh wrote:
And yes, we are often at iGGC at the same moment, so I'd be happy to be your next victim :) |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by Arimabuff on Mar 29th, 2009, 12:04pm on 03/29/09 at 11:48:44, christianF wrote:
Wasn't that a quote from Lasker? |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by Fritzlein on Mar 29th, 2009, 2:22pm on 03/28/09 at 03:45:06, christianF wrote:
And I truly appreciate the experience and insights of a veteran game designer. The honor is ours. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Apr 8th, 2009, 5:34am on 03/08/09 at 18:30:08, Fritzlein wrote:
Hi Fritzlein, Omar, all, Unexpectedly and unintentionally I've been given the opportunity to put my little money where my big mouth is, that is, I've invented a new game over the last three days. No board or material and implicitly no play testing. That's your department ;) . It happened in the process of translating rules at iGGC. For the last two weeks I've been engulfed in rules and ideas, and out of the chaos the contours of a game emerged, the evening of the April 6th, not looked for and rather intrusively. I eventually fell asleep pondering it. The next day it popped up on and off, and solidified in the evening. This morning I added a final modification concerning shots at the goal and the keeper ... soccer, yes, quite an unusual theme in the light of my previous work. The trigger was a game called Jeson Mor (http://www.iggamecenter.com/info/en/jesonmor.html), very old, and rather blunt and primitive in structure, but obviously fun or it wouldn't have survived in the first place. Something stuck about running toward a basket, grabbing what's inside and bolting. That's what occupied me while translating Phutball (http://www.iggamecenter.com/info/en/phutball.html), a game I knew of course, though I'm embarrasingly bad at it. Further games that crossed my mind during the 'whispering' period were Camelot (http://www.iggamecenter.com/info/en/camelot.html) and indeed Arimaa (http://www.iggamecenter.com/info/en/arimaa.html). You'll find some similarities there. Last night the concept had solidified to the point that I mailed the story and the provisional rules, with the diagram below, that I quickly made using Congo (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/side-dishes/interesting-games?start=3) material, to Ed van Zon, my partner at MindSports, to Arty Sandler at iGGC, and to Benedikt Rosenau, a friend in Germany with a deep interest in board games. Here's a slightly more crystallized version: http://i44.tinypic.com/eitwd2.jpg © mindsports.nl HanniBall is a two-player abstract boardgame invented by Christian Freeling the 6th, 7th and 8th of April 2009, without board or pieces, as a 'mental exercise'. Board The board is a rectangle of 9x15 squares, with two additional goals of 1x3 squares. There are two 'goal areas' of 2x5 squares. Both players, White and Black, have 11 pieces: 1 Keeper, 2 Lions, 4 Elephants and 4 Knight. The diagram shows the board with the pieces in the initial position. The ball lies in the centersquare. Object The object of HanniBall is to shoot the ball into the opponent's goal. If a player shoots the ball into his own goal, he has lost. Moving and capturing On his turn a player is allowed to make up to three moves. A 'move' may be: 1. Moving a piece that does not have the ball. 2. Moving a piece that does have the ball. 3. Shooting the ball. Shooting the ball can only be done by a piece that has the ball in its possesion. The pieces move and shoot as follows: * The Knight moves as the knight in Chess, but may not jump to its target square if both the in between squares are occupied by pieces. A Knight shoots the ball 'king's move' wise. If a Knight shoots the ball, it lands on a straight or diagonally adjacent square. * The Elephant moves as the king in Chess. An Elephant shoots the ball 'knight's move' wise. If an Elephant shoots the ball, it lands on a square one knight's move away, no restrictions. * The Lion combines the options of Knight and Elephant, so it moves and shoots either way in any combination. * The Keeper combines the options of the 'HanniBall knight' and the queen in Chess, but may not leave the goal area (except for the goal itself). A Keeper shoots the ball up to five squares away, queenwise. Direction and distance are the player's choice. * Only the Keeper is allowed to enter the goal, the other pieces are not. Inside the goal the Keeper should not have the ball in its possession, because a ball inside the own goal ends the game in a win for the opponent. The Ball The Ball may land on any square, whether or not occupied. * If a piece moves to a square where the ball is, it takes possession of the ball. * If the ball lands on a square occupied by a piece, the piece takes possesion of the ball. * If a player is in possesion of the ball, and it is his turn, and he has still one or more move options left, than he can do one of the following. 1. Shoot the ball. 2. Move the piece and take the ball along. 3. Move the piece and leave the ball. 4. Move another piece. * If a player is in possesion of the ball, and it is not his turn, then the piece holding the ball can be captured by the opponent. Capture is by replacement. The captured piece is taken off the board, and the capturing piece takes possession of the ball. Please note that if a player shoots the ball to an opponent's piece, and he has still one or more move options left, he can capture that piece! Shots at the goal or the keeper If a player shoots the ball into the opponent's goal, he wins the game (into his own goal means he loses). If a player shoots the ball at the opponent's Keeper, then the latter cannot catch it. Instead the following happens: * Is the Keeper in the goal, then the ball ricochets back into the field, straight or diagonally forwards, with a maximum of five squares. Direction and distance are at the shooting player's choice. * Is the Keeper not in the goal, then the ball ricochets back into the field, straight or diagonally forwards or straight sideways, with a maximum of five squares. Direction and distance are at the shooting player's choice. Swap The game starts with a 'swap' option for the second player. One player makes up to three moves, the other chooses which side he'll play. That's it. Give it a try, you'll be the first :-* cheers, christian HanniBall © mindsports.nl - First publication at the Arimaa Forum, April 8, 2009. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Apr 9th, 2009, 8:59am We've done some playtesting today. Any enthusiasm would appear biased, so let me just say that I've found neither inconsistency nor incompleteness in the rules. Strategically I can say that it's a team sport. In actual play this is one of the first things that becomes apparent. [color=#aa0000"]a provisional board with Grand Chess pieces[/color] Tactics revolve around capture. You cannot, as a rule, in a crowded field have the ball and not risk being captured. Towards an endgame this will be another matter. Usually capture starts with one player picking up the ball (1), passing it to an opponent's piece (2) and capture that piece (3). So the capturing piece is left with the ball in possesion. Now there's a risk of a double capture: the opponent captures back the piece that is in possesion (1), passes the ball to another opponent's piece (2), and captures it (3). Of course this leaves him in possesion of the ball ... So more often than not, the ball will remain in the field, to avoid immediate capture. I'm sticking my neck out here, to convince the sceptics - whom I fully understand, and who's reactions have been equally well formulated as received - that this was (and obviously still is) the way I invented the majority of my games. This one, again, more or less put itself together with me just watching the process. This is not in any way intended as provocative, just illustrative. cheers, christian |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by Adanac on Apr 9th, 2009, 2:32pm Christian, Congrats on inventing yet another game! I really enjoy Grand Chess and I’ll try this one out too when it goes online. I’m contemplating whether it’s possible to generate a goal against a perfect defensive player. For example, if a defensive-minded player retreats all 11 players into the goal zone, can the attacker break through? If the attacker ends a turn with a ball-carrying lion 4 rows away from the goal, then the next move it threatens: 1. Shoot the ball as an Elephant 2. Move the Lion as a Knight, capturing a defender. 3. Shoot at the goal, either winning the game or sending the ball back to its team-members. The attacker has to leave an empty square 1 row outside of the goal zone for step #2 to work. But is it possible to generate such an attack without allowing the defender to break through? I can easily find such a position, but I can I force it against a perfect player? Perhaps the attacker’s strategy should be a wall of pieces just outside of the defender’s goal zone with a ball-carrying elephant behind the wall. Then: 1. Shoot the ball at a powerful defender. 2. Capture it with an adjacent elephant. 3. Shoot the ball back behind the wall. I suppose the defender’s perfect position won’t be a solid 2x5 box but actually a large box with gaps between the pieces. Is there such a box that cannot be broken? |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Apr 9th, 2009, 11:12pm on 04/09/09 at 14:32:40, Adanac wrote:
That's the plan. However, the applet is not simple, and I'd like to see/hear results of some playtesting first. It would be nice to see the game at iGGC and/or LG at some time in the future, though. on 04/09/09 at 14:32:40, Adanac wrote:
Good questions. If the attacker ends a move with a ball carrying Lion. then this Lion may be captured before it gets to the next turn. It's close to the defenders so it's more that likely that on of those can capture it in one or two moves. Most of the time, a player ending a turn with the ball in possesion does so as the result of a previous capture: getting the ball (1), passing it to an opponent's piece (2) and capturing the piece (3). Sequences of exchanges may occur in which it is important to keep in mind that: 1. if a player has the ball in possesion at the beginning of the opponent's turn, the latter may be able to capture two pieces instead of just one. 2. an exchange may have an odd number of pieces directly involved, resulting in one player capturing more often than the other. I noticed something that was not delibarately done: the squares of the back row, just outside the goal area, cannot be covered by the Keeper and allow a shot by an Elephant or Lion. It would appear hard to cover everything, because it seems hard to avoid a capturing sequenqe in the first place, if after the opening pieces start to gather around the ball. Quite another thing is: can 8 pieces be put tight around the ball? In that case the opponent cannot get to it (the knight's move is no jump). I'm not sure about that one, but I doubt whether it can be forced. But what about 5 on the side or 3 in a corner? That might be less difficult to enforce. This situation should be covered by the rules of course, but I'll have a look at it first. It will require a 'modification that emerged in playtesting', guilty as charged ;) . A simple solution would be to allow a player's Knights an Lions to jump, if and only if all squares a king's move away from the ball are occupied by opponent's pieces. Even then the opponent might try to enclose the ball with 3 pieces in a corner and 2 extra pieces occupying the squares a knights move away. Food for thought. on 04/09/09 at 14:32:40, Adanac wrote:
I think it is not very likely, in a crowded and close position, that the opponent would allow a Lion to be in possession of the ball at the beginning of the attack. If the attacking Lion did have it in possesion at the end of his previous turn, then the defender could most likely have captured it. In a crowded position, almost any piece holding the ball can be reached in two moves by some defender. So it would most likely be the result of a previous capturing sequence that left the Lion in possesion in the first place. And it's like Chess: you don't leave your strongest pieces exposed without a good reason. "Lion in possession" was one of our first red flags, yesterday. So my feeling is that tactics are on strained terms with the strategies you suggest. I can't say I'm sure though. The decisions in our games yesterday all saw quite a lot of captures, and eventually one or two players breaking through the lines, taking advantage of the reduced material. And indeed the squares left and right of the goal area on the back rows, were involved because the attacking piece, once away from the defenders, can indeed hold the ball there for one move, because the Keeper can't move outside the goal area, and thus not capture such an attacker. On the next move the Keeper cannot block the player or the ball alone, because the attacker can make a move or even two, and shoot. One modification for now: I think I'm going to call the 'knights' what they are: 'Horses'. I named the game "HanniBall" because of the Elephants, and Lions and Horses fit the name better. Ever seen a knight (in shining armour) cross the Alps? ;D |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Apr 10th, 2009, 2:12am It is possible to 'bury the ball'. If the ball, with or without piece, is in a cornersquare, say a2, and there are white pieces on b3, b4 and c3, then two additional pieces, one one a3 or a4, and one on b2 or c2, would block the opponent from getting to the ball. In the 'a4,c2' case, the ball would not even be surrounded 'king's move wise', so the above suggestion of allowing a conditional jump doesn't even solve the problem in a simple and generic way. A simple solution would be to do away with the restriction of the knight's move altogether, but that would mean losing the tactics involved in blocking the knight's move with two interposing pieces. Not too big a loss maybe, but I kind of like the analogy with real soccer: you can get past one defender quite easily, but if two are blocking your path, it's a lot harder. I'm not prepared to give up on that quite yet. Moreover it doesn't solve the above situation, where the squares a knight's move away from the ball are also blocked. Of course it's 'unsporting conduct', but the rules should cover it one way or the other. I'm thinking about it. As long as it remains the only problem emerging after playtesting, I'm quite happy :D |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Apr 10th, 2009, 4:37am Modifications I've got three modifications that have no relation to playtesting: 1. 'Knights' are renamed 'Horses'. The second one is a simplification of the 'shot at the opponent's Keeper' rules, by using one generic rule: 2. If a player shoots the ball at the opponent's Keeper, it ricochets in any of eight directions, 'queenwise', at the choice of the shooting player, not farther than 5 squares and not into the goal. This eliminates the need to specify the Keepers position as either in or outside the goal, and makes the bounce generic 'queenwise', without the need to specify 'forwards' or 'sideways'. The third one is 3-fold - I can hardly see that playing any role. Maybe at some point in endgames, but I can't even think of an example right now. Nevertheless: 3. 3-fold is a draw. The 'Buried Ball' problem Now the one modification that emerged through playtesting, concerning the 'buried ball': 4. At the end of any player's turn, the ball may not be in an area that is completely separated from the rest of the field by orthogonally connected pieces of either or both colors. In other words, there must be, at the end of any turn, a 'king's move route' out of an area surrounded by pieces, if it contains the ball. With this rule, the restrictions on jumping, for the Horse and the Lion, can remain intact, and therewith the tactics involved, and the affinity with real football in terms of being able to get past one defender, but not past two at the same time. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by jdb on Apr 10th, 2009, 6:55am After some reflection about the game, here are some comments. Elephants and Horses move and shoot in opposite ways. I assume this was done so that it takes an individual piece a full turn (ie three moves) to capture an enemy piece. Having a special case rule for the 'Buried Ball' makes it harder for people to learn the game. It would be better if the mechanics of the game made a buried ball impossible. The rules for Elephants and Horses look good, so that leaves the Lion. Modifying its powers, so it has enough mobility to get through a blockade, would eliminate the need for a special case rule. One way could be to allow the Lion to move like a queen up to three squares (but able to move through any blocking pieces) and have it shoot like a knight. In this way a Lion would need a full turn to make a capture on its own. If the ball is on the corner squares (a2, i2, etc) it takes the fewest pieces to make a blockade. Maybe removing the 4 corner squares would be effective. On a separate topic, I like the simplification of the rules regarding shooting the ball at the keeper. It looks like capturing the keeper would be a devastating advantage. What if the ball would bounce off either keeper the same way? In other words, shooting at your own keeper causes the ball to ricochet away. Also make it illegal for the keeper to possess the ball. This way the keeper is immune from capture. This also makes it impossible for the keeper to capture anyone. Looks like an interesting game. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by Adanac on Apr 10th, 2009, 9:02am on 04/10/09 at 04:37:20, christianF wrote:
I was thinking about this same issue yesterday after I commuting home last night. I was going to propose a similar rule, except that a wall would only be illegal if it's impossible for one player to reach the ball with any of his/her remaining pieces (unless one player only has a Keeper, in which case the game is either a forced win or forced draw and the wall rule ceases to apply). For example, if: (i) White has 9 pieces from a12 to i12 and (ii) Black has 8 pieces from b13 to i13 then according to my suggestion the position is legal so long as the ball is on row 12-17 (neither team is walled off from the ball). Neither player can shoot the ball to rows 1-11 until the white wall is broken. However, if I've understood your rule correctly, then the White position is illegal, regardless of ball location, because the white team has created a wall. Is that correct? If so, suppose we have a different example: the ball is in the middle of the field and there are 5 pieces forming a wall in one of the corners. Would that be illegal because part of the field is walled off, or is it OK so long as neither player tries to shoot the ball over the wall? JDB's idea of allowing lions to jump walls simplifies the rules but I think there are 2 problems: (1) If a player loses both lions, then the opponent can wall off the position and then wait 1000 moves before deciding to free that ball. (2) Leaping a lion over a wall and onto the ball amongst a throng of enemy pieces would be futile -- it would be exposed to capture without being able to accomplish anything useful. I play-tested a few scenarios today, and the opening is far more interesting than I imagined it would be. Getting to the ball first isn't the major advantage that I expected. It really takes a re-organization and co-ordination of several pieces to gain a positional advantage. One final question: had you considered other board sizes when designing the game? Because pieces move slowly, and have to move in large groups for safety, it seems that it would take a very long time for the action to move from one side of the board to the other. Perhaps a board with 11 or 13 rows would play better? |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Apr 10th, 2009, 9:51am on 04/10/09 at 06:55:47, jdb wrote:
Thanks JDB for your comments. Regarding the first point, it would not, I think, because one could lose both Lions and the problem would remain. And giving the Lions extra 'jumping power' would also require an extra rule. Regarding the second, there's some interesting play in the corners and the current shape is a soccerfield. on 04/10/09 at 06:55:47, jdb wrote:
This suggestion is a good one. I like it because it simplifies the rules and allows some interesting tactics around a player's own goal area. Consider it implemented and thank you :) |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Apr 10th, 2009, 10:01am on 04/10/09 at 09:02:38, Adanac wrote:
Hi Adanac, Thanks too. Allow me some time to look at your other examples, but you may have a point here. The size was chosen rather arbitrarily. Till now we've had no problems with it, and playing "on the counter" can make a player who has 'escaped' with the ball awfully fast (as long as he's beyond immediate capture and can hold the ball). I lost two times on that scenario, after attacking with too many pieces and just failing to push the advantage home. I think this can wait till there's a bit more experience around in the game. Fortunately my son has fallen for it :) |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by jdb on Apr 10th, 2009, 11:48am Thats a good point about the Buried Ball and piece captures. Consider a situation where one side is down to just their 4 Horses and the Keeper. The other side could have the ball on a2 (ie in the corner), and pieces on c3 and b4. The ball is not walled off, and there is no way for a Horse to get to it. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Apr 10th, 2009, 12:13pm on 04/10/09 at 11:48:49, jdb wrote:
Very good point, I'll have to reconsider my 'solution'. There should be a generic solution to the 'buried ball' problem. Also, I haven't considered Adanac's input yet. It's late, I'll sleep over it. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Apr 10th, 2009, 1:45pm on 04/10/09 at 09:02:38, Adanac wrote:
You're right, my 'solution' is far from consistent. I'll try to think along your highlighted suggestion. How to formulate it bullseye, that's the problem. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by omar on Apr 10th, 2009, 2:43pm I hadn't checked the forum in a few days and what a nice surprise I had today to read the rules of HanniBall posted by Christian and discussion over the rules. Sure brings back memories from the early days of Arimaa. Thanks Christian for choosing to post the first official rules here. Perhaps we should move the discussion into its own thread so that it will be easier to find in the future. Aamir and I will try it out this weekend and let you know how it feels :-) |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Apr 10th, 2009, 11:38pm on 04/10/09 at 14:43:53, omar wrote:
Hi Omar, thanks, and I really appreciate the chance to post an unintended invention here, and the valuable comments it has generated. You can even try the game with the modufied rules, because I think I've solved the 'buried ball' problem. 8) |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Apr 11th, 2009, 1:07am Barring the renaming of the knight as 'Horse', and 3-fold, there has been one modification (in two steps) and one addition to solve the 'buried ball' problem. The first step of the modification was the generalisation of the initial 'shots at the Keeper' rule. The second step was to make the rule even more simple and generic. This one is courtesy of JDB for which my admiration and thanks. As mentioned in the previous post, I thought I'd solved the 'buried ball' problem in a satisfactory way, and I did inasmuch as it has become a 'red card' offense against the rules. However, the definition of 'obstruction' that led to the final solution came from Adanac (see: *) for which my admiration and thanks too. So here are the modified rules, similar enough to the ones I conceived in my head, to illustrate that I was close, different enough to illustrate that some playtesting is always necessary, even for a 'game whisperer' ;) . Eventually the modifications went through a process of simplification, which is almost always the right way to go. http://i44.tinypic.com/eitwd2.jpg © mindsports.nl HanniBall is a two-player abstract boardgame invented by Christian Freeling the 6th, 7th and 8th of April 2009, without board or pieces, as a 'mental exercise'. In the days following its invention, some important modifications were suggested by members of this Forum, for which I'd like to thank all posters, in particular Adanac, JDB and Omar. Board The board is a rectangle of 9x15 squares, with two additional goals of 1x3 squares. There are two 'goal areas' of 2x5 squares. Both players, White and Black, have 11 pieces: 1 Keeper, 2 Lions, 4 Elephants and 4 Horses. The diagram shows the board with the pieces in the initial position. The ball lies in the centersquare. Object The object of HanniBall is to shoot the ball into the opponent's goal. If a player shoots the ball into his own goal, he has lost. Moving and capturing On his turn a player is allowed to make up to three moves. A 'move' may be: 1. Moving a piece that does not have the ball. 2. Moving a piece that does have the ball. 3. Shooting the ball. Shooting the ball can only be done by a piece that has the ball in its possesion. The pieces move and shoot as follows: * The Horse moves as the knight in Chess, but may not jump to its target square if both the in between squares are occupied by pieces. A Horse shoots the ball 'king's move' wise. If a Horse shoots the ball, it lands on a straight or diagonally adjacent square. * The Elephant moves as the king in Chess. An Elephant shoots the ball 'knight's move' wise. If an Elephant shoots the ball, it lands on a square one knight's move away, no restrictions. * The Lion combines the options of Knight and Elephant, so it moves and shoots either way in any combination. * The Keeper combines the options of the 'Horse' and the queen in Chess, but may not leave the goal area (except for the goal itself). A Keeper shoots the ball up to five squares away, queenwise. Direction and distance are the shooting player's choice. * Only the Keeper is allowed to enter the goal, the other pieces are not. Inside the goal the Keeper should not have the ball in its possession, because a ball inside the own goal ends the game in a win for the opponent. The Ball The Ball may land on any square, whether or not occupied. * If a piece moves to a square where the ball is, it takes possession of the ball. * If the ball lands on a square occupied by a piece, other than a Keeper, the piece takes possesion of the ball. * If a player is in possesion of the ball, and it is his turn, and he has still one or more move options left, than he can do one of the following. 1. Shoot the ball. 2. Move the piece and take the ball along. 3. Move the piece and leave the ball. 4. Move another piece. * If a player is in possesion of the ball, and it is not his turn, then the piece holding the ball can be captured by the opponent. Capture is by replacement. The captured piece is taken off the board, and the capturing piece takes possession of the ball. Please note that if a player shoots the ball to an opponent's piece, and he has still one or more move options left, he can capture that piece! Shots at the goal or the keeper * If a player shoots the ball into the opponent's goal, he wins the game. If he shoots it into his own goal he loses. * If the ball is shot to a square occupied by a Keeper of either side, the ball 'ricochets' off the Keeper, queenwise, upto 5 squares, but not into the goal. Direction and distance are determined by the shooting player, whether the shot is directed at a player's own Keeper or the opponent's Keeper. Note that a Keeper can only take possession of the ball by picking it up in the goal area, or by capturing a piece there, that is in possesion of the ball. A Keeper in possesion of the ball risks capture like any other piece. Obstruction Obstruction is a 'red card' offense against the rules. It is permitted, but may and usually will be punished. * If a player on his turn finds a position in which he has at least one piece other than a Keeper, and not one of his pieces can reach the ball in any number of moves, then the opponent has committed obstruction and the player to move may (but is not obliged to) remove one of the blocking pieces from the board as his first move. * 3-fold If a player on his move can for the third time recreate an identical position, he can claim a draw. Swap The game starts with a 'swap' option for the second player. One player makes up to three moves, the other chooses which side he'll play. cheers, christian HanniBall © mindsports.nl - Second publication at the Arimaa Forum, April 11, 2009. * Definition of obstruction courtesy of Adanac, suggested in a following post and applied in this version afterwards. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Apr 11th, 2009, 9:11am 2B fair, with the ball on a2 (corner) and a white wall of pieces on a4, b2, b3, b4, there's a vacant kingfield, a3, and a vacant knightfield, c3, while black cannot penetrate. So there remains a formal problem, demanding regulation, no doubt, but as far as practical play goes, it doesn't seem easily enforcable. For starters you must get the ball first and by the time you're back with it, the opponent is all over the place and can prevent any walling off. But it might yet be an option now and again. Any suggestions? A draw? There's still the option to give Horses and Lions the right to jump. The whole problem will then cease to exist, and the rules would be simplfied. But it would lose the tactics involved in blocking Horses and Lions, and those seem nice enough tactics that are in line with soccer, where you can get past one defender easily but not past two. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by Adanac on Apr 11th, 2009, 10:05am on 04/11/09 at 09:11:36, christianF wrote:
I think this rule would be easy to understand and prevent all types of obstruction: Suppose white has created a wall and it's black's turn to move: If black cannot possibly reach the ball with any piece within an infinite number of moves, then white has violated the obstruction rule. ** Using the same example I used earlier: (i) White has 9 pieces from a12 to i12 and (ii) Black has 8 pieces from b13 to i13 (iii) the ball is located between rows 2-11 If it's black's turn to move then white has clearly violated the obstruction rule as no black piece can possibly reach the ball given an infinite number of moves. If the ball were in rows 12-16 then it's OK because both teams have access to the ball. ** unless black only has a keeper remaining in which case it's a forced win for white and the obstruction rule does not apply. EDIT: unless the lone keeper is holding the ball against a single enemy horse in which case it's a draw. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Apr 11th, 2009, 10:35am on 04/11/09 at 10:05:36, Adanac wrote:
I think you're right, and it's easily checked too. However, I've also come to like the idea of the 'red card' and the removal of a piece as a penalty, so it may not be necessary to actually forbid obstruction as you define it, just to give the opponent the right to penalize it if it happens by removing one of the obstructing pieces as his first move. Gives more of a 'soccer flavor'. I've even considered "Choccer" as a name, an unlikely mix of Chess and Soccer. There's also an implication to realize: the definition of obstruction remains the same if a player has only Elephants or Horses left, but the actual type of blockade that causes obstruction changes. In any case you and JDB have earned the right to be mentioned in the credits :) The modification discussed here has been introduced in the rules @ post #39 (http://arimaa.com/arimaa/forum/cgi/YaBB.cgi?board=other;action=display;num=1236541162;start=30#39) afterwards |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by Adanac on Apr 11th, 2009, 2:09pm Does anyone want to play a game of HaniBall (or Choccer if you prefer), by e-mail? Untimed, of course, but I'd like to play at a pace of roughly 1 move per day. If so, just send your first move to grmagne@yahoo.com For notation how about something like: 1w Hb4-c6 Eb3-b4 Ke1-d1 If the elephant on i16 is shooting the ball then the notation can be Bi16-h14 (B for ball). If the elephant carries the ball then EBi16-i15. If a piece is removed then use an X such as Hb4Xc6 (similar to chess). Grand Chess is a lot of fun too. If anyone wants to play against me, the website is http://www.mindsports.nl/index.php/players-section/ListGames.cgi?game=GrandChess |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Apr 11th, 2009, 2:27pm on 04/11/09 at 14:09:14, Adanac wrote:
That seems fun, it's too late now, over here, but you can expect my move (or yours, if swapped) tomorrow. Thanks again for your contribution :). I'm christian-at-mindsports.nl ************************* It's Monday the 13th now and the game between Adanac and yours truly has begun. Meanwhile the game has been renamed "Choccer" and the pieces may be renamed too, eventually - the 'animals' came with the name 'HanniBall'. Also, this game may have some commercial potentional, but hardly as a pure strategy game. That's why I have come up with a variant that introduces the 'hand of fate'. It's called "Choccer-6" and in it the number of moves a player has on his turn, is determined by the roll of a normal six-sided die, all else being the same. The average number of moves in this game is 3.5, but the distribution of the actual number of moves will ensure many 'twists of fate' and make for a much faster game, more suited for beginning players. Just thought I'd let you all know :) . |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Apr 13th, 2009, 4:31am More news, more thoughts 3-fold and the 'swap' may be unnecessary in Choccer. Ed van Zon suggested '4-moves-per-turn' as a variant, and I agree. It would make the character of the game somewhat wilder: 1. A piece can grab the ball (1), play it to an opponent (2), capture the opponent (3) and kick the ball (4) therewith avoiding capture itself, or ... 2. A piece can get to the ball in two moves (2), play it to an opponent (3) capture the opponent (4) and stay in possesion of the ball, therewith risking capture. So a 'turn' can have both a different and more of an impact. The 'hands-of-fate' variant mentioned above neatly fits in between with 3.5 moves on average. Then there's this: I've googled around to see whether blending Chess with Soccer, however unintended, was an original idea. It's isn't, in fact: far from it. Most attempts were deliberate and resulted in very different games. One however is fairly similar, especially at first glance. It has been invented by João Pedro Neto, a fellow inventor with whom I've been in contact for many years and who's work I value very highly. His Internet Home (http://homepages.di.fc.ul.pt/~jpn/) has always been prominent in the mindsports linkpages, and his game Gonnect (http://homepages.di.fc.ul.pt/~jpn/gv/gonnect.htm) is featured (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/side-dishes/interesting-games?start=9) at mindsports. His version, dating from November 1997, can be found at the Chess Variant Pages ('crossover games'). It is called Soccer Chess (http://www.chessvariants.com/crossover.dir/soccer.html). The similarities are obvious: 11 chesstype players, who can obtain and kick the ball on a similar playing area with the same goal (literally), though his field measures 11x17 while Choccer uses 9x15. There are '5-moves-per-turn', however the moves must be made with different players. The other differences soon become obvious. Soccer Chess is more of a long range game, more 'soccerlike' if you want, where the ball may range from one side of the field to the opposite side in one shot. Less 'soccerlike' is the fact that many players move as far as the ball does in one move, as rooks, bishops as queens, which makes it a far more a game of 'surprise tactics' than Choccer (although there's no lack of surprise tactics there). More importantly, pieces may not move with the ball and cannot keep it in possesion: the ball must be 'kicked' as part of the same move - very modern, considering the 'one contact' school of play that has become so prominent in soccer. Most importantly, pieces cannot be captured or 'red carded'. All of this makes Soccer Chess more 'soccer' than 'chess', while Choccer leans towards the reverse. There's no 'hands-of-fate' variant included, though a die to determine the number of move a player is allowed to make, could be applied the same way as in Choccer-6. cheers, christian |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by omar on Apr 14th, 2009, 10:12am I drew the board on a sheet of paper, cut out some disc pieces out of paper; labeled them with red and blue markers and tried it out. I didn't play it with Aamir yet, but I tried playing both sides myself. As soon as I started playing, I thought there should be a Zillions of Games file for this. It is difficult to play test new games without it. Even though Zillion won't play games like this very well, it is helpful because it can make sure that you aren't making illegal moves, can easily take back and redo moves and it automatically records the moves, which you can easily email to human opponents. Christian you might want get a ZRF file made for this. If you are not familiar with ZRF programming you might want to post over at the Zillions of Games forum and see if someone can help you with it. Some thoughts on the game. At first I tried to have a couple lions from one side go forward and score, but found that as soon they near the opponents side of the board, they become vulnerable to being captured. So a quick offensive strategy won't work. Though initially I thought capturing pieces in a soccer game was weird, I can see why it is needed to prevent one side or the other from hogging the ball. It also makes the ball a bit of a weapon :-). It is not really the opponents pieces that can hurt you; they need the ball to do it. It also adds an interesting twist between your pieces wanting to get close to the ball and away from it (to avoid capture). Also the captures are needed to add committal moves to the game. Without committal moves games can easily become non-progressive. I am not good enough at the game to know if captures can always be avoided. But even if they can the threat of captures may be enough to keep the game progressing forward. The amount of change per move did feel a bit overwhelming to me; especially with different pieces moving/shooting in different ways. Can't really say much more by playing just one game, but one thing for sure is that games like this need to be play tested a lot. Good luck with the game Christian. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by Fritzlein on Apr 14th, 2009, 10:46am I haven't playtested Choccer at all, but just from looking at the rules I would be concerned about piece density. It seems like it would be difficult for the game to be good both when the pieces are strung out sparsely across the board, and good when the pieces are all clumped in one area. More specifically, the rules must make it possible to defeat defensive play where one player clumps all of his pieces in front of goal and merely tries to avoid being captured (three-step strategy: jump out to the ball, kick the ball away, jump home to safety). But I would worry that rules which can handle the defensive huddle won't also make for a good game when pieces aren't all near each other. Given the obvious advantage of massed pieces that mutually protect each other, there needs to be a compensating advantage of spreading out pieces. In Go, for example, there is the strength/territory tradeoff where players are continually torn between playing thinly and playing thickly. Will well-played Choccer be a slow-moving game because the pieces stay clumped of necessity, and therefore you have two mobs slowly pushing each other forward and back? I eagerly await the reports of the playtesters. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Apr 14th, 2009, 12:29pm on 04/14/09 at 10:12:42, omar wrote:
Hi Omar, thanks for your kind comments. As for Zillions, Ed van Zon, my partner in crime, has done a load of games for Zillions and is already working on this one :) . |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Apr 14th, 2009, 12:37pm on 04/14/09 at 10:46:58, Fritzlein wrote:
Hi Fritzlein, I understand your comments, but my feeling is you worry too much ;) . It's hard to avoid excanges in close contact. 'Merely' avoiding capture isn't all that easy. Material dwindles. Meanwhile there are now 'officially' three variants: 3-moves per turn, 4-moves per turn (you will appreciate the impications regarding capture) and 1-6 moves, depending on a die. That's the 'commecial angle': quick games, dramatic turns of events, beginning players can win. Also, the keepers shot and ricochet range has been extended from 5 to 6 squares. I'm enjoying a game against Adanac by mail :) cheers, christian |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by Fritzlein on Apr 14th, 2009, 3:13pm on 04/14/09 at 12:37:34, christianF wrote:
I get that a lot. :) Worrying is one of my strengths, but I can see how it would be an obstacle to an inventor/innovator. Anyway, if I believe my own arguments, I should shut up and playtest, because I'm not going to be able to deduce anything from the rules alone. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Apr 15th, 2009, 3:12am I've chewed a bit on 'Choccer' but I got trouble swallowing it. I think I'll revert to 'HanniBall'. It isn't soccer anyway ... ::) ... it's an old Carthaginian ball game, played in between feeding Romans to the Lions. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Apr 15th, 2009, 10:17pm
This is the position after white-9 in the game between Adanac (black) and me. No clogging or clumping till now 8) Note: there should be an Elephant (rook) on h3. I found it under the table. My cat's name is Simba >:( . |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Apr 18th, 2009, 2:25am
* = ball According to the 'broad definition' in the MindSports site: "Strategy games have strategies varied enough to allow different styles of play, tactics varied enough to induce their own terminology, and a structure that allows advantageous sub-goals to be achieved as calculable signposts along the way. Tactical games have strategies that are either fairly obvious (however deep), like Pente, or fairly obscure, like Othello." HanniBall leans towards the tactical. No pawns. 'Advantageous sub-goals' boil down to winning a piece or forcing an actual breakthrough in which a piece 'escapes' with the ball and cannot be stopped. The advantage in the latter case may dwindle if the piece fails to score. The ball goes around rather quickly, so running after it with as many pieces as possible seems rather pointless. No clogging or clumping in sight. We've declined several exchanges, but now I've traded a Horse for an Elephant - not sure about their relative strenght, but Horses are more mobile. 13. Hd4-f5-d6-c8 serves to protect the Horse on d10 that risks capture by 13. ... Lcd9/*d9-10/Hf11xd10 The game seems to behave properly, but we should be able to establish that more objectively in about two weeks time, when Ed will have the first version of the Zillions implementation ready (without the 1-6 random version, but with both 3 or 4 moves per turn). |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Apr 19th, 2009, 12:54am on 04/18/09 at 02:25:45, christianF wrote:
For the start of the game I'm reverting to a 'swap' that will be the same for all versions (3 moves per turn, 4 moves per turn and 1-6 moves per turn). The first player wil make a number of white moves up to the maximum of the chosen variant (3, 4 or 6, inclusive). The second player then decides whether to play white or black. In the 1-6 version this first turn is the only one that is performed without the use of a die to determine the number of moves. The implementation of a 'swap' in Zillions is not easy because it's not built into the system, but according to Ed it can be done. Meanwhile Adanac launched a sudden attack that brought the ball to h2, and almost succeeded. It forced my Horse and Keeper into an emergency 'ricochet' cooperation (the only escape, I was very lucky to find that line) that sent the ball to the leftcenter.
* = ball ^ = ricochet The position after white-16 |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by Adanac on Apr 19th, 2009, 10:00am on 04/14/09 at 10:46:58, Fritzlein wrote:
I had also expected a lot of clumping and thought that the best strategies might involve large walls of pieces that that block off key squares and shield off the enemy from the ball. However, the ball has been moving around the field so quickly that neither of those things has occurred in my game against Christian. I also wonder about how easy it is to score once a material advantage has been established. Scoring with a lion seems easy enough but can 2 elephants score against a single lion and a keeper, for example? Probably, but we haven't reached that stage yet :-/ |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Apr 19th, 2009, 12:47pm on 04/14/09 at 10:46:58, Fritzlein wrote:
on 04/19/09 at 10:00:49, Adanac wrote:
In fact my trust in what shaped itself in my head was the reason to engage in a 'live on stage' invention process in the first place, and this trust appears to be justified. That's why I have published the game in the "almost complete games" section of MindSports too, now, with due reference to JDB's and Anadac's contributions: HanniBall (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/side-dishes/more-games-by-cf?start=22) Shortly the story of its genesis will be part of the Epilogue of my essay on game inventing. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by Fritzlein on Apr 19th, 2009, 1:43pm on 04/19/09 at 12:47:02, christianF wrote:
Heh, I'd say it's a mixed verdict so far. Why do you have variants of three actions per turn or four actions per turn if you can tell in advance which would make a better game? But I would quickly concede this: you can see from the rules how the game will behave better than I can see from the rules how the game will behave. I'm not trying to pit my game-inventing instincts against yours; the unresolved tension in my mind is between instinct and play testing. Although you may have enough evidence from the games of Hanni-Ball you have already played, and Adanac's report is independent verification, the jury is still out in my mind. I still believe that it is difficult to know how the game will behave when it is played well. To know that one must have players who play the game well, right? As evidence for my claim, I hold up early Arimaa games which were replete with captures and goal races. Only after the players developed a certain skill level did it emerge that Arimaa is a rather defensive game, and races are the exception rather than the rule. From the bare rules I wouldn't have worried that Arimaa might be a defensive stalemate; that worry was emergent given the way experts played a year after the game's Internet release. You would have really knocked my socks off if you could have definitively said that Rekushu was or wasn't a defensive draw without playing it. All of which is not to say that you exaggerate your prophetic abilities. I say only that my limited information doesn't let me see that you can do what you claim. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Apr 19th, 2009, 11:45pm on 04/19/09 at 13:43:20, Fritzlein wrote:
I'll settle for a mixed verdict. As for three or four moves, it basically remains the same game, but the 4-moves variant will give more room for opportunism, because the margin for tactical mistakes is wider. I'm not saying the comparison goes all the way, but I cannot "see" which bordsize would be the best for Hex. Players may prefer different sizes for different reasons, but Hex is still Hex. on 04/19/09 at 13:43:20, Fritzlein wrote:
If that's 'by definition', then there's no argument, is there? My claims could be discarded as being silly and baseless. In my statement I also added "more or less". Not all games have the 'organic' qualties that enable me to 'identify' with a game mechanism and I've never claimed I could foresee the behaviour of any given game. on 04/19/09 at 13:43:20, Fritzlein wrote:
Some might add "and rightly so" ;) . I ressurrected it just yesterday as Square Off (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/side-dishes/more-games-by-cf?start=15). It's not in any way like Rekushu, except that it blends configuration mechanics with a territorial theme. I've also added it to the 'miscellaneous' section of the essay. on 04/19/09 at 13:43:20, Fritzlein wrote:
Don't worry, I actually do exaggetate sometimes, and there's no definite answer as long as experience with HanniBall is so limited. Moreover it may remain limited - "you can take a player to a board, but you can't make him play", to paraphrase an equine proverb. And even if HanniBall should turn out to be a game that can handle the pressure of accumulating strategical insight, it would not in any way 'prove' my claim, only make it less outrageous. For the record, I do feel that HanniBall would withstand the pressure, but making a fair prediction of, say, a margin of draws, can be very difficult. It took over a century of grandmaster games to establish that 10x10 International Checkers indeed does have a problematic margin if played on the highest level, especially in match play (as opposed to tournament play). It's a great game, but a slightly flawed 'weapon'. Which is to say that everything, after all, is relative. cheers, christian |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Apr 20th, 2009, 1:47am
* = ball ^ = ricochet Position after white-20 http://i41.tinypic.com/4lj23p.jpg Note that the ball was still on h2 after black-15 and is now on a16 after white-20. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Apr 21st, 2009, 2:15am I've uploaded the lot in the mindsports site, though 'a late arrival' still must be added to the essay's menu (a bit tricky for me, so I'll leave it for Ed, presumably tonight). HanniBall (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/side-dishes/more-games-by-cf?start=22) A late arrival (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/how-i-invented-games-and-why-not/434)
* = ball ^ = ricochet This is better: position after white-22
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by Adanac on Apr 21st, 2009, 2:44pm on 04/21/09 at 02:15:44, christianF wrote:
I’m not falling for that trick :o I’ll decline both captures and kick the ball upfield instead. 22. Hd10-e12-c13/Hc8-d10 Eb15-a14/*a14-b12-c10 |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Apr 21st, 2009, 11:26pm on 04/21/09 at 14:44:44, Adanac wrote:
It was worth a try :)
^ = ricochet position after white-24 http://i39.tinypic.com/1ooq37.gif |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Apr 23rd, 2009, 2:00am
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Apr 23rd, 2009, 5:48am
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Apr 23rd, 2009, 10:55pm
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Apr 24th, 2009, 7:56am
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Apr 24th, 2009, 11:58pm
Congrats Adanac, on winning the first ever recorded game of HanniBall ;D ! On a personal note on 03/16/09 at 08:11:28, Ciribot wrote:
That's why I feel priviliged that HanniBal 'happened'. And I didn't 'look at a board'. I looked at Jeson Mor and my mind wrapped itself around a kind of 'advanced' Jeson Mor with a 'grab-the-treasure-and-run' theme. I am familiar with that 'wrapping' process - that's what the essay is in part about. It took over unexpectedly and uninvitedly. There was nothing deliberate about it and it left me somewhat surprised at the outcome, because mechanisms employing chess type pieces usually aren't all that 'organic'. And in my mind it feels like an organism or a certain spirit taking shape. The pieces and the unusual capturing mechanism came first, the board and the actual numbers came last. This is how it happens, and I can't change it. Neither can I decide to 'invent another game', and nor do I want to. on 03/08/09 at 18:30:08, Fritzlein wrote:
You're right, can't very well deny that, except that I haven't much 'knowledge' to share. For one thing: I can't explain what happens during the 'autoshaping' process. I don't know where the pieces of HanniBall came from, but there was never an alternative because they 'fitted' the organism. The unusual capturing mechanism fell into place almost at the same time, without any deliberation. I have always trusted the systems that evolved 'of their own accord', so I implicitly trust HanniBall. That's my prerogative, and I don't expect anyone to follow suit. For me the first 'serious' game revealed exactly what I expected in terms of behaviour, despite the fact that playing any new game feels like riding a bike for the first time. My judgement is inductive and therefore of little value to the objective observer. However, the same objective observer has seen a game that evolved in my head over the course of two days slip into it's final shape with, barring some details, only two modifications. I want to thank JDB again for the generalization of the 'ball on the keeper' rule. That fits perfectly. I want to thank Anadac again for bypassing my lame suggestions to solve the obstruction problem, and getting right to the core of it. It underlines my feeling that if the system is sound (this is not to be taken for granted, nor will it, hopefully) the rule will be there. And Adanac had no trouble finding it. On a general note Barring platitudes as 'pieces having to cooperate', I'm still very much in the dark about strategy. The first thing to notice is the risk of having the ball in possession at the end of one's turn, in a field full of players (unless a player got his bases covered in terms of exchanges). In the early stages the ball therefore is mostly kept 'afloat', which means that it has a tendency to go around rather fast. In our game. on white 16 the ball was on h2, four moves later it was on a16, admittedly with a ricochet involved, but then, I got the feeling that ricochets will be part of defensive strategy quite often. With the keeper on d17 and an elephant on b16, the opponent cannot leave a ball next to the elephant, because it can take possesion, return to b16 and ricochet off the keeper to midfield. It's just an example of the general idea of putting the keeper on the correct ricochet distance of a defender. In the later stages, things change. A player who keeps the ball in possession, moves both the piece and the ball, doing in one move what in the earlier stages would take two. So when material has dwindled beyond a certain density, a player 'running with the ball' becomes an increasingly important factor: you'll have to stop the piece before it slaloms through the defense. See the end of my game against Adanac. My opionions don't matter. The verdict on HanniBall is open. Next weekend it will be available on Zillions so many can put it to the test. And I hope many do and comment on their findings. Enjoy :) christian |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by Fritzlein on Apr 25th, 2009, 7:52am Thanks, Christian, for posting the moves to your game with diagrams so that it was easy to follow to the dramatic finish. The increasing tempo you describe sounds similar to what happens in Arimaa and shogi: the more captures have happened, the more the position becomes razor-sharp. I didn't anticipate the consequences of being able to run with the ball. If HanniBall is sharp enough with only 3 actions per turn, then 4 actions per turn seems likely to make the game worse. But 4 actions per turn is unnecessary only if 3 actions per turn is sharp enough in the opening as well as the endgame. I'm so enmeshed in Arimaa that I'm unlikely to be play-testing HanniBall, but I hope someone else tests it because I am curious about the result. When strategy is better understood, will the gameplay look anything like it did in this game? (For Arimaa the answer was no...) Thanks for sharing your latest game with the Arimaa community first. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Apr 25th, 2009, 8:18am on 04/25/09 at 07:52:11, Fritzlein wrote:
Fair chance it will not. I remember seeing some very early Havannah games years later. It didn't resemble 'Havannah' very much. This probably holds for any strategy game. On the other hand, HanniBall may lean more towards a 'tactical' game, where strategy remains fairly obscure. Let's therefore say I hope it didn't look too much like hypothetical future games. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by Adanac on Apr 25th, 2009, 8:41am Technically, I recorded my final move incorrectly as I meant to play: 28. Ef3-f5/Kg2-g3 *g7-f5/Lg7xf5/L*f5-f4 (oops :-[ ) In any event, it was a lot of fun to try out a new game that combines strategy and tactics in original ways. Strengths 1. With a cluster of slow-moving, slow-shooting pieces on a large field, I had expected the action would be slow. But my game against Christian was surprisingly fast-paced with frequent ball movement and momentum shifts. 2. Playing a game that blends soccer, chess & even arimaa themes is quite fun! While a 4-step variant would make HaniBall more arimaa-like ;), the 3-step variant has an amazing side benefit... 3. I completely overlooked this when I first read the rules, but the 3-step version of HaniBall (the version used in our e-mail game) has a brilliant feature that I never would have expected from such a tactical game: as long as both players are careful not to blunder a piece away, virtually all trades are 1-for-1. This unique concept implies that: (a) This would be an excellent anti-computer game because the human can focus on strategy without worrying too much about tactical blunders. (b) Beginners can have fun playing against experts. As long as the new player learns some basic lessons about positioning & mutual protection, the material should always be fairly balanced. This is in sharp contrast to virtually every other tactical game where a beginner will always fall behind in material very early in the game. (c) Games are most often decided by strategy rather than unfortunate blunders. Weaknesses There are 2 weaknesses, but I’m optimistic that both can be solved quite easily. 1. The lions are far too powerful relative to the other pieces. While an attack with only a few horses and/or elephants is very easy to stop, lions are quite dangerous. However, lions are also extremely powerful defenders covering a full radius of 5 squares plus about half the squares 6 steps away. One player might choose to keep both lions back leading to… 2. A defensive player can create an iron curtain by keeping 2 lions back, supported by a few other defenders. My game against Christian was very offence-focused because we both used lions on the attack. I’ve tested a few scenarios and it seems impossible to score against a talented and determined defender that keeps both lions back. Obviously, if perfect defensive play makes it impossible to score then this will be a fatal weakness in the design. Whether this is true or not will soon be revealed on zillions. Possible Solutions I think HaniBall is a potentially great game that needs only a few minor tweaks to overcome the impossibility of scoring against a perfect defender: 1. Add extra kicking power to horses and elephants. This simultaneously solves both of the weaknesses mentioned above. Possibilities include: (a) Horses can shoot in any of the eight directions at a distance of 1, 2 or 3 squares. (b) Elephants can shoot in an L pattern of 2-1 or 3-2 or 4-3 (i.e. the last option would be 4 square in one direction and 3 in the other). (c) Lions would still kick like either a chess king or knight (no change from the current rules). I believe that a Lion would still be the strongest piece due to its fast and flexible movement. 2. If option #1 doesn’t work, perhaps just make pieces stronger in the attacking zone than the defending zone. This isn’t realistic, however, and I’d much prefer the previous suggestion. 3. Adding a second ball would greatly increase the offensive chances, but it would completely destroy the soccer theme. Again, I’d much prefer the first suggestion. If someone can demonstrate that it *is* possible to score against a perfect defender then I suppose my suggestions are pointless. But if I’m right, then this game needs a bit of a fix. I’m confident that HaniBall can easily become a classic strategy game with 1 or 2 very minor rule changes. :) |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by Fritzlein on Apr 25th, 2009, 11:01am on 04/25/09 at 08:41:10, Adanac wrote:
on 04/14/09 at 12:37:34, christianF wrote:
So, we have diametrically competing claims. I demand a rematch under the condition that Adanac can't win by scoring goal, he can only win by preventing goal for 100 moves. Christian doesn't have to worry about defending; he can move up all his pieces except the keeper in an effort to score. The stakes are whether or not the HanniBall rules as written are fatally flawed. The outcome will also indirectly support or undermine Christian's claim that he can see from the rules how a game will play. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by Tuks on Apr 25th, 2009, 11:20am that sounds like a good way of finding out if its a viable flaw, hopefully the attacker wins! |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Apr 25th, 2009, 11:22am on 04/25/09 at 11:01:49, Fritzlein wrote:
That seems like a correct assessment and an interesting proposition. I hope Adanac will agree - I'm all in for it :) . on 04/25/09 at 08:41:10, Adanac wrote:
In the very early days of modern Chess, when the queen was just introduced, it was sometimes called the 'mad queen' because its power seemed so unbridled within the context of the still existing Shatransj community. Nowadays no player would consider the queen outside the bounds of balance. It's not easy to establish at face value whether a piece is too strong. HanniBall is not Chess however. Chess dwells in the highest realms of strategy, while HanniBall is a recreational pastime with no higher ambitions than intelligent fun. There's no 'strategical framework' that keeps a piece within bounds. So I really can't tell - my feeling is that the pieces and their division are balanced, but that's only due to my implicit trust in the process of its genesis. The questions Adanac raises however, are very legitimate. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by Adanac on Apr 25th, 2009, 9:10pm on 04/25/09 at 11:01:49, Fritzlein wrote:
I'll accept against all challengers. I hope a few people take a shot at it (I have an Excel spreadsheet with a formatted HaniBall board if that helps). To speed things up, how about this...we'll fast-forward to the endgame and the game ends after: 1. 100 moves 2. admission that it's impossible to score 3. a goal --> :-[ :o :-[ Choose one of the following scenarios (or multiple scenarios if anyone wishes) and try to score on me: 1. White: E-E on d2 & f2 // Black: E-E on d10 & f10 2. White: L on e2 // Black: E-E on d10 & f10 3. White: L on e2 // Black: H-H on d10 & f10 4. White: L-L on d2 & f2 // Black: L-L on d10 & f10 5. White: E-H-E on c2-e2-g2 // Black: E-H-E on c10-e10-g10 6. White: H-E-L on c2-e2-g2 // Black: H-E-L on c10-e10-g10 7. White: E-E-E on c2-e2-g2 // Black: H-H-H on c10-e10-g10 8. White: L-E-L on c2-e2-g2 // Black: H-H-E-H-H on a10-c10-e10-g10-i10 9. White: L-H-L on c2-e2-g2 // Black: E-E-E-E on a10-c10-g10-i10 10.White: E-H-L-H-E on a2-c2-e2-g2-i2 // Black: E-H-L-H-E on a10-c10-e10-g10-i10 Rules - The ball begins on e9 and the White Keeper on e1 in every scenario. - I will never advance any of my pieces beyond the 9th row. - I will play with the white pieces in every game. - Otherwise, all the standard 3-step HaniBall rules apply, including the new 6 square rule for Keeper shots & ricochets. Quote:
For the record, this isn’t my intent. I think HaniBall has tremendous potential and I’m very curious as to whether it’s possible to score in these 10 scenarios. If the game needs a only minor rule tweak to make it work, I won't lose any sleep over it ;) |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Apr 26th, 2009, 2:16am on 04/25/09 at 21:10:02, Adanac wrote:
Neither will I, the game is after all more important than my ego, and I'm as curious as you are. I'll have to take a closer look at the scenarios first though. I'm flattered by the 'tremendous potential', but the question is 'as what'? On our homepage is stated: Quote:
These 'advantageous sub-goals' ... Chess is full of them. But HanniBall must do without a strategical framework such as is for instance provided by pawns. The only permanent sub-goal would be winning a piece, but barring that, the game is far more volatile in that it is difficult to imagine any more or less permanent sub-goal. Like a soccer match really. So I would label HanniBall a tactical game with a 'fairly obscure' strategy. This may have some commercial potential (whishful thinking, more likely) but for me it remains a possible intelligent recreational pastime rather than a 'strategy game'. No value judgement implied. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Apr 26th, 2009, 4:25am on 04/25/09 at 21:10:02, Adanac wrote:
Adanac, I've looked at the first couple (I'd add White: L on e2 // Black: H on d10, E on f10) but wouldn't it be better to have info on one-on-one endgames first? Here's a table I tend to fill. The defender (White) using the Keeper and a piece. The attacker (Black) using only a piece and starting with the ball from the center spot. Say + if the attacker wins, = if it's a draw.
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Title: Cancelling a rule / Zillions game available! Post by christianF on Apr 26th, 2009, 7:41am I've had a look at an attacking Horse against a defending Elephant and the outcome leads me to the conclusion that there slipped a superfluous rule into the game. Guilty as charged! :-[ The rule that players are not allowed in the goals appears to needlessly favor the defender. So I've omitted it. It boils down to cancelling one sentence. The rule slipped in on a misplaced sense of esthetics. It's omission is in line with a point already made by the more sceptical section of the forum, by Fritzlein for instance, that a defensive strategy may lead to problems. On top of that, Ed just called with the announcement of the first moves made by Zillions. Zillions, according to Ed's first impression, favors a defensive strategy as well*. It's to soon to say to which extend, because dwindling material makes a game more 'decision prone', but there's no reason for an explicit rule that favors defensive play, in particular if the game is better off without it. The omission of the rule implies that all players now may be anywhere on the field, including the goals. Nothing changes with regard to a ball in the goal, with or without a player of whatever side: the game ends in a win for the other Keeper's side. A piece other than the Keeper in the own goal has no great defensive potential, because a ball shot at it lands in the goal just the same, and the opponent wins. It at most can prevent an attacking piece from entering the goal, ball and all. Important The cancelling of the rule will certainly have consequences for the scenarios that Adanac suggests to test defensive strategies. More precisely: it will turn out to favor the attacker! Now back to the one-on-ones. The attackers main concern is of course to avoid being captured while approaching the goal:
* The Zillions game is available in a bèta-0.3 version, albeit without implementation of the obstruction rule, but also already without the rule I omitted above. download HanniBall (beta 0.3) from the rules page (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/side-dishes/more-games-by-cf?start=22#zillions) download HanniBall (beta 0.3) directly (http://mindsports.nl/Download/Freeware/HanniBall_0.3_Zillions.zip) Meanwhile Ed has reason to reconsider the degree to which to program 'plays defensively' - if given half a chance it does indeed attack. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by Adanac on Apr 26th, 2009, 11:37am on 04/26/09 at 04:25:45, christianF wrote:
IMPORTANT NOTE: I examined these scenarios before seeing Christian's new rule regarding nets. The key difference is that Horses can now win against Elephants and Horse versus Horse is much easier. Otherwise, the same analysis applies. Horse vs. Elephant Attacker: Black Horse & ball on e10 Defender: White Elephant on e2 With perfect play I believe this is a draw. A ball-carrying horse is a threat to score anywhere from rows 2-6. However, if the white elephant steps up to e3 it benefits from Keeper protection while covering all 35 squares in b2:h6. The black horse will need to score between a2:a6 or i2:i6. 1. Ee2-e3 H*e10-a5 2. Ke1-d2 H*a5-c4-a3 3. Kd2-c2/Ee3-c4 Draw In this position, the horse flees with the ball and the elephant returns to e3. The key is that the elephant did not de-centralize until required. It would have been a blunder to make an unnecessary early decentralization: 1. Ee2-e3 H*e10-a5 2. Ke1-d2/E3-c4 H*a5-g4 Goal-in-one Elephant vs. Horse Attacker: Black Elephant & ball on e10 Defender: White Horse on e2 A defending horse can capture a ball-carrying attack over the vast majority of squares over a 5 square radius. However, there are key squares that a horse cannot reach within its 3 step allotment: 2-2 (two steps in one direction, two in the other) 4-4 5-1 5-3 So, with a defending horse on b8, for example, an attacker should carry the ball to a square such as d6 or f4. I think the ideal square for a defending horse is e5. From that square, the key weak squares are c3, g3, c7 and g7. However, the keeper is protecting c3 and g3 leaving very little room for infiltration. That forces the Elephant to infiltrate via c7 or g7 and then later kick the ball into the corner upon further advancement. I cannot find a forced win for the attacker but I haven’t examined all possibilities yet. 1. He2-e5 Ee10-g7 2. Ke1-g3 *g7-h5/Eg7-g5 3. He5-g4 At this point, I tried various strategies for the horse to try to score but could find anything. This looks like a draw to me, but I’m not 100% sure. Lion vs. Lion Attacker: Black Lion & ball on e10 Defender: White Lion on e2 This is a curious stalemate as neither piece can end the turn with possession nor kick the ball within 1 move of the opposing lion, lest it be captured. The best I can come up with here is a perpetual dance in which the lions can trade roles as attacker and defender but neither side makes any real progress. 1. Le2-e4 L*e10-c6/*c6-a5 2. Le4-c3 Lc6-a5/L*a5-b3/*b3-a3 3. Lc3-a3/*a3-b5 Lb3-b5/*b5-c5 4. La3-c5/*c5-d7 Lb5-d7/*d7-e5 Draw Horse vs. Horse Attacker: Black Horse & ball on e10 Defender: White Horse on e2 This is the toughest scenario. An attacking horse can drive a defending horse absolutely crazy by constantly kicking the ball one orthogonal space beside the defending horse and then setting up to repeat the process on the next move. Or sometimes it can just pick up the ball and move 2 diagonal steps from the defender. Note that neither horse can capture the other unless one carelessly hold onto the ball on the 3rd step. 1. He2-e5 H*e10-c7 2. Ke1-c3 H*c7-d5/*d5-e6/Hd5-f4 3. Kc3-e3 Hf4-e6/*e6-d5/He6-c7 4. He5-e4 Hc7-d5/H*d5-c6 5. Ke3-c2/He4-e2 H*c6-g4 Goal-in-one |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Apr 26th, 2009, 12:08pm on 04/26/09 at 11:37:09, Adanac wrote:
Taking your much appreciated analysis into account the preliminary result is:
Thanks for all the work :) My mind is poorly wired for deduction :-/ Note: The Zillions game is available in a bèta-0.3 version. (Implemented by Ed van Zon) download HanniBall (beta 0.3) from the rules page (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/side-dishes/more-games-by-cf?start=22#zillions) download HanniBall (beta 0.3) directly (http://mindsports.nl/Download/Freeware/HanniBall_0.3_Zillions.zip) |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Apr 27th, 2009, 2:20am I'm a poor analyst, but here's how far I came with the Elephant versus Horse: http://i42.tinypic.com/2yphqhv.gif diagram 1 It's not too difficult to get the ball to h2 and the Elephant next to it, say h3. It's also clear that the Keeper on f1 and the Horse on g2 are the only defense. http://i43.tinypic.com/2urpekp.gif diagram 2-1 If Black moves ... Eh32/E*h2i4, both the Keeper and the Horse are pinned. http://i39.tinypic.com/2ljjblh.gif diagram 3-1 If the Horse moves, it must end on h3 to prevent the Elephant from reaching g2 with the ball in two steps, and score. However this triggers ... E*i4f5 and Black can score next move. So white can't move either piece, but then, he doesn't have to, does he? A player may make up to 3 'moves' per turn, which up to now included 'zero moves'. Of course this endgame probably isn't the most frequent to appear, and I don't consider it a big problem that its outcome hinges on the possibility of passing. However ... Guilty as charged, again :-[ However, it may be indicative of a more general problem concerning passing on one's turn. I have therefore changed the move rule to "On his turn a player is allowed to make up to 3 (4, 1-6) moves, making at least one change". Taking this change of the move rule into account the preliminary result of the one-on-one endgames is:
The next update of HanniBall for Zillions (beta 0.3 download) (http://mindsports.nl/Download/Freeware/HanniBall_0.3_Zillions.zip) will have the rule implemented. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Apr 28th, 2009, 9:23am To revert to what this was all about, here's the content of my original mail to Ed van Zon, Arty Sandler and Benedikt Rosenau, sent April 7: Quote:
So how much has changed since? major 1. The 'ball to the keeper' rule has been generalized, courtesy of JDB, to apply to both keepers the same way. 2. Obstruction has been recognized as possible, and defined by Adanac, and it has been made a 'red card' offense. 3. There are now 3 variants, depending on the number of moves allowed per turn - this is not a rule change however. minor 1. Pieces other than the Keeper have temporarily been banned from the goal. This restriction has been lifted again. 2. After any turn, there must be at least one change in the position. 3. The Keepers shot & ricochet range was extended from 5 to 6 squares. That was all. For now we haven't seen "a whole lot of rule adaptions induced by playtesting" as was the prediction of some of the more sceptical posters. Now I'm curious about the game's behaviour because my prediction was and is that it will behave properly. And it is this prediction that is at stake here. So, did anyone try the Zillions Game? (download HanniBall bèta 0.3) (http://mindsports.nl/Download/Freeware/HanniBall_0.3_Zillions.zip) P.S. Maybe it is worth noting that HanniBall has an unusual theme and unusual mechanics. It's not as easy to predict it's behaviour as, say, Grand Chess, which is basically Chess, or Dameo, which builds on an established and well tested framework. So I'm not betting on the safe side with this one. Nor is it in the same league (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/arena) as Grand Chess and Dameo. A game idea develops on its own terms, and HanniBall turned out to be a tactical game with a loose and largely unknown strategical framework, that might solidify somewhat over time, if indeed it is played enough for that, but hardly enough to qualify as a 'strategy game' by mindsports (http://mindsports.nl/) standards (see point 4 of the 'acknowledgement'). |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Apr 30th, 2009, 3:04am You know the Zillions Machine: "It doesn't feel pity, or remorse, or fear, and it absolutely will not stop. Ever. Until you are dead." So I'm only too glad I'm facing a bèta version here. No swap. It's by mail, because I'm on a mac. It gets 45 sec per turn (actually 15 per move, and it works up to seven ply each time).
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Apr 30th, 2009, 3:41am
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Apr 30th, 2009, 5:51am Zillions prefers defensive play, which is good inasfar as the merits thereof were a discussion point.
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Apr 30th, 2009, 6:53am
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Apr 30th, 2009, 7:54am The little sneak is stealing my ideas >:( Time to keep an eye on every piece that can get the ball from the Keeper, in particular my own. Meanwhile I'll try 'coordinated progress'.
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Apr 30th, 2009, 8:36am I could capture the Horse of course, but I don't like the exchange. My provisional plan is to have a strong midfield first. For the record: I spotted a possible problem reminiscent of actual soccer: prolongued possession of the ball by the Keeper should not be allowed.
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Apr 30th, 2009, 9:45am To and fro with the ball. So much for bot coordination.
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Apr 30th, 2009, 10:49am So I got the midfield covered :P
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Apr 30th, 2009, 12:25pm I said the game would behave properly, I'm not sure about the program ;) Its Lion is now under direct threat (and not merely an exchange), so it may be time to get rid of the ball.
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on May 1st, 2009, 12:00am It's digging in - this is where a mix of Elephants and Horses comes in handy.
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on May 1st, 2009, 2:03am After *c5, H*e4, white can ricochet off the Keeper, so I'll have to cover the right flank to a degree.
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on May 1st, 2009, 2:51am Now Kec3 *a4-c3^d4 leaves the Horse on d4 open to capture, but the result is immediate loss.
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on May 1st, 2009, 4:10am White 13 is effectively a pass, but the 'change required' rule isn't yet implemented, so for now we'll have to accept the 'move'. But it is rather stupid to hold on to the ball because the Lion can be captured now.
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on May 1st, 2009, 4:55am The program behaved less than properly ;) . As for the game, the Keeper should not be able to hold the ball indefinitely, because of its range - an attacker would be forced to cover the midfield while the ball isn't actually 'in play'. I'll think of a fix there. Other than that I'm not entirely sure how to interpret this game. It ended in 14 moves, but against a generic bot of doubtful qualities, at least in a game with a tree density as high as HanniBall. If someone argues that such a result means twiddlytwit, I'd have to agree. To know how the game will behave eventually, many games will have to be played. My prediction stands, as well as my qualification: a tactical game with a strategy that is at the same time 'fairly obvious', in terms of pieces having to work together, as 'fairly obscure', because the action has a 'shifting' local focus point in the ball, without having a more permanent strategical framework such as for instance the pawn structure in Chess. But then, I never quite know what comes out if a game 'autoshapes'. I am happy to have been given an unexpected and unsought for opportunity to illustrate how it happens. To the sceptics: it's not a provocation, but if the truth means offending someone's lack of imagination ::) then so be it.
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on May 3rd, 2009, 5:20am on 05/01/09 at 04:55:57, christianF wrote:
So I did, and the solution that presented itself was not to restrict the Keepers time with the ball explicitly. On the contrary: The Keeper combines the options of the 'Horse' and the queen in Chess, but may not leave the goal area (except for the goal itself). A Keeper in possesion of the ball, may not let go of it other than by shooting it (that is, he may not move and leave the ball behind). A Keeper shoots the ball up to six squares away, queenwise. Direction and distance are the player's choice, but the ball must land outside the goal area. The darkblue parts are new. Note that the rule feels in agreement with actual soccer, and the time restriction is implicit: a Keeper in possesion of the ball risks capture like any other piece, and 3 moves per turn opens ample opportunities to threaten it. I've also made '3-moves per turn' the main variant and pushed the other two a bit further to the back. christian freeling PS. I'm playing the Zillions program again, this time with 10 minutes or more per move (half an hour or more per turn). The 'or more' is due to the fact that Ed must keep an eye on the timer himself: Zillions has no automatic timer above 3 minutes. Nevertheless it needed only seven turns to lose its first piece. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on May 3rd, 2009, 6:45am This time Zillions has 10+ min. per move (30+ min. per turn) Links in the notation table go to the position after the black move. The new Keeper rule is implemented, swap and obstruction not yet. @ black-30: this is tricky, Zillions is winning a piece ... mea culpa! Disregarding the fact that I'm an absolute beginner, I think it's clear that Zillions tends to blunder in positions with many pieces, as was to be expected, but improves as the number of pieces is diminishing, to the point of tricking an inexperienced humanoid out of a piece :) . Meanwhile, in this game, none of the preperceived 'problems' materialized. Obstruction needed a formal definition and a formal procedure, but as an actual problem not even a shadow of it has emerged on the horizon. That's not to say these problems might not emerge, although I don't feel they will. I trust the game to be what I said all along: an intelligent tactical game, and a nice and unexpected addition to my oeuvre, but not quite a 'mental sportsweapon'. finished game ...
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on May 5th, 2009, 4:37am Since Zillions is obviously no match, this game may be considered to be the first serious HanniBall game. I've rejected to swap white's first move. Links in the notation table go to the position after the corresponding move. @ Black 9: overlooked the Horse on c10, now I'll have to do without a Keeper :o . @ Black 11: my last move initially was E*f13-f12 which was stupid because the Horse on e9 can capture in two moves and thus win a piece. Adanac kindly allowed a redo (E*f13-g13). It's the flipside of the medal. When inventing, my mind moves effortlessly, when playing it stumbles from one tactical oversight to the next, making it hard to do justice to any game, including my own. The game, I'm glad to say, behaves as expected, and so, I'm sorry to add, does the inventor :-[ . @ Black 27: White aims at the ricochet La87/L*a7b5/*b5c3^... The horse was moved to b5 to prevent that, for the moment. Should it be captured, the Lion on d8 can recapture in two moves and use the third to get rid of the ball, possibly even using a ricochet off the white Keeper. @ Black 34: In terms of material I could capture 34 ... Hg9-h11/*h11-g11/Eh12xg11. White can recapture, but he cannot risk the second possible capture of the Horse on g10, because his Lion would remain in possesion of the ball and be captured in the rebound. However, he can instead move 35. Lh9xg11/L*g11-f13/*f13-e15. And he would certainly do that because it's the point of moving the Elephant to d15 in the first place. Since I must manage without my Keeper, the capture of the Elephant on g11 at this (http://i40.tinypic.com/209t0t2.gif) point would actually lose the game. @ Black 36: Here (http://i41.tinypic.com/30hylgn.gif) White has only the chosen (http://i39.tinypic.com/2n9xd1v.gif) option, Lh3, *i5 or the same with *i2 or *i3. On the chosen option 37... Hg9-i5/*h5 seems also possible, but I'm a bit worried about 38. Lh35, *i7 because I can't reach the ball in one move there. @ Black 39: Since my breakthrough @36 (http://i41.tinypic.com/30hylgn.gif) Adanac has had to defend very carefully, and now (http://i40.tinypic.com/2vccjyh.gif) he threatens to ricochet off to midfield. Exchanging a Lion doesn't help, because the Lion on d5 recaptures in 2 and thus can still employ the same ricochet. So I'll have to 'bury the ball' and summon reinforcement. I'm curious how the game will handle the ensuing cornerfight ... ::) . @ Black 40: White 40 (http://i44.tinypic.com/2jdgx88.gif) is a dirty trick >:( and a pattern that should be kept in mind for cornerfights. I can't capture the Elepant because I would lose a Lion. Meanwhile the threat is to pick up the ball with it, return to h2 and ricochet off the Keeper. So I'm forced to retreat, politely but decisively. @ Black 43: White 43 (http://i41.tinypic.com/2rge05j.gif) threatens to capture the Lion on h3 with the Elephant on g3. The exchange of an Elephant on h6 looks disadvantageous for black because it would set off the g5 Lion towards the wide open spaces in front of my keeperless goal. @ Black 48: My idea in the last couple of moves was to sneak up on the solitaire Elephant on d15 and try to trap it, but events take a somewhat unfavorable turn :-/ . @ Black 49: Black resigns.
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on May 25th, 2009, 5:03am First things first: Adanac, congrats with your victory in the first ever serious Hanniball game. Thanks for the game and I hope you enjoyed it as much as I did :) . Of course I'll never be able to prove any claims with regard to the game's behaviour at a hypothetical grandmaster level, because there will be no 'grandmaster level'. When a game 'autoshapes' I never quite know what will emerge until it's there, and HanniBall turned out a nice recreational game among a multitude of nice recreational games. Strategy games have 'advantageous sub-goals' in their bag, such as for instance promotion in Chess of Draughts. Hanniball has only material gain as a sub-goal, so I'd classify it as a tactical game. With regard to its behaviour, one aspect isn't quite clear to me. Fritzlein touched on that when he wrote: on 04/14/09 at 10:46:58, Fritzlein wrote:
Adanac wrote: on 04/25/09 at 08:41:10, Adanac wrote:
Quote:
Mark Thompson remarks this about Chess: Quote:
And these games have 'pawn structures' of a progressive nature, enabling the 'sub-goal' of promotion (although in Arimaa this promotion has been 'promoted' to the actual goal). HanniBall doesn't. Wouldn't that make the problem even worse? I'm not sure about HanniBall's measure of 'decisiveness', but it differs in one important aspect: where in the above games, mutual reduction of material will eventually lead to more drawish positions, in Hanniball it's the reverse: the less material, the greater the chance of an attacker escaping the ranks of the defenders. Even with a mutually balanced reduction of material, the game becomes progressively more 'unbalanced' and more inclined to tip one way or the other. Alas, we'll never know, because it would require a miracle to get enough high lever players for a game that is nice enough between a multitude of nice enough games. It's fun, but it's certainly not a 'mental sportsweapon'. In terms of sticking my neck out by predicting the behaviour of this highly unusual organism, with no past references to build upon ... I think my head is still attached ;) . |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on May 25th, 2009, 6:16am A more general remark about 'future behaviour' - Fritzlein wrote: on 03/26/09 at 22:24:47, Fritzlein wrote:
I totally agree, but there's an underlying premise that the question of predicting future behaviour is devoid of rational arguments. In judging Grand Chess (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/arena/grand-chess/), can't one rely to a fair degree on the behaviour of Chess? There are differences, sure, otherwise it wouldn't be Grand Chess, but there are ample similarities too. Grand Chess has by now proven to suffer no obvious imbalance from its opening array. That being the case, isn't the behaviour of Chess a reliable indicator of Grand Chess' behaviour? As for specific strategies, let's for the sake of argument assume different openings will eventually emerge in Grand Chess, and that they will have names. I cannot predict which main alleys will emerge, only that main alleys will emerge. And so, it would appear to me, can anyone. Why Grand Chess would "very likely to prove flawed in the long run" is not clear to me, unless one holds to the idea that inventing games is a human activity excluded from progress. And why would that be? The same argument holds for Dameo (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/arena/dameo/). The framework on which it is build is well known and well tested. It is capable of the same mindboggling combinations that can be found in International Draughts, but has a much smaller margin for draws, quite independent of the level of play. It is more flexible in terms of pace than any other draughts game. This is what Benedikt Rosenau writes at BoardGameGeek's A call to arms to all ABSTACTS fans! (http://www.boardgamegeek.com/geeklist/41721/item/941927#item941927): Quote:
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by Adanac on Jun 1st, 2009, 9:29pm Thanks again for an interesting game, Christian. The Keeper for Horse trade created quite an unusual imbalance. On the one hand, I knew that I could score easily if I could advance the ball deep into your territory. Unfortunately, with one less piece on the board, I had great difficulty getting control of the ball. Overall, I’d have to say that this second game has reinforced many of my beliefs from the first game: - Lions are far, far more powerful than the other pieces and virtually every successful attack & defence in our 2 games have relied heavily upon Lions. - I find Horses to be the least useful pieces. They’re good at long-range threats against enemy ball-carriers and, of course, they can be effective as part of a wall of pieces. But they seem to be near-useless as attackers because it’s often so awkward for them to pick up the ball, and having done so they might have to immediately kick the ball away at a range of only 1 square. - It’s extremely difficult to score. Our last game went on for 49 moves and I only won by getting a Lion in deep against a Keeper-less net. Intuitively, I still believe that scoring against a determined stonewaller with defensively-positioned lions is near impossible. I still believe that increasing the kicking distance of the Horse & Elephant would simultaneously solve many of the problems that I’ve noted in previous posts. Extra kicking power it would allow many more tactical options on each move, allow more interesting long-term positioning of pieces across a larger area of the board, reduce the clumping of pieces, eliminate/reduce those long sequences of play where pieces are afraid to get too close to the ball, reduce the enormous power imbalance between Lions and other pieces & greatly increase the number of scoring chances. I’m of the opinion that HaniBall has a little bit of commercial potential if it’s targetted at youths/teenagers when they’re just getting into organized sports & strategy games. This game has a really fun & appealing theme and a lot of strategic and tactical options on every move. However, I find the game overly defensive at this point and some small rule tweaks are likely needed. I have no idea whether a simple change to the kicking rules would be the magic-bullet fix to all the little issues, but I would be very interested to see it tested. Finally, Christian may have stumbled onto a great anti-computer game, without even trying to do so! HaniBall is both tactical & strategic, yet doesn’t easily allow material imbalances. That’s an unusual feature in a tactical game and it implies that humans may be able to dominate this game even if talented bot-programmers took up a “HaniBall Challenge”. I’d love to see it, but I’m not necessarily saying that I’m brave enough to risk $10,000 of my own money like Omar did for Arimaa! :D |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Jun 3rd, 2009, 6:44am Thanks Adanac. I've gone over your comments and I agree largely with your diagnosis, less so with the suggested remedies. I'd like to disregard the 'behavioural claims' in favor of the game itself, because there's room for improvement indeed. on 06/01/09 at 21:29:27, Adanac wrote:
Horses and Elephants are each others reverse in terms of movement and shooting, while Lions are their union. The resulting set and the 4-4-2 distribution has a certain completeness and elegance that I value greatly. In fact: this is the set I saw playing in my head and I still believe it basically behaves properly. Differences in character appear almost implicitly in such a set, so for me that's less of an argument. At its introduction in the sixteenth century, the Queen in Chess was also largely considered to be off the scale in terms of strenght, and even coined the 'mad queen'. But I agree with your third point: a player who declines exchanges as much as possible, and concentrates on defense, might keep a game dragging on indefinitely. A lack of 'decisiveness' as Mark Thompson would call it. on 06/01/09 at 21:29:27, Adanac wrote:
You advertise it so convincingly that I'm almost inclined to follow. Almost, because I think the same improvements can be made without altering the nature of the pieces. It's not simple to maintain the 'duality' of Horse and Elephant, and their 'union' in the Lion, when you want to increase the shooting range, even apart from other side effects that might emerge. So this is what I suggest: 1. Reduce the keeper to the Lion's move. That is 'king or knight' instead of 'queen or knight'. Of course its restriction to the goal area remains, as do its shooting abilities. I had initially given it the queen's move to compensate for its restriction to the goal area, but the Keeper is indeed too strong in the current context. 2. Reduce the board by two rows. That obviously brings the target nearer. It also implies that a shot by or a ricochet off the Keeper both have a maximum range of 5 instead of 6. 3. Make it 4 moves per turn and forget about '3' and '1-6'. This needs a somewhat more elaborate motivation. First and foremost: it will be harder to avoid captures and harder to restrict them to exchanges. That's good, because the less pieces, the more Hanniball tends to tip one way or the other. Secondly: light pieces one step away from the ball get the opportunity to capture solitary. With 3 moves per turn they can't: they can grab the ball (1), shoot it at an opponent (2) but next they cannot capture, because they move and shoot in different ways. So you always need a combination of light pieces to capture. With 4 moves per turn however, such a single minor piece can capture on its own, albeit at the price of being in possession of the ball, and thus vulnarable, at the end of the turn. Nevertheless this is an increase in potential to be reckoned with. Of course the Lion also profits: it can now capture solitary and even get rid of the ball. That's good in another way: it increases opportunities for mistakes that result in the loss of a piece and thus increases 'decisiveness'. Taken together, these changes don't actually alter the core of the game all that much. Boardsize is arbitrary to begin with, and 4 moves per turn was already an option. The only real change is a slight reduction of the Keepers options, and one that even brings is more in line with the moves of other pieces. on 06/01/09 at 21:29:27, Adanac wrote:
I'm not so optimistic there, because I'd have to convince a manufacturer, and I'm not a merchant. I can't say (though any manufacturer must have heard that a hundred times before in the first place) that I invented a 'great strategy game' and that 'the end of Chess is nigh', because it's not true. But I'm expected to say at least that much, because saying that I've invented a nice tactical game when there's a multitude of nice tactical games out there, just won't cut it either. on 06/01/09 at 21:29:27, Adanac wrote:
On this I can comment more generally. It's not too difficult to taylor a game to be manageable for humans and unmanageable for bots. Omar did so with Arimaa, which is not to say that it was an 'easy' game to invent (you should ask Omar for that), but only that this particular aspect is not too difficult. I guess Omar took his inspiration from the Jungle Game (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jungle_(board_game)) and introduced 'multiple moves per turn' to make sure the game tree had an exploding branch density that would choke a program. HanniBall's bot resistance is based on the same, and if you care to take a look at Medusa (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/side-dishes/more-games-by-cf?start=12), you'll discover a mid-game branch density that easily surpasses them both. Medusa also was invented without that in mind (at the time programs were hardly able to play Chess or Checkers and Go was a faint dream). The point being that for the forseeable future there will be human superiority in games, because we can taylor games that way ;D . There'll also be computer superiority in many other games. The qualities required for one or the other are very interesting. Havannah's 'unprogrammability' for instance, is not so much based on complexity and an exploding branch density. I think this is a highly interesting field, and the more programs, the clearer the contours of the possible and impossible, and the more mysterious the pattern recognition abilities of the human mind. P.S. I've already simplified the rules (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/side-dishes/more-games-by-cf?start=22) and 'a late arrival' (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/how-i-invented-games-and-why-not/a-late-arrival) accordingly, and of course I'd love to play another game for the gallery, against Adanac or anyone willing to give it a try. P.P.S. On informing Ed of the above changes, he suggested to get around the swap rule (which is difficult to implement on Zillions) by limiting the number of moves for white on his first turn to 'two', instead of 'four'. Since this effectively leads to a very similar result, I think it's an excellent idea - consider it implemented. P.P.P.S. The game has been updated @ Zillions - thanks Ed! Download HanniBall for Zillions (bèta 0.6) (http://mindsports.nl/Download/Freeware/HanniBall_0.6_Zillions.zip) |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Jun 5th, 2009, 9:35am Here's a HanniBall game 'new style' for the Gallery: @ black-5 (http://i42.tinypic.com/mt3sjq.gif): A mistake triggering a nice manoeuvre by the Horse on c8, first clearing the way for the white Lion, while preparing for the capture of the black Lion. @ black-7 (http://i44.tinypic.com/fb3nq.gif): Here black already indicated the hopelesness of the position. It would seem that Mark Thompson's decisiveness criterion (http://www.thegamesjournal.com/articles/DefiningtheAbstract.shtml) is sufficiently met under the '4-moves-per-turn' rules. @ black-9 (http://i41.tinypic.com/11sm2v4.gif): Hopeless or not, black 9 is a strong defense and I must retreat with one Lion. Both white Lions are offered for exchange after white-10 and the Elephant on d7 covers the center against breakout attempst by the black Lion. @ black-10 (http://i41.tinypic.com/5ds6yp.gif): A 'ricochet escape' that white overlooked. It suggests that there's no lack of Mark Thompson's drama criterion (http://www.thegamesjournal.com/articles/DefiningtheAbstract.shtml) either. @ black-11: I made a mistake in the display (Elephant should be on the h-file, ball on the i-file instead of vice versa - miraculously white's next move still fits as intended). It is corrected now.
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Jun 9th, 2009, 11:05am Well guys, that's it. Ed will make an applet soon, so HanniBall will be accessible to everyone at mindsports (http://mindsports.nl/). Later maybe at iG Game Center (http://www.iggamecenter.com/) too, but that might take a while because Arty has several shortlists of different weight and for the moment HanniBall isn't on any of them. I enjoyed the process of invention that unexpectedly started and the reactions of the posters in this thread, and I thank Omar and Adanac in particular, for starting the thread and contributing so enthusiastically to the game's development respectively. christian |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by SpeedRazor on Jul 3rd, 2009, 5:08pm One of the most interesting, and worst forum threads that I've ever read. Anywhere. I'm such a Big fan of Havannah, that I shuddered following through all of the leads/games, everything. I don't believe that I can be as tactful as others - so I won't. I understand that I may be barred from this, one of my favorite Games' website, but I just can't "sit on my hands..." (Note: your "Lasker" quote based on the preceding sentence quip is wrong: T'was Siegbert Tarrasch who said it. Just an observation.) Oh yeah, castling in chess is more important in hiding the one-step king, than in getting the multi-step rook to the center: but I do see your point about Fischer 960. It's ... not going to get easier from here... Christian, your essay was very insightful, but you're no more a "game whisperer" than most (in the same vein as everybody who likes movies is a 'film critic': matters of taste aren't arguable, or so says the ancient Latin proverb. Hey, who are we to argue with the Ancient Roman). Now, down to brass tacks: I've taught ~untold~ many people Havannah, but I always, at first, teach it with TWO rules missing (Occam's Razor manifested, let's just say). Note: these are mostly Go and Chess enthusiasts whom I've taught - three or four dozen, realistically - which is quite easily reflected in which board they choose: triangular: play on the nodes; or hexagonal: play in the cells (Go and Chess players, respectively.) After a while, I add the remaining two rules, and so far, nobody wants to use them. None. Let me elaborate: the two rules that I omit are... 1. There are three ways to win. (Me: there are just two ways to win: ring, or connect three edges. I omit connecting corner to corner wins - not necessary), and... 2. Corner nodes don't count as being on an edge. (Me: corner nodes count for both of the edges that they are a part of) Now notice, what used to be called a 'bridge', is now just a three edge fork: if you connect two corners, and corners count for what they obviously are (touching two edges each), than you AUTOMATICALLY have three (or four) edge connections: a win. Why confuse people with a third winning condition, plus telling them that corners don't count as "edges"? What has actually changed? Now, connecting a corner to a non-contiguous edge will win, also. Tactics do jump up a notch, here, plus corners are more valuable: but only negligibly so. Now ... I had presumed ... that you had already done the extensive play testing, and that you added those two, what seem to me as, superfluous rules because it was "necessary". The game might have been broken without them. But now, I think that all of my ASG friends may have been right all along: your game - which is, and I hope, will remain, a classic - is Flawed, as it is. The corner connection winning mechanism just adds confusion. After playing through your Hanniball games, I'm now convinced of it. It was added because 3:2:1 seemed more organic (whatever that means): 1 ring, 2 corners, 3 sides (even though 2 corners is ALWAYS 3 sides if edges are counted intuitively). My apologies for being so forthright, and thank you for such a great game... |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Jul 4th, 2009, 5:23am on 07/03/09 at 17:08:22, SpeedRazor wrote:
Thank you, I appreciate frankness and indeed, there's no 'format' for inventing a game live & online so it was an ad hoc event, implicitly prone to lack of structure. on 07/03/09 at 17:08:22, SpeedRazor wrote:
I think in this metaphor you would be the one "who likes them" while the inventors are the ones who make them, right? on 07/03/09 at 17:08:22, SpeedRazor wrote:
You're welcome. I must say you choose very elaborate way to make a very simple point. And you're dead wrong. The bridge is the soul of Havannah, and you definition would change its role dramatically, not 'negligibly'. You're absolutely right that 'tactics would jump up a notch, but at the cost of refinements of strategy provided by the current game - not at all in the right direction. I hope you'll excuse my frankness ;) Now that I'm here, HanniBall has been officially launched at Zillions (http://www.zillions-of-games.com/cgi-bin/zilligames/submissions.cgi/12098?do=show;id=1735) last month. iG Game Center now features live Havannah (http://www.iggamecenter.com/info/en/havannah.html), Dameo (http://www.iggamecenter.com/info/en/dameo.html), Emergo (http://www.iggamecenter.com/info/en/emergo.html), Shakti (http://www.iggamecenter.com/info/en/shakti.html) and Grand Chess (http://www.iggamecenter.com/info/en/grandchess.html). Several bots are participating in havannah base-4 to base-7 tournaments at Little Golem. Best place to keep an eye on them is the hex/havannah forum (http://www.littlegolem.net/jsp/forum/forum2.jsp?forum=50). cheers, christian |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Oct 21st, 2009, 11:39am Hi all, long time no see. Last night, in bed, I thought "the rules of Superstar (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/side-dishes/more-games-by-cf?start=19) are in fact too complex". So I dreamed up 'YvY'. It has of course never been played, let alone playtested - sue me :). Here's the board: Grey is taboo, the orange pairs, called 'bricks', are part of the playing area. Players take turns to place one stone. A player may pass without losing the right to move next turn. A 'chain' is defined as usual, a 'loop' is a chain surrounding at least one cell completely, regardless of whether this cell is vacant or occupied, or by whom (as the 'ring' in Havannah (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/arena/havannah/)). A player completing a loop wins - this is the sudden death way to end a game. If no loop is completed, the player with the highest score at the end of the game (on two successive passes) wins. A chain is worth two points less than the number of bricks it connects - thus connecting chains pays off. A player's score is the sum of the scores of his chains. The game may end in a draw. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Oct 22nd, 2009, 9:11am There's a thread on it @ LG (http://www.littlegolem.net/jsp/forum/topic2.jsp?forum=50&topic=418) and David Bush pointed out a misstatement in the rules. "A chain is worth two points less than the number of bricks connected" isn't meant to go into the negative, so you don't lose a point by having a stone on an otherwise disconnected brick. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by omar on Oct 24th, 2009, 11:03pm 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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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Oct 25th, 2009, 5:45am on 10/24/09 at 23:03:31, omar wrote:
It's no big deal. on 10/24/09 at 23:03:31, omar wrote:
It's very easy. Connect 3 bricks and you score 1 point, connect 5 and you score 3. Provided they're separate chains, they total 4. Now connect them to get one chain connecting 8 bricks, scoring 6 points. So the connection brings 2 additional points. The aim was to get a very simple low-res scoring system in a connection game. It's all about winning by 1 or 2 points or ... sudden death. The loop is of course the tactical disruption tool in the scoring strategies. Loop threaths must be met regardless of the score. on 10/24/09 at 23:03:31, omar wrote:
The best ones wait till you're trying to avoid them ;) so this sounds very promising. Let us know if and when you're ready :) PS. The name. The 'Y' connection, no pun intended, had little to do with it. I had decided on 'bricks' to emphasize simplicity, and the chains were like 'ivy' creeping in between. Then I misspelled 'Ivy'. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Oct 26th, 2009, 10:20am David J Bush worried about the margin of draws, and probably rightly so, and made an interesting suggestion to try to eliminate it. I liked it enough to go along and make YvY a joint invention. It also led to an elegant rephrasing of the score. Not to mention a new board: http://i38.tinypic.com/mlqwq9.jpg See the thread at LG (http://www.littlegolem.net/jsp/forum/topic2.jsp?forum=50&topic=418) for the ongoing developments. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Oct 28th, 2009, 6:16am I'll gladly trade my original game for the one that evolved after David's suggestions. Here's the new YvY board - let's call this one base 4/5. YvY The green cells are 'sprouts' and a closed chain of like colored stones is a 'group'. The game has a swap and players may pass without losing the right to move next turn. Loops must surround at least one cell completely (vacant or occupied doesn't matter), and win regardless of the score. The score for each player after two successive passes is: That's the same as before, but phrased more elegantly. 'Bad sprouts' are vacant sprouts the occupation of which reduces the score for either player doing so. Close off a vacant sprout with two white stones, and close off those two stones with black ones, and you have a bad sprout. In order to end in a draw, an odd number of bad sprouts is necessary, but not sufficient. YvY © MindSports/David J Bush P.S. This game was invented without the use of a board or pieces, and without ever being playtested, something that cannot be done ... ;) |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by SpeedRazor on Oct 28th, 2009, 11:07pm I SO want to study your new ideas, Christian. If I told you my Mom is flagellating up/down with anger as we speak, you may understand Gbye. Okay, I'm back on the computer - no time to study your new hexagonal-themed idea. Tomorrow. As Abstract game designers, and Mathematicians/Programmers, you guys MUST also know: http://www.cameronius.com/ Please don't be insulted if I say that he rocks - one day - as cool as you are, Christian/Omar! That's saying a lot! Probably you already know him ... |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Oct 29th, 2009, 12:04am on 10/28/09 at 23:07:43, SpeedRazor wrote:
Oh yes we do, and you're quite right, Cameron is an icon in the abstract games world, a great designer and an expert on connection games :) Speaking of which, there is an aspect of YvY that begs playtesting. The whole point of David's suggestion to take an odd number of single-cell sprouts, was to eliminate draws. Consider: with all sprouts occupied, one has an odd number, and one an even number. Both must subtract an even number, i.e. 'twice the number of groups involved'. So with all sprouts occupied, a draw cannot occur. Whether or not this was a good decision would depend on the frequency in which 'bad sprouts' occur. My guess is that they will occur occasionally. It is not likely that one would occur in the opening, or even middle game: there are other priorities at these stages. So the cradle must be in the finer points of the endgame. It is admittedly hard to make a calculated guess about the frequency of occurence of bad sprouts without a great number of games between seasoned players. As it is, the first ideas about strategy haven't even been established. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Oct 31st, 2009, 10:27am Finding YvY Inspired by the deafening silence I'll try to show what you're looking at and how it will behave. As for playtesting: Ed and I just started our first game - you can find it in the MindSports Spectators Section (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/players-section) at the bottom of the scroll box. First a rerun of the rules in a nutshell: An YvY base 4/5 board The diagram shows a base 4/5 board, with 27 cells called 'sprouts' along the edges. There are two players, black and white. White moves first by putting one stone on the board, after which black has the option to swap (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pie_rule). After that players alternately put one stone on the board. Players may pass their turn without losing the right to move next turn. The game ends by sudden death or when both pass on successive turns. Groups A 'group' is a number of connected stones of like color. A single stone is a group by definition. An 'involved group' is a group containing one or more sprouts. Loops / Sudden Death A 'loop' is a group that completely surrounds one or more cells. Whether or by whom such cells are occupied is irrelevant. A player completing a loop wins immediately, regardless of the score. The Score If no loops are completed the game ends after the players both pass on successive turns. Now all uninvolved groups are removed from the board and the player with the highest score wins. A player's score is the number of sprouts he occupies minus twice the number of his groups (now all involved). This is equivalent with an involved group having a value equal to the number of sprouts it contains minus 2. However, if a group is located inside a group of like color (as a result of the removal of uninvolved groups), the two count as one group. connections, loops, cutting points If black occupies F1 he gets one point but at the same time creates a new involved group that cannot be connected anywhere, costing two points, the net result being the loss of one point. If white occupies F1, the same applies initially. However, at the end of the game, the black group of 2 is removed and a white stone on F1 is considered connected to the surrounding white group. So for white the net result is the gain of one point. Note: a purely theoretical consideration: suppose black has a group around the 5 white stones, including stones on D1 and H1. Now the white group is uninvolved too and situation is the reverse. Black can occupy F1 and eventually score +1, white cannot occupy it because it would render -1. History You may have noticed that the history's still evolving - I solved the 'bad sprouts' problem and eliminated draws halfway the article ;-) - but its still all here and at the LG forum (http://www.littlegolem.net/jsp/forum/topic2.jsp?forum=50&topic=418). To give my critics credit, this version is better than the first version (the one with the 'bricks') thanks to David's contributions, that gave it a final push in the right direction. The organism was only too happy to slip into this better outfit. Nevertheless the basic subject of this thread is met: barring the one game currently played between Ed and me, the game has been completed without any playtesting whatsoever, and I'll try to have a go at its 'character at high level play' in all openness. The twilight zone between Go and Hex I posted a question at LG asking if anyone knew other abstract boardgames besides Craige Schensted (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Craige_Schensted)'s Star (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Star_(board_game)) and my own Superstar (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/side-dishes/more-games-by-cf?start=19) where connections rendered scores. There was no answer, so I figure there may not be all that many. However, I found the inventor formerly called Craige, himself improved on his creation. I must say I like this one (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/*Star) better, because it shifts the counting from vacant cells adjacent to the board, to actual cells (or points rather) on the board. And what a board! A beautiful 'hexpentagonal' plane with slightly rounded edges. Like Hex, Star is pure 'pathfinding'. But where Hex is abysmal in a life or death situation, Star is abysmal in a point scoring situation, and not a very convenient count either. There's nothing wrong with that, or Go would have the same defect, but back then I thought I'd make it a bit livelier, and created Superstar. Superstar isn't all that bad either if you get to know it, but it doesn't exactly invite you to get to know it. Complex rules and complex counting of stars, superstars and loops, are too much of a treshold for that. That thought occured to me a few days back, followed by "a loop should simply win", followed by the consideration that simultaneously merging the concept of stars and superstars, would reduce counting to just one aspect instead of three. And it would keep the loop in play as monkey in the snakepit, introducing similar tactics as the ring in Havannah into the general 'pathfinding' strategies. The merger is still visible in the 'bricks' of the first version. It's not a flawed game. What's wrong with it is that this one is so much better. The most important push was due to David's quest to eliminate draws. The final piece of the puzzle was the removal of uninvolved groups at the end and defining enclosed groups of like color as 'connected' to the enclosing group. To speak with Michael: This is it. Character I don't hesitate to call Star (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/*Star) a quintessential "Gonnection" game. Although that qualification has already been taken by Gonnect (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gonnect) - a game that developed in the opposite direction: employing territorial mechanics for an absolute connection goal - I'll use it here for convenience. Yet Star falls short of Go in the tactical realm. Not that it doesn't have deep tactics, but they are not all that pluriform. That's why I made Superstar in the first place, overshooting the target. YvY, more than Havannah, will have the feel of Go, very much a game of territorial influence. It's resolution is lower because there are only 27 sprouts to be divided. The bright side is that counting is too easy to be distracting and a swap seems to remedy too much of an advantage for the first player. After that it's a fine line: as in Havannah or Go, it can be a one point difference that makes all the difference, and at its highest level it almost certainly will be. At its highest level, too, the loop will be a constant presence in the equation, without ever materializing. In Havannah a ring may materialize as the consequence of a simultaneous deadly threat, but in YvY you're inclined to prevent one at all cost, because it's a choice between sudden death and losing one or two points. Of course loops might materialize in less high level games. The 'influence' aspect comes from the risk of occupying a sprout: unconnected it will cost a point, so taking one is a risk to begin with, and taking one under an 'umbrella' of the opponent is probably a bad idea. In consequence an umbrella, or 'influence' will be a leading strategical concept. So where does YvY fit in? Thematically it's in the "Gonnection" class that as far as I know holds four games, two of which are more or less redundant. For the 'feel' of it, it resembles Havannah as 'something in between Hex and Go', but YvY leans more to the Go side in that a player can accumulate, whereas Havannah is all about one winning structure. Stripped from the 'loop' YvY would be a Star variant. The loop provides what is lacking in Star: pluriformity of tactics. A pluriformity that strongly resembles havannah's. Let's have a look at the diagram again. connections, loops, cutting points In Star a black stone at "X" would be a rock solid connection in the fast majority of cases, and the white groups would have no escape. In YvY however, white A and B cannot be defended both, because then C would mean sudden death. The loop is the basic tool to gain tempo, force cuts an draw defensive stones in the process, which are the primary source of 'uninvolved' groups. There'll be no end to YvY's inticacies. Thirty years after its invention, Mirko Rahn (current rating at LG: 2102) taught me a new 'basic tactic' in Havannah, by making me its victim three times in a row. I'm a slow learner. The thing is called a "blockbuster" and requires the preparation of a second stone at some distance, but then it makes a block (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/arena/havannah/51-basic-tactics?start=2) impossible. So I can still learn in Havannah, and YvY will not be different in this respect. That's my prediction about its general behaviour at high level play, should it ever come to that. There's no need to take my word for it however, as far as I'm concerned YvY should be able to care for itself. I don't know about David, but I guess he feels the same. We hope you enjoy the game :) YvY © MindSports / David J Bush |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Nov 5th, 2009, 12:50pm In Go, if it is said that a certain group is dead, it doesn't mean that the group is a group, nor that dead is dead in the formal sense. The 'group' may consist of several smaller groups or loose stones, and all of them may have liberties, or they wouldn't be on the board in the first place. In YvY (and other games) a similar semantic freedom is used. Formally a group must be connected, but when I say that in the endposition both players have two groups, it is said in this semantic freedom. Also, vacant sprouts under a player's control simply count as belonging to the enclosing group. Of course they could be formally occupied, like one could formally enclose dead groups in Go. It just isn't done because experienced players know and agree on the situation, or both wouldn't have passed. Here we're halfway Here both have passed Here the uninvolved groups have been removed The single white stone bottomleft formally is an 'uninvolved group' - of course it isn't within the semantic freedom between experienced players. Likewise the bottomleft red 'group' fomally consists of three groups. The count Both have two groups, so that evens out. White occupies two sprouts and controls five, red occupies three and controls five. Red wins by one point. Note: In this example the situation didn't arise, but if the final position has groups that include precisely one sprout, without contolling others, then such groups may be removed since doing so doesn't alter the score difference: both gain a point. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Nov 27th, 2009, 2:23am YvY will be launched @ MindSports shortly. Here are the rules as I've posted them a @ Little Golem to see if David or others might have any comments. In a small section on strategy and tactics I predict the game's behaviour at high level play. When will I ever learn :-* YvY is played on a special board. The image shows a 'base-9' one, with 9 sprouts - the green cells - along any two adjacent sides. MindSports also provides base-7 and base-5 applets. Rules > The game starts on an empty board. Players move in turn to place one stone on an empty cell. White moves first. The second player is entitled to a swap (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pie_rule) The MindSports applet will shortly offer the swap under the 'choose' button. The result will be a switch of color of the stone on the board. > A player may pass his turn, without losing the right to move on the next one. Groups & Loops > A 'group' consists of a number of connected like colored stones. A single stone is a group by definition. As in Go, a 'group' is most of the time meant in a less formal way as a group of 'cooperating' stones. > A 'loop' is a group that completely surrounds one or more cells. Whether or not such cells are occupied, or by whom, is irrelevant. Object The game ends in one of two ways: > By sudden death: if a player completes a loop he wins, regardless of the score. > After both players pass on successive turns: now the player with the highest score wins. Life & Death > A group lives if at least one of its stones occupies a sprout, otherwise it is (as yet) dead. Territory & Scores > If a game ends by the players passing on successive turns then dead groups are removed from the board before the counting starts. > After the removal of dead groups, any group fenced in by a group of like color, is considered part of that same group. > The score of each player is the number of sprouts he controls (that is: sprouts occupied or fenced in by his stones) minus twice the number of his groups. If, for example, one player has followed a center oriented strategy, resulting in one group controlling 11 sprouts, his score would be 9. The other player controls the remaining 16 sprouts, so if he managed to do that with three groups, he has 10 points and wins, but if he needed four he has 8 points and loses. This is a game of 'divide and rule'! Note: if one player's score is even, the other's will be odd, so the game cannot end in a draw. Strategy & Tactics In terms of tactics, YvY first and foremost requires reading the hexplane the same way as in games like for instance Hex (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hex_(game)) and Y (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Y_(game)), but the presence of the loop as an absolute criterion to win makes its tactics much more Havannah (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Havannah) like. In fact YvY might be considered a 'generalized Havannah' in which the concept of corners and sides has been replaced by by an odd number of evenly distributed sprouts and the goal is, roughly speaking, to connect as many of them as possible with as few groups as possible. Not surprisingly, the strategic dilemma of Havannah - 'spider' versus 'snake' - is revisited here. The edge is important to get control of a sufficient number of sprouts, but the center is clearly the area where connections are made. One may sacrifice a couple of sprouts to connect one's own live groups, as in the example given in the rules: one group controlling eleven sprouts wins if the opponent has four groups or more, and loses if he has three groups or less. The resulting tension between moving near the edge or higher up is totally reminiscent of Havannah, as is the loop, that fulfills the same tactical role: a tool to cut and/or connect. There are important differences nonetheless. In Havannah the fastest connection is usually very important, whether it be ring, bridge or fork. A frame doesn't mean much if the opponent has a faster one. In YvY the score is accumulative, and in terms of the absolute win, a loopframe will usually not face a faster threat (the only option being a faster loop). So basically framing is winning. Another difference is that YvY will usually have a 'Go type' opening, with claims staked out along the edges, whereas Havannah can have many different types of opening. YvY definitely feels more Go-like than Havannah. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Nov 27th, 2009, 11:34am P.S. Concerning Havannah, here are some photos (http://www.althofer.de/lange-nacht-jena-2009.html) of "The long Night of the Sciences 2009" in Jena, Germany. It included a human versus computer Havannah tournament with two strong players and the two strongest programs to date (scroll down). Here are the games (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/arena/havannah/443-jena-2009-tournament). P.P.S. YvY has been launched (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/arena/yvy/) @ MindSports. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by omar on Dec 9th, 2009, 10:48pm Thanks for sharing the pics with us Christian. Wow, Ed's Havannah set is really nice. Much better than the one I made: http://arimaa.com/havannah/. Can I buy one of those signed by you. Haven't had much of a chance to play Havannah this year, but I shall return :-) |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Dec 15th, 2009, 6:02am @ Omar, I'd gladly sign one if I had one :) Meanwhile YvY (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/arena/yvy/about-yvy/446) may have been my final whisper, but not my final breath, nor my departure from the world of games (frankly, I expect those two to coincide). So I'm going to stretch my hardly accepted point - hardly so despite HanniBall and YvY - to the limit with an epic abstract game that has been dormant for a quarter of a century because the conditions for its launch were less than favorable. Its name is Mu. Now things are different, because Ed considers the multi player applet required as a challenge, which gives me a good hope that it will take shape in 'the not too distant future', considering that Ed has a steady supply of other priorities. The applet will impicitly be fit for at least two other games, Chinese Checkers (http://chinesecheckers.vegard2.no/) (at Vegard Krog Petersen' excellent site, and playable here (http://www.truantduck.com/cc/cc.html), here (http://thinks.com/java/chinese-checkers/chinese-checkers.htm) and here (http://www.vinigames.com/Game.do?gameKey=chineseCheckers)) and my own multiplayer abstract Phalanx (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/side-dishes/more-games-by-cf?start=17), which may be considered Mu's support act. A delicate point is - again - that it has been playtested only once, early eighties, against Anneke Treep who was to become the mother of my son Falco, a decade later. She won. Like Muldoon I say "clever girl". It's introduction at the games club Fanaat couldn't have been at a less promising time, because almost everyone had started climbing Martin Medema's previously developed 'Atlantis', and shortly after it was all Dungeons and Trolls - and abstracts all but disappeared from the scene. So it remained on the shelf and for its only change I didn't even have to dust it off: when Phalanx became a 'segmented game', in my mind I took note that this would improve Mu too. So shortly you can have a go at my claims again, and this time the organism/mechanism covers several themes within its territorial object, with ample opportunity for "advantageous sub-goals to be achieved as calculable signposts along the way". |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Dec 17th, 2009, 9:43am http://mindsports.nl/images/smilies/mu_logo.gif (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/the-field/470-mu) christian freeling game whisperer :-* "The reason I could conceive Mu without so much as a checker, is the same that made me unable to forget it: it's a self explanatory organism with will, intent and logic, rather than a bag of assorted rules and restrictions. It would always explain itself." |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by omar on Dec 25th, 2009, 6:06pm Wow, looking forward to seeing the rules of Mu. I think Havannah is still your best creation. It will be interesting to see if Mu tops that. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Dec 26th, 2009, 7:45am Hi Omar, thanks for the reply. I was wondering if anyone would. You can click on the logo to see the rules. What's missing is the applet, and that's not an easy one compared to our usual ones. Ed will make it, but he's also in the process of finding a new house, and if he finds one ... well you know what moving is like. So not only has Mu been playtested only once, it won't be playtested for some time. Good case regarding my claim that an organism can be self-explanatory. Mu is not like anything the abstract game world has seen, and comparisons are therefore hard. An 'abstract perfect information Risk' may be a workable way of putting it. I wish you a very happy new year and an ever expanding Arimaa :) |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by omar on Dec 26th, 2009, 6:20pm I didn't notice the image was a link to the rules. Thanks. I just read the rules. I think I still like Havannah :-) Just because it's so simple and pure. I didn't realize until I read the rules that Mu was a multi-player game; actually you did mention that, but I missed it the first time. I am not much into playing multi-player games and I remember Karl mentioned to me that he also didn't like multi-player games even if there is no element of chance or hidden information because there can always be collusion among a group of players and so a single player does not have full control of the outcome. I don't like mulit-player games because I hate waiting for all the other players to go before taking a turn again :-) I don't mean to be negative about Mu in any way; it might well be a great multi-player game. It's just that I know even less about multi-player games than I do about two players games. One think I do admire about you is your ability to keep inventing and thinking out of the box. Keep'em coming :-) |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Jan 16th, 2010, 10:12am Hi Omar, Thanks, but no thanks, I stopped. There's no shortage of inventors, lately, and I prefer a place along the sidelines. Mu is not new, I just never got around to publish it. Arty of iGGC told me that a Russian proverb is "Moving is worse than fire". Ed, responsible for the MindSports applets, will be moving shortly to another town, another province, same old country. That means that a Mu applet and/or improvements in the current applets will likely come later than sooner. All else being the same of course - anyone wanting to playtest Mu manually before anyone else, in particular the inventor, can find the rules under the logo above. Take white draughtsmen for Virginity, black ones for the Wall, plastic chips for pieces and a number of cardboard segments and you can easily beat us to it. :) |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Mar 26th, 2010, 2:05am I wouldn't deny you Omar's four out of four win (http://www.littlegolem.net/jsp/tournament/tournament.jsp?trnid=havannah.mc.2010.feb.1.4) in a Hanannah Tournament at Little Golem, counting yours truly among his victims! :o Another pleasant message is that Ed van Zon managed to buy a very nice house in the countryside. Another couple of months and he'll be settled in and MindSports will be set to proceed with new and better applets and a more 'player friendly' structure. And above all: hey guys, it's spring! ;D |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by omar on Mar 27th, 2010, 7:50am I got very lucky. I seem to have a lot of beginners luck and this was the first time I tried a tournament on LG :-) Thanks for sharing the good news with us. I'm looking forward to see the new MindSports site. I've played a lot of Havannah there in the past. I hope one of the features in the new site will be to permanently save the games. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Apr 23rd, 2010, 2:38am Hi Omar, At the moment we already keep them longer (a year if I'm not mistaken) and in the coming update we'll reconsider it, among many other things. Because David and I wanted to play on a smaller YvY board - to figure out how it's ticking strategically - Ed has implemented the base-23 (two-three, not twentythree :P )and base-34 applet, so if you challenge someone for a game, you get the choice between three different sizes. YvY's opaque strategy is due to the combination of an absolute and a relative object, and the way they interact. This is rather new and feels a bit weird. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on May 14th, 2010, 5:19am HanniBall, which was the theme of this thread about a year ago, has now been implemented (http://www.iggamecenter.com/info/en/hanniball.html) at iGGameCenter. Have fun :) |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by omar on May 14th, 2010, 6:18am Cool. This will make trying it out much easier. Thanks for letting us know. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on May 19th, 2010, 10:43am After six days @ iGGC, here are HanniBall's stats (http://www.iggamecenter.com/stats/game114.html). It's not unusual for a new game to be played fairly frequently (http://www.iggamecenter.com/stats/topplayed7.html), so let's see how it develops. This is the playtesting that according to common sense should have been done before the game's launch. Till now the game behaves as expected - that is: the way described a year ago, though now my view is indeed more crystallized by actually playing it. A couple of games ended in a draw by lack of plan caused by unrealized tactics. That'll pass. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on May 24th, 2010, 5:33am So where's Hanniball at the moment? There have been three modifications since its genesis: 1. The boardsize has been slightly reduced (9x15 -> 9x13 for the field). 2. JDB's stroke of brilliance simplified the shots at the keeper rule and it works perfectly. 3. Greg Magne defined 'obstruction' and the rule is implemented in both iGGC (http://www.iggamecenter.com/info/en/hanniball.html) and the Zillions machine (http://www.zillions-of-games.com/cgi-bin/zilligames/submissions.cgi/12098?do=show;id=1735) in the 'smart' version: if a player has only horses left in the field, the systems will notice if an open narrow passage causes obstruction. There has been a slight modification of the penalty on obstruction, because it simplified Arty's algorithm: in case of obstruction, the victim can choose to remove any opponent's piece, and is thus not restricted to removing a blocking piece. If the obstruction is still there at the beginning of the next turn of the player who caused it, it is up to him to undo it or to risk having another piece sent off. Obstruction is far from being the 'exception' I suggested it would be. I'm a (cautiously) attacking player and building a fortress around the ball is not the first thing that comes to my mind. But it should have. Arty Sandler was the first to explicitly formulate a strategy based on 'near obstruction': Get the ball (black can get to it first), bring it to the left or right backfield and build a 'narrow passage' along the b- or h-column where you keep the ball save from invasion by a knight's move. To get in the opponent would need a Lion or an Elephant, and a lone invader runs the risk of being captured. Now here's the puzzle: move the whole narrow passage towards the opponent's side, taking the ball along, till you're close enough to the opponent's goal to make a break for it with a Lion and the ball. That's it in a nutshell. It has been coined catenaccio (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Catenaccio). But in actual play it is complicated. Black can get to the ball first, but he cannot keep it in possesion because of the approaching pieces of the opponent, so he can only drop it one square off center. The one who eventually gets away with it doesn't have all that much time to make his narrow passage and may be forced to retreat to somewhere near his own backrow. Near the goal area anything might happen: a. The opponent's goal is a freezone for capture: to capture a piece in his own goal, the player would have to shoot the ball into his own goal. b. The jump from a cornersquare of the goal to the backrow is always possible because there are no two intermediate squares, so a piece in the opponent's goal often has this option (and the systems won't signal obstruction if this route is open). A Lion on the cornersquare of the goal may jump to the backrow, jump to the ball, jump back with the ball and jump back into the goal: end of game. c. Both players may have the option to use a ricochet to free the ball and totally alter the nature of the position. So you won't want to be too far back while building your narrow passage, but less far back you need more time and the opponent's pieces can cooperate better to frustrate the attempts. And always, always there's the risk of a piece, usually a Lion, breaking away with the ball and dropping it in too thinly spread a defense, ready to score next turn (or even the same turn, sudden death happens). As I said it's very complicated, but grinding over it, I got a taste of possible gridlock anyway. Where did it come from. Implicit restrictions shape the nature of a game, but an 'organism' should preferably not explicitly hamper itself. It's not a law, but rather an intuition. It didn't take me too long to realize that the restriction on the knight's move, based on the 'visual' that a player can pass one, but not two players, was somewhat funny, because it implied that the player is hindered as much by his own as by his opponent's piece. And the consequences showed when trying to invade an opponent's fortress. So I changed the rule from "the knight's move is not possible if both intermediate squares are occupied by pieces" to: 4. "The knight's move is not possible if both intermediate squares are occupied by opponent's pieces". My critics were right: playtesting is a must. Yet I don't feel I was far off the mark for a game this complicated. Anyway, what does the rule change imply? For the catenaccio player, aka the defender, aka the ballkeeper not much changes. He can jump over his own wall into or out of his fortress and 'organize' the required moves to get the whole thing forward somewhat easier. The latter is the more important. There's not much 'jumping in and out' of one's own fortress. A piece of the wall that moves to the ball inside, leaves it's own hole to exit, and Lions and Elephants can also shoot the ball over pieces without restrictions. For the attacking player, aka the ballhunter, things do change: any piece he manages to get in between the opponent's pieces that make up the enclosure can act as a 'bridge' for another piece to jump over, so the coordination as wel as the effectivenes of his pieces increases. The implementation of the rulechange was far from applauded by Hanniball players at iGGC, and they pointed mainly at the advantages for the catenaccio player: hey, now Arty gets even stronger, if not unstoppable. So it was kind of a relief that I won my first game new style against him, and against a clear catenaccio I might add. But it was a close call. Let's see how it works out :) |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on May 24th, 2010, 7:46am on 03/27/09 at 08:36:31, Fritzlein wrote:
Wrong. That's exactly what will happen. 1. Game X has only been played seriously for a couple years. 2. Drawish play almost never happened. 3. Therefore, so what?? Good luck with your planned grandmaster community. With all this prophecy going on, in the coming centuries finite games such as Oust will leave infinite games such as Arimaa in the dust. Of course I don't expect anyone to believe that. Not this century. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by megajester on May 24th, 2010, 9:16am on 05/24/10 at 07:46:16, MarkSteere wrote:
Who the hell are you!? [A Google search later...] Oh good grief. The fact that you're the inventor of Oust has nothing to do with your observations, does it? No-o of course not. Heaven forbid. I mean what is the point? Why did you waste your time signing up here and browsing the forum if all you're gonna do is find some obnoxious way of saying "My games are better than yo-our game! Ner ner ner ner ne-er ner!"? Excuse me if I ignore your self-serving claptrap and keep on enjoying myself. Why don't you go off and invent hex Ludo or something. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on May 24th, 2010, 10:05am I was seeing links to this discussion every day in the iggc chat. When I finally checked it out I had to answer the desperate cry for a reality check. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by Fritzlein on May 24th, 2010, 10:48am Here's an amusing contrast. One the one hand, I have played and studied Arimaa for about six years, and I think it is not a stretch to say that I am one of the world's foremost experts on Arimaa. Nevertheless, I am well aware that I can't know the future of Arimaa if it is someday played by folks who are significantly better at it than I am. Indeed, a portion of this very thread is filled with my skepticism of Christian Freeling's claims that he (or anyone) can know in advance of playing and developing expertise at a game what will become of that game in the long run. I take the "So what?" part of Mark's comments very seriously. Thus, even now, my most forceful predictions about Arimaa (including the one he quoted) are still qualified by words like "probably" and "unlikely". Indeed, even from the paragraph he quoted, Mark trimmed my qualifier, "but one never knows". On the other hand, Mark Steere, who is only superficially familiar with Arimaa, claims to know "exactly" what will happen in its future, although he advances neither argument nor evidence to support his claim. I expect I would dispute the argument or the evidence if it were there, but since neither is present we have only his expertise to dispute (i.e. his right to hold an opinion with no justification). In addition to the lack of substance, Mark also threw in inflammatory comments. This is classic trolling behavior. Mark, I understand that there are communities in the world which would benefit from a "reality check", but you have provided nothing of the sort to the Arimaa community. So far you have added heat while shedding no light. I invite you to choose between (A) backing up your claims in less incendiary form than your first two posts, or (B) leaving the Arimaa community in peace. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on May 24th, 2010, 11:06am I'm going to leave you in peace. I hold court in rec.games.abstract, a moderator free zone. I recently started a new topic there, "Arimaa grandmaster society". |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on May 24th, 2010, 11:42am on 05/24/10 at 10:48:02, Fritzlein wrote:
So I never predicted Hanniballs 'future'. I just predict that it will behave properly in the long run, gamewise. And I gladly admit that some finetuning has been going on as the result of playtesting, and that I'm not out of the woods yet. Playtesting has only just begun and my neck is still on the block. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by Fritzlein on May 24th, 2010, 1:39pm on 05/24/10 at 11:42:52, christianF wrote:
It may be that the only thing we disagree about is what you claim to be able to know about a game prior to playtesting. :) As the evidence from playtesting Hanniball trickles in, I keep interpreting it as proving you wrong, whereas you keep interpreting it as proving you right! Perhaps I simply don't know what you mean for a game to "behave properly in the long run". Also I am not sure what you mean by "finetuning" rules, presumably as opposed to making fundamental changes. My thought about what makes a rule change superficial or fundamental is the extent to which it would invalidate the expertise of grandmasters. Let me use chess to illustrate. An example of a trivial rule change would be changing between a 50-move drawing rule and a 100-move drawing rule. If the Russians all played with one rule and all the Chinese played with the other rule and their respective champions got together to play a match, the better player would win regardless of which rule was in force. A moderately significant change would be randomizing the opening setup, as chess960 does. The top players will be similar in strength, but a specialist in one would likely gain a couple hundred rating points of "home-field advantage" over a specialist in the other. A fundamental change would be replacing the queen on each side with a second king and requiring double checkmate for victory. Since I haven't played Hanniball myself, it isn't clear to me which of your several rule changes were "finetuning", except for one. Changing from three actions per turn to four actions per turn was fundamental. If all the Russians played 3-step Hanniball and all the Chinese played 4-step Hanniball, and their respective champions played each other, the winner would be whoever got to play with familiar rules. It wouldn't even be close. So what does that prove? It might be that your introduction of a fundamental rule change proves nothing because you didn't need to make the change. (I believe you implied this earlier.) But suppose for a moment that 4-step Hanniball is playable at an expert level whereas 3-step Hanniball does not behave properly in the long run. Would that not disprove your ability to know in advance of playtesting how a game will behave? At some point, I will no longer be able to fence with you verbally about Hanniball without becoming good at the game myself. At that point I will have to retire from the debate even if I am not persuaded of your thesis. Nevertheless, regardless of how you and I variously interpret the data, I salute you for inventing Hanniball out in the open and reporting candidly on its progress. That is courageously done. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on May 24th, 2010, 2:50pm on 05/24/10 at 13:39:27, Fritzlein wrote:
To get an idea across you have to exaggerate to some degree. Grand Chess is a good example of a game that supports my claim. Some opening weakness might have emerged that I missed, but I saw none. Given that why would Grand Chess not behave similar to Chess? HanniBall is another matter because the mechanics are quite new and the interaction is very complicated. That makes its long term behaviour much harder to predict. But I can predict that if no fatal flaw is found the game wil be rich in strategies and tactics. Outlines of both the possible flaw and at least the tactical richness have by now emerged. The possible flaw is that the 'catenaccio' approach might prove to strong. But it's not even clear which player has the better chance of getting the ball more or less savely surrounded into his own ranks in the opening stage. But you're right that I didn't get it 100% right. on 05/24/10 at 13:39:27, Fritzlein wrote:
Yes, that was less than a week after its genesis. Good fundamental change! on 05/24/10 at 13:39:27, Fritzlein wrote:
Or would it 'prove' it? It's not provable is it, but it might suggest it: I changed it because the four moves version is the smallest that supports grabbing a ball, shooting it to an opponent, capturing the opponent and getting rid of the ball, in one turn. Kind of the essence of HanniBall capture. on 05/24/10 at 13:39:27, Fritzlein wrote:
Thank you, it's always a pleasure to read your comments, and I'd sure welcome you at iGGC :) . |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by Fritzlein on May 24th, 2010, 4:46pm on 05/24/10 at 14:50:20, christianF wrote:
So, it might suggest that your intuitions are highly informed by minimal playtesting. This puts you at the opposite end of a spectrum from those who can't see flaws in their favorite games despite a mountain of evidence. But even if so, the ability to intuit game behavior with no playtesting whatsoever would be off the end of the spectrum. Quote:
Quote:
I, too, enjoy reading your comments (when you aren't manipulating your audience through intentional exaggeration :P), and enjoy trying to glean principles of good game design from you. Your writing is always lively and laced with insight. Although I insist that no one can know how a game will behave prior to playtesting, I also don't go to the opposite extreme of saying that generating random rules and playtesting is likely to create good games. Obviously people like yourself somehow manage to generate more sound game ideas than other would-be game inventors, and there must be a reason for it. Thank you for sharing your wisdom and experience. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on May 25th, 2010, 2:20pm on 05/24/10 at 16:46:59, Fritzlein wrote:
I surrender myself to the mercy of the court. Let's go for the minimal playtesting then. My latest 'finetuning' concerning the restrictions on the knight's move made the game slightly less positional and slightly more tactical. Not the way I would have gone naturally, but it would have been no problem ... if it had solved the problem. But it hasn't. So there's no need to divert from the previous version. The problem is catenaccio, because it is both boring and successful. It doesn't violate any rules and it hasn't led to draws, even to a substantial percentage of wins, but it's not the way the game wants to be played: victory comes like popping a pimple, a huge mass progressing ever so slowly, and then suddenly poof. I've been pondering this for a couple of hours now, looking for a generic solution without arbitrary parameters ::) and I think I've found one. But I'm going to sleep over it to make sure. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on May 26th, 2010, 4:18am on 05/25/10 at 14:20:44, christianF wrote:
There's a Shogi proverb "if you find a good move, look for a better one" and it applies to rules too. The whole problem was centered around the ball and the definition of 'obstruction'. I once praised Greg Magne's definition as 'perfect' and it was indeed, if perfect is defined as 'without the currently known defects'. The unknown defect being catenaccio. So a new obstruction rule emerged that implicitly includes the current one. If Fritzlein would ask me how, my explanation would suffer from retrospectively applied logic. In hindsight every step makes sense. Of course not every step in the actual process did. Maybe I just got lucky. For the new obstruction rule it is necessary to define the ballsquare as 'the square where the ball is at the beginning of any given turn'. The squares of the goals cannot be ballsquares (because there would be no next turn). Around the ballsquare, there are rings: The first ring consists of the squares one king's move away from the ball. The second ring consists of the squares two outward king's moves away from the ball. The third ring consists of the squares three outward king's moves away from the ball. ... The 'N'th ring consists of the squares 'N' outward king's moves away from the ball. Goalsquares are excluded, implicitly as ballsquares, explicitly as ringsquares. The obstruction rule: If at the beginning of his turn a player finds that on any one ring (the first, second, third ...) the number of opponent's pieces is more than half the number of squares of that ring, then the opponent commits obstruction and the player is entitled to send one of his pieces off the board. Barring the keeper, this may or may not be one of the pieces causing the obstruction. If a non-obstructing piece is sent off, then the opponent, on his next turn, will have to undo the obstruction himself, or risk having another piece sent off next turn. The most important difference with the current obstruction rule is that it is defined in terms of rings around the ball rather then in terms of access by an 'open' route, given enough steps to get there. In the new definition, the number of defenders that is allowed, shrinks with closer proximity to the edges or the corners. Centerfield there's no problem: with four defenders on the first ring a player doesn't even have enough pieces left to violate the second, unless the ballsquare is on the b- or h-column, where the second ring has at most eleven squares. A ball in the corner has three squares on the first ring, five on the second and seven on the third. That's one, plus two, plus three possible defenders. It is not possible to distribute these over the three rings in such a way that an opponent's access to the ball is completely obstructed. Along the side it's a similar story. The best columns to push catenaccio would still be the b- and h- column. Along the left and right center, you can put four defenders on the first ring, five on the second. But this still is far to 'loosely packed' to deny an opponent access the way the current style catenaccio can. Implicitly the old style obstruction test has become obsolete. Though generically defined, the actual test a system has to perform would be on the first three rings, or four if you want to cover every eventuality (a player could put 5 pieces on the 4th ring of a cornersquare). |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by gatsby on May 26th, 2010, 6:29am on 05/26/10 at 04:18:26, christianF wrote:
But it is four possible defenders on the fourth ring, and it is indeed possible to distribute the ten pieces of a player over the four rings to commit obstruction: . . . . . . x x x x . . . . . x . . . . . x . . . . x x . . O x x . . . | | | | | | | 4th ring | | 3rd ring | 2nd ring 1st ring O -> the ball in the corner x -> pieces (Pasting the diagram on Notepad will help) |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by Arty on May 26th, 2010, 6:57am on 05/26/10 at 06:29:32, gatsby wrote:
Didn't you put 7 defenders on the 3rd ring? (at least this is what I see after pasting to Notepad) |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by Fritzlein on May 26th, 2010, 7:34am I like the "font=courier" and "/font" tags. . . . . . . x x x x . . . . . x . . . . . x . . . . x x . . O x x . . . | | | | | | | 4th ring | | 3rd ring | 2nd ring 1st ring O -> the ball in the corner x -> pieces |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on May 26th, 2010, 7:43am Gatsby is right. It would appear that the new rule does not fully include the current one. So some more ::) is required. Suggestions are welcome :) . Of course demanding that both definitions be used and both tests required is less than elegant. It is worth noting that in Gatsby's example all 10 initial fieldpieces are required. Having one piece captured renders the given example impossible. Also, keeping up such an arrangement may prove quite a puzzle. At the same time this type of arrangement is possible elsewhere too, for instance on the side: In this example the left side is the edge of the board, and only 9 pieces do the trick (2 on the first ring, 4 on the second and 3 on the third). x x x . . . x . . . x . o . x . x x x . . . . . . . . . It's even possible on the on the b-and h-columns (left side edge: 4 on the first ring, 5 on the second). x x x . . . x . . o x . . x x . x x . . One possibility is to change the maximum number of pieces per ring from "not more than half" to "less than half". This would reduce the maximum on rings with an even number of squares with one piece, while not affacting rings with an odd number of squares, Of the three example above, it would only change one though, so this isn't what we're looking for (though it's always worth to keep in mind). So we're not looking for a bandaid solution. We're looking for one definition that covers both previous ones. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on May 26th, 2010, 8:01am on 05/26/10 at 07:43:29, christianF wrote:
This is turning into a pretty big "nutshell" :) |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on May 26th, 2010, 9:29am on 05/26/10 at 08:01:14, MarkSteere wrote:
I described the problem in a nutshell, I never said it was one, whatever that might mean. Systemwise the solution is simple: test on both definitions. One test is already implemented, and the new one is even simpler to implement (according to Arty). Rulewise this is less than elegant, that's why I feel one definition covering both criteria would be preferable. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on May 26th, 2010, 9:36am on 05/26/10 at 09:29:20, christianF wrote:
And that would be the precise nutshell to which I was referring. It's growing like Pinocchio's nose :) |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on May 26th, 2010, 11:09am on 05/26/10 at 09:36:59, MarkSteere wrote:
Hi Mark, glad you're enjoying the proceedings so much. Seems like I didn't quite make it with my 'predictable behaviour' claims. I clearly misjudged the catenaccio approach :P . Are there extenuating circumstances? At the core of the game there's a simple 'king's move / knight's move' scenario, but the interaction is very complex. So it was a difficult monkey to judge to begin with. Predicting the behaviour of say Grand Chess or Dameo is simpler because there are earlier games one can rely on, or your own Oust, which is a stroke of genius, or Cage, where the 'entrance into an endgame' aspect is immediately apparent (wasn't there a rule change in Cage? - gridlock if I remember correctly? :) ). At the same time I don't think the problem is any bigger than implementing both criteria and calling the first one 'obstruction' and the second one 'shielding'. They're not illegal, both are red card offences, and may cost you a piece just like any other bad move. This soon learns you to keep an eye on them. They may even be committed as an actual sacrifice if a player can manage a threat to score despite any piece being sent off. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on May 26th, 2010, 1:12pm on 05/26/10 at 11:09:15, christianF wrote:
:D Sorry, not to be celebrating your dilemma. Just goading you a little. I've committed at least my share of folly in the game design business, retracting flawed games on occasion. on 05/26/10 at 11:09:15, christianF wrote:
Thanks re Oust and yes re Cage gridlock, my folly :D In a contrived position, a giant diamond of like colored checkers around the center, the checkers couldn't move inward. Fortunately a tiny fix was available to straighten out the game. There isn't always. The problem was kind of a "typo" in the game's geometry. Cage was trying to be a valid game, but I wasn't letting it at first. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on May 27th, 2010, 6:37am on 05/26/10 at 13:12:23, MarkSteere wrote:
Thanks, I'm in sheer desperation. on 05/26/10 at 13:12:23, MarkSteere wrote:
We seem to have in common that you perceive a game as a spirit whose accomodation is the inventor's goal :) . HanniBall has the spirit of a soccer game and should first and foremost be fun. A single dominant strategy, however successful, has no place in that equation. Another nights sleep brought no single gereric rule so I'll go for the double. This means that the current obstruction rule remains in place and the new one, governing piece density and distribution around the ball, is added under the name shielding. Obstruction If a player on his turn finds a position in which he has at least one piece other than a Keeper, and not one of his pieces can reach the ball in any number of moves, then the opponent has committed obstruction and the player to move may remove one of the opponent's pieces from the board as his first move. This may or may not be a blocking piece. If the obstruction is still in place at the beginning of the blocking player's next turn, it is up to him to undo the obstruction, or risk having yet another piece removed. Shielding concerns only the 9x13 fieldsquares, not the goals. Definition: the 'ballsquare' is the square where the ball is at the beginning of any given turn. A piece's or a square's distance to the ballsquare is measured as the smallest number of king's moves to get from there to the ball. Squares with equal distance to the ballsquare lie in 'rings' around it. A ring is an odd sized 'square of squares'. The first one (R1) is 3x3, the second one (R2) 5x5, then (R3) 7x7 and so on. Rings may be truncated, the remainder being outside the board. Shielding If a player on his turn finds a position in which on any particular ring the opponent's pieces occupy half the number of squares of that ring or more then the opponent has committed shielding and the player to move may remove one of the opponent's pieces from the board as his first move. This may or may not be a shielding piece. If the shielding is still in place at the beginning of the shielding player's next turn, it is up to him to undo it or risk having yet another piece removed. Very similar to obstruction. The penalty may or may not be given. It would be silly, for instance, to send a piece off at the cost of a move, when a player has a win in four moves. In terms of visualizing, obstruction is easy to spot as long as there are still Lions and Elephants in the game: only a complete seal off, orthogonally and diagonally, constitutes obstruction. In the (probably rare) event of a player having only Horses left, the opponent may cause obstruction with an enclosure that is open to a king's move, but inaccessible for Horses. The systems (Zillions, iGGC) signal such cases of obstruction. Concerning shielding, please note that I've finetuned it by changing the maximum number of pieces per ring from "not more than half" to "less than half". This reduces the maximum number of like colored pieces on rings with an even number of squares with one piece, while not affacting rings with an odd number of squares. To understand the implications, let's see how piece density and distribution is affected in R1, R2 and R3, going from the field to the edges and corners: http://i45.tinypic.com/9v8acn.gif
In actual play shielding in the center hardly amounts to more than checking the first ring. It's nearer to the edge and corner that a more thorough check is required. To make visualisation easier the first two rings around the ball (and therewith implicitly the third) will be highlighted in lighter shades inward towards the ballsquare. Where the rule against shielding does not prevent obstruction, thanks Gatsby for pointing that out, is guarantees a structure around the ball in which at least half the number of squares from any distances are available for invasion. Towards the edges and the corners, the number of like colored pieces allowed around the ball shrinks considerably (note: though mainly a problem of the player in possesion of the ball, the opponent may also commit shielding!). And catenaccio needs, if nothing else, a ball that's near the edge and sufficient 'piece density' around it, to proceed. So rather than facing a dilemma, I think the rule against shielding effectively puts an end to the one problem HanniBall turned out to have after its launch at iGGC (http://www.iggamecenter.com/info/en/hanniball.html). |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on May 28th, 2010, 8:37am The rule against shielding will be implemented soon at both iGGC (http://www.iggamecenter.com/info/en/hanniball.html) and Zillions (http://www.zillions-of-games.com/cgi-bin/zilligames/submissions.cgi/12098?do=show;id=1735). Highlighting the rings may take a bit longer because it may require a change in the interface. The alternative can be to make the rings part of the ball. Moving the ball would then imply moving the rings, and the highlighted squares would cover other pieces, requiring a rewrite of the whole position. To get around this, only the lines between the squares could be highlighted. The ball would then look something like this: http://i49.tinypic.com/s16fc5.gif And in the initial position it would look like this: http://i48.tinypic.com/egekgh.gif The problem is that the rings will go over the edge of the board. To solve this, Ed will employ only two horizontal and two vertical lines ... http://i45.tinypic.com/zss2ns.gif ... (using one pair for each shade of yellow) and project the required ringlines with them for every possible square. Bit of work, but easier than changing the interface. Predicting behaviour This is the epilogue I added to a late arrival (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/how-i-invented-games-and-why-not/a-late-arrival): [color="#0000aa"]Playtesting for a week or two at iGGameCenter (http://www.iggamecenter.com/info/en/hanniball.html) revealed that the game's tactics satisfy its spirit. However, a not anticipated problem emerged, in terms of strategy. Arty Sandler was the first to formulate it: "Get the ball (black can get to it first), bring it to the left or right backfield and build a 'narrow passage' along the b- or h-column where you keep the ball save from invasion by a knight's move. To get in, the opponent would need a Lion or an Elephant, and a lone invader runs the risk of being captured. Now here's the puzzle: move the whole narrow passage towards the opponent's side, taking the ball along, till you're close enough to the opponent's goal to make a break for it with a Lion and the ball. That's it in a nutshell. It's been coined catenaccio (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Catenaccio), and though it revealed no inconsistency in the rules, it wasn't the way the game wants to be played. It clearly needed a rule to limit the number of pieces and their distribution around the ball. Thus the rule against shielding (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/side-dishes/more-games-by-cf?start=21#shielding) emerged. [/color] The point being that I did 'feel' the game's behaviour the way it now has become apparent, in it's immediate movements and interaction with itself, but missed the emergence of a strategy that clearly is not 'in the game's spirit'. I think with the rule against shielding the rules have now 'accomodated the game's spirit' adequately. As an afterthought, note that shielding can be used in a tactical way. A player can leave the ball in a position where not he, but his opponent commits shielding. Of course shielding is only considered at the beginning of any given turn, and when a player finds that his own pieces commit shielding at the start of his turn, it is up to him to undo it in the course of his own moves. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on May 29th, 2010, 9:00am I'm vicariously relishing your patient, understanding audience :) |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on May 29th, 2010, 9:09am My ashes would be blowing out of a cold charcoal pit by now. lol |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on May 29th, 2010, 9:49am on 05/29/10 at 09:09:59, MarkSteere wrote:
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on May 30th, 2010, 1:54pm Controversy rules >:( The chat at iGGC suffered overload, so at least HanniBall is capable of causing controversy. Several alternatives were suggested and I was subtly remembered that my previous attempt at a fix failed miserably. Not surprisingly so, because it didn't address the problem, just shifted the game in slightly less positional surroundings. I had jumped at a solution just like some of the chatters today, and I jumped back rather quickly. I believe the rule against shielding does precisely what it has to do: it regulates both density and distribution of like colored pieces around the ball in a generic way. Yet Arty's suggestion to simply disallow three like colored pieces in a straight and unbroken line might work too. Or it might not, I haven't had time to let it sink in yet. The rule against shielding doen't prevent obstuction, but it might prevent a special 'undetectable' kind of obstruction Arty came up with: http://i45.tinypic.com/x0u43c.png The system wouldn't detect 'obstruction' here because there's a black horse in the ranks, and if it would move, the position is open king's move wise. But the horse can't leave its position. The readers here are evidently good puzzlers, so here's a puzzle: Can a similar indirect obstruction be constucted with the shielding rule in place? In the example white is two pieces over the limit on the first ring. Arty had another interesting example: it is a shielding situation on R8 and it certainly doesn't look like shielding: http://i45.tinypic.com/20joc4j.png Here it is important to realize that shielding and obstruction aren't forbidden: they're red card offences, so black could lose a piece here. No big deal, if your pieces are in this position you're probably so bad at the game that you're quite used to losing pieces. I don't really see the probem arising, and if it does I don't really see the problem, period. Generally: the difference between disallowing something and making it a 'red card' (that is: allowed but punishable) is that in the latter case the offence can be made on purpose. Like not minding the punishment if it gets you two pieces in a scoring position. And the punishment in turn is an option: like not capturing a piece at the cost of a move, because you have a win in four moves. So they're part of the possible tactics. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on May 30th, 2010, 3:05pm on 05/30/10 at 13:54:40, christianF wrote:
Your nutshell is growing, Pinocchio :D |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by Arty on May 30th, 2010, 7:41pm Quote:
Well, it's not about "straight and unbroken line" but any group of orthogonally adjacent pieces of the same color. So "L"-shaped group of 4 same-colored pieces will be punished too. I also got an idea to include the Ball into the counting. So putting three pieces orthogonally adjacent to the Ball (either directly or forming a "chain", touching the Ball) can be punished too. In general, this rule punishes "clustering together", which is the "core" of the Catennacio. on 05/30/10 at 13:54:40, christianF wrote:
Yes :) It took me a minute to construct it. http://i45.tinypic.com/208b88m.jpg I forgot to put other white pieces on this image so put one white Lion somewhere on the board. The position does not fall under the "shielding rule": 1st ring - 3 squares, 1 black piece - no shielding 2nd ring - 5 squares, 2 black pieces - no shielding 3rd ring - 7 squares, 2 black pieces - no shielding 4th ring - 9 squares, 1 black piece - no shielding. Both white horses cannot move. The white Lion cannot reach the Ball. So this is a clear "Obstruction", which won't be detected with the current algorithm. By the way, my variant of "shielding" rule "punishes" this position - Black player formed a group of 4 pieces. Removing one of them either opens the way to the Ball or unblocks one of the white horses. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on May 31st, 2010, 2:13am on 05/30/10 at 15:05:37, MarkSteere wrote:
I'm not sure what you mean nor what your 'pinocchio' association means, but it is evident that you're enjoying youself in your own way. The remark I made about disallowing something or to make it a 'red card' offence is a general remark and might be worth thinking about, even by a brilliant inventor such as you, because, frankly, I don't think you quite understand. We're still eagerly awaiting your insights regarding the game, instead of constantly repeating your smallminded remarks from the sideline :-* . |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on May 31st, 2010, 2:32am on 05/30/10 at 19:41:55, Arty wrote:
Ah, three max. I must admit that your solution has the lure of simplicity and I can't see anything wrong with it just now. I'll have to chew on this one a bit more, but you might be on to something. Implicitly, my concern is the best possible accomodation of the game's spirit, not the best possible preservation of my ego, you can understand that Mark, can't you? ??? So I'll consider it for a few hours and see how it feels. Up front, and especially for Mark: it should still be a red card offence. If you disallow it, the system would disallow it at every move, i.e. a square the occupation of which would violate it, would not even show up as a target square for the selected piece. The game would thus be hampering itself. As it is, the system checks the position after submitting and doen't prevent the player from violating it at any stage, but simply gives the opponent the right to punish it. The opponent may find reasons to violate it despite the punishment, as pionted out previously. Sacrificing a piece that way is no different from sacrificing a piece in chess. Likewise an opponent may choose not to accept the sacrifice (for instance if he has a win in four). All much simpler and more 'fluid' and far more interesting than disallowing the configuration. on 05/30/10 at 19:41:55, Arty wrote:
You're aiming at a rule that implies obstruction, right? With your rule, the only possible obstruction configuration would be around a ball in a corner. Making the ball a 'piece' would prevent that configuration from going unpunished, right? :) With a bit of luck this may turn out to be the one generic rule I was looking for to cover both obstruction and shielding. One rule against 'clustering'. Does making the ball a 'piece' in Arty's concept really prevent obstruction as it appears to do? 'Prevent' in the sense that every form it can take will be punishable? I sincerely hope so. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by Arty on May 31st, 2010, 4:07am Quote:
Unfortunately, this rule doesn't include all kinds of Obstruction. With the Ball on A2 and two pieces on C3 & B4, an opponent's Horse cannot reach the Ball. So if this is the only kind of pieces the opponent has then the situation is Obstruction. Besides that it seems so that my variant includes all other kinds of Obstruction. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on May 31st, 2010, 5:58am on 05/31/10 at 04:07:44, Arty wrote:
Let's first establish that the shielding rule does require the obstruction rule too. The 'cluster' rule is much simpler and seems for all intents and purposes to lead to a similar spreading. Moreover, if indeed your variant includes all other kinds of obstruction, it will allow the formulation of a much simpler obstruction rule, that systemwise only needs to kick in after all king's move fieldpieces of either side have vanished. And that's not the most common of situations, most likely. For the Zillions machine it would mean less checks and more speed too (although branch density makes HanniBall a tough case for computers, regardless). So let's go for it :D |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on May 31st, 2010, 6:41am on 05/31/10 at 02:13:52, christianF wrote:
Right on all counts, Christian, especially about not understanding. :) I barely made it through the original rule sheet, never mind the cappucino, red flags, and "punishment" for naughty players. By the way, "penalty" might be a better word choice. A game is supposed to be fun, not punishing. I totally apologize for the "sideline" commentary. Somehow I can't resist goading you but believe me there's no malice at heart. It's really just the volume of the current, epic rule set I'm commenting on. It's like the oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico. I do believe you'll get it all straightened out, whatever it takes. I wish I could help but I'm incapable of focusing on voluminous rules. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on May 31st, 2010, 7:10am on 05/31/10 at 06:41:09, MarkSteere wrote:
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on May 31st, 2010, 7:51am on 05/31/10 at 07:10:22, christianF wrote:
I won't even consider conducting any sort of "investigation" until at least 12 consecutive hours transpire without any increasingly voluminous version updates. I'm still waiting for the dust to settle. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on May 31st, 2010, 8:00am on 05/31/10 at 07:51:46, MarkSteere wrote:
But all the updates concerned only one problem: cappuccino ;) |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by Arty on May 31st, 2010, 8:16am I must admit that I still don't know how to write that word :D |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on May 31st, 2010, 9:52am on 05/31/10 at 08:16:34, Arty wrote:
It didn't >:( It led to the dutch definition of soccer: "Soccer is a game between 2x11 players and Germany wins". Barring South America, the rest of the world was still oblivious of it at the time I think. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Jun 1st, 2010, 7:23am on 05/31/10 at 07:51:46, MarkSteere wrote:
1. The rule is simpler. 2. It implicitly covers "king's move" obstruction, so the obstruction rule, not to mention the algorithm checking it, can be simplified too. For the Zillions machine this is definitely a plus. So HanniBall now behaves as intended: as a soccer game that's fun to play despite considerable depth ;) . It has a nice selection of very novel tactics as well as great variety in the ways they interact. You're all invited to play at iGGC (http://www.iggamecenter.com/info/en/hanniball.html). |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Jun 1st, 2010, 8:30am on 06/01/10 at 07:23:17, christianF wrote:
[Resetting 12 hour timer...] |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Jun 1st, 2010, 8:51am on 06/01/10 at 08:30:25, MarkSteere wrote:
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Jun 1st, 2010, 9:20am on 06/01/10 at 08:51:54, christianF wrote:
There was never a flaw in Mad Bishops, Christian. I've changed the starting setup a couple of times, a 100% cosmetic change. I've also released Mad Rooks, essentially a cosmetic variation as well. http://www.marksteeregames.com/Mad_Rooks_rules.pdf Not that I've never released a flawed game. I have. But Mad Bishops isn't one of them, and I've retracted the ones that were. If you want to pick on an MSG flawed game, you've got some waiting and hoping ahead of you. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Jun 1st, 2010, 9:48am on 06/01/10 at 09:20:28, MarkSteere wrote:
I never said anything about a flaw in Mad Bishops, although the thought may bother you, and I'm fully reassured about Mad Rooks now that you've called it a 'cosmetic' variation. In fact it's hardly even that, see grids (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/how-i-invented-games-and-why-not/key-concepts#grids) :P So when are we going to see Mad Queens? |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Jun 1st, 2010, 10:36am on 06/01/10 at 09:48:34, christianF wrote:
A brief history of Mad Bishops: In January I designed Flume, kind of a simplification of Dots and Boxes. Instead of two types of "tokens" - line segments and colored boxes - you only have one. Stones. http://www.marksteeregames.com/Flume_Go_rules.pdf This led to a brief flurry of interest in combinatorial game theory and exposure to the ultra simple games the theorists work with - combinatorial games, as strictly defined, such as Clobber. Soon I needed to have a combinatorial game of my own, which has so far turned into three: Jostle, Colonnade and Mad Bishops (or rooks, but not queens). http://www.marksteeregames.com/MSG_abstract_games.html Normally a combinatorial game wouldn't pass muster at MSG and I had to bend some long standing rules to make it happen. Mad Bishops in particular - I rejected it and came back to it at least twice. Turns out it's a rather typical combinatorial game with quick and dirty play. Christian, I don't know where you're going with the "Mad Queens" but if you're saying I'm a stupid designer, this would seem to contradict your statements from earlier in the discussion: "or your own Oust, which is a stroke of genius" "even by a brilliant inventor such as you" I understand, you're frustrated over the Hanniball debacle. Christian, I was just having a little fun. I don't want to become the target of your wrath. I should probably just butt out of the discussion and let you work out your Hanniball issues in peace. Sorry :( |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Jun 1st, 2010, 11:52am on 06/01/10 at 10:36:20, MarkSteere wrote:
Debacle no less, now you're really funny. Hanniball is excellently accomodated, thank you. One thing about consistency: you seem to have some compulsory need to rub people the wrong way. No problem with me, they often deserve it (none of your 'targets' here implied). But style then dictates that you should also be able to take 'a little fun', shouldn't you? ;) |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Jun 1st, 2010, 3:14pm Quite right, Christian. Mad Queens it is. :) |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Jun 4th, 2010, 2:40am Oops, strategy ... One of the criteria for a game to be called a 'strategy game', according to mindsports (http://mindsports.nl), is that there should be "advantageous sub-goals" to be achieved, as "calculable singposts along the way". So I had characterized HanniBall as leaning towards the tactical. It seems I was a bit off the mark there too. Not that it's suddenly grandmaster stuff, but I'd like to give an example of such a 'calculable sub-goal'. Courtesy of Arty Sandler who introduced is as an extreme form of the 'new' catenaccio. The 'new' catenaccio, curbed by Arty's rule against clustering, is a strategy among strategies, instead of being a pain where the sun don't shine. This extreme form is called "Launchpad strategy". Consider this, a bare bones example: http://i49.tinypic.com/28jdy13.gif The 'launchpad' is formed by the Elephant with Ball and the Keeper: the Elephant shoots the Ball to the Keeper, and the Ball can ricochet all the way to b8 or g8. The Horse on h12, together with the Keeper, shields the ball against knight's moves, so to enter, you'd need king's moves. The threat is to shoot the Ball to say g8 and go running with the Lion towards the white goal. But you can't make it with the three moves left, so with enough defensive pieces nearby, the black Lion would be left stranded on the doorway, and vulnarable to capture. But white must always measure his defense: if the Lion cannot be captured it's a big danger so close to the goal. Or the threat is to shoot the Ball to b8, where the white Lion shouldn't be in the first place (on the ricochet line). After that Horse b12 can capture and even get rid of the ball. The opponent's goal is a freezone against capture, so a white piece on square 'X' would come in handy to break up the launchpad, but what piece? Not a Horse, although it always can hop from 'X' to 'O' if the latter is vacant. But it can't access the ball. Not an Elephant because it's way to slow and a piece on g14 leaves it way away from the ball. So it should be a Lion: in the current situation a Lion could hop to 'O', grab the Ball (capturing the Elephant in the process), move bach to 'O' and shoot the Ball (or move with the Ball) back into the goal. So black would be advised to get a piece on 'O', but then g14 must be vacated lest clustering would occur. So put the Elephant that is on g14 to 'O' and white's Lion needs three moves to get to the Ball. That's risky unless you can get the Ball out of the way. To do that white might use the 'black' launchpad against its owner and ricochet the Ball via the black Keeper to a place where it is least accessible for black and most accessible to white. There's a lot to consider. An attacking Lion on a safe spot is is a real thorn in the side of this kind of black strategy, but the drawback is that white must do without that Lion in the center, where Lions are most at home. It implicitly weakens the defense. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Jun 7th, 2010, 2:00pm on 06/01/10 at 10:36:20, MarkSteere wrote:
According to the current stats (http://www.iggamecenter.com/stats/topplayed30.html), HanniBall has been played more often the last 30 days (although it hasn't even been there for 30 days), than Oust, HexOust, Mad Bishops, Tanbo, Atoll, Cephalopod and Dipole taken together. If that's a debacle, the question is for whom ::) . Just having a little fun ;) . |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Jun 7th, 2010, 4:15pm on 06/07/10 at 14:00:12, christianF wrote:
Well, of course. :) It's a brand new game by the famous Christian Freeling - one which uber programmer Arty put a lot of work into, developed complex animation for, and ultimately salvaged. It's not a dowdy, combinatorial game like Mad Bishops. I almost wanted to play Hanniball. Hex Oust had it's own little chart topping stats for its first couple of months at iggc. Have I caught you misleading the readership with statistics, Christian? :D You don't pose the faintest challenge to me, Christian, and you never will. We have two completely different design approaches. You intuit depth of play and clarity and so on with, by your own admission (on bgg), no particular regard for originality. "I never invented to be commercial or even original." I, in polar opposition, strive for original architecture, with little or no regard for quality of play. It's a minor miracle that any of my games have taken root, considering my unconventional design approach. I'll take what little popularity I can get. But it's going to take a lot more than Hanniball before you even get close to doing what I do. I hope your games are popular, Christian, since that's your goal. If all your games are outstanding, then I commend you for that. It seemed like one of two of them didn't find their way onto any of the favorite CF games lists though. I designed all but two of my games in the last seven years. That's a lot different from half a century. Let's keep some perspective on the timeline, shall we? And in the statistical analyses. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Jun 7th, 2010, 5:16pm I'll bet you even money that Hex Oust beat all Christian Freeling games combined during its first couple of months on iggc. So what? :) |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Jun 8th, 2010, 4:02am on 06/07/10 at 16:15:27, MarkSteere wrote:
;) |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Jun 8th, 2010, 6:33am on 06/07/10 at 17:16:27, MarkSteere wrote:
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Jun 8th, 2010, 7:43am on 06/08/10 at 04:02:32, christianF wrote:
I couldn't have put it better myself. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Jun 8th, 2010, 7:54am on 06/08/10 at 06:33:38, christianF wrote:
No I don't. I think it had a glitch, what I call an infinity problem, that in this case took the form of ball hoarding or some such. I think you created a debacle when you kept triumphantly announcing your final solution, and two hours later it's broken again. Save the champagne until you get through a day without revisions. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by megajester on Jun 8th, 2010, 8:00am We have a tradition here in the Arimaa community of mutual respect and sportsmanly behaviour. I, for one, believe that this kind of ugly posturing, putting other people's work down just to massage one's own ego, has no place here. Especially not from some gatecrashing troller who has not played even a single game of Arimaa. I'm sick to the back teeth of this and I say it stops now. Who's with me? |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Jun 8th, 2010, 8:30am on 06/08/10 at 08:00:16, megajester wrote:
I'm sorry. Did I get something on your back teeth? lol |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Jun 8th, 2010, 8:58am Don't look now, but the topic is "Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games." I'd say that gives Christian Freeling some latitude in determining the content of the topic. If he's chosen to banter with a fellow designer of at least equal stature, I don't see that as entirely inappropriate. Nobody's forcing you to read this particular topic about and guided by Christian Freeling (even though this happens to be the only active topic in the Arimaa forum). |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Jun 8th, 2010, 10:15am on 06/08/10 at 07:54:33, MarkSteere wrote:
There may be some misunderstanding here about the content of the thread. I made a claim about being able to predict some games' behaviour, others doubted that on very reasonable grounds. Then the 'inventing process' actually happened when my mind wrapped itself around the idea of a Jeson Mor (http://www.iggamecenter.com/info/en/jesonmor.html) for grown ups. HanniBall came together in a couple of nights, between going to bed and going to sleep. I came out into the open with it immediately, to show the process 'live'. Initial parameters like boardsize and number of moves per turn were changed quite quickly, something I could have done before coming into the open, but that was counter to the idea. The idea was to put myself in a vulnarable position regarding my claims. Obstruction was spotted by the viewers, and Greg Magne defined it in the way the algorithms still check it. It immediately became a 'red card' offence. JDB had a stroke of genius when he suggested a generalization of the 'shots at the keeper' rule. Apart from that, the game was still very much the same as the one I perceived. Then a year went by in which nothing much happened, pending playtesting. Playtesting proved me wrong. That was the vunarability implied in the process. It demanded I do everything 'live'. So I stumbled over the 'catenaccio' strategy, first with a suggested change that was in no way related to the problem, then with a solution that was made redundant by a simpler solution with a similar effect, provided by Arty. So I don't think I made the process a debacle, I was following the rules of complete transparancy, even if the light didn't shine favorably on my claim. Meanwhile HanniBall is great fun and I'm very satisfied with its behaviour. You see Mark, I do take games seriously. I don't always take inventors quite that seriously, including myself :) . |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Jun 8th, 2010, 10:20am on 06/08/10 at 09:38:34, Arimabuff wrote:
Speaking of beyond the "pale", Arimabuff... :D |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by FireBorn on Jun 8th, 2010, 10:28am on 06/08/10 at 08:00:16, megajester wrote:
Agreed. We don't need the bad vibes. And you're giving abstract game inventors a bad name. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Jun 8th, 2010, 10:56am on 06/08/10 at 10:15:16, christianF wrote:
Christian, you're a very highly regarded designer with a gift for making games people like. Nobody expects more from you than that. I believe you. You can intuit characteristics of the as yet unplayed game. You can tame the spirit. But as some have pointed out, one can never foresee everything, as was clearly borne out with Hanniball. You seem to have enshrined yourself in a house of claims. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by Forum Admin on Jun 8th, 2010, 12:33pm Mark, thank you for following up your needling of Christian with positive remarks as well. A generally negative tone in posting won't win you any friends, but it also won't get you banned from the Arimaa forum. What will result in banning is vulgarity and personal attacks, such as you have routinely employed in other forums, including your inexcusable abuse (http://groups.google.com/group/rec.games.abstract/browse_thread/thread/d1bbc6f753f8eaf5#) against one of our own (ocmiente) in rec.games.abstract, when you invited us to discuss Arimaa there rather than here. If we were more proactive, that exchange alone would be sufficient grounds for banning you from arimaa.com. I have deleted your vulgar post in this thread. With contributing members of the Arimaa community, we tend to be very patient, but that doesn't extend to uncivil non-Arimaa debates which have migrated here. Therefore, this is your last warning. Please keep it clean while you are on arimaa.com, or go elsewhere. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Jun 8th, 2010, 1:56pm Ok lol Well, thanks for being a good sport about it. With ocmiente, who's fault was that? I didn't invite anyone to mislead the group. You don't go to rec.games.abstract and try to perpetrate a hoax. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by FireBorn on Jun 8th, 2010, 2:35pm I couldn't see Thomas' posts, but from what you quoted it didn't sound like he was purposefully attempting to mislead. He seemed to believe what he was saying, and just because you don't agree with him doesn't make him a stupid liar. I don't think anyone cares enough to perpetuate a hoax about the "pureness" of an underground board game that can be easily refuted just by looking at the rules, especially if he's not even the inventor. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by ocmiente on Jun 8th, 2010, 3:18pm Fireborn, After my exchange with Mark on rec.games.abstract I felt that leaving my posts up there wasn't worth it. I figured that the way usenet works, the posts wouldn't be deleted everywhere, but that I would try. They are gone from google's site. However, you can google 'Arimaa Grandmaster Society' and find the entire thread (http://www.gamesforum.ca/showthread.php?t=500093). If anyone other than Mark can see that I lied, or tried to perpetuate a hoax, I'd appreciate the reality check. I still don't see it. If you're interested about the Arimaa forum quote mark sites, Fritzlein's entire response can be read in response #11 (http://arimaa.com/arimaa/forum/cgi/YaBB.cgi?board=other;action=display;num=1236541162;start=0#11) of this same forum topic thread. I am sorry to everyone here that I was foolish enough to even respond to Mark's post on rec.abstract.games. If I had known then what I know now, I would not have done it. Mark's behavior appears to be fairly consistent, and well documented on rec.games.abstract and other forums. <EDIT> just updated the hyperlinks to look neater... learn something new every day :) |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by Fritzlein on Jun 8th, 2010, 4:26pm on 06/08/10 at 15:18:01, ocmiente wrote:
I did my best to address the substance of Arimaa's alleged drawishness in this post (http://arimaa.com/arimaa/forum/cgi/YaBB.cgi?board=talk;action=display;num=1274916361). I have no wish to be insulted and abused, so I didn't cross-post to the rec.games.abstract thread. Everyone, including Mark, is welcome to disagree with the substance of my findings, but hopefully in a civil fashion. I suggest we move any discussion of the role of Arimaa's repetition rule in preventing draws to the linked Arimaa forum thread, so that it doesn't further hijack this Hanniball thread. Unfortunately, the discussion of anti-social behavior must take place wherever the behavior arises, and thus will inevitably hijack threads. Hopefully the need will not arise in this thread any more, so that Christian can get back to reporting on his progress with playtesting and fixing Hanniball, and discussing whatever that implies with respect to his claims that kicked off the whole discussion. ;) |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Jun 8th, 2010, 5:46pm on 06/08/10 at 14:35:10, FireBorn wrote:
I was willing to give Thomas the benefit of the doubt and let the whole thing slide. But then he came back to brag that yes, of course he knew what superko was and that superko was why the draw column was zeroed out for the past couple years at the Arimaa server. It was clearly a tee hee/gotcha/well I was technically telling the truth kind of thing. The problem was that Thomas had been essentially saying that Arimaa's natural resistance to draws is so great that there hasn't been a draw in years on the Arimaa server. I was grudgingly going to take him at his word until someone turned up Arimaa's superko inconvenient truth. Then, after he got busted, Thomas was saying, Oh well, in my opinion, draws would only be at about 1%, blah blah blah blah blah. That's why Thomas is here, and no longer at rec.games.abstract. Now he's running around trying to delete posts from usenet. Consciousness of guilt? |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by Fritzlein on Jun 8th, 2010, 7:21pm Mark, your latest post is based on an unstated assumption that if Thomas was wrong, then all your cursing and insults were justified. Compared to your egregious assumption, any errors that he might or might not have made are not even worth discussing. I simply won't debate on that basis. If you can't discourse courteously, eventually no one will want to discourse with you at all. The only reason I am engaging you even to the extent that I am is on the hope that you might desire to behave differently in the future than you have in the past. If you still feel, to the contrary, that the way you treated Thomas was perfectly justifiable, it is only a matter of time before your sense of justice leads you into behavior that the Arimaa community won't tolerate. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by Arimabuff on Jun 8th, 2010, 10:34pm on 06/08/10 at 10:20:34, MarkSteere wrote:
Lame... |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Jun 9th, 2010, 4:02am on 06/08/10 at 16:26:10, Fritzlein wrote:
Preliminary evaluation of the games I've played and seen has shown no need to fix anything further. Arty's solution to the problem he showed in the first place is simple and effective (rules (http://www.iggamecenter.com/info/en/hanniball.html)). I don't expect HanniBall to harbor anymore 'unspirited' behaviour - it now feels as what I 'saw' and tried to accomodate. What it implies? Well, hopefully I didn't do too bad. The core is still very much the game that solidified last year. I missed catenaccio as a strategy, that was bad. I suggested a fix that was hardly related to the problem, that was very bad. But all in all we're talking one major discrepancy between what I perceived and what now is HanniBall. And for a totally new kind of interaction of four kinds of pieces based on only two kinds of moves, that wasn't too bad I think. It has resulted a game that hopefully gives the kind of intelligent fun that many people appreciate, and I'd like to thank you all for participating in what has been a very interesting journey :) . P.S. I think Arty's solution of the problem of catenaccio strategy, a strategy he formulated and empoyed in the first place, is so valuable to HanniBall that I've offered him a shared copyright of the game. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Jun 9th, 2010, 6:12am on 06/08/10 at 19:21:43, Fritzlein wrote:
There's no moderator at rec.games.abstract, and no end to ignorant buffoons forwarding retarded agendas there. Cursing and insults are the only available tools to eject them. The only thing you have to fear in rec.games.abstract is your own stupidity, which understandably can be terrifying for some. The asinine statements you make are the ammunition that's used to bounce you out of the group. Along comes Thomas, dragging a family sized sack of grenades. "Hi guys. Where do I put this?" |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Jun 9th, 2010, 6:32am on 06/09/10 at 04:02:11, christianF wrote:
Oh Lord. 14 pages of spirits and claims. Enough already. on 06/09/10 at 04:02:11, christianF wrote:
And rightfully so. Arty dragged your cindered butt out of the coals. End of story. No more visions of grandeur. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by Fritzlein on Jun 9th, 2010, 7:28am on 06/09/10 at 06:12:06, MarkSteere wrote:
Is it a mystery how your hostility has swelled the ranks of people who don't want to converse with you to include many, many more than the "ignorant buffoons" you have specifically targeted? If I choose not to respond to your next expression of general contempt, will you interpret it as yet another victory in your campaign to silence the unworthy? Do you not expect your attitude to eventually alienate everyone, leaving you talking only to yourself? If, ultimately, you are banned from the arimaa.com, will it only prove in your mind how far superior you are to the paltry community that would not tolerate your behavior? I would be happy if you would adhere to some community norms, including generally respectful behavior, but I am not sure what core values exist within you that I can appeal to. You justify your abuse of Thomas as being necessary to stop him from talking. What is it that you treasure apart from winning your arguments and silencing your opponents? If nothing, then there is no reason for you to behave differently in the future than you have in the past, and I don't see what I could do to influence the inevitable outcome. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Jun 9th, 2010, 7:41am on 06/09/10 at 06:32:15, MarkSteere wrote:
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by Arty on Jun 9th, 2010, 8:08am on 06/09/10 at 04:02:11, christianF wrote:
:) Thank you! |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by Arty on Jun 9th, 2010, 8:29am on 06/09/10 at 06:12:06, MarkSteere wrote:
No, they are not. Cursing and insults are _always_ the indicator of inability to prove something in a conventional way. Of course, the one, you are trying to prove, can be really dumb (I am talking abstractedly now, not referring to anyone) but it doesn't change the reason for "cursing and insults" - inability to prove. No matter whether you are not smart enough to find another way to explain something or your "opponent" is too dumb to understand you. There is no real "OR" there but both statements are true. So by "cursing and insults" you don't show the correctness of your words but show your inability that I mentioned above. Other people are not that stupid, Mark. They can read comments from both sides and make their own conclusions. If you think your opponent makes silly points you can just express your point of view and then ignore him. So other people will be able to compare your wit with your opponent's foolishness. Instead you give them the right to compare your opponent's foolishness with your exaggerated aggressiveness multiplied by your inability to explain something (that reduces your wit in their eyes). This comparison is not in your favor. And will never be. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Jun 9th, 2010, 10:18am on 06/09/10 at 08:29:12, Arty wrote:
Arty, you're putting me in a tough spot. I never like to argue with my favorite programmer. :) But... I won't deny you a fair argument. You just dedicated two paragraphs to arguing against something I didn't say. I never said that cursing and insults are the only way to prove someone wrong. Obviously not. What I said is that cursing and insults are the only way to eject someone from an unmoderated forum. Banning me from the Arimaa forum wouldn't prove anything either. But if I became totally obnoxious, that would be the moderator's only recourse to restore civility to the group. What's my recourse when somebody becomes totally obnoxious in rec.games.abstract? I don't have a button to push like the Arimaa forum moderator - unless it's your button. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by Arty on Jun 9th, 2010, 10:32am on 06/09/10 at 10:18:31, MarkSteere wrote:
Arguing and falling out are two different things ;) Quote:
I didn't argue, Mark. I just said that "cursing and insults" are the _result_ of something, not a _tool_ for something. The latter sounds more like an excuse. I also said what other "tool" you can use to stop someone's stupidity: Quote:
This tool works way better than "cursing and insults", which show your own weakness. You've been lucky to meet people who don't answer your "cursing and insults" with a similar thing. What would you do in such case without the "moderator" button? Continue with endless attempts to make your "cursing and insults" stronger than the opponent ones? Your "tool" won't work in this case. Which means that your tool is not that good as you may think of it :) |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Jun 9th, 2010, 11:34am All this discussion of cursing and insults is a little out of place here in the Arimaa forum. Rec.games.abstract uses a wild West protocol, one that was in place long before I got there. I like rec.games.abstract simply because of its name and because it's a place to announce my games. Not much else even goes on there beyond that. Not directing this at Thomas, but the occasional nitwit wanders into the group, and has to be bounced. When it's closing time at the bar and you just need five more minutes to go back to your table and finish your drink, no. Out. Now. Bouncing isn't elegant or justifiable or rational or any of these lovely things that we all aspire to be. It's just, you've abundantly demonstrated that you're intellectually retarded and that there's a much more appropriate place for you to be - the BoardGameGeek abstract games fourm. Leave now. No further discussion required. To me that's how it works at rec.games.abstract. If I'm doing it wrong, then I'm doing it wrong. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Jun 9th, 2010, 12:28pm Of course I'm curious what the interested viewers make of HanniBall. The unusual capturing tactics, not to mention the strategical use of the 'ricochet', require some getting used to (something even I can predict :) ). The fastest signposts can be found in games against any of the slightly more seasoned players, some of whom have a nice bag of tricks already, to baffle a beginner :o . |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Jun 9th, 2010, 3:32pm on 06/09/10 at 12:28:38, christianF wrote:
zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by Fritzlein on Jun 9th, 2010, 9:30pm on 06/09/10 at 11:34:25, MarkSteere wrote:
I rejoice in your implied willingness to behave differently here than you do elsewhere, even though your reason for doing so is explicitly not that you respect your fellow forum participants. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by megajester on Jun 9th, 2010, 10:19pm In our teens my brother and I tried and tried to make a chess-football hybrid, and never came up with anything workable. In the end I had personally concluded that football's involving chance elements and simultaneous movement makes it impossible to realise as a turn-based abstract strategy game. Of course introducing a "ball" concept is relatively easy, but then it's very hard to make it feel anything like football. A bit like the drinks machine making tea in the Hitchhikers' Guide to the Galaxy, you come up with something almost, but not quite, entirely unlike football. :) So I have immense respect for anyone who actually manages to pull it off. Looking at Hanniball it seems it really does capture the ebb and flow of a football game while still having a chess-like requirement for strategic understanding and not just tactical analysis. So hats off to you Christian! (and Arty) |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Jun 10th, 2010, 2:11am on 06/09/10 at 22:19:22, megajester wrote:
Thank you megajester, I think your characterization hits the bulls-eye :) . It may have something to do with the fact that it didn't start out as a football game, so I was shielded from any preconceived 'requirements' I might have had if I had set out that way. But it set out as a 'Jeson Mor for grown-ups' and in that process turned out to have a 'soccer spirit'. Ironically the capturing mechanism contributes in no small way to this, while at the same time being 'not very football like', as Schachtelhalm, one of the players at IGGC, remarked. That's true, and that's the irony: I would never have come up with this particular mechanism if I had set out to make chess/soccer. I was wondering about the 7 draws (http://www.iggamecenter.com/stats/game114.html) in the games till now, and found out 5 of them were achieved by two particular players. I think this somewhat diminishes the statistical relevance (in as far as some 80 games do have any statistical relevance). |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Jun 10th, 2010, 6:27am on 06/09/10 at 21:30:04, Fritzlein wrote:
When did I explicitly state that?? The problem you guys are having with me and rec.games.abstract isn't cursing and insults. The problem is rec.games.abstract's code of standards, apparently an unfamiliar concept here. Baseless accusations, fanciful claims, and an orgy of self-importance are the order of the day here in the Arimaa forum - none of which is tolerated by me or anyone else in rec.games.abstract. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Jun 10th, 2010, 6:53am on 06/10/10 at 02:11:50, christianF wrote:
Current Hanniball stats at iggc: Number of wins by the 1st player (excluding quits): 39 Number of wins by the 2nd player (excluding quits): 31 Number of draws: 7 Hannibal has attained a 10% draw rate in its first month at iggc and you think that's statistically irrelevant?? You don't just toss out statistical data because you don't like it. The two players in question are undoubtedly more skilled and therefore more pertinent to a statistical analysis than the other players in the sample, simply because they've played the game at least 5 times. If you want to toss out data, toss out the one time players. Then see what happens to Hanniball's already alarming draw rate. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Jun 10th, 2010, 7:18am on 06/09/10 at 06:32:15, MarkSteere wrote:
on 06/10/10 at 06:27:50, MarkSteere wrote:
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by Arty on Jun 10th, 2010, 7:20am 5 Hanniball games have been ended by a draw because raza had to leave and he asked to finish a game. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Jun 10th, 2010, 7:44am on 06/10/10 at 07:20:57, Arty wrote:
Occam's Razor, the simplest explanation is often the best ;) . |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Jun 10th, 2010, 10:20am on 06/10/10 at 07:18:42, christianF wrote:
Christian, nobody does the fanciful claim quite like you. You constructed a house of tattered claims and now you have to live in it. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by megajester on Jun 10th, 2010, 12:03pm on 06/10/10 at 10:20:31, MarkSteere wrote:
zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Jun 10th, 2010, 2:24pm on 06/10/10 at 12:03:05, megajester wrote:
15 pages of self-flagellation. It's a story of love and endurance. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Jun 11th, 2010, 6:57am on 06/10/10 at 14:24:50, MarkSteere wrote:
And as far as I'm concerned, it has reached its conclusion. I thank all the contributors :-* . Mark, it's lonely at the top, you're so high that mere humans can't hear you. You really should try to shout louder, use more bold, more capital letters, more exclamation marks! Don't worry about your current inventor's block, it'll pass and then we'll all suffer the consequences ;) . |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Jun 11th, 2010, 7:26am on 06/11/10 at 06:57:32, christianF wrote:
Ok lol |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Jun 20th, 2010, 5:03am It so happened that life went on. I stopped pursuing new games, so therse recent additions (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/side-dishes/more-games-by-cf?start=27) are mainly solidified loose ends. With one exception (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/side-dishes/more-games-by-cf?start=29). As you all know, a squaregrid with one set of diagonals is topologically equivalent with the hexgid: http://i47.tinypic.com/2dl8awo.gif While considering the board of Alquerque in a different context, I noticed that this grid, too, is obtained by removing half the diagonals from the square grid, albeit half of both directions intead of all in one direction. http://mindsports.nl/images/stories/sidedishes/moregamesbycf/queryd1.gif This led to the question whether these 'twins' might have some properties in common, and that of course led to 'connection' and games like Hex, Twixt and Crossway. So here is Query (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/side-dishes/more-games-by-cf?start=29). As far as I could check it's new (quite surprisingly so), and the name Query doesn't show up at BBG either so I expect no complaints on that front. The rules are what you'de expect: Black and White take turns to put one stone on a vacant intersection of the board. Black begins by putting one stone, after which White is entiteld to a swap. White tries to connect the upper and lower side of the board, Black the left and right side, following the lines of the board. The cornerpoints belong to both sides. Not an 'invention' actually, more something I stumbled over accidentally. Is it a fun game? I don't know. I can predict Mu (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/the-field/470-mu)'s behaviour because it's a self explanatory organism. Here I've got no clue except logic. I'm not attempting a formal proof here, but it would seem that one connection excludes the other, and that mutual blockade is impossible. Clearly there are strong and weak points, eights and fours, and within both sets there will probably be stronger points nearer the center, weaker points going outward. So there's a good chance the swaprule fits properly. I must admit to the absence of any 'feeling' regarding the game's behaviour, just that it's finite and one will win. That's the one who was smarter and that's what makes it a game ;D . |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by Polyfractal on Jun 20th, 2010, 7:09am Oh boy this thread is something else. :D Gonna make some popcorn and read through the whole thing |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Jun 20th, 2010, 8:00am Very interesting. Nice work, Christian. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Jun 20th, 2010, 10:05am on 06/20/10 at 08:00:10, MarkSteere wrote:
'Nice' is an open question too. Michael Howe posted (http://boardgamegeek.com/article/5176118#5176118) a critical question at BGG: "Query has c-8 and c-4, so I'd be concerned that the former would be so much more important than the latter as to unbalance the game. Players would play on almost all of the c-8 before playing on any of the c-4. Can you give us a sample problem where c-4 play is critical?" I don't know the answer: one might consider a vacant four with adjacent alternating eights 'critical'. http://i45.tinypic.com/2rpsbvq.gif There are two players and a probably decent swap, no imbalance there. If eights are more important, then players should try to do without fours and see where it leads. My guess is: into fours, eventually. But my guess is as good as Michael's. I never played it and I won't for the forseeable future due to work on a draughts project. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Jun 20th, 2010, 10:51am on 06/20/10 at 10:05:52, christianF wrote:
All of the work was making the graphics. Hex works on a wide variety of tessellations, including this one (from an old file): http://www.marksteeregames.com/pictures/Octagon_tessellation.jpg That Hex also works on the octagon/square tessellation rotated 45 degrees, ala Query, should be little surprise. I'm not sure if this "discovery" warrants a renaming of Hex, but... You see, I happen to know a thing or two about connection games. MSG connection games (http://www.marksteeregames.com/MSG_connection_games.html) |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Jun 20th, 2010, 10:59am on 06/20/10 at 10:51:15, MarkSteere wrote:
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Jun 28th, 2010, 7:06pm New MSG game: Fractal, a Hex variant http://www.marksteeregames.com/pictures/Fractal.jpg |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by omar on Jul 1st, 2010, 8:46am Cool. Since it uses a hexagonal board, maybe even Havannah would work on a fractal board with a larger base. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Jul 1st, 2010, 5:01pm on 07/01/10 at 08:46:02, omar wrote:
Thanks, Omar :) Fractal seems to be making quite a splash. I thought Cage was more interesting but, as usual, my public disagrees. This is the second time since I released Fractal a couple of days ago that someone has recommended its board for Havannah. You're raining on my parade, Christian :) |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Jul 2nd, 2010, 4:06am on 07/01/10 at 17:01:14, MarkSteere wrote:
It's all relative, you might as well be parading in my rain :) I think Fractal introduces an interesting new concept that might find wider applications, so you'll always be the first one to think of it, whatever games it may turn up in. Consider it sunshine ;) |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Jul 2nd, 2010, 4:32am P.S. Concerning Query, Michael Howe informed me about Wayne Schmittberger who, in a c-7 c-4 game decided to allow a choice each turn between two c-4 and one c-7. I think that would be an excellent idea for Query: two c-4 or one c-8. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Jul 2nd, 2010, 6:34am on 07/02/10 at 04:06:22, christianF wrote:
It's decided then. Fractannah! :D It won't be the first time we've shared a game board in some sense. http://lh3.ggpht.com/_3-aqNd-9ATA/TA7Bf31FD7I/AAAAAAAAAyw/o44PpxheKeA/s720/100_2546.jpg Havannah is printed on the backside of Hexboard's Atoll board. http://lh6.ggpht.com/_3-aqNd-9ATA/TA7C-mvZFVI/AAAAAAAAAzM/hlsSQQyEvVQ/s800/100_2560.jpg Atoll front / Havannah back. http://lh4.ggpht.com/_3-aqNd-9ATA/TA7BgfiEu4I/AAAAAAAAAy0/1zdYGN_zU6o/s800/100_2547.jpg |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by leo on Jul 10th, 2010, 12:21pm It reminds me that I once made an applet to play on a board that could be fractally expanded "from within", so to say, as players split connections between nodes. When the maximum recursion depth was large or infinite, there was a zoom command on the mousewheel to see the finer details. At the time I searched the web if the concept existed but found nothing similar. I can't believe nobody had come up with it before. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Jul 10th, 2010, 2:31pm Small world :) A connection game would be confusing if you had to zoom in and out to follow a path. It'd be hidden information, or obscured information - something that would reduce clarity. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Jul 10th, 2010, 2:43pm Like what's that stacking game where you have to remember what type of checkers are in the stack since you can't tell from the side? That wouldn't be a fun game for me. I can't even remember what it's called, never mind what checkers are in a stack. That's like remembering where the spots are on blank dice. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by leo on Jul 11th, 2010, 1:45pm It seemed to fail as a connection game indeed, even with a limited recursivity. Fractals make pretty pictures but are basically about endless repetition, something best left to computers. It might work as a pattern building game but I haven't tried hard enough. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Aug 30th, 2010, 9:34pm Cage flaw Daniel Schultz discovered a flaw in Cage. There were no legal moves available in the following scenario: A ring of 8 stones around the center, arranged red, blue, red, blue... I relaxed the rule constraints a tad to allow for a legal move in that situation. See Figure 5. http://www.marksteeregames.com/Cage_rules.html Daniel played the Cage program about 50 times before this special position occurred to him, so it wasn't real obvious. I don't see how any problems could exist in Cage now but that's how I felt about the original version. So, stay tuned I guess lol The new version allows a new type of move but it doesn't disallow any old move types, so it's a superset of the old version. There's a larger tree and there should be a correspondingly richer gameplay. Yeah it's a little embarrassing when flaws turn up, but at least a fan discovered it and broke it to me gently. I didn't have to learn about it from the usual YIPPEE I PROVED MARK STEERE WRONG!! public announcement. Bottom line, an outstanding game just became a little more outstanding. I took the downloadable Cage program off my website for now, but hopefully Thomas Plick will agree to incorporate the change into his program. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Oct 11th, 2010, 3:50pm Symple (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/the-pit/symple-560) Here (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/the-pit/symple-560)'s what occured to me last friday (oct 8th), just before falling asleep (when else ;) ). http://i51.tinypic.com/3026fyv.gif (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/the-pit/symple-560) Of course there's a little story attached. It started with a mail by Zick that I quote here, in part, with his permission: Quote:
And there followed a number of proposals that I couldn't really set my mind to, because it was otherwise occupied. So part of my answer was: Quote:
But Zick had struck a chord and I could hear the whisper I mention in my answer: there must be a simpler, better deeper game on the general principle. I was also reluctant unless you consider this cooperative: Quote:
A reference to the 15 years it took before a shotgun marriage between Bushka and Croda resulted in Dameo. It should be clear I had no high hopes or expectations, nor any plans to wrap my mind around it. But it did, and drifting in the twilight between going to bed and falling asleep, I saw 'bacteria in a petri dish' like Phalanx, and groups one needs for growth, but not too many, because there's a penalty .... and suddenly it became too simple. And my last thought was ... "could it really be so simple? what's wrong ...". The next day I was fortunate enough to suddenly remember I had had a thought of sorts ... and reconstruct it. Here's another telling except from our correspondence, the mail I sent after I remembered: Quote:
In between the above rules, be it that I gave both players the right to use both options, instead of either the one or the other. That was Zick's suggestion and rightly so: it pushes the game from the tactical to the strategical. Here's Zick's latest comment, after I posted the rules: Quote:
Amen 8) |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by omar on Oct 12th, 2010, 7:51am Thanks for sharing this with us Christian. Funny how these ideas come right when you're about to fall asleep. I've had similar experiences many times. When I was younger I used to jump out of bed and try them out right away. Now adays I just sleep on it and trust that if it's a good idea I'll be able to recall it in the morning :-) |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by clojure on Oct 12th, 2010, 8:29am Interesting game! I find the near sleep state very exciting since I am able to "play music" in my head, i.e. spontaneously improvising, which I'm not capable normally. This might interest some of you: Quote:
http://www.arthurmag.com/2010/06/25/diy-magic-dropping-the-sthingy -by-anthony-alvarado edit: I don't get the url working. If I use url tag, it works in preview but not after posting. Just copy-paste without the space. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by aaaa on Oct 12th, 2010, 8:51am Off-topic, but is your given name really "Christian" with just one 'a' or is it the more Dutch-like "Christiaan" and you anglicized it? |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Oct 12th, 2010, 9:28am on 10/12/10 at 08:51:49, aaaa wrote:
I was thinking, a long time ago, what would have happened to Christian Dior if his name had been Christiaan Dior ::) . By the way, is it really 'aaaa' or 'aaaaa' ;) |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by ocmiente on Oct 12th, 2010, 11:28am Interesting idea. It took a few times through reading the rules to understand what they meant - so it might benefit from more examples. I think I've got it now, but that was my first impression. I was also wondering how to actually play this. It would be easy enough on a computer, which could track which groups had already been added to. On a physical board, it seems like a third color (let's say red) of stones would be helpful, used temporarily from the beginning to the end of a turn, making it easy to tell which groups had been added to - and where - on that turn. When the turn is complete, the red stones would be replaced by white or black. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Oct 12th, 2010, 11:32am on 10/11/10 at 15:50:10, christianF wrote:
Of course. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Oct 12th, 2010, 11:37am on 10/12/10 at 11:28:00, ocmiente wrote:
Welcome to the club. I haven't tried yet, but looking back at how we played havannah, the first year or so ... like riding a bicycle for the first time :D I hope actual play will provide some examples. There's dilemma's all over the place, and Go-like territory control seems essential (with less of an edge/center division). A strategy game by the looks of it. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Oct 12th, 2010, 3:41pm Here's Zick's comment again, after I posted the rules: Quote:
I haven't played it yet, but then, that's what this thread is about in the first place, so I'll give it a shot. Just to get an idea, suppose both have started 3 groups, i.e. isolated stones, and now white starts to grow while black starts 2 more groups. We get the following count in the subsequent moves: 4: (0) - (-4) 5: (3) - (-5) 6: (6) - (0) 7: (9) - (5) 8: (12) - (10) 9: (15) - (15) Now white has 3 groups of 7 and black has five groups of 5. There are 46 stones on the board and white has gloomy prospects because from this point on black can outgrow him 2 points a turn and, should white start new groups, follow suit. So obviously one shouldn't start growing too early. If one starts too late however, the opponent's growth will hinder the above assumed 'free growth' strategy. One of the tactical goals will indeed be to cover territory in such a way that one eventually can grow 'inward', whereas the opponent would be forced to start a new group to prevent it, preferably a group with little prospect on growth or connection - were talking a fairly crammed board here already. The kind of position that signals the endgame in which connections may pay off more than growth in itself, despite the implied loss of growing options in subsequent turns. Just to elaborate, suppose both have started 7 groups, i.e. isolated stones, and now white starts to grow while black starts 2 more groups. We get the following count in the subsequent moves: 8: (0) - (-8) 9: (7) - (-9) 10: (14) - (0) 11: (21) - (9) 12: (28) - (18) 13: (35) - (27) 14: (42) - (36) 15: (49) - (45) 16: (56) - (54) 17: (63) - (63) Now white has seven groups of 11 and black has nine groups of 9. There are 158 stones on the board. That's fairly crammed on a base-8 board, and it is unlikely that a game would develop according to these numbers, because stones get in the way of the presumed 'free growth'. Starting new groups on a base-n board may indeed be a good strategy up to turn 'n' or thereabouts. I also presume two stages, sprouting and growing, although the rules leave either option open at any turn. Symple Square A usual thought, on this occasion put forward by Frans Faasse (http://www.iwriteiam.nl/) in a mail just after this publication, is translation to another grid. The Go board for instance, or any odd numbered square board of sufficient size. All things being equal, a 'group' then is: one stone or two or more like colored orthogonally connected stones. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Oct 15th, 2010, 12:13pm The old link to Symple is redundant, here's where we are now: Symple http://www.mindsports.nl/images/stories/arena/hex_symple/symple_d01.gif (http://www.mindsports.nl/index.php/arena/symple/) Symplex http://www.mindsports.nl/images/stories/sidedishes/moregamesbycf/symplex_d01.gif (http://www.mindsports.nl/index.php/arena/symplex/) Now here's the thing. This thread is about my claim to, sometimes, be able to predict a game's behaviour. You can read how this started. Zick wrote: Quote:
Suspecting, as I did, a simpler and more fundamental game at the core of the principle. Despite his thinking, and despite my reluctance to do so, the game, in an unguarded moment, came to me. It embodies the thematic hallmark: Quote:
with, basically, a single rule: Quote:
Barring Hex, you can't get much simpler than that. I've yet to play it, but I already mentioned the dilemma: Quote:
Think about it, when to start? My calculated guess is with a move near the square root of half the board. A 169 board? around move 9 or 10 (if you dare). Before that there's the placement strategy: you can place the stones dumb, so you can also place them better. Initial placement affects the growth potential of both players. Or you can start to grow or place just one more before you do - that moment always comes. After that, strategy is shifting to tactics. Keep the groups isolated with as many 'liberties' to grow as you can realize, to maximize growth and minimize the opponent's potential, but take into account that towards the end it will at a certain point be advantageous to connect groups, especially those with limited potential for growth. There's a lot of positional play there, and many means to combine the many moves at one's disposal. This game is quintessential (that is: it is the basic game around said principle), very simple, very organic, very 'fast' and very deep. The only factor that's difficult to establish without actual play, is the first move advantage. A swap just may be enough in the square game, but I'm not sure about the hexgame. Anyway, I'm surprised at the lack of comments (barring the one by Mark who feels that stories are his prerogative). Too symple perhaps ??? . |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Oct 17th, 2010, 9:47am Symple can now be played (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/players-section) at MindSports. Just register, add it to your prefs, and you're ready to go. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by clojure on Oct 17th, 2010, 12:05pm on 10/15/10 at 12:13:04, christianF wrote:
Don't be discouraged for not getting comments. This is quite a small community after all, and the timing of post might have affected that also. Sure it's hard to say anything without playing. There is not much rules to discuss so it is quite abstract. Personally, these kind of games are what I value most. The emergent properties that stem up from trivial rules make the game feel universal. Unfortunately I'm not very good at getting involved in a new game, and have lately been fascinated by Arimaa, shogi and restarted playing go, not to mention reading the book on checkers AI, Chinook, history. It was crucial that you have the game as playable now. I hope people will try it out. Even if they won't, know that there are people that have huge respect for designers such as yourself. I also like to read how the games evolve, as in this thread. Thank you for those valuable posts. [offtopic] Personally, one type of game that I might myself someday innovate, is a game which main purpose is to modify its rules. A combination of stack based programming language (higher-order combinators) + self-modification of the stack. Though queue might fit better.[/offtopic] |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Oct 17th, 2010, 2:43pm on 10/15/10 at 12:13:04, christianF wrote:
Someone please douse me in gasoline and take away the pain. |
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Title: cable to any odd sized grid Post by christianF on Oct 17th, 2010, 3:19pm on 10/17/10 at 14:43:06, MarkSteere wrote:
Then who would be out there in the woods, chasing games, while I'm sitting on the porch enjoying the occasional one that comes to me? ;) Now there's a thread at BGG, no Mark, not started by me (and neither was this one for that matter) where players interested in something new under the sun discuss Symple and Byg (by Nicholas Bentley). Something really new in terms of mechanics, applicable to any odd sized grid. It's called Byg (P)review of Symplex (http://www.boardgamegeek.com/thread/574830/byg-preview-of-symplex). Symple was conceived as a hexgame. The hexgame is now called 'Symplex'. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by Fritzlein on Oct 17th, 2010, 11:25pm on 10/15/10 at 12:13:04, christianF wrote:
Is the lack of comments from the Arimaa community about Symple any more surprising than your lack of comments about the new Arimaa material evaluation function that was recently proposed, the new Arimaa analysis tool that was recently developed, the Arimaa game that was recently submitted for critique, the Arimaa festival that is currently being planned, the outcome of the recent Arimaa Postal Mixer and Arimaa World League season, or anything else in any of the other Arimaa threads? I do not take it amiss that you find nothing in any of dozens of Arimaa threads in the Arimaa forum to be worth your time to read and respond to; do you nevertheless feel slighted by us? |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Oct 18th, 2010, 1:05am on 10/17/10 at 23:25:04, Fritzlein wrote:
Yeah Christian. Way to hijack a forum. Btw guys, congrats on Games magazine Abstract of the Year. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by Fritzlein on Oct 18th, 2010, 2:09am To be clear, I am glad that Symple is being discussed and examined. I have nothing against Symple, and nothing against posting about Symple in the off-topic section of the Arimaa forum. I was merely asking what Christian meant by expressing surprise at the lack of responses. Is the relative silence a failure of the community's courtesy? Probably there some other reason he let us know that he expected something different from us; I should have asked what that reason was in a less loaded way. Instead of asking, "Did you mean this criticism that your words seem to imply?", I could have simply asked, "Why are you surprised?" Then Christian could have responded without having to dispute any words that I have put in his mouth. It may explain (although perhaps not excuse) the sharpness of my previous post that I haven't recently been spending twenty hours per week on Arimaa as I have done in prior months. I find it difficult to respond to all the posts that are worthy of a response. I would like to spend more time on Arimaa, but I have been pulled in other directions. That makes me rather sensitive to an implication that I have been allocating my attention poorly. On the other hand, I quite likely hold the all-time lead in Arimaa forum posts that have not been responded to. I understand the disappointment of floating an idea that no one pays any attention to. I know how short a leap it is from being disappointed to sharing that disappointment along with an implication that I had hoped for better. Having gone down that path many times myself, the wisest thing I could have done was probably to silently learn from Christian's comment without responding to it at all. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Oct 18th, 2010, 5:20am on 10/18/10 at 01:05:36, MarkSteere wrote:
Hijacking a thread titled "Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games"? A clear example of misdirected 'Markasm' I'd say. Don't worry, I know you're far too intelligent to mean what you say. ;) So am I, sometimes. on 10/18/10 at 02:09:53, Fritzlein wrote:
Fritzlein, you're excused for the sharpness of your first post regarding this subject. Let me assure you I didn't mean to criticize anyone. Why should I? I usually have an excellent time here, not in the last place because of your comments that have always been serious and insightful. No I was surprised. Symple appears to be the quintessential implementation of a somewhat obscure theme first embodied in Star. I use quitessential for games of which the basic idea can implemented without any diversions from it: Go, Hex, Y, Checkers, Emergo, to name a few. It's not a value judgement, but it is a significant feature. Symple doesn't have the 'special cells' that Zick presumed (i.e. the edges in Star). Symple is applicable to any odd-sized grid, even a single line. Symple has new mechanics, a new dilemma, and basically has but one rule. As a bonus that may appeal to Mark, it's finite. It's also fast, ending between 20 and 30 moves or so, depending on boardsize. The minimum number of stones to completely fill a board with one color, following the rules, isn't trivial and shows something of the dilemma the game raises. Symple is not a construction like Chess variants or Arimaa (again: no value judgement implied), it's an organism. A new simple organism with deep implications. Like finding a new species. The rules where perceived as described. The 'hanging matter' of balancing the first move advantage has been resolved. Now did I or did I not publish this game, for you all to enjoy, and describe it's nature, before playing it? Did I need to playtest it? No, because I can see the game's fundamental simplicity and the dilemma emerging from it. I trust simplicity. Did I worry about the first move advantage? I did mention possible solutions like a swap, which Zick was doubtful about, a 3-move swap, which Ed was doubtful about, and komi, which I was doubtful about. But I wasn't worried because I go from the premiss that if the system is sound, the rule will be there. Remember that Mark, next time you 'can't find the rule' ;) . And the rule, when it came, was none of the above. I would expect players to be glad that game inventors do what they do, even if they cannot understand the way they do it. Or don't believe it. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by qswanger on Oct 18th, 2010, 8:32am on 10/18/10 at 01:05:36, MarkSteere wrote:
Whoa, I must have missed something. Did Arimaa win Games Magazine abstract of the year (this year)? ??? My subscription ran out and so I don't remember the timeline for their awards anymore. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Oct 18th, 2010, 10:54am on 10/18/10 at 05:20:09, christianF wrote:
No, Christian. Hijacking a forum entitled "Arimaa" with a thread entitled "Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games." on 10/18/10 at 05:20:09, christianF wrote:
Christian, I didn't want to critique your game for two reasons: 1) I already pick on you too much, and 2) I didn't want to subject myself to the Symple rule sheet. But now you've forced my hand. on 10/18/10 at 05:20:09, christianF wrote:
This is your idea of "but one rule" ???: "A short clarification: top-left black has grown one group (the marked stone). Now he may not grow the leftmost group at the cell marked 'X', because the other group would have two new adjacent stones. Top-right a similar situation, but now black may still grow the rightmost group at the cell marked with a white spot. He connects to an already grown group, true, but no original group has grown more than one stone. In the center, the marked white stone connects three groups, turning the 'local score' from -3 to +2 (see: object). No further stones may be added to the resulting group in this turn, and of course he now may only grow one stone at it in his next turn. At the bottom white has grown the marked stone. Now cells marked 'X' are off limits, and the cell marked with a white dot is still optional for growth." Hex has one rule. Tic-Tac-Toe has one rule. Complycated has way more than one rule. on 10/18/10 at 05:20:09, christianF wrote:
You've complied with a building standard. There's no bonus for that. Cephalopod uses the exact same object but Cephalopod has architecture. http://www.marksteeregames.com/Cephalopod_rules.pdf on 10/18/10 at 05:20:09, christianF wrote:
Again, not a bragging point. Your game is scalable and therefore meets a building standard. on 10/18/10 at 05:20:09, christianF wrote:
Lean forward slightly so I can christen you with a dense rubber mallet labelled "reality check". As far as quality of play, I'm sure Symple is a lovely game. My grade for Symple's architecture: F-. The reasons for the F are innumerable. The minus is for this: "If, and only if, neither player has grown yet, then black on his turn may use both the above options in the above order: he may place a stone, therewith creating a new group, and he may grow any or all of his other (!) groups." on 10/18/10 at 05:20:09, christianF wrote:
Now I'm being mentored by Christian Freeling. What next?? Christian, Symple crawled up onto your porch not for fear of getting bagged by big game hunters, but because nobody else wanted it. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Oct 18th, 2010, 11:48am on 10/18/10 at 10:54:34, MarkSteere wrote:
You're invariably funny ;D, but for your information, I didn't start this thread, Omar did. That's a reality check. on 10/18/10 at 10:54:34, MarkSteere wrote:
"On his turn a player may either put a stone on a vacant cell, not connected to a like colored group, thereby creating a new group, or grow any or all of his existing groups by one stone. A stone connecting two or more different groups is considered to have grown all off them. No group, considered at the beginning of the player's turn, may grow more than one stone in that particular turn." That's the rule. Of course you know the difference between a clarification and a rule. You may have missed the 'hanging matter' of the first move advantage, but that problem was considered from the very beginning. It became the one exception: as long as no growth has taken place, black is entitled to use both options in one turn. Apart from that, I love you :-* keep hunting and caging, and if you ever happen to visit the Netherlands, I'd be more than pleased to welcome you on my metaphorical porch. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Oct 18th, 2010, 12:33pm on 10/18/10 at 11:48:22, christianF wrote:
And I you :D I may visit the Netherlands again someday. It's my favorite country. If there's an Oust tournament or something, which one can't rule out (since it's the world's best modern game) I'll be there, invited or otherwise. You'll have to promise not to throw your boa constrictor on me though :D. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Oct 18th, 2010, 12:52pm on 10/18/10 at 12:33:29, MarkSteere wrote:
It's a Burmese python, and somewhat difficult to throw ;D . http://i34.tinypic.com/259bn8y.jpg |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Oct 18th, 2010, 12:56pm Holy [something that would certainly be deemed "vulgar" by the moderators]!! |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Oct 20th, 2010, 11:58am Those of you who know Zickzack (http://www.boardgamegeek.com/user/Zickzack), yours truly included, value his opinions on games highly. Here (http://www.boardgamegeek.com/article/5678716#5678716) is his latest post in the thread he started about Byg and Symple at BGG in connection with our current game (http://mindsports.nl/cgi-bin/Arena/Serve.cgi?file=Symple1287573635.html) at mindsports. The first game (http://mindsports.nl/cgi-bin/Arena/Serve.cgi?file=Symple1287345883.html) ended in a win for Zick - he had been playtesting with iGGC's Arty Sandler and some friends, discovering, among other, the importance of the second line. It was my first game and I'm happy not to be slaughtered completely, but I waited way to long with a 'prevention growth' that would have taken out black's option to both place and grow. Moreover, my opening stones around the 3rd and 4th line were misguided. The game ended, typically, in the twenty-some moves. I resigned because I had clearly lost. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Oct 21st, 2010, 3:17am on 10/20/10 at 20:49:53, SpeedRazor wrote:
Maybe it comes with the territory. Sometimes inventors are so familiar with the implications of their new finds that they tend to forget that players implicitly are not. Mark and I despise the sloppy reading of rules that sometimes shines through in comments. Yet both of us have been known, occasionally, for sloppy writing. I like to hate Mark, but I don't hate to like him. Sometimes, too, there's misunderstanding, such as Fritzlein's suspicion that my first Symple post implied criticism on the members of this forum, which was not intended. In retrospect I can see it may have given that impression though. That I don't post in other fora at Arimaa isn't because I don't have an interest in the game. I do have an interest in Chess, as an inventor, but I am such a poor player that my contributions to a Chess forum would be a waste of effort and time, both on my side and the readers' side. Same holds for Arimaa and quite a few other games. I'm at my end, offering my contibutions as best I can. I'm copying a summary of sorts I made the BGG forum. - Symple was conceived the 8th of October, as an organism and as the fundamental implementation of the 'Star theme'. It presented itself with the implicit plroblem of the first move advantage, and a strong sugestion that a swap wouldn't solve the problem. - I found the rule that solves any imbalance resulting from a first move advantage shortly after. - I played my first game (http://mindsports.nl/cgi-bin/Arena/Serve.cgi?file=Symple1287345883.html) the 17th of October, not to playtest the organism, because I can see it move and it moves well, but to get a feel for it, because I am curious as hell. - So I did exactly what so seems to upset some posters because they cannot imagine how that can be: find the game and describe its character before making a single move. Here's the summary - this was October 16. Quote:
And that was an excellent point. I've always argued that if the system is sound, the rule will be there. Emergo, like Symple a quintessential game, provides a beautiful example: when the idea emerged, all it needed was its entering protocol, and we found its entering protocol. Symple also provides its own opening protocol: Quote:
Posted fresh from the brain. Quote:
That was spotted very good and argued accordingly, but there's a twist Zick initially missed, and noticed shotly thereafter: Quote:
So it's not a swap in the traditional sense, but it still offers a similar choice. We go from a white first move advantage which was difficult to compensate, to a black advantage that can implicitly be 'trimmed down to size', forcing black to either cash in early, grabbing the advantage as far as it goes in terms of points, or having it taken it away altogether. The difficult point being 'how early'. Not a metarule, but a rule rendering a similar result within the game itself, and every bit as organic as the game itself. It also illustrates that 'placing (an isolated stone) after growing' does indeed occur. In the engame this may also be the case: an isolated stone (adding '-1' to the score), may prevent a connection between two opponent's groups (which would add '+3' to the opponent). P.S. This really is my last game. Half my life embedded between Havannah and Symple feels too satisfactory to risk having "little more than half my life" embedded between Havannah and something ornamental 8) . |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Oct 21st, 2010, 8:09am on 10/20/10 at 20:49:53, SpeedRazor wrote:
Now you have :) |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Oct 21st, 2010, 8:17am Quote:
[shaking head] Just when I thought the Symple discussion was winding down... |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Oct 21st, 2010, 9:15am on 10/21/10 at 08:17:39, MarkSteere wrote:
If members care to look beyond the inventor's questionable character and outrageous claims, I'd be surprised (!) if it would :) . |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Oct 21st, 2010, 11:16am on 10/21/10 at 03:17:49, christianF wrote:
I've tried to quit design a few times, mainly because it always leads to conflict on the Internet. Now I seem to have embraced the conflict, but I still think of retiring because I'll probably never top the games I already have and I don't want to add substandard games into my portfolio. In any case, I don't really have the option of retiring. I can make it at most a couple of months before I'm drawn back into musing about design concepts - eyes closed, feet up, perfuming the breeze with smoldering California green,.... Ahhhhhhhhhhhh |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Oct 21st, 2010, 12:39pm on 10/21/10 at 11:16:56, MarkSteere wrote:
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Oct 22nd, 2010, 12:37pm Here's a game where we're attempting a more or less coherent newbie strategy: Benedikt Rosenau (DE) - christian freeling (nl) (http://mindsports.nl/cgi-bin/Arena/Serve.cgi?file=Symple1287573635.html) White 5 is a growing move, where Benedikt grabs 4 points and prevents black from using his first growth privilige, both good for white. However, black is now one group up and can afford (to a degree) to postpone growth: if white grows first, he'll still be one group down. At move 13 white considers further growth undesirable, because black threatens to grow too, and with 13 groups the first growing action usually allows several combinations that give the first player to grow the initiative. White's reasoning is that black may have ample compensation that way for giving up the one group he is up. So he rather takes the initiative, at the cost of black being one group up now. And that where we are at the time of posting this: the start of the growing phase where our feeble attempts at opening strategy are presumed to pay off. Edit 1: At white 18 black has caught up thanks to his extra group, but it's not just a growing race: white has the better position, securing more 'territory' to grow in. Edit 2: The game ended in a white victory in 26 moves, which was slightly more than was needed for clarity on the score, and far more than was needed to conclude on a white victory. Since players may pass, and since no advantageous invasion is possible anymore (the last being black 25 that costs black one point, but would have costed him 3 had white connected), both can just fill in, so the go-concept of 'chinese count' is applicable. The difference is that in Go 'chinese count' includes stones on the board on top of vacant points (japanese count), whereas here it includes vacant points on top of stones. The applet counts stones minus twice the number of groups. Since the filling in doesn't connect any groups, white gets 16 points on top of the 130 already present, black gets 4 on top of the 113 he managed. 146-117 and congrats Zick :) |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Oct 25th, 2010, 4:15am Symple Numbers (http://www.iwriteiam.nl/D1010.html#24) I'm not an expert, actually not even a layman, in graph theory, but for those who are, Frans Faase (http://www.iwriteiam.nl/) has implemented a program (http://www.iwriteiam.nl/SympleNumberSquareGraph_20101024_cpp.txt) for calculating Symple Numbers (def.) (http://www.iwriteiam.nl/D1010.html#14) for graphs of the form Pn (path graphs) and PnxPm (square grid graphs). |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Oct 25th, 2010, 2:24pm Someone suggested that Symple was an "homage" to me. It does't matter if is or not, but now I feel bad about judging the game too harshly. The minus has to be there because of the balancing rule, but maybe it should be a D- or a C-. If it's any consolation, I hate two of my own games almost as much as Symple. Why am I such a game hater? I didn't used to be. When I first started, I was designing in a total vacuum. I never played games or knew anyone who did. I even didn't know what "abstract strategy games" were. I just knew about a handful of classics. One day I found out about Reversi and I was smitten. Had no desire to actually play Reversi but I did design Quadrature, my first game. One day I got into a move cycle, something I didn't even know was possible in Quadrature, and it was an awful, terrible moment in my life. From that point forward, no more draw susceptible games. In my vacuum, the only things that mattered were robustness and architecture - design interest. Quality of play was never an issue because people would be thrilled to have something other than Chess, Checkers, and Backgammon. At age 33, I had still never heard of Go or Hex or any commercial abstract games other than Othello/Reversi. Whenever I hear someone say "I used to be totally naive," my first thought is "Used to be?" I'm still naive and I'm still designing in a vacuum, but I set a very high standard for myself. I don't know if there are even ten games, not of my own design, that I like. There's slim chance of obtaining a reassuring response to the question, "Hey Mark, what do you think of this game?" |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Oct 26th, 2010, 7:53am on 10/25/10 at 14:24:51, MarkSteere wrote:
But not quite as much, I hope. I'd like Symple to be unique in at least that respect. It's not a homage, actually, I hadn't planned it. It drifted upwards while I was drifting downwards, and there was this small overlapping window, but large enough to remember it next day. The window, that is - took a couple of minutes to realize what had been in it. But you may consider it a homage, no sarcasm implied. Anyone capable of dreaming up HexOust and Atoll can count me among his admirers. on 10/25/10 at 14:24:51, MarkSteere wrote:
I consider inventing another game one of the best things one can do with Reversi ;D . on 10/25/10 at 14:24:51, MarkSteere wrote:
What we have in common, apart from a questionable character and annoying claims, is that we're not really players. But then, there's a lot of players out there who aren't really inventors and I think we serve them better than vice versa ;) . |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Oct 26th, 2010, 10:18am on 10/26/10 at 07:53:09, christianF wrote:
lol you're a funny guy, Christian. on 10/26/10 at 07:53:09, christianF wrote:
Thanks :) on 10/26/10 at 07:53:09, christianF wrote:
:D Yes, now looking back, Reversi seems to have lost some of its luster, though not nearly as lusterless as the fifty year old Twixt. on 10/26/10 at 07:53:09, christianF wrote:
An atheistic amen to that. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Oct 27th, 2010, 6:45am About a parameter The 'Star' theme is about points for stones, but a penalty on groups. On an odd-sized grid the counting is of the general form "number of (such and such) points, minus '2n' points for every group", where 'n' is integer, though usually restricted to natural. Because of the odd number of points, the final score cannot be equal. Symple is about territory control consequently has to deal with invasions, in particular invasions in the endgame. Why the endgame? - In the opening, placing a single stone is not 'invasion', but a claim on territory - The middle game is a growing stage where neither can afford to take a break by placing a single stone. So invasions start when the advantage of further growth is petering out. In this stage players will have vacant territory surrounded, and good play is aimed at shaping this 'territory' (between quotes, because territory is formally defined as 'stones minus') in such a way that invasions won't pay of. In Symple we currently play with n=1, and the minimum size for a group to pay off is two stones: for the owner it counts neutral, but it snatches 2 point from the opponent. So invasions don't need much space to be successful. Placing a single stone is in fact without risk: if it can't grow it costs the owner 1 point (getting 1 for the stone, but losing 2 for the group) but it also takes 1 point from the opponent. This means that the board will grow rather full. Of course, formally the game ends when the board is full, but in actual play vacant territory completely surrounded by one player, and safe from invasion, may be counted as if competely filled (that's not a rule, but a consequence). In fact 'n' is a parameter for the risk and reward of an invasion, and for the 'openess' of the final position. - Set n=0 and every stone pays off and the board fills up completely. - Set n=1 and a single stone won't hurt or harm either player. So between reasonable players the board won't fill up completely, and 'chinese count' can be used. - Set n=2 and placing a single stone becomes disadvantageous, unless at least one stone can be grown at it, in which case it becomes neutral. Only when at least two stones can be grown at it, does it become advantageous. So setting the parameter at 2 will be an option in the mindsports applet. It isn't an arbitrary choice either: it is the minimum number at which invasions face an intial penalty, and are not without risk. Shaping territory in such a way that invasions become less attactive is easier with n=2 than with n=1, and consequently the vacant territories to which it applies, will be larger and the board in the final position will show significant vacant territories (that need not to be filled up, because chinese counting leads to the same result). Finally, here's an idea for wannabe inventors: What if the parameter were set to a negative number? In other words: what if the count were of the general form "number of (such and such) points, plus '2n' points for every group", where 'n' is natural? Obviously connecting groups would be disadvantageous. I'm satisfied with Symple, but I'm sure there's a game there, somewhere. Have fun :) . |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Oct 27th, 2010, 10:12am on 10/27/10 at 06:45:03, christianF wrote:
Please, don't encourage them. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by clojure on Oct 27th, 2010, 10:34am I don't understand. Just after Forum Admin has declared that one should not bait people to violate forum rules, we get a disrespectful notion of "wannabe". From http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wannabe A "wannabe" (slang for "want to be") is a person with an ambition to be someone or something that they are not. The term is mildly pejorative, intended to convey the foolish nature of the desire due to the incompetence of the "wannabe" to accomplish the goal. Of course, it could be that the above definition does not capture what you meant. I would just hope that you clarified it. Mark's comment "don't encourage them" supports my understanding that there is hint that others are not as capable to design good games. All this is in good spirits. I am just baffled, that's all. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Oct 27th, 2010, 11:24am on 10/27/10 at 10:34:57, clojure wrote:
Indeed it doesn't. To me it would seem that requiring any skill starts with the intention to do so. Hence 'wannabe'. Don't you think you're just a bit overly sensitive and making an uncalled for stand for the feeble-minded? For those who's opinions are so difficult because opinions are so easy? For those who think having thoughts qualifies as thinking? Are you their spokesman? on 10/27/10 at 10:34:57, clojure wrote:
Baffled? I made a suggestion regarding a theme for a game. Am I missing something? P.S. You may actually harbor the opinion that game inventing is not a skill. I won't comment on that. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Oct 27th, 2010, 11:25am on 10/27/10 at 10:34:57, clojure wrote:
The offensive post was amateurish. One must be a master baiter. on 10/27/10 at 10:34:57, clojure wrote:
It's more than a hint. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Oct 27th, 2010, 11:43am on 10/27/10 at 11:25:52, MarkSteere wrote:
It's a bait ;D . |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by clojure on Oct 27th, 2010, 11:55am on 10/27/10 at 11:24:45, christianF wrote:
Ok. I was just wondering why not use a word that is not loaded with negative connotation. Quote:
I'm no-one's spokeman, not even mine. I just pointed out what felt controversial in the light of the post previous to yours, i.e. Forum Admin's. Quote:
Maybe I don't know how to use "baffled" at the right context. It didn't reference the totality of your suggestion to try out finding out a game -- only the "wannabe" usage. Quote:
My take on this is that in traditional sense, it is a skill. But personally I feel that everything is just a discovery; i.e. one explores the space of possibilities. It doesn't mean I don't value inventors/discoverers. Inherently nothing has absolute value. I just prefer some things, and I do prefer to see skilled inventors over non-skilled. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Oct 27th, 2010, 12:17pm on 10/27/10 at 11:55:53, clojure wrote:
The moderator's action was directed against a member who addressed another member personally, in a fashion that "borders on baiting someone to say something that would violate the posting guidelines". Could you please explain how that reflects on my post? |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by clojure on Oct 27th, 2010, 12:34pm on 10/27/10 at 12:17:55, christianF wrote:
Sure, I did consider the difference before posting. The attack with targeting specific person is more visible and concrete but to me the spirit of what Forum Admin was saying was that one should not attack anyone, by mentioning someone specifically, or as well by having more abstract way to categorize the object of disrespect. Quote:
Your post doesn't necessarily fulfill the criteria what Forum Admin said in concrete terms. Also your intention wasn't to hurt anyone's feelings, as you said. I wanted only you to dis-ambiguate the word "wannabe". But in general, I don't think Forum Admin would approve if someone says bad words about a subset of people even when not mentioning anyone by name. If I'm wrong here, please correct me. Anyways, let's leave this interplay and concentrate on your interesting game design musings. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Oct 27th, 2010, 12:39pm on 10/27/10 at 12:34:21, clojure wrote:
Al Qaeda springs to mind. Note that I'm not mentioning "He who must not be named". |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Oct 27th, 2010, 12:49pm on 10/27/10 at 12:39:42, christianF wrote:
Osama Bin Laden is alive and Pat Tillman is dead. Not that I care about Pat Tillman, a victim of his own ego. Sit the ____ down, shut the ____ up, and wait for backup to arrive, just like everyone else in the unit. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Oct 27th, 2010, 1:08pm on 10/27/10 at 12:34:21, clojure wrote:
If we were to do that, we'd notice that Symple was conceived in a few seconds, in a small window while drifting off to sleep. I published it before playtesting and described its character. The only thing playtesting suggests is to set the parameter '2n' at n=2. The mechanism is new and the game is of a profound strategical depth, very Go-like but much faster and, because there's no capture, without any ambiguity in the rules. So maybe we'd better not concentrate on them ;) . |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Oct 27th, 2010, 2:08pm on 10/27/10 at 13:08:51, christianF wrote:
I've had that experience with a lot of designs, including Oust. Once I considered the boundary conditions, that the board starts out empty and ends with only one color of stones on it, the solution instantly materialized. The Oust concept did require a couple of quick run-throughs on a tiny board. I had to allow singletons adjacent to enemy groups because there are no-legal-moves positions without that. I also had to add the reiterative kill. Otherwise it was an automatic first kill win. My sudden design experiences are wildly outnumbered by failed design attempts that can span weeks or months. on 10/27/10 at 13:08:51, christianF wrote:
You realized Symple's profound depth after playing it for three weeks?? :) May I call upon designers to, in specific terms, abandon the tiresome, epidemic Go comparisons? |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Oct 27th, 2010, 2:50pm on 10/27/10 at 14:08:45, MarkSteere wrote:
Yes to the first. You didn't with (Hex)Oust? It's organic simplicity points to a field of strategical and tactical refinements to be unveiled in prolongued play, even if beginners, yours truly included, cannot see the full extend of them. It's in the nature of the organism. Concerning the second, sorry :-/, you're right, frequent (mis)use has made it less of a recommendation, if at all. Let me elaborate on the first in this specific case. Obviously white would have an advantage if no balancing mechanism were present. Symple is balanced by a new one: black gets a privilige that counterbalances it, but to a shifting degree. At any time white can decide to insert a growing move to keep black from cashing in his privilige. If he does so too early black will have the advantage white used to have - being one move ahead - at almost no price. If he does so too late, he doesn't at all, because black will cash in. Of course black wants to cash in as late as possible. There's the first dilemma for both. The second dilemma is when to stop placing stones and to start growing. This moment, in actual play, is something of a black hole: the games are circling around it and the precise center must be derived from their orbit. The point being: there is such a center, albeit not so precise as a black hole, but indeed something to zoom in on, in prolongued play. Deeper knowledge of tactics may help, but the presence of a timing dilemma is clear in this game, in every single game. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Oct 27th, 2010, 7:30pm on 10/27/10 at 14:50:50, christianF wrote:
Yes, that is happening. Oust gradually reveals new tactics to the extent that its gameplay becomes counterintuitive after a hundred or so plays. You want to avoid killing, almost no matter what, in the opening game now. This is diametrically different from how the opening play was in the first few weeks. Strategy has grown a lot with no obvious limit in sight. I'm not sure what you mean by organic, though from the context I'm interpreting that as a fundamental concept embodied in a minimal rule set. There's a sente in Oust, something I've become aware of after playing it over 200 times. Play can end in as little as three moves, and there's a clear distinction between Black play and White play in the first several moves. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Oct 28th, 2010, 2:56am on 10/27/10 at 19:30:24, MarkSteere wrote:
Close enough, but usually an 'organical' game is also homogeneous. Chess games for instance are much more 'mechanical'. That being said, to me it's a way a game 'feels'. Despite being non-homogeneous, the interaction of the three fieldpieces in Hannibal felt a bit 'organical'. But that quality wasn't enough to pinpoint the game in one go, only to see the core of the system, and some rules in the final version, though well-considered, are arbitrary. Symple is much easier. I wasn't even seriously looking for it. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Oct 28th, 2010, 1:05pm on 10/27/10 at 14:08:45, MarkSteere wrote:
Oh dear, I tried to get it back in, even invoking your spirit, but the genie is out of the bottle (http://boardgamegeek.com/article/5721682#5721682) :o . On another note, this thread started around my claim to sometimes be able to perceive a new game and see what it holds for a hypothetical future in a world where it would be played extensively. Obviously this is not a claim that takes its commercial success or lack thereof into account, as some posters assumed. There was a lot of scepticism and general disbelief, and among the best argued answers was one of Fritzlein that I quote here in part: on 03/08/09 at 18:30:08, Fritzlein wrote:
This was more of a 'benefit of the doubt' than I got from most other posters. I was somewhat surpised, therefore, by the agressive answer I got from the same source after posting the freshly conceived rules of Symple. Or of the annoying small-minded rebuke about the use of the word "wannabe" by Clojure. My surprise is this: I offer a new game of which I, and by now not only I, think its a great game. Does anyone say "hey thanks, we love games and this appears to be a great game"? No, good chance Clojure didn't even read the rules, let alone try to understand them. No I'm treated agressively or annoyingly and none or my critics has the greatness of mind to say that Symple may well be an example of how I sometimes perceive games - as I said I did. With Hanniball it was easy to try to refute my claim - it's part chesslike and that part is mechanical rather than organical. So its more of a constuction than a self-explanatory organism, and it needed some fixing. Now try Symple (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/arena/symple/). The best strategy for my critics, I suggest, is showing that it's not a great game. Or keep your silence. But then, you're doing that already ;) . |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by clojure on Oct 28th, 2010, 5:02pm Quote:
I apologize for the "wannabe" question, now explicitly since it seems my efforts to explain reasons for it were not enough for neutral judgement. Quote:
For the record, I did give you respective and positive message after you wondered why no-one paid attention to Symplex. Now, I'm withdrawing myself from this thread since it's getting too personal for my taste. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Oct 28th, 2010, 5:34pm on 10/28/10 at 17:02:04, clojure wrote:
But delicate sensitivities are anybody's prerogative, so be my guest. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Oct 28th, 2010, 5:48pm on 10/28/10 at 13:05:13, christianF wrote:
That was a pretty major "edit", Christian. Your justification for the Symple/Go comparison here replaces your apology for said comparison from yesterday. The edit function is for typos and such, not to erase and diametrically change what you already said. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Oct 28th, 2010, 6:01pm on 10/28/10 at 17:34:37, christianF wrote:
Man, ease up on clojure :) He gets out of bed, takes a bath, and he's baffled before breakfast. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by ocmiente on Oct 28th, 2010, 7:53pm Quote:
Symple is not a great game because it hasn't been around long enough, not many people have played it, there are no strategy books about it, there's no evidence that the first or second player doesn't have some huge advantage, and the best penalty value for extra groups is still not well understood. Quote:
Yes, quite true. Given time, Symple might turn out to be a great game - but it's nowhere close yet. For me personally, I thought it was an interesting rule set. It's not the kind of game that appeals to me though. I think Go is a truly great game - but I don't play it very much. Any game that requires adding things up to determine the winner doesn't excite me as much as games like Chess or Arimaa. Maybe that's why you're not getting as much feedback about Symple as you did for Hanniball? That is, HanniBall is more Chess like than Symple is - and Arimaa players in general might be more interested in games that have more Chess-like qualities? I don't know. For myself, I'm wrapped up in understanding Arimaa, and don't have a lot of time to spend learning about all of the new ones that come out - but I do enjoy reading about new games. So, yes, thanks very much for creating the game. Looks interesting. Might be a lot of fun. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Oct 28th, 2010, 8:32pm on 10/28/10 at 19:53:04, ocmiente wrote:
Precisely. Thank you. The need for a calculator in a game is an aesthetic Hiroshima. on 10/28/10 at 19:53:04, ocmiente wrote:
Yes, and if I may speak for the readership, I think we all need a little breather after our last euphoric celebration of prophetic claims come true. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Oct 29th, 2010, 1:55am on 10/28/10 at 20:32:20, MarkSteere wrote:
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Oct 29th, 2010, 2:08am on 10/28/10 at 19:53:04, ocmiente wrote:
on 10/28/10 at 19:53:04, ocmiente wrote:
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Oct 29th, 2010, 2:20am on 10/28/10 at 18:01:28, MarkSteere wrote:
It's not bad to be mediocre, it's implicit in the existence of different levels of skill in whatever man does, and all of us excell at it one way or the other. But its bad to feel that mediocrity should be the measure of all things. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Oct 29th, 2010, 2:34am on 10/29/10 at 02:08:48, christianF wrote:
"I'm great enough to know when my claims of greatness are valid." |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Oct 29th, 2010, 2:46am on 10/29/10 at 02:34:59, MarkSteere wrote:
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Oct 29th, 2010, 3:34pm on 10/29/10 at 02:20:33, christianF wrote:
Looking back I think the Baffled One may have gotten short changed here. His dashed circle suggestion for the Flume rule sheet was very helpful. Flume is an important game in my portfolio, and just in a general sense. Way too many people were having trouble with the rule sheet. Clojure's dashed circle is much more intuitive than the green check that it replaced. The fact that clojure formulated a complaint against Symple with an alleged incomplete understanding of the game does not subtract from his credibility for me. *I* don't have a thorough understanding of Symple. Christian, here's what happened. Nobody responded about your game, and you ran out of patience and demanded to know what the problem was, essentially. Then, when people reluctantly came forward to accommodate your request, you berated them. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Oct 29th, 2010, 4:03pm on 10/29/10 at 15:34:37, MarkSteere wrote:
Yes, quite so. It's a bit annoying that when I honestly explain how I invent games, I encounter loads of scepticism and disbelief for doing so. Then, when I find a game off the top of my sleepy head, without so much as touching a stone, and present it, I would think it makes a good case. Of course the game must still prove itself, but some things are as easy to predict, game technical, as predicting Hex will have a winner. Like Hex, Symple is strategically deep by the nature of the organism. Predicting its general behaviour is as easy as predicting Hex's general behaviour. It is also balanced. What more does it take? It seems that my honesty is taken for arrogance. Know then that I'd rather seem arrogant than be hypocritical. Obviously too, the Arimaa forum tends to favor Arimaa type games, so this thread has become a bit of an anachronism. And Clojure is right, it's getting to personal, being about inventors rather than games. That's getting a bit boring so let's call it a day. Thanks all for contributing and have a good life :) . |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Oct 29th, 2010, 5:55pm on 10/29/10 at 16:03:35, christianF wrote:
Ok, without discussing inventors or whatever, I'll try to specifically answer your question. Primarily it takes being robust and I believe that's what's missing from Symple. I believe there's a false premise in your question, What *more* does it take. Yes the game is balanced between beginners who've played the game like ten times. What happens when it turns into 100 times or 1000 times. The "balancing rule" will no longer be adequate to balance the game. Now it'll be a complex tweakfest like Go Moku. That's my suspicion anyway, based on the fact that it needs a balancing rule in the first place. What simple mechanism that now balances the game soon will not. Sometimes people won't like your game as much as you anticipated. And some other times people will like it more than you expected. I was, and still am, really enthused about Cage but I perceived a lukewarm reaction to it initially based on one or two comments from people. Now, I'm getting some positive feedback. Some people elect not to play it again. One guy said I should consider a variant where the outer two rows (shells) should already be vacant since that would speed things up quite a bit, not a bad idea at all. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Oct 29th, 2010, 7:58pm on 10/29/10 at 19:40:50, SpeedRazor wrote:
Good night :) |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Oct 29th, 2010, 11:38pm on 10/29/10 at 22:47:52, SpeedRazor wrote:
That's patently false. I know for a fact that Christian knows the rules of Arimaa. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by megajester on Oct 30th, 2010, 2:37am on 10/29/10 at 23:38:34, MarkSteere wrote:
LOL very witty :) I know what you're trying to say SpeedRazor, but seeing as Christian has already indicated he's not going to be pursuing this thread any further, I vote we just let it die peacefully and give it a decent burial. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by Fritzlein on Oct 30th, 2010, 11:59am on 10/28/10 at 13:05:13, christianF wrote:
I am glad that you have clarified that you are not merely "surprised", but in fact offended that the Arimaa community is not engaging with Symple, and that you feel we owe it to you to take up your latest game in order to see how great it is. I see that I wasn't misinterpreting your tone when I responded aggressively. In fact I was right on the money in inferring that you thought the Arimaa community was not giving you the respect you deserve for inventing another brilliant game. Thank you for making it explicit what you think you are due. Quote:
In the case of Hanniball, you demonstrated in full view of everyone that you can't perceive how a game will play until you have playtested it, and specifically that a major rule change may be required on the basis of playtesting. If you could do what you claim, you would never have to do more than introduce minor tweaks, but for Hanniball you had to fundamentally change the mechanic, and that after engagement by a relatively small group of people for a relatively short period of time. It was good of you to have the courage and candor to reveal the process to everyone. Unfortunately, at the conclusion of the process, you blithely concluded that you had proved your claims about your own abilities, when in fact the opposite had occurred. In this context it is highly ironic to fault others for lacking "greatness of mind". My opinion of Symple, which you may think justified or unjustified as you choose, is that it might be a far superior game to Hanniball, and indeed might be a superior game to Arimaa. I don't know. I haven't investigated it and I am not qualified to comment on it. I did, however, take the time observe the evolution of Hanniball closely. Because of that experience I am quite convinced that you, Christian, also do not know whether or not Symple is a great game. My opinion of you, which you my think justified or unjustified as you choose, is that you do not know in advance of playtesting. If Symple is taken up seriously by a large community of players, it might be busted by the community, after which it would become unplayable without a major rule change. I am not saying that you are not the greatest abstract strategy game designer of all time. I am not saying that Symple is not the greatest abstract strategy game of all time. What I am saying is that your inflated claims of your own powers are tiresome. Furthermore, your feeling that the Arimaa community owes you something with respect to Symple that it is failing to give you is manipulative and unjust. The more you assert that we must pay attention to you, the more you can expect that the attention you do get from us will be negative attention, particularly since you are not offering to support Arimaa in any way. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Oct 30th, 2010, 12:45pm on 10/30/10 at 11:59:13, Fritzlein wrote:
A word in defense of a fellow designer. Christian is known for releasing games people like and so has earned credibility. If you like his games, you do owe it to him to fairly thoroughly evaluate his latest one, not as Arimaa community members, but as players of Christian Freeling games. It doesn't matter that the discussion happens to be taking place here in the Arimaa forum. It is in the off topic subforum. Don't offer a blaze response like, Well I'll see if I can get around to reading the rule sheet some time next week. That's BS. You don't have an obligation to *like* the game, but you really do need to at least read and understand the rulesheet, in a timely manner. When a designer feels he isn't being treated fairly, this can lead to backlash, the prerogative of the artist. on 10/30/10 at 11:59:13, Fritzlein wrote:
Bingo. When someone throws a party in your honor, they don't expect you to show up with a toothbrush and provisions for seven months. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Oct 30th, 2010, 1:11pm on 10/30/10 at 12:45:15, MarkSteere wrote:
I'll leave you with this final public thought though. Mark's Atoll is a great game. Anyone who is only slightly familiar with Hex can see that. Like Hex it needs a balancing factor. Provided there are cells that are 'sufficiently bad' to start with, a swap will work in a game of this type. Does anyone actually have to play Atoll to see that? Is anyone able to explain how it could not be a great game? The irony is that Mark's scoresheet at iGGC shows 21 losses and 2 wins. Does that mean anything? Now I'll stop being a troll in a thread that has my name in the title ;) . Again, thanks for contributing and have a good life! |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by Fritzlein on Oct 30th, 2010, 1:20pm on 10/30/10 at 12:45:15, MarkSteere wrote:
Yes, Christian has great credibility as a game designer. His past successes incline me to believe that his latest offering is more likely to be a great game than a game invented by someone with no track record or a poor track record. Yet Christian has staked his claim to credibility not on the fact that he has invented games in the past that have proven to have strategic depth, most notably Havannah, but rather that he knows how Symple will turn out. You shared my astonishment, at least according to your response: Quote:
Note that Christian didn't back away at all from his claim to foreknowledge, only from his comparing Symple to Go. I have been playing Arimaa for over six years, and have learned enough about its strategy to fill a book. We have over a hundred active players and a database of over 150,000 games played on arimaa.com. Ratings span over eight class intervals. Yet in spite of all this evidence, the claim I make for Arimaa is that is has the potential to be a great game. Arimaa hasn't developed any problems yet that would cut off the seemingly-infinite strategy learning curve, but that could change. It is not too late for Arimaa to be busted. My interest in this thread was from the beginning based on my curiosity as to whether there is a way to know in advance what games are great, with an eye to applying that evaluation method to Arimaa. Is there a shortcut to many people playing a game quite seriously for a prolonged time? The case of Hanniball gave me a satisfactory answer to the negative. I was never motivated by wanting to try out all the latest abstract strategy games, or even to try out all the Christian Freeling games. I don't see why I would have given cause to anyone to believe that I was. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by Fritzlein on Oct 30th, 2010, 1:24pm on 10/30/10 at 13:11:07, christianF wrote:
Yes, I would have to play it to see it. I can't tell just from the rules. It could prove not to be a great game if the strategic learning curve runs out at some point. I don't see how anyone can know that the strategic learning curve will never run out. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Oct 30th, 2010, 2:11pm on 10/30/10 at 13:11:07, christianF wrote:
No, Christian, I can't allow you to make a fallacious point and run off. The pie rule is a simple, generic, ugly-but-extremely-useful rule that can be applied to any game, including Symple. I know, I know. Symple doesn't need it, right? You want to know a game that really doesn't need it as much as Hex? Atoll. Byg, Symple, etc. are based on an unstable, divergent principle. If they're in the same class as Go Moku, only worse, which I strongly suspect, advancing skill will always be accompanied by advanced tweaking of the balancing rule set. Your special balancing rule, the Nagasaki of Symple, makes the the pie rule look like a firecracker in comparison. on 10/30/10 at 13:11:07, christianF wrote:
lol It means that, like you, I don't play the game. I *make* the game! |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Oct 30th, 2010, 2:16pm on 10/30/10 at 13:24:42, Fritzlein wrote:
Not to put too fine a point on it Fritzlein, but in this case Christian is right and you are wrong. Because Atoll is extremely robust and crudely scalable, you will *never* wring out Atoll. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by Fritzlein on Oct 30th, 2010, 3:38pm on 10/30/10 at 14:16:12, MarkSteere wrote:
Wrong about what? I didn't say that Atoll wasn't a great game, or that it was not robust, or that it was going to run out of strategy. I said that one can't tell it is a great game from the rules alone. That is what Christian asserted, and what I disagreed with. You have more experience with Atoll than just knowing the rules, and presumably bring that experience to bear in evaluating its quality. (And now that I read more carefully, even Christian tries to bring in familiarity with Hex as an aid to being able to evaluate Atoll. There is a gray area in my "no playtesting" criterion if massive playtesting of one game is relevant to evaluating another, newer one.) Are you staking out the position that it is possible to tell a great game just from its rules, without playtesting? If so, then it is humorous that the two people in this Forum who believe that it is possible to know without playtesting each often think that they get it right and the other guy gets it wrong. Or how else do you explain the fact that the two of you can disagree about the quality of games when you both know all the rules? Bringing it from the general to the specific, you were a vocal critic of Hanniball throughout its vogue. Is it not fair to say you thought Hanniball had serious problems that Christian was not aware of just from the rules, and became aware of only as it was being playtested, because it was being playtested? And therefore that you believe Christian didn't demonstrate, in the case of Hanniball, the ability he claimed to have? And finally, if Christian doesn't have this ability, you are the only one around here who does? I'm just curious to know on exactly what points we disagree. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Oct 30th, 2010, 5:38pm on 10/30/10 at 16:29:53, SpeedBump wrote:
Welcome aboard, SpeedBump. One can never have too many psychotic fans, apparently. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Oct 30th, 2010, 6:13pm on 10/30/10 at 15:38:42, Fritzlein wrote:
It is possible to know just from looking at the rule sheet for some games, such as Atoll (http://www.marksteeregames.com/Atoll_rules.pdf), that the strategic potential is unlimited. Just logically, any sort of "winning strategy" in Atoll would translate into first move advantage. We know enough about the strategic depth of Hex to extrapolate that to the "convoluted" Atoll. Bump the board up to the next larger size and boom, the once superior strategy isn't looking so superior any more. I've lost track of how many people have told me Atoll is a better game than Hex. There's always room for a better strategy in Atoll. The only question is, "How good are you?". The answer to "How robust is this game?" should be evident from the rule sheet alone. Too much ado is made of the pie rule. It's a very simple concept. One player should not start the game with the dual advantage of both first move and best move. It should be first move and sufficiently bad move to compensate for the sente advantage that the first move provides. Boom. Done. You made the starting point as fair as possible, and sufficiently fair that the better player will probably win. Quick and dirty, but very effective. The pie rule is clearly defined. It's used once at the beginning and then forgotten about. It's not an arbitrary, ridiculous baloneyfest that's the base point for an endless tweakfest. Edit: "the the. to too" |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Oct 30th, 2010, 6:48pm Christian, I hope you don't mind my posting your question here in what has been up until now an active discussion of your game, Symple. I don't understand what you're asking, but maybe the other participants in the discussion can be of help. In any case I see no reason to suddenly take the discussion offline. "Hi, I just sent a message to Fritz(lein) about a difference between the pie rule and a swap (???) I never realized before. It emerged because Symple features a pie rule, but not a conventional swap. Do you want me to elaborate? (Put the same question before F)." |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Oct 31st, 2010, 8:21am on 10/30/10 at 19:37:51, SpeedRazor wrote:
Studying my picture, are you? Classic psychotic obsession. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Oct 31st, 2010, 9:22am Christian, I'm going to make one more attempt to bring the discussion back online. Yes the group did go a little "dog pack" on you but you instigated that by ignoring repeated warnings to stop talking about your claims, from me and others. My challenge to you: don't use the word claim again in this thread. One can naturally expect to find loyalty to Arimaa in a forum entitled "Arimaa". Don't mention Arimaa if there's a risk of your comments being misinterepreted. Like I said earlier, we are in the off topic subforum. There's no requirement to include Arimaa in the discussion. In any case, I am absolutely not willing to discuss Symple with you privately. The topic of Symple does not in itself hold my interest, though I have found the public debate about it entertaining. "I think the thread has become a waste of time. I would appreciate to continue discussing the arguments with Fritz, who is concerned with their content rather than their source, and with you, Benedikt, Ed and whoever is interested in abstract game design. But to be interrupted time and again by a dogpack that due to misdirected loyalty bites at anything that is perceived to be an attack on Arimaa, and almost anything is, is tiresome. Oh, yes, a swap is a special case of the pie rule, the foremost case too, because it can be applied to a large number of two-player abstracts. A pie however can be extended to more than two players, a swap cannot. When applied to more than two, the element of 'timing' enters the equation. I'll explain what I mean by that later. For the moment I'll leave it at the fact that a swap doesn't work for Symple, the problem being that there appear to be no obvious 'bad cells'. This also reflects on your answer to my statement that Atoll needs a 'balancing factor', and that a swap fits it perfectly. You said: ------ "No, Christian, I can't allow you to make a fallacious point and run off. The pie rule is a simple, generic, ugly-but-extremely-useful rule that can be applied to any game, including Symple. I know, I know. Symple doesn't need it, right? You want to know a game that really doesn't need it as much as Hex? Atoll. Byg, Symple, etc. are based on an unstable, divergent principle. If they're in the same class as Go Moku, only worse, which I strongly suspect, advancing skill will always be accompanied by advanced tweaking of the balancing rule set. Your special balancing rule, the Nagasaki of Symple, makes the the pie rule look like a firecracker in comparison." ------- I see no disagreement in the first paragraph: as you said "You want to know a game that really doesn't need it as much as Hex? Atoll.", therewith implying that it does need one. _That's_ the balancing factor I was talking about. In the second paragraph you lose me, but that's the point I'd like to discuss in the first place, but later. Just staking out the context." |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Oct 31st, 2010, 11:50am "Since you decline a private exchange of ideas, I suggest we go elsewhere. Last October 5, Benedikt started a thread at BGG.." Ok, I'm agreeable to a change of venue. I no longer post at bgg as a matter of policy. Rec.games.abstract is really the best place to discuss abstract games IMO. The yahoo group abstractgames is barely alive but that would probably work too. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Oct 31st, 2010, 12:35pm I started a topic for you in rec.games.abstract entitled "Christian Freeling". http://groups.google.com/group/rec.games.abstract/browse_thread/thread/fcef5852dc96d784# No moderator, no dog pack. There was a dog pack but that's a story for another time :) |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Oct 31st, 2010, 6:16pm Symple Newsflash: "Note: In the first version of the game the 'group penalty' was set at 2 rather than 4, which leads to the possibility of..." BOOM!! What did I say about the tweaking ??? Do you believe me now ??? |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Oct 31st, 2010, 6:32pm on 10/31/10 at 18:04:05, SpeedRazor wrote:
Fair enough, and you won't bother anyone if you focus on content instead of displaying ignorance. Here's something about the balancing rule. A kiss is still a kiss, a sigh is just a sigh, but a swap ain't a pie ??? The first quote is copied from Byg (p)review of Symple(x) (http://www.boardgamegeek.com/thread/574830/byg-preview-of-symplex), by Benedikt Rosenau. Quote:
Benedikt does in fact explain the balancing principle adequately, but I had to understand the use of 'Chicken' from the context. Moreover, there are other opinions to be taken into account, for instance this one of Mark: Quote:
I attribute the comparison with Go Moko to Mark's somewhat eccentric sense of humor and his reference to 'divergence' to not quite seeing black's privilige working as a pie-rule. Not a swap, a pie-rule, despite the fact that wiki (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pie_rule) treats them as one and the same. So what's the difference? This is what wiki says: Quote:
You have to eat it too, obviously :P but what I'm getting at is the order 'divide and choose'. A slightly different protocol allows to reverse the order. One person moves the knife over the pie, from side A to side B. Both can say 'cut' at any moment, but the piece chosen must be at the 'A' side. It doesn't matter who yields the knife, other than that the person doing so can refrain from saying 'cut', and simply cut. The result of this 'choose and divide' protocol is the same: both get about half the pie. But there are two differences: a: The element 'timing' is introduced. b: The protocol works for any number of participants: 'n' people can divide a pie in 'n' pieces that all converge around about the same size. We're concerned with the first one, because the 'timing' aspect is exactly what guides Symple on two different levels: 1: When to stop placing isolated stones and start growing. 2: When to either cash in or prevent black's privilige. How to place and where to grow is a different matter. These are strategical and positional aspects and I'll leave them outside the equation for now. Both 1 and 2 are different for white and black. Without 2, white would have the advantage, but still neither can start too early because the later the start, the bigger the impact of the first growth and the stronger the initiative. An early start has little enough impact to allow the opponent to postpone growing for another move, or even two, and reap the fruits of an extra group or two in the subsequent turns. Within that context, black can't very well start first, because he would be one group down, allowing white one stone extra in every move in the foreseeable future. So white can wait to see the impact of his 'first stake' ripe to its full potential. But even without 2 he cannot wait forever, because the very impact of the first strike will at a certain point surpass the advantage of white's extra group if black decides to go for it. This converges to a certain area of moves, beyond which white's advantage diminishes. The balancing mechanism The balancing mechanism of Symple a clear convergence too. As long as no growth has taken place at either side, Black may both place stone and grow all other groups. So this is something black can cash in, and white can prevent. What's the timing? If black grows on his second move, both will have two groups, that is white has two stones and black has a stone and a group of two stones. For white this is almost as advantageous as a situation without black's privilige, so black won't do that. From black's point of view he'd rather cash in as late as possible. Having an equal number of groups and a strong initiative is precisely what constitutes white's advantage without 2, so he would like to do that. But he can't wait that long, because white can grow at any turn, depriving black from his advantage. He's worse off than without 2, but it's better than leaving black exploit his privilige. So black must cash in fairly early or not at all, grabbing a small initiative with an equal number of groups. This converges to a certain area of moves, beyond which white can grow and take a small initiative in return for black now having 'the move', that is: an equal number of groups on his turn. Both 1 and 2 are converging, though to what specific area's remains to be seen. At the moment cashing in or its prevention on the 19x19 board appears to be around move 4-5, while the main 'pie' - when to start the growing phase - hovers around move 10-15. Still somewhat unclear, but naturally converging. There is no doubt whatsoever that black's prerogative impicitly evens out any first move advantage, as Benedikt explicitly mentioned, considering it evident, and no 'tweaking' will be required. Symple is complete and consistent. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Oct 31st, 2010, 6:37pm on 10/31/10 at 18:16:02, MarkSteere wrote:
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Oct 31st, 2010, 11:06pm on 10/31/10 at 18:37:17, christianF wrote:
Sorry, but times of crisis call for masterful baiting. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Oct 31st, 2010, 11:25pm on 10/31/10 at 18:32:10, christianF wrote:
Christian, the following paragraph from the Symple rule sheet tortures me. "There's one exception to the above. If, and only if, neither player has grown yet, then black on his turn may use both the above options in the above order: he may place a stone, therewith creating a new group, and he may grow any or all of his other (!) groups." This is not my "eccentric sense of humor" talking. I had to cover my eyes when I cut and pasted it so I wouldn't accidentally read it again. Please stop comparing your unequal goals rule to the innocuous pie rule. It's so unfair to the pie rule. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Nov 1st, 2010, 2:39am on 10/31/10 at 23:25:18, MarkSteere wrote:
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Nov 1st, 2010, 6:20am Here's the first Symple variant (http://www.iwriteiam.nl/D1010.html#31). It's an interesting idea that leads to an even more explosive branch density and a far more tactical game, in which positional play in the opening bears less weight on the growing phase, because players are free to shift the focus to 'local issues'. Feels like fun :) . |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by FransFaase on Nov 1st, 2010, 7:59am I think that Christian might be right that the game (Super Symple) becomes more tactical. Now that I have thought a little more about the game, it really feels like a very different game. The strategy of enclosing groups of your opponent is complete absent in Super Symple, which means that the other method for gaining an advantage, creating territory, becomes the focus of the game. I guess that that would makes the dominance of corners and the sides much more greater than with Symple (like in Go). I also guess it becomes easier to connect groups (and/or prevent your opponent from connecting), which might make the moment of connecting more critical. And then there is this nasty thing in the end, that if you end up with too few groups and a too large territory, you face the possibilty of an invasion. I don't know if this shift in focus makes it a far less strategical game, because creating territory is a strong strategical principal. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Nov 1st, 2010, 8:35am on 11/01/10 at 06:20:08, christianF wrote:
brb, I need a calculator |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Nov 1st, 2010, 8:49am on 11/01/10 at 08:35:34, MarkSteere wrote:
Enter 2 x 3 - 4 and next "=" P.S. the net effect of a group of 'n' stones is '2n-4', but that borders on math and may be a bridge too far ;) . |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Nov 1st, 2010, 9:48am Symple borders on math and may be a bridge too far. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Nov 1st, 2010, 10:59am on 11/01/10 at 09:48:48, MarkSteere wrote:
I wouldn't know how to find a game on a theme, while avoiding the theme, but maybe you can help out ??? . |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by Fritzlein on Nov 1st, 2010, 3:01pm Christian, I responded to both of your private messages to the e-mail address you included, but for some reason my letters both bounced. Here is one question I included that might as well be discussed publicly: You say "A pie however can be extended to more than two players, a swap cannot." Are you sure that swap can't be extended to more than two players? I don't play any multiplayer abstracts, but my imagination is failing me here. Why can't a three-player game be balanced by giving the second player the option to swap with the first, and the third player the option to swap with the second player, or if necessary with either of the other two? |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Nov 1st, 2010, 3:33pm on 11/01/10 at 15:01:16, Fritzlein wrote:
The rule that tortures Mark's eyes, nothing more than given black a one time conditional opportunity to combine both options, how weird can it get :), works as a pie and is implicitly balancing. Which is very fortunate, because a swap doesn't work in Symple. But as I've always said: "if the system is sound, the rule will be there". Regarding a multi player pie, I must admit that the only thing I visualized, a long time ago, is ten children and a literal pie of around a meter or so, and a knife going slowly from one side to another, and the children who may call 'cut' at any moment. How that would translate to a multi player game is another matter. It may not be very useful I fear. Phalanx and Mu have balancing procedures, but I never got anywhere near something resembling a swap (or a pie for that matter). P.S. christian'at'mindsports.nl ('at' being @, but maybe I'm overly careful) should work. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Nov 3rd, 2010, 9:55am I've been notified, by a very dependable source, of a bug in Symple. However, the bug wasn't specified, but 'left for me to find'. The source added reassuringly that 'it shouldn't be too hard'. My way of finding bugs is to wait till they show up. For whoever is more hasty, 'it shouldn't be too hard'. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Nov 3rd, 2010, 11:34am Sorry to hear that about the bug. Is it a bug where there are no legal moves available or is it an algorithm for first player win? |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Nov 3rd, 2010, 11:44am on 11/03/10 at 11:34:58, MarkSteere wrote:
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Nov 3rd, 2010, 8:50pm Does the guy want to antagonize you for some reason? Why not just say what the bug is so you can deal with it? |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Nov 4th, 2010, 2:43am on 11/03/10 at 20:50:58, MarkSteere wrote:
Then I spam about the game, 'prematurely' and in 'unlikely places', hijacking threads at bgg such as the one that covers the 'star' theme in the first place (not started by me), the very thread about the game itself (also not started by me) and the thread that bears my name (started by Michael Howe). Like you once accused me of hijacking this thread ;) Anyway, I don't want to bother anyone with a game they failed to invent. And the bug may be located elsewhere. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Nov 4th, 2010, 8:01am Alright. I didn't understand that, but that's ok. I've grown surprisingly comfortable with not understanding things in life :) |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Nov 5th, 2010, 3:30pm Today I visited a thread (http://groups.google.com/group/rec.games.abstract/browse_thread/thread/ba8398206c08fdfd/3d2db64144c5a2b6#3d2db64144c5a2b6) started by Nick Bentley at google rec.games.abstract about a game design contest. One of the suggested themes struck a chord and at 11:11 pm I posted an interest in competing, should that particular theme be chosen. At 12:43 pm I posted the rules of what had emerged in an hour or so, from combining elements of Symplex and Hexade. The Validation box above the submit button read "Whingi" and that sounded like a good name. So here is Whingi (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/the-pit/whingi-560). An applet will soon be available for playtesting. Of course this is not invented at all according to what many would consider abstract game inventing etiquette ;) . |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Nov 5th, 2010, 6:25pm on 11/05/10 at 15:30:14, christianF wrote:
It suits me fine :) It's the naming that's problematic. Symplex is a venereal disease and whingi is the first part of whingi and whiney, something toddlers get when they have to do number two. Christian, as a friend, you must consult with an American before naming your games. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Nov 6th, 2010, 3:12am on 11/05/10 at 18:25:42, MarkSteere wrote:
Naming can be tricky. "Flume", is in dutch perceived as "Fluim", the dutch word for "Phlegm" :P . Edit 1: thus far Symplex has become Symplehex (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/the-pit/symplehex-566). |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Nov 6th, 2010, 8:11am on 11/06/10 at 03:12:30, christianF wrote:
Oh great. Now you tell me :-[ |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Nov 6th, 2010, 8:39am [quote author=MarkSteere link=board=other;num=1236541162;start=345#352 date=11/06/10 at 08:11:47] Oh great. Now you tell me :-[/quote] It's only Dutch, I've checked German too: phlegm is "Schleim" there, and nothing like Flume means anything in German. And ... I've decided on Lhexus (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/the-pit/lhexus-560) for the latest arrival. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Nov 7th, 2010, 2:58pm on 11/06/10 at 08:39:40, christianF wrote:
Remember, valid configurations may not overlap: any stone may only be counted in ONE configuration. The counter just counts stones on the board: in case of a tie in the number of valid configurations, the player with the lesser number wins. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Nov 10th, 2010, 11:54am From the recently rewritten epilogue of the essay this thread is about: Quote:
Here's how I invented them. (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/how-i-invented-games-and-why-not/late-arrivals-a-final-whispers) |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Nov 10th, 2010, 1:32pm on 11/10/10 at 11:54:05, christianF wrote:
This would tend to imply that you have either more good games or a higher percentage of good games than the lowly hunter. Are either of these verifiable assertions? Are there no turkeys running wild on the Freeling estate? on 11/10/10 at 11:54:05, christianF wrote:
Just as long as you're not the other kind of whisperer mentioned in that other forum :D |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Nov 10th, 2010, 2:03pm on 11/10/10 at 13:32:50, MarkSteere wrote:
To be fair, Lhexus and Charybdis were triggered by a contest, so it was a 'hunt' if you like. Lhexus took an hour or so. I withdrew it from the competion because it didn't quite fit the one provisional theme it was meant to fit, and modifying the theme to fit the game seemed too much of a reverse procedure. Moreover the theme had switched to "othelloish, but less crappy than othello". Charybdis took me a day and mainly shaped itself during the long daily walk in the woods with my husky and two raccoon dogs. No boards, no pieces, no turkeys ;) . And not much of a hunt either because the 'symple' mechanism provided a good base. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Nov 10th, 2010, 2:05pm I only hunt in the sense of searching for new discoveries, new principles, new architectures. I'm not greedily rubbing my hands together, striving for "the next Blokus". My technique doesn't feel brutish to me, though it may seem so to Christian. It might if my end goal were popularity. Of course I'm happy when people like my game. I'm not immune from that. But popularity is not a design imperative. Oddly, I end up making good games in spite of myself. Bold, refreshing architecture can sometimes lead to bold, refreshing gameplay. Cephalopod (http://www.marksteeregames.com/Cephalopod_rules.pdf), case in point. Edit: Cephalopod url |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Nov 10th, 2010, 3:07pm on 11/10/10 at 14:05:24, MarkSteere wrote:
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Nov 11th, 2010, 11:47am Benedikt Rosenau, a well known expert on abstract games, characterized Symple as "Go on speed". He was wrong: this (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/arena/sygo/) is Go on speed. It is also my entry at the Official Abstract Game Design Contest (http://groups.google.com/group/recregamescombinatorial/browse_thread/thread/7e7a797725397f56?hl=en#) at Recre.Games.Combinatorial. As anyone following the invention proces that started with Symple can check: after I realized I had failed to apply the Symple mechanism to the most important candidate in the field of territorial games, the game took me a day. No fumbling with pieces and boards involved. That's not provocative, that's how it happened 8) . |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Nov 11th, 2010, 12:25pm on 11/11/10 at 11:47:47, christianF wrote:
Welcome to my world, Christian. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Nov 27th, 2010, 8:09am Sygo (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/arena/sygo/) is up and running @ Mindsports. To play: Mindsports Players Section (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/players-section). |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Nov 30th, 2010, 4:21am So it's once again time to call it a thread. In the preface of "How I invented games and why not" it says: Quote:
Of my subsequent games, Hanniball is part organism and part construction - the latter aspect made it somewhat difficult to spot the main bug. YvY wasn't thought trough properly and ended up consistent, and even 'new' in that it combines a relative theme (counting points) with an absolute one (sudden death), but somewhat forced and 'artificial'. Query is number whatever in a large family of square connection games, so who cares. The latest wave consisted of Symple (square & hex), Lhexhus (inconsequential), Charybdid (hex & square) and Sygo. All of them were based on the meta-mechanism that came to me one night while dropping of to sleep, and found it's way into Symple. The realization that it was indeed a meta-mechanism with a range of applications came sometime later. All of them were simply conceived without the help of boards, pieces or testplaying. Barring setting the 'group penalty parameter' in Symple to '4', none of them underwent any change. My prediction: Symple is a true strategy game for the thoughtful planner, but lacks what Mark J. Thompson in his leading article (http://www.thegamesjournal.com/articles/DefiningtheAbstract.shtml) calls 'drama'. It's like a big ship, slowly heeling one side or the other, with little tactical leverage to turn the tables, once the hard to spot tipping point has been passed. Symple is very much a square game - the hexversion's tactical means are even less decisive. Lhexus is ornamental. In Charybdis the 'symple mechanism' has been aplied to an 'othelloish' theme. There are two different square versions, but hexversion is the main one here. The 'wild' nature of Othello has been reigned in her by the 'no capture by placement' rule, and the negative feedback of capture: capture means less groups which means less growth in the subsequent turn. More of a strategy game than Othello itself. Sygo was what it was all about, in retrospect. It is the symple mechanism applied to the 'othelloanian' form of Go that I already used in Medusa and Lotus. It is my first game that means anything since Dameo in 2000. And the last game I have posted about in this thread. Don't bother about my predictions and have a good life ;) . |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by omar on Dec 3rd, 2010, 12:12pm Christian, thanks for sharing your game design process with us in real-time. I've quite enjoyed reading this. It's quite rare to be able to experience the thought process of the game designer while the game is being designed. Many times I was reminded of when I was working on the Arimaa rules. I too would have some idea strike me just as I was about to fall asleep and would excitedly jump out of bed to go test it. I'm glad this thread could preserve some of the thought process that went into designing your latest games. Perhaps they will go on to become as popular as Havannah; only time will tell. I'm sure you will continue to design more games and I hope you will continue to share your experiences with us. But please start another thread so we don't hit the max message limit on this one :-) |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Dec 4th, 2010, 3:46am on 12/03/10 at 12:12:15, omar wrote:
Hi Omar, thanks, but I fear I'm quite empty at the moment. This latest wave was all about Sygo, in the end, although Charybdis may be a fun game. I got two Sygo games running at mindsports at the moment: christian freeling - Benedikt Rosenau (http://mindsports.nl/cgi-bin/Arena/Serve.cgi?file=Sygo1290866564.html) christian freeling - Tristan Parker (http://mindsports.nl/cgi-bin/Arena/Serve.cgi?file=Sygo1291037249.html) I'm glad I could write down the rules in a couple of minutes, without so much as touching a stone, and see the games running without any bugs in sight. I predict Sygo will be a lasting game: it is simple, deep, and has a good balance between strategy and tactics - unlike Symple, that is heavy on the strategic side, but light on the tactical one. But then, time will tell indeed: I wouldn't rob Fritzlein of an argument. My audience was keen enough to criticize my claims when Hanniball needed a fix and there's no need to acknowledge anything now, despite the number of games that emerged in a couple of weeks and their quality. You see, I can't prove anything, can I? And if one tries very hard, it is possible to fail to see that Sygo is a great game. So I'm glad you at least answered in a friendly way, and frankly, I had not expected anything but silence from my critics. You go for the kill when the prey is wounded, every pack animal knows that. Besides, anyone can be a game inventor and know precisely how it is done - and my way is clearly impossible. And my predictions mean nothing, because "who can predict the future" ;) . I certainly won't be starting any new threads: I'm quite done with fora for the time being :P . |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Dec 9th, 2010, 7:03am Oh well, this one rolled out accidentally. It's not a strategy game, rather a tactical funny ;D Monkey Trap has an obvious affinity with Walter Zamkauskas' Amazons (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/the-pit/amazons-516), but the board is 8x8, it has half the number of pieces and less 'dropping' options, because in Amazons the number of combinations of a move and a 'shot' largely exceeds the number of combinations of a (move and) 'drop' and move in Monkey Trap. It is designed to be a fast fun game for the younger ones. Here is the board with the pieces in the initial position. White begins. Turns alternate. On his move a player must move one of his monkeys, queenwise. A monkey may not move onto or over a square that is occupied by another piece or a coconut ... a coconut ... and must leave a coconut on the square it starts from or any intermediate square. First player to get stuck loses. Monkey Trap © MindSports (http://mailto:info@mindsports.nl) |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Dec 9th, 2010, 7:08am The coconut bears a striking resemblance to its predecessor token. :D |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Jan 11th, 2011, 7:00am InSight (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/the-pit/insight-575) InSight is a combinatorial quickie between two players, here called Player One and Player Two. http://mindsports.nl/images/stories/sidedishes/moregamesbycf/insight_d01.gif (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/the-pit/insight-575) Rules The game is played on a square 7x7 board. Player One makes an initial position, using 4 white and 3 black (red) men, satisfying the condition that no two men occupy a same row or column. The diagram shows one possible position. It is now black's turn. Player Two next decides whether he will play white or black. If he chooses white, then it's Player One's turn to move, if he chooses black, then it's his turn to move. Turns alternate and moving is compulsory. On his turn a player must place a new man satisfying the following conditions: 1. The man may not be placed orthogonally adjacent to a like colored man. 2. The man must have at least one like colored man horizontally or vertically 'in sight' (i.e. 'having an unobstructed view of'). Object If a player cannot make a legal move he loses the game. InSight © MindSports (http://mailto:info@mindsports.nl) The process (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/how-i-invented-games-and-why-not/late-arrivals-a-final-whispers#insight) of invention. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Jan 20th, 2011, 7:16am I've developed a liking for combinatorial quickies. So here's another one, actually my entry in the R.G.A. Stacking Games Contest (http://groups.google.com/group/rec.games.abstract/browse_thread/thread/3d7d1849463cb271/ca5401bd47d32149). The charm of these games is that they're immediately accessible in terms of mechanics and object. If they're fun to play and intruiging for combinatorial games theorists, and spawning a few puzzles maybe, they may last. So I hope this one will last at least as long as there are checkerboards and checkers. Grabber http://mindsports.nl/images/stories/sidedishes/moregamesbycf/grabber_inpos.gif (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/the-pit/grabber-578) Grabber © MindSports (http://mailto:info@mindsports.nl) The process (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/how-i-invented-games-and-why-not/late-arrivals-a-final-whispers#grabber) of invention (or lack thereof ;) ). Other games I've invented since Monkey Trap and InSight: Trounce (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/the-pit/trounce-574) Jump Sturdy (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/the-pit/576-jump-sturdy) |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by omar on Jan 21st, 2011, 2:11pm Wow, your pace of inventing is really picking up steam :-) Thomas Foy had mentioned a stacking variant of Arimaa a while back. Here is the thread: http://arimaa.com/arimaa/forum/cgi/YaBB.cgi?board=talk;action=display;num=1273854806;start=12#12 Combining some of the ideas I like from this without ever play testing any of it here is a stackable Arimaa variant you can enter in the contest. Gold player starts with 37 gold checkers and Silver player starts with 37 silver checkers. Gold places his checkers on the first two rows. Checkers may be stacked on each other. Some squares may be left empty. There is no limit to the height of a stack. At least one square must have a single checker. Single checkers are like the rabbits in Arimaa. The stacked checkers are like the stronger pieces with their strength determined by stack size. Silver then places the silver checkers in the two closest rows. All the usual rules of Arimaa apply. There is one additional rule. A single checker can jump on to an orthogonally adjacent stack (one or more) of friendly checkers to create a taller stack. Doing so requires all 4 steps of a turn. Lets call it "Arimaa Stack" :-) |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by Fritzlein on Jan 21st, 2011, 2:48pm on 01/21/11 at 14:11:21, omar wrote:
Gosh, inventing games is so easy! ;) |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Jan 22nd, 2011, 8:43am on 01/21/11 at 14:11:21, omar wrote:
I believe I've just run out of steam. Looking around in my head there's a peasant lack of stimulus. Grabber's 5 seconds invention was an unsolicited cherry on the cake :) on 01/21/11 at 14:11:21, omar wrote:
Generalized Arimaa - Thomas has suggested a very valid idea that should be considered carefully I think. I like the initial dilemma of how many singles to use, and the number and the size of the stacks, and how to adapt to the first players choice when you're second. A word of caution: always consider an idea outside the context in which it emerged. Arimaa may put demands on its generilazation, but the reverse may also be true. The step up rule for instance is only for singles, so only a single can save the day for a piece in need of reinforcement. And at a fairly heavy price: not only does the player lose one potential winner, but he does so at the cost of a full term. Obviously a 'step down' rule would enable a player to spawn singles in unlikely places, so I'm all for the step up, but it feels as if non-singles might want to come to each other rescue in a like manner. Of course that could also spawn singles in unlikely places (left behind ones) and maybe that should be disallowed. But it is a bit stange that only singles should be allowed to enforce a piece, not another piece. Finally I feel I must quote Mark with regard to another entry: Quote:
I'd be very pleased if you did, and I hope you can put it up somewhere in the Arimaa site before February 9th. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by omar on Jan 22nd, 2011, 9:09am on 01/21/11 at 14:48:38, Fritzlein wrote:
LOL; yes it's quite easy to invent rules; not quite the same as inventing a game :-) |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by omar on Jan 22nd, 2011, 9:39am Thanks for the additional info Christian. I'm glad Mark added those requirements; otherwise it would be very hard to evaluate the entries and you could get too many untested entries. Although it is very tempting for me to play test this, I won't have much time to do it right now. It's easy to make up rules based on gut feel, but that doesn't mean the game is any good. For me the only real way to tell is by playing it. I'd like to open it up to the Arimaa community to try it out and give feedback on how this plays out. It would probably require some tweaks. Maybe it would be OK to allow non-single pieces to jump on adjacent stacks or to allow stacks to split. If anyone is interested feel free to make a stackable variant of Arimaa and submit it to the contest. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Jan 22nd, 2011, 10:04am on 01/22/11 at 09:39:56, omar wrote:
Playtesting has two sides to it, and the first one is to check for bugs. That wouldn't seem to hard here. I can see no bugs in the variant you suggested, and my own suggestion regarding exchange of power between pieces will probably not add to clarity to begin with. Just something that crossed my mind. The other side is whether the game is worth playing. That's different for different games and for different players, so to figure that out playtesting it yourself is of limited significance. The only way is to kick it into the open and maybe lobby for it if you're convinced of its value. But I don't need to tell you how much effort that may require. Fortunately it's not a requirement for the contest: bugfree and clear will do and the feedback may be valuable for its own sake. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Jan 26th, 2011, 12:03pm I already have two miniature chess games that are build around the "Atlantis effect", a gradual disappearance of the playing field that will eventually strip one king or the other from refuge, namely Shakti (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/the-pit/shakti-550) and Caïssa (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/the-pit/caissa-519). These games, in their small and rather eccentric way, provide a tactical playing ground for some rather revolutionary ideas, and both have proven their merits over the years. Now playing around with the 'offspring' idea of Mark's game Monkey Queen (http://www.marksteeregames.com/Monkey_Queen_rules.html) has rendered a third: Cyclix (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/the-pit/cyclix-580) For now it's only the bare rules, I'll add some examples later and an applet will be provided in due time. Cyclix © MindSports (http://mailto:info@mindsports.nl) The process (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/how-i-invented-games-and-why-not/late-arrivals-a-final-whispers#cyclix) of invention. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Feb 1st, 2011, 8:22am I discovered a grain of sand in the machinery of Cyclix. It comes with the territory: chess variants are exercises in arbitrariness to begin with. They're usually mechanical rather than organical. They don't come together, you have to put the elements together like a watchmaker. Playing around with it, Cyclix turned out the be something of a streetfight. You hit a lot and take a lot, and things can become rather chaotic. Close combat, an unclear strategy, except maybe in very general terms, lots of tactical leverage and lots of sacrifices. That's to be expected when the pieces are immediately returned to the player making the 'sacrifice'. At a certain point I noticed that the pieces were hampered by the increasing number of holes. The holes are meant to hamper the king - that's the whole 'Atlantis' idea. They may hamper pieces to a degree, and they do in Shakti. But not in Caïssa, where a piece may carry its tile along to land on a square that doesn't have one - the problem isn't new and the choice may go either way, depending on the nature of the interacting elements. The Cyclix king is stronger than Shakti's, because in Shakti a king in check is restricted to adjacent squares. But Shakti's pieces are less in number and not too strong either. So I had already decided not to restrict Cyclix' king that way. The Cyclix king is also more often forced to take a piece that gives check because pieces are easily and readily 'sacrificed' for instance to force a king to 'draw holes' around itself. But that may not always affect the king's escape routes negatively, and at a certain point the number of holes may hamper the pieces to a degree that feels annoying, especially if the king finds a long jump as a loophole. So with the implicit exception of the king, I've given pieces the right to take along the tile they occupy if moving to a square that doesn't hold one, as in Caïssa. It gives the pieces greater flexibility and introduces new tactical goals, for instance 'stealing' tiles close to the opponent's king. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Feb 24th, 2011, 9:11am We've embraced a project of Greg Schmidt at mindsports: The Axiom Universal Game System Project http://mindsports.nl/images/stories/axiomlogo.jpg (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/axiom) |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Feb 27th, 2011, 9:29am Monkey Queen (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/the-pit/581-monkey-queen) and Grabber (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/the-pit/grabber-578), both contestants in the RGA Stacking Contest, can now be played turnbased at mindsports.nl (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/players-section) as well as downloaded as Axiom games (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/axiom) (these work stand alone, no interface required). The Axiom version of Grabber lends itself excellently for solving a number of puzzles that are implied (if players choose to cooperate, which is simple since Axiom allows you to play both sides) such as: Shortest possible game Longest possible game Max pieces in final position Min pieces in final position Max # of prisoners (16 most likely) Max stack height Shortest game resulting in total elimination of one color When Axiom plays against itself, games typically end between 10 and 20 moves. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by omar on Feb 27th, 2011, 7:55pm I downloaded and tried out Hex and Grabber. The interface looks and feels just like ZoG. Very nice. Did Greg develop this? Is there a project page of Axiom? Any plans to do Havannah? |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Feb 28th, 2011, 4:57am on 02/27/11 at 19:55:23, omar wrote:
Yes and yes: http://games.groups.yahoo.com/group/axiom-system/ and maybe in time. The only bots that actually play havannah use MC/UCT. The traditional alpha/beta search using an evaluation function doesn't work too well for lack of a reliable evaluation function. Maybe a good MC/UCT bot can be linked up, but I'm no expert in that field. Or any field except inventing abstract games for that matter :P |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Feb 28th, 2011, 11:22am Cameron Browne started a thread at R.G.A (and a similar one at R.G.C. - but I'm not a member) called Games that stretch MCTS (http://groups.google.com/group/rec.games.abstract/browse_thread/thread/112faea2b5217b60#). There are some interesting observations there (though few conclusions), one of which is that uniform finite games are more 'susceptible' to MCTS. Arimaa would seem to be out of the woods where Havannah is in dangerous waters :) I got a reply that was posted at R.G.C. by way of its author, Benedikt Rosenau (Zickzack at BGG and iGGC). Here's a Quote:
Symple (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/the-pit/symple-572) owes its existence to the fact that Benedikt reminded me on an old and faint smell. The smell that Star (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Star_(board_game)) and Superstar (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/the-pit/superstar-552) and YvY (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/the-pit/yvy-555) and *Star (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/*Star) all suck, not because they're bad games, but because they miss the elusive target, the essence of the theme. They were all off the mark, but what was the mark I missed twice? I had more or less given up on that, and if Benedikt hadn't been so persistent I'd probably left it at that. I'd give *Star the highest credits in the above company, so I can't really blame Craige for saying *Star is what those other games wanted to be (http://ea.ea.home.mindspring.com/*Star.html). But it's off target all the same. I've described Symple's arrival elsewhere (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/how-i-invented-games-and-why-not/late-arrivals-a-final-whispers#symplehex). Even Benedikt thought of the target in terms of a connection game, because Star is a 'connection game'. That's why we were shooting in the wrong direction. The theme is 'group penalty', and connection is a way to dress it. But not the most simple way, not the quintessential (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/how-i-invented-games-and-why-not/key-concepts#quintessential-games) way. Generic Symple is more generic than the above mentioned 'group penalty' games because it doesn't have 'special cells' to connect. There's Occam's Razor (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Occam's_razor) for you. Squares/cells are simply squares/cells and groups are orthogonally connected stones of one color. Symple goes right to the heart of the 'group penalty' theme by asking how many groups you want when on your turn you may either: - grow every one of your existing groups by one stone, or ... - ... start a new group by placing a single stone, in the knowledge that every stone counts, but every group has an 'existence penalty' of 4 points. I consider a couple things to be obvious: 1. Everyone here can figure out the dilemma posed by this protocol. 2. It suggests a paradigm of a division between an 'opening stage' where players place single stones and a 'growing phase' in which the seedlings are brought to bloom. 3. The first player has an advantage: if the second player grows first, he's a group (and thus a source for growth) behind, if he doesn't, he's equal in groups but behind in initiative. I can't very well argue against the first The second isn't hardwired and there's a paradigm shift of sorts going on in Sygo (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/arena/sygo/), so I'll leave it at that for now. The third one was undeniable and a swap doesn't work because there are no 'bad cells' to start with - the price of being generic. Bummer. Of course those who have followed the birth of the 'Symple protocol' know it has a happy ending: the protocol itself gave the tool, the 'contract' Benedikt is referring to, to balance any advantage. 4. The protocol is itself generic and may be applicable to games that have the growth of groups as part of their mechanics. 5. Symple is a highly organic uniform finite game, the kind that is considered (at least in Camerons thread) to be 'susceptible' to MCTS. Keeping Benedikt's remark in mind I doubt that. Symple is also rather 'predictable' in its behaviour. I've played one or two games and I can see considerable refinement of its modest tactics and considerable deepening of its bottomless strategic considerations. Great? Do I think Symple is a great game? No, I think it's an interesting game and better than any of the other 'group penalty' games. Actually Symple is what *Star wanted to be ;) . What Symple lacks (as does *Star) is drama, in the sense of Mark Thompson's leading article Defining the Abstract (http://www.thegamesjournal.com/articles/DefiningtheAbstract.shtml). I've compared Symple to a big ship slowly heeling to one side: by the time it's clear which way, there's little tactical leverage to turn the tables. And my scale ends with 'great', it doesn't start with it. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by omar on Mar 3rd, 2011, 11:34pm Thanks for the link Christian. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Mar 4th, 2011, 9:59am on 03/03/11 at 23:34:06, omar wrote:
To be fair, I had hoped for somewhat more elaborate comments, but with the championship running I can imagine many posters here have more pressing matters on their mind :) Anyway, I'll probably come back to that, but I've got some ad hoc news I'd like to share. Dave Dyer has implemented Crossfire at Boardspace.net (http://boardspace.net/english/about_crossfire.html). http://boardspace.net/images/crossfire-small.jpg (http://boardspace.net/english/about_crossfire.html) It's a beautiful board, breathing ancienty (wholly unjustified but highly appreciated) and it comes with an AI to play against on different levels. Of course live play against another human player is also possible. Dave writes Quote:
I've thanked Dave for that and asked him to mention Sid Sackson's Focus as the source of this simplicity and elegance. At the same time I should mention that Crossfire has by some been discarded as a "Focus clone". Apart from the question whether a translation of a game to a different grid automatically makes it a clone, I disagree. The 'twist' that characterizes the game - replacing the artificial ceiling of a stackheight of 5 by a natural ceiling defined by a cell's number of neighbors - is of major strategical and tactical relevance. Aiming large stacks at low capacity cells is an estabished part of both strategy and tactics and provides fixed 'focuspoints' for both, that are totally absent in Focus. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Mar 26th, 2011, 4:48pm We've given the ArenA (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/arena) and the Pit (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/the-pit) a much needed facelift :D |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by megajester on Mar 27th, 2011, 11:58am on 03/26/11 at 16:48:04, christianF wrote:
Lookin' good... 8) |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Apr 1st, 2011, 3:04pm on 03/27/11 at 11:58:05, megajester wrote:
We'll pull it through somewhat more extensively, new applets and all (Draughts, Dameo and Bushka have been updated accordingly now). Meanwhile I still plan to elaborate on why Symple is an important game, although I still haven't played it more than two or three times, just after its discovery. As far as playing is concerned, I prefer Sygo, which is far from quintessential, but it features capture and offers more drama. And it illustrates the strength of the symple mechanism. A particularly interesting game (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/players-section/Serve.cgi?file=Sygo1299157008.html) between Rendong You and me ended in a 181/180 score, with yours truly at the short end. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Apr 3rd, 2011, 11:55am on 04/01/11 at 15:04:39, christianF wrote:
Again?? Edit: Toned down but still slightly incredulous. I'll be famous too someday... like a hundred years after I'm dead. That's the nice thing about games. When it's your turn, it's really your turn. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Apr 4th, 2011, 3:35am Restyled till now, with new and better applets: Draughts (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/arena/draughts/), Dameo (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/arena/dameo/), Bushka (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/arena/bushka/), Hexdame (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/arena/hexdame/) and Emergo (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/arena/emergo/). Next weekend we'll presumably restyle Go, Sygo and Symple. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Apr 5th, 2011, 9:54am In my case I'd be roasted alive. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Apr 10th, 2011, 4:22am The new Symple applet is ready, please have a look: Ed van Zon (NL) - Benedikt Rosenau (DE) (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/players-section/Serve.cgi?file=Symple1289066427.html) Also, my reflections on Symple have crystallized: About Symple (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/arena/symple/586-about-symple) Did something change? Yes, it was rather arrogant of me to try to set a fixed penalty, where the choice of penalty has such a profound impact on the game. So the group penalty can be set from 2-32 prior to a game and will be displayed accordingly. Any other reflections? Yes, I've played less than ten games (the reason being that I prefer Sygo, and I'm also playing Havannah quite a lot to keep my wits in shape for next year's challenge). The story (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/how-i-invented-games-and-why-not/late-arrivals-a-final-whispers#symple) of Symple's genesis is well documented. Symple shows what this thread was about in the first place: I invented the game without touching a stone, and predict how it will behave. Some games allow one to do that. It's not even very difficult. You only need a deep (if not obsessive) interest in the workings of organic mechanisms. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Apr 25th, 2011, 2:27pm The mindsports update is progressing nicely. In the process we've also published a work in progress called On the Evolution of Draughts Variants (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/on-the-evolution-of-draughts-variants). Thought I'd mention it :) |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Apr 25th, 2011, 11:07pm on 04/25/11 at 14:27:17, christianF wrote:
Looks good :) Thanks for including Cage in that. Couple of nitpicky points: * "Draughts are the youngest" --> is the youngest * "Checkers basically took of on an 8x8" --> took off * "columns reaching the back row have to sit it out unless capture" --> unless captured? Not sure what you're trying to say here but it seems grammatically incorrect. * "We have not listed the backdraws" --> drawbacks * "move into a direction" --> move in a direction * "One may argue that the the increasing" Syntax. * "With 30 stones each" --> men each? * "but it must end the move on the behind" grammar |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Apr 26th, 2011, 2:16am Thanks, I don't consider that nitpicking but useful comments. The Cage section isn't complete yet (lacking a couple of examples). Same holds for a couple of traditionals. More applets will be added by and by and they will be used for examples too, rather than more diagrams. on 04/25/11 at 23:07:31, MarkSteere wrote:
Pieces that reach the backrow cannot move in Stapeldammen: movement is forwards only and there is no promotion. However, they can be forced to make a capture (capture being mandatory, and forwards as well as backwards). Such a capture will (unless it also ends on the backrow) bring them back 'in the field'. This is unusual and aesthetically questionable, but the strategical implications are quite fascinating. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on May 2nd, 2011, 1:52pm Ingo Althofer (http://www.althofer.de/index.html) posted this at the LG forum: Quote:
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on May 5th, 2011, 7:20am The Frisian Daughts (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/on-the-evolution-of-draughts-variants/draughts-variants/501-frisian), Turkish Daughts (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/on-the-evolution-of-draughts-variants/draughts-variants/502-dama_t) and Armenian Daughts (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/on-the-evolution-of-draughts-variants/draughts-variants/503-tama_a) sections are, if not complete, at least reasonably informative now. Frisian uses the 10x10 International applet, but in 'frisian mode', whereby pieces that are captured orthogonally are highlighted the same way as those captured diagonally. Turkish and Armenian use the Dameo applet, but in 'vacuum cleaner' mode, whereby captured pieces are removed in the process of capture. Like a dog on a cookie trail. These applets will shortly be available for turnbased play too. The Go and Sygo applets already are available for turnbased play, and they've been updated too now. Here are two games in the new outfit: Go: Alexander Dinerchtein - Rob van Zeijst (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/arena/go/57-example-game) Sygo: Rendong You - Christian Freeling (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/players-section/Serve.cgi?file=Sygo1296040448.html) |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on May 10th, 2011, 3:15pm The column checkers section of the "Evolution" is taking shape. Please have a look at the new Bashni (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/on-the-evolution-of-draughts-variants/column-checkers/486-bashni) applet - is that a nice applet or is that a nice applet :D . Except for Lasca, all column checkers games (Bashni, Stapeldammen, Emergo, Hexemergo, Grabber) can now be played at mindsports. Hexemergo will soon have a new applet in the new 'house style' too, and Lasca will not take long either. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on May 23rd, 2011, 6:16am Guess what, the new Lasca applet (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/the-pit/609-lasca) is ready. No build-in 'legal' yet, so you'll have to abide by the rules, but a nice display (we think). Shogi has a new applet too (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/arena/shogi/465-example-game). The western symbols may seem difficult at first, but the effort is well worth the reward ;) This thread has drifted somewhat off topic I fear, as I have drifted away from inventing games. I merely acknowledge the fact, there's no plan or ambition either way. Meanwhile I recommend interested readers to have a closer look at Symple and Sygo. The first is a game more worthy of contemplation than would seem to be the case, the second is a great game. Be sure you belong to those who can later say "I told you so!" |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on May 24th, 2011, 3:35pm on 05/23/11 at 06:16:58, christianF wrote:
Me too. I still muse over game concepts during idle moments like while I'm driving or getting massaged by a brutal Chinese lady, but I'm not throwing myself into design. It's summertime. Time to be outside riding a bicyle, or inside practicing tenor sax. on 05/23/11 at 06:16:58, christianF wrote:
A claim I have no doubt of, however oft repeated. Trouble is, there are a lot of "great games" out there now. We're in the middle of a great game explosion. In my case, I try to make my games robust. This in itself doesn't make a game great. It's just that *if* the game turns out to be great, like Oust, you know you won't have a problem with draws since draws were designed out from the outset. [Oust is naturally finite. No bs ko type rules are needed.] And you won't have a problem with first move advantage since it's extremely scalable. Oust can be played on *any* board, even or odd sized. Oust rule sheet: http://www.marksteeregames.com/Oust_rules.pdf |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on May 25th, 2011, 5:10am on 05/24/11 at 15:35:14, MarkSteere wrote:
In my opinion the criteria for a great game have been excellently summarized by J. Mark Thompson in his short essay Defining the Abstract (http://www.thegamesjournal.com/articles/DefiningtheAbstract.shtml). If put against these criteria, Symple and Hex fail, although I've argued otherwise by leaving 'drama' out of the equation, because neither lacks clarity or depth or decisiveness. Sygo on the other hand meets all criteria Mark Thompson considers essential. Of course Mark's criteria may not be everybody's, but they are clear and concise, which suits me well in a realm where all criteria are inherently subjective and arbitrary. Maybe 'AI resistance' would nowadays qualify as an additional essential criterion. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on May 25th, 2011, 10:04am on 05/25/11 at 05:10:30, christianF wrote:
The celebrity of Mark Thompson's article seems to have taken on a life of its own, inexplicably. It's a lovely, well written document, but little more than a rehash of pre-existing definitions. on 05/25/11 at 05:10:30, christianF wrote:
Mark Thompson's criteria are themselves subjective and arbitrary. There are objective, measurable quantities in games such as skill level, draw rate, and first move advantage, as well as the inter-dependencies among these quantities. No game has more drama than Oust, at least that I've ever played. As far as decisiveness, all of my games are finite-decisive. You can't get more decisive than that. There certainly could be a tie in Sygo though, right? Conspicuously absent from the Sygo rule sheet is any mention of draws. Ignoring draws won't make them go away. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on May 25th, 2011, 12:13pm on 05/25/11 at 10:04:17, MarkSteere wrote:
Mark's essay is not an attempt at completeness. Skill level, as a criterion, reveals itself better with an increasing player base. Given the importance of first/second player advantage I'm a bit surprised that a very intricate balancing system as featured in Symple and Sygo draws so little response (I'm not saying it gets little attention, judging from the view count). Your bashing it may not have helped. Then again, some like disagree with you, so the reverse may also hold. Your dislike of draws is well documented. However, not everybody agrees that draws should be impossible in great game. Draughts players even consider them essential! Out of necessity :P . on 05/25/11 at 10:04:17, MarkSteere wrote:
In Sygo draws will never be a problem, but ironically we've come very close (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/players-section/Serve.cgi?file=Sygo1299157008.html) in one game. You were right about the rule sheet, but wrong about the 'conspicuously' - I actually thought I'd mentioned it (I now have). Of course the possibility of neutral points was mentioned, which impicitly allows for a draw. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on May 25th, 2011, 1:35pm on 05/25/11 at 12:13:03, christianF wrote:
You haven't really proved or even made a strong case as to why Sygo is so extraordinarily balanced. You've demonstrated semantic wizardry worthy of Cameron Browne, but nothing that speaks of logic, so far. on 05/25/11 at 12:13:03, christianF wrote:
lol, Now it's my fault Sygo's a dud. Newsflash: Me not liking a game isn't a red flag for anyone. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on May 25th, 2011, 2:25pm on 05/25/11 at 13:35:17, MarkSteere wrote:
My case for Sygo's balancing mechanism can be found in About Symple (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/arena/symple/586-about-symple) - it's the same mechanism. Your comments till now had little to do with logical arguments, but a lot with mockery, sloganism and misrepresenting content. I guess that's more of a personality issue though. It must be hard to escape Mark Steere when he's inside ::) . |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on May 25th, 2011, 6:23pm on 05/25/11 at 14:25:56, christianF wrote:
It's not too difficult. One could, for example, suddenly change the topic from Sygo to The bad personality of Mark, the bad guy. Whenever you're finished "escaping", lol, reality and I will still be here, patiently waiting. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on May 27th, 2011, 7:02am on 05/25/11 at 18:23:47, MarkSteere wrote:
http://i56.tinypic.com/5127a1.jpg This is me and Woolfie, a white male born here in 2005. He's extremely relaxed as long as he's not handled (like here) and he's a dedicated father. http://i55.tinypic.com/1zfr7eh.jpg This is Daisy, a wildcolored female born in a zoo in Bayern in 2010. She was unexpectedly tame when we got her last year, 13 weeks old at the time. http://i55.tinypic.com/25fq648.jpg Here is Falco with the one white pup and one of the remaining six wild colored ones. We'll keep the white one because it's a male and male's are easier to keep because they don't have trouble in the mating season. Female's have induced ovulation, meaning they don't get out of heat unless they're 'served'. And they can get very moody and agressive if that doesn't happen. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on May 28th, 2011, 2:34pm on 05/25/11 at 10:04:17, MarkSteere wrote:
Just a detail: you were right about the rules. However, in the ArenA Sygo is introduced (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/arena#territory) thus (and was all te time): Quote:
So it was and is, however unimportant, one of the first things mentioned. Saying that logical arguments are "semantic wizardry" isn't a very stong bid, don't you think? And saying Sygo's a "dud", whatever that may be, doesn't seem much of a logical argument. Surely you can do better than that, even if it means actually contemplating content. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on May 28th, 2011, 6:38pm on 05/28/11 at 14:34:26, christianF wrote:
Semantic sorcery? ??? |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on May 29th, 2011, 10:07am on 05/28/11 at 18:38:59, MarkSteere wrote:
Here's an interesting summary of your views on Symple as posted at rga, March 14/15. Let's start with my claim. Quote:
Quote:
Let's have a closer look at these "unbearable kludges". (1) is addressed in the paragraph "Countering a-symmetry with a-symmetry" in About Symple (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/arena/symple/586-about-symple). Here's what it says: Quote:
Quote:
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(2) is the very THEME of the game, which is "group penalty". The one thing in your comment that justifies it to a small degree is the specific height of the penalty, here indicated as "4". As I've said before, that was arrogant. The height of the penalty is itself a parameter whose value determines a gradual shift in strategy. But that's not addressing the main point. The main point is that you don't seem to recognize Symple's theme in the first place, treating it as if it were some undesirable byproduct. As for "the perfect game", that's your interpretation of my words. I claim that Symple in the long run will impicitly converge to a 50/50 rate and that no arguments concerning the first/second move advantage, or lack thereof, can be given. For the record: Symple is a finite drawless game, one of a multitude, and as such completely determined, including the winner according to God's Algorithm. But everybody knows that. And that's what I said at rga: Quote:
Quote:
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After this theme was left alone for a month it resurfaced in april: Quote:
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on May 29th, 2011, 11:52am on 05/29/11 at 10:07:47, christianF wrote:
What does that even mean? In the "long run"? on 05/29/11 at 10:07:47, christianF wrote:
Yep, got that. Still have no idea what you're talking about. on 05/29/11 at 10:07:47, christianF wrote:
No, of course not. Sign post ahead: "Now Entering the Freeling Zone" on 05/29/11 at 10:07:47, christianF wrote:
Ohhhhh. So this is what you've been carrying on about all this time. On an infinitely large board, Sygo would have no move order advantage. So what?? Tons of games are like that. Any crudely scalable game, such as Checkers, whose move order advantage (i.e. first move advantage or second move advantage) is alleviated by a shift to a larger board size, will converge to zero move order advantage at infinity. This is your big claim to fame for Sygo?? on 05/29/11 at 10:07:47, christianF wrote:
Black swans. White swans. Red herrings. This is the "logic" we were promised? Sygo is a white pigeon. on 05/29/11 at 10:07:47, christianF wrote:
I didn't kill Sygo! lol If Sygo is dead, that's the law of the jungle. Get a grip. on 05/29/11 at 10:07:47, christianF wrote:
I was trying to throw you a bone to appease your ongoing Sygo tantrum. A lot of good that did... on 05/29/11 at 10:07:47, christianF wrote:
And you still haven't. on 05/29/11 at 10:07:47, christianF wrote:
Christian, your logic is consistently non-existent. You're a celebrated game inventor, and decidedly not a scientist. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by robinz on May 29th, 2011, 11:54am Er, why do we have a long thread devoted almost solely to an argument between 2 people who have, as far as I can tell, never played a game of arimaa? Sure, this is the "off topic" forum, so if others were contributing I'd have no problem with this thread - but can you two please consider taking your arguments elsewhere? |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on May 29th, 2011, 12:21pm on 05/29/11 at 11:54:57, robinz wrote:
And what exactly might that problem be, I wonder, if you can simply skip the topic? I consider Arimaa a great game, by the way, so your attempt at suggesting we're here at its expense is rather curious. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on May 29th, 2011, 12:53pm on 05/29/11 at 11:52:17, MarkSteere wrote:
In a way I can well understand Robinz. Concerning your other 'refutations' I rest my case because the readership, if not very vocal, certainly is intelligent enough. And Robinz, I will probably post now and again, and I can't really avoid being corrected by Mark ;) |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by Fritzlein on May 29th, 2011, 1:18pm on 05/29/11 at 12:53:29, christianF wrote:
No, you can't avoid Mark responding to your posts here, but you could avoid cutting and pasting arguments that are going on elsewhere so that they continue here rather than there. Although I can see the temptation to try to move a debate from an unmoderated forum into a moderated one, the moderator won't necessarily be thrilled. :P Robinz, although I, too, wish that feuds that started elsewhere would not be imported into the Arimaa forum, my experience with Arimaa gives me a certain sympathy for Christian and Mark. I realize as I had not previously done, that the circle of people in the whole wide world who take any interest in new abstract stragety games is quite small. Even that small group of people can't agree what makes a game worth playing. The upshot of a small and fractured community is that, if anyone were to take a reasonable list of features of "the perfect abstract strategy game" and invent a new game that had every feature on this list in greater measure than any game in history, this new, perfect game would be largely ignored. Sad, but true. Part of the reason a fight about games that aren't Arimaa is taking place in the Arimaa forum is that there is no good place for it to happen. Here we have civil, active, high-quality discussions. Is there another abstract games forum that beats us on all these counts? I know the Arimaa forum doesn't seem like much in larger scheme of things, but it is special for its niche. My promotion of Arimaa has evolved over time in that I have become less eager to trumpet what is wrong with its classical competitors such as chess and shogi. Also I have tried to become more frank that the virtues of Arimaa are contingent, and may evaporate under further scrutiny. Arimaa appears drawless, balanced, infinitely deep, computer-resistant, dramatic, generative of distinctive playing styles that all may succeed, etc. But every single one of these virtures may prove false in the long run. Therefore I try to be less strident about the virtues of Arimaa, and show due respect for classic games which, however much flaws are now peeking through, nevertheless have withstood withering examination without breaking. If some game inventor seems over-eager to extoll the virtues of his own game, or if some game inventor seems to delight in criticizing games that are not his own, and if above all they wish to be noticed rather than ignored and forgotten, I can identify, because I have felt the same way about Arimaa, of which I am not even the inventor! If the discourse remains civil, confined to the off-topic thread, and not too provocative in assertions that Arimaa players should be diverting their attention to other games, I can skim it and move on untroubled. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on May 29th, 2011, 1:28pm on 05/29/11 at 11:54:57, robinz wrote:
Exactly. on 05/29/11 at 11:54:57, robinz wrote:
Speaking of non-contributions, would you kindly consider butting out? |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on May 29th, 2011, 1:34pm on 05/29/11 at 13:18:10, Fritzlein wrote:
Good point. Don't run away from an rga discussion to hide under Omar's skirt. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on May 29th, 2011, 2:54pm on 05/29/11 at 13:34:23, MarkSteere wrote:
The one thing I find missing is someone pointing out what is wrong with the balancing mechanism around which the current discussion revolves. The "let's look at this from white's/black's point of view" part. Because if there's nothing wrong with it, then it works as a "high resolution" pie-principle, no longer dependent on considering the relative advantages of one particular opening move or another, as in Hex. And the result in the hypothetical "long run" will converge to a 50/50 rate. Why? Suppose it deviates to one side, what will the other side learn from that, with both having a finger on the sliding rod? Of course the mechanism is restricted to games that employ the opening protocol of Symple and Sygo, so its applicability is limited, but its very existence is not - and I would naturally see that recognized. The relative merits of its inventor are less of an issue for me. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by robinz on May 29th, 2011, 5:28pm Sure, I could just ignore your argument - and have been doing so for a while. You're right that it's not really any concern of mine. I just find it strange that the two of you seem to be choosing this forum in particular to be having it. Is there really nowhere else to discuss the merits of various games? Boardgamegeek would seem an obvious example of a better forum (or rather set of forums) than this one, and no doubt there are others... I'd have no problem with this discussion whatsoever if it involved any members of the arimaa community - but, to this relative outsider, it looks like a simple feud between two people who aren't actually members of that community. This is the only reason I question whether it belongs here. Of course, if everyone disagrees, by all means continue, and I will just ignore. PS - I very much respect both Chirstian and Mark as designers of interesting abstract strategy games. But I find it rather unedifying to see the kind of childish sniping at each other that occurs here. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on May 29th, 2011, 7:08pm on 05/29/11 at 14:54:27, christianF wrote:
The Arimaa forum bears no responsibility for disproving your unintelligible, outlandish claims. I don't even know what you're claiming at this point. I only know it's outlandish, whatever it is. on 05/29/11 at 14:54:27, christianF wrote:
Meaning what?? on 05/29/11 at 14:54:27, christianF wrote:
For any given board size, Sygo is a win for Player 1 or Player 2. The more skilled players become, the more move order advantage there will be at that given board size. Sygo is no different from Checkers in this regard. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on May 30th, 2011, 6:10am on 05/29/11 at 19:08:44, MarkSteere wrote:
Quote:
on 05/29/11 at 19:08:44, MarkSteere wrote:
on 05/29/11 at 19:08:44, MarkSteere wrote:
Regarding the second: You're wrong. The convergence takes place regardless of the "truth" that is locked in the gametree. But please keep trying not to understand if that makes you feel better. Regarding the third: Ask Jonathan Schaeffer or compare branch density. Or try to make English of this: Quote:
P.S. "The one thing I find missing", I said in a previous post, "is someone pointing out what is wrong with the balancing mechanism. The 'let's look at this from white's/black's point of view' part." And I still find it missing. Please have a shot at it. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on May 30th, 2011, 10:28am on 05/30/11 at 06:10:22, christianF wrote:
In the sense of giving you the benefit of the doubt while having no idea what you're talking about, yes. As I said yesterday, I threw you a bone in rec.games.abstract in a foolish attempt to appease the latest flare-up in your months long Symple tantrum there (which has now merged into your Sygo tantrum here). Christian Freeling's tantrum flare-up in rec.games.abstract: "Since you apparently have a need to criticize everything I do, and to make everything I say suspect, I'll refrain from participating in any contest if you are." . . . "Your particularly ignorant comments on Grabber and Symple show a different attitude." on 05/30/11 at 06:10:22, christianF wrote:
What a stupendous crock. Consider my "belief" in anything relating to Sygo rescinded. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on May 30th, 2011, 12:03pm on 05/30/11 at 10:28:07, MarkSteere wrote:
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on May 30th, 2011, 4:57pm on 05/30/11 at 06:10:22, christianF wrote:
Baloney. You claim Sygo is scalable. So play Sygo on a tiny board and watch how quickly play diverges from "a 50/50 win/lose overall score at the highest level of play." You ducked the exact same argument in the exact same debate in rec.games.abstract. Where will we find you next? Iago?? lol Board size, skill level, and move order advantage are related quantities. Using my own Hex Oust as an example, there might be a slight statistical advantage in moving first at the current board size of 7. At Game Site X, Hex Oust win/loss/draw = 349/328/9, and most of those games were size 7. If move order advantage ever does become an issue in Hex Oust, we can bump the board up to the significantly larger size 8, which should totally clear up move order advantage for years of advancing skill. There's a trade-off between game length and move order advantage. A couple of points of move order advantage may be deemed tolerable when faced with moving up to a larger, longer-playing board. There's certainly no call to increase the board size every time a half point of statistical advantage is suspected. Games are governed by laws - laws which haven't been even slightly perturbed by Sygo. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on May 30th, 2011, 5:37pm on 05/30/11 at 16:57:13, MarkSteere wrote:
The short answer would boil down to repeating that you've not addressed the question: what is wrong with the reasoning in the "Countering a-symmetry with a-symmetry" paragraph in About Symple (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/arena/symple/586-about-symple), in particular the white's/black's point of view part? (assuming that you understand the move protocol of course) Is that so hard a question (for anyone)? And if the reasoning is right, what would then be the conclusion? A long answer might attempt to show which presumptions lead you to draw a wrong conclusion from factual correctness. But that may take more than a paragraph. Consider it written, but let's give it some time lest the thread gets overheated. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by RonWeasley on May 30th, 2011, 8:27pm I haven't been following this recent discussion very closely, so I have nothing to contribute. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Jun 1st, 2011, 10:41am Before I go to the matter at hand, a summary of the context may be in place. - Omar started this thread and whatever happens with it is his call alone. I'm grateful he did and I hope the views expressed in it will be interesting enough to justify its existence. If you can find nothing of interest, just move on, it's a thread, not a threat. - Since it's an off topic thread please note that I feel the host game is a great game. Most readers will know by now that I consider J. Mark Thompson's Defining the Abstract (http://www.thegamesjournal.com/articles/DefiningtheAbstract.shtml) an excellent quick reference of what makes a great game, and Arimaa certainly meets all criteria mentioned in the article. Personally I find "AI-resistence" a great plus, nowadays, and Arimaa as far as I know still has a good score in that field too. Nevertheless I don't actually play it. Consider this: I don't play Grand Chess either. I'm not going to invest a large effort to get from bad to mediocre (and failing at even that, most likely). - The thread was initiated because of How I invented games and why not (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/how-i-invented-games-and-why-not), which was supposed to wrap up my work and explain how it came to be. My claim to be able to predict the behaviour of certain games from the rules was shown certainly not to extend to all abstract games, as could have been predicted without the gift of prophecy. On the other end of the spectrum are games the behaviour of which can be predicted by anyone. Not necessarily in terms of strategy, but in terms of the general nature of the fight, the outcome, and the possible problems regarding move order advantage. Take Hex or Dan Troyka's Breakthrough. The conclusion must therefore be that my claim wasn't all that special. Yet it's a slippery slope and two of my respected critics have recently voiced comments regarding the subject: on 05/29/11 at 13:18:10, Fritzlein wrote:
The other one is from Rozencrantz at recregamescombinatorial@googlegroups.com (http://recregamescombinatorial@googlegroups.com). It was send to me by Benedikt Rosenau. The subject matter was posted by João Pedro Neto: Quote:
To which Rozencrantz replied: Quote:
Different opinions on the same subject. Fritzlein treads thoughtfully and carefully. Considering that it took the drawmargin of International Draughts about a century to manifest itself as problematic, this seems a wise approach. João noticed what I've said all these years, some games are discoveries rather than designs, and Rozencrantz takes a considered sceptical view regarding 'discoveries'. Hex is such a discovery and for that very reason sprang identically from two different minds. Havannah, though more a lucky design than a discovery, also came fully formed. So did Reversi, Oust, Breakthrough and LOA to name a few more - how is time supposed 'shape' these games, one wonders. [edit]Even Checkers complies. Sure, variants have been formed over the ages. As it happens Benedikt Rosenau and yours truly recently published On the Evolution of Draughts Variants (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/on-the-evolution-of-draughts-variants) on that very subject. But, barring balloted openings, Checkers itself didn't change. You really can't go anywhere else on a diagonal grid with a short range king.[/edit] Yet generally speaking Rozencrantz has a point of course. Games made by design have a good chance to be altered by design. - Regular readers know the "wrap it up" part was premature. I unexpectedly came up with a bunch of games in the context of a design contest. Symple and Sygo are of special interest in the above context, because one is by discovery and one by design. Both of them have predictable behaviour in the same sense that Hex or Breakthrough have it. I claim no more that that they are interesting, not in the last place because of a new move protocol and an additional high resolution pie-principle that does not depend on the relative merits of one opening move or another. - I'm 64, with an unobstructed view of Mount Doom. Every time I light a joint I feel the Eye of Mordor swaying may way - it didn't find me yet though :) What I'm saying is: I really don't care too much about the future. I present my work at mindsports and discuss it ... well, here, actually. I love to care for my animals, enjoy life, and certainly feel no part of any 'game designers contest'. I entered one, true, but I hadn't anticipated that it would be like Hotel California. I feel compelled however to answer to misrepresentation of my words or work, although without much pleasure. So my next post will address the issue of Symple's balancing mechanism and maybe get some insight into why a simple question - what's wrong with my reasoning regarding it - is so elaborately ignored ;) . |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by ocmiente on Jun 1st, 2011, 12:21pm on 06/01/11 at 10:41:13, christianF wrote:
Sid Sackson made a similar claim. (http://www.webnoir.com/bob/sid/zetlin.htm) |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by SpeedRazor on Jun 1st, 2011, 4:12pm Do Not Feed The Troll |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Jun 1st, 2011, 4:31pm on 06/01/11 at 16:12:43, SpeedRazor wrote:
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by megajester on Jun 2nd, 2011, 12:56am on 06/01/11 at 16:31:56, christianF wrote:
Maybe he's just telling you not to feed "the troll." ;) |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Jun 2nd, 2011, 2:35am on 06/01/11 at 10:41:13, christianF wrote:
It's been nearly a month since you last reminded us of your impending "doom". You must be a real barrel of monkeys at home. Zzzzzzzzzzzzzzz on 06/01/11 at 10:41:13, christianF wrote:
Why, because you lost? on 06/01/11 at 10:41:13, christianF wrote:
You got out of it about what you put into it. on 06/01/11 at 10:41:13, christianF wrote:
What got so misrepresented? on 06/01/11 at 10:41:13, christianF wrote:
Yes, the bizarre question about your presumed faulty reasoning. I can't say I would be shocked beyond belief if there was something wrong... |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Jun 2nd, 2011, 2:41am on 06/02/11 at 00:56:49, megajester wrote:
Trolls are people too. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by megajester on Jun 2nd, 2011, 3:37am on 06/02/11 at 02:41:02, MarkSteere wrote:
So are drug addicts, but that doesn't make you want to hug them and pet them and squeeze them and call them George now, does it? It makes you want to send them to rehab. But point taken, I will try to be nice to trolls in future. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Jun 2nd, 2011, 7:38am on 06/02/11 at 03:37:24, megajester wrote:
The use of pot is very common here, and not considered a big deal. Only recently has driving under the influence been declared an offence - in fact since there's a quick test available. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Jun 3rd, 2011, 9:45am A good friend of both Ed van Zon and me, Gerard Dijkman, astrologer extraordinaire, died yesterday. It's becoming a trend. We're from the "People try to put us down, talking 'bout my generation" generation but there's hardly any need to push it, nowadays. He was extremely well-read, erudite and funny, and an alcoholic, and that's what did him in. Now the rest of us who ruled in the seventies make arrangements to go to the funeral together and talk about old times and who's most likely to go next. The last one will know for sure :) I'll be back later. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Jun 3rd, 2011, 11:10am on 06/03/11 at 09:45:36, christianF wrote:
Anything else we can talk about besides Mt. Doom and old people dying? on 06/03/11 at 09:45:36, christianF wrote:
Well, yeah, if you're still alive. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Jun 7th, 2011, 5:53am To keep this on target, what I'm saying about Symple's and Sygo's move order advantage balancing mechanism is that, given a regular boardsize, it isn't possible to argue one way or another. I'm not talking about "the truth" because the truth, although known to exist for any move in any position in any two-player abstract perfect information game, cannot be determined. I'm not claiming a revolution here either. The pie in Hex goes a long way in the same direction. Gametrees The truth of any game is contained in its gametree. If all possible legal positions and how they result from one another are mapped, the result in terms of win and loss can be tracked backwards from the leaves, leaving the remaining connections as draws, should these be possible. Only relatively small games have been completely mapped: Tic-tac-toe, minimancala, awari, fanorona, checkers, to name a few. Here's the minimancala gametree (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/the-pit/minimancala-567). It has two leaves. It also has cycles and is thus called 'infinite'. Some games, like Hex or Othello, don't and are thus called 'finite'. Most dominant games, Chess, Go, Draughts, Shogi, Xiangqi, have cycles in their respective gametrees. Saying that ‘finite games rule’ is like Castro saying ‘communism rules’. In the gametree of any size Hex (http://www.wordiq.com/definition/Hex_%28game%29) the truth of every position is win or los. Hence any move in any size Hex is always winning or losing, never 'advantageous'. Truth and the human condition But that doesn't help a human player when faced with an opening move in 19x19 Hex and having to decide whether or not to swap. Here we already have a case where it is difficult to 'argue one way or the other'. The relative merits of a move cannot be considered in terms of 'perfect play', because that would be based on complete access to the gametree, and nothing would be 'relative' anymore. Humans would have to rely on a multitude of imperfect games between 'consistently high level players' with that particular opening move to get to the 'most likely' result. That is true for any opening move, so given enough high level matches the 'most likely truth' of each and every move would emerge. Convergence and divergence - a timeline More importantly: the overall results of each particular move will eventually drift away from 50/50, not converge on it, because the move is either winning or losing and that fact will eventually 'shine through' in the results. In this world Hex probably isn't played extensively enough to become 'problematic' on 19x19. Players make mistakes and the 'truth' may favor one player or the other several times during a game without the players being aware. And where the result of any particular opening would eventually diverge from an equal score, it initially will converge on it because that's the very point of a swap. Divergence only takes place once its intricacies have been extensively explored. A high resolution refinement Suppose extensive play would eventually have zoomed in on the truth of every one of the 181 opening moves in 19x19 Hex, then a refinement could be introduced in the form of a 3-stone swap. Now players would have to zoom in on the truth of more than 20 million positions. That would mean that the procedure would hardly get beyond the ‘convergence’ stage. That subjected to extensive play each of the positions would eventually diverge from an even result towards ‘the truth’ has become meaningless in view of the sheer number of positions to be considered. Arguing one way or the other would be impossible for a large subset of the 20 million plus positions. The balancing mechanism of Symple and Sygo is of a much higher resolution, and that by nature, not by 'amplification' as in the 3-stone swap in Hex. It's not a swap: white is white and black is black and at no time a switch is offered. A further difference is that it is based on the timing of an action rather than an initial choice. Note: it is inherently based on the move procedure of both Symple and Sygo: you either place a single stone, thus starting a new group, or you grow any or every one of your groups present on the board by one stone. To understand the balancing mechanism, one must be familiar with the move procedure and the inherent dilemma as set out in About Symple (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/arena/symple/586-about-symple). The obvious revisited Since one poster clearly wrestled with the balancing mechanism I'll try a step by step explanation. In Symple white has the move order advantage so we counter this inherent a-symmetry by giving black a compensation. The compensation is this: Black may once, and conditionally, place a stone and grow every one of his groups. If this compensation were unconditional, Black would have the advantage. Usually (not always) when one player decides to start growing his 'groups' (as yet single stones) instead of placing new ones, this gives an initiative that incites the other, at least to a degree, to follow suit. If Black simply awaits White's initiative, he can follow suit and have an extra group. If White doesn't grow, Black can eventually decide to cash in his option himself and have a large initiative with an equal number of groups. So giving the compensation unconditionally doesn't solve the problem. Pushing the button The condition under which Black may cash in his compensation is that neither player has grown yet. This means that White can grow first anytime and therewith take Black's compensation from him. Or that Black can grow first anytime and thus cash in his compensation. Both players are faced with when to 'push the button'. Now we get to the point where I fail, where some succeed, to see any lack of clarity. It is copied directly from About Symple (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/arena/symple/586-about-symple): Quote:
Quote:
Both players have a clear disadvantage if they push the button too early. However, with the impact of the compensation rising with the number of stones placed, pushing too late will at some point, and not more than a few moves away, give the opponent a clear advantage. So timing is of the essence. This I put up with the question what , if anything, was wrong with the reasoning. Here's an intesesting reply by dr. Sheldon Cooper of finitegames.nut: Quote:
It shows that the author is waiting for someone else to validate or refute the argument, which I find striking. Yet, at the same time, I'm honored by his well meant comments, because he considers Symple and Sygo important enough to spend some considerable time on them. Household announcements I thank the readers and the posters because I'll leave for now and the foreseeable future. Some readers may have noticed that it wasn't the stacking games contest I can't get out of, so rigorous measures are necessary ;-) If we have new implementations at mindsports.nl I'll let you know though. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Jun 7th, 2011, 9:58am on 06/07/11 at 05:53:41, christianF wrote:
That much is clear. on 06/07/11 at 05:53:41, christianF wrote:
I knew there'd be something about me in here, though I never imagined I'd be branded a communist! lol "Finite games rule" is my motto at Christian's game site, MindSports. Finite games, unlike communism, really do rule. on 06/07/11 at 05:53:41, christianF wrote:
What?? Plenty of moves in Hex are advantageous. In perfect play, moves are winning and losing. In imperfect play, moves are advantageous and disadvantageous. This applies to Hex and to all other games, from which, once again, Sygo is not exempt. on 06/07/11 at 05:53:41, christianF wrote:
If only. on 06/07/11 at 05:53:41, christianF wrote:
Boy that's a lot of emerging truth. Are we assuming unlimited player IQ's now? One loses track of all the surreal parameters. on 06/07/11 at 05:53:41, christianF wrote:
...because nothing "converges" in games! Games are inherently divergent. All games. Including Sygo. The similarity of that word to psycho can no longer be ignored. on 06/07/11 at 05:53:41, christianF wrote:
Divergence takes place from the word go, and never lets up. Pastafarianism is the only thing I can think of more absurd than this convergence/divergence nonsense you've whipped up, Christian. You used the words true and truth eight times in this one post. This is like my housekeeper droning on about the truth of the gospel. Show of hands: Is anyone buying this "convergent Sygo" nonsense? |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by megajester on Jun 8th, 2011, 12:32am Hello everyone who's just joined us, yes, right now we're watching Mark Steere's back garden and... Oh there he is, he's coming out now. Might he be about to mow the lawn perhaps?... No he's setting up some mannikin of some sort, or is it a scarecrow?... No it's a straw man... And a very handsome straw man if I say so myself, a worthy addition to any vegetable allotment... Ah but what's he doing now? He's pulling... is that a baseball club, out of his bag? And he's... he's... BEATING THE STRAW MAN OH IT'S SO BARBARIC I CAN'T WATCH... STRAW... EVERYWHERE... HE'S SHOUTING, SHOUTING PROFANITIES AT IT... DEMANDING IT ANSWER HIM... OH, THE STRAWMANITY! on 06/07/11 at 05:53:41, christianF wrote:
An equal score, eh? You don't suppose he could be talking about accruing or losing advantage in imperfect play, hmm? on 06/07/11 at 05:53:41, christianF wrote:
on 06/07/11 at 09:58:27, MarkSteere wrote:
Oh for pity's sake, you're not supposed to agree with the straw man! Come on Mark, we know you can do better! on 06/07/11 at 09:58:27, MarkSteere wrote:
OK if I accrue an advantage, and then give it back again, we've returned from our short sojourn into the realm of asymmetry to "converge" to the point where it's a straight 50/50 that either of us will win. So no if we're talking about perfect play. And yes if we're talking about imperfect play. It's actually fairly obvious what he's talking about where if you stop to think about it for two seconds. But that wouldn't give us any ammo now would it? Sorry hang on just one second... Yes... Yes I believe that was Mr. Steere's mother calling from the kitchen to tell him to clear up all the mess he's made with his straw man... |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Jun 8th, 2011, 8:31am on 06/08/11 at 00:32:20, megajester wrote:
You've sojourned into the realm of the surreal, converging to a dank, dark place reeking of methane, and sounding of faint, muffled Dutch conversation. on 06/08/11 at 00:32:20, megajester wrote:
...when you inhale deeply and drift off in a methane rush. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Jun 8th, 2011, 11:05am Megajester: "Sometimes I have the advantage and then later I don't. Therefore Christian Freeling's claim that 'Sygo converges to 50/50 in the long run' makes perfect sense." Brilliant. How do you do it? |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by megajester on Jun 8th, 2011, 2:49pm on 06/08/11 at 11:05:21, MarkSteere wrote:
It's one thing to take something somebody said and make a straw man out of it. It's quite another to use something that person never actually said. It's brilliant. How do you do it? |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by Eltripas on Jun 8th, 2011, 11:48pm Board games. Serious business. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Jun 9th, 2011, 1:49am on 06/08/11 at 23:48:35, Eltripas wrote:
Only when people make outlandish claims and then other people mindlessly jump on board with said outlandish claims. Christian and Nanojester are barely capable of formulating a sentence, never mind a coherent logical premise. This is why I have to argue both sides. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by Fritzlein on Jun 9th, 2011, 2:04am on 06/09/11 at 01:49:32, MarkSteere wrote:
That's not vulgar, but it is a personal attack. If it were a first offense, I would warn you myself. If it were a second offense, I would ask Omar to warn you. In this case, however, given your long history of abusive posts, I hope that Omar, having warned you before, will now ban you from the Forum. Unfortunately, he will probably just warn you again. Oh, well, if a warning will get you to merely ridicule what people say rather than ridiculing people directly, I will go back to gritting my teeth and not responding to your posts. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Jun 9th, 2011, 6:12am on 06/09/11 at 02:04:31, Fritzlein wrote:
Here's unfair: When I say "I'm not talking about "the truth" because the truth, although known to exist for any move in any position in any two-player abstract perfect information game, cannot be determined.", I'm talking about the game theoretical proof that all these games are completely determined. What's taken out is: "I'm not talking about "the truth", and the reply is "That much is clear", referring to a whole different meaning of the word. Here's no sense (just one example of a recurring theme): on 06/07/11 at 05:53:41, christianF wrote:
The reply is: on 06/07/11 at 09:58:27, MarkSteere wrote:
That's repeating what I say while suggesting I meant the opposite! All these games are completely determined, that's common knowledge and I never said otherwise. And it's not what my claim about Symple and Sygo is about. But I'm bored with its deliberate misrepresentation. Players can either try Symple or Sygo or leave it. Opinions won't make them different games. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by ocmiente on Jun 9th, 2011, 9:55am on 06/09/11 at 06:12:34, christianF wrote:
Criticizing people should be done in a fair manner, and it should make some sense. The way this was stated made me think that the writer thought, in some small way, that games deserved more respect than people. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Jun 9th, 2011, 9:56am on 06/09/11 at 06:12:34, christianF wrote:
That's why it was obviously a joke, Christian. It's called irony. Could you possibly be more sensitive? on 06/09/11 at 06:12:34, christianF wrote:
So stop deliberately misrepresenting Sygo! Good Gordon! Nobody's misrepresenting Sygo more than you! First we have your outlandish claim that "Sygo converges to 50/50 in the long run." Logic torpedo: If your claim is true in principal, then it should be true for all board sizes, including tiny boards, which it clearly is not. You ran back to the previously unbearable Arimaa forum to duck said logic torpedo in rec.games.abstract. Now that you're here, you're pretending not to notice that the logic torpedo has followed you. It's still there, Christian! Next on the Sygo ridiculous claim list is the notion that... "Hex, without the pie rule, is a proven win for the first player. ... What makes Symple different is that you can't even argue one way or the other" Hogwash. Hex was not solved, except for on a handful of small boards. There's a difficult, complex, theoretical proof that Hex is a first player win, but nowhere in that proof is any indication of how one goes about winning. Your argument that Sygo is actually impervious to argument is beyond absurd. It's asinine! This is like Cameron Browne fantasizing about human designed games vs computer designed games, as though humans had nothing to do with the computers designing games. It's psuedo-science and it's offensive. Christian: "Oh no, that's not what I said. You're putting words in my mouth." Well, why don't you start making sense, Christian. Then your "words" won't be so subject to misinterpretation. Sygo has no mystical properties that other games such as Hex don't have. As long as you continue to expound the magical properties of Sygo, logic torpedoes will continue to be fired. If not here, then in Tidbits, and I don't think you want that. Nobody likes Tidbits. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Jun 9th, 2011, 11:51am on 06/09/11 at 09:55:39, ocmiente wrote:
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Jun 9th, 2011, 12:16pm on 06/09/11 at 09:56:55, MarkSteere wrote:
Notice anything? READ what you reply to. (P.S. It's not all that difficult either, but non-constructive, and yes, I know who gave it). Concerning the second quote, numerous times did I say that Symple isn't different from any finite abstract perfect-information zero-sum game in this respect: Quote:
That these games are proved to be completely determined doesn't mean anything for actual play - that's another thing I've referred to many times. Please stop enlightening me with common knowledge. In Hex you can prove the result, which doesn't mean you can use the proof to achieve a win. Some games allow you to argue towards a result without anything that can be proved. I can argue Draughts is most likely a determined draw. Or that Chess most likely is not a determined Black win. In Symple and Sygo - with the balancing mechanism in effect - I say you can't, but if you can, please do. It's not about a mathematical proof, it's about a high resolution balancing mechanism. That in itself is the means of convergence - just like a swap is intended to seek the middle, even if 'the middle' doesn't exist in a game-theoretical sense. It's the sheer number of positions to consider that it generates (effectively all positions before a first growing move, far more than the 20+ million of a 3-stone swap in hex19) that make that the divergence that would eventually result from exploring the intricacies of one such position, in deep over a long period of time, will never come to be. That's what I'm saying, NOT that Symple and Sygo are different in any fundamental way. There will be another 'refutation', no doubt. My problem is that I don't say what I'm saying. ::) |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by ocmiente on Jun 9th, 2011, 1:16pm on 06/09/11 at 11:51:25, christianF wrote:
I would have the same concern if someone stated that someone's illogical behavior toward their person was less concerning than someone's illogical behavior toward any other inanimate entity. I'm struggling with this thread in general. While I appreciate your contributions, there appears to be some unwritten social rule similar to one of the Bush doctrine's "prongs" that occurs to me, i.e.: "Make no distinction between trolls and the people that respond to them--and hold both to account." I suspect that's partially what SpeedRazor had in mind, maybe... possibly... who knows. He has more common sense than I do in not posting to this thread in a while :) |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Jun 9th, 2011, 1:17pm on 06/09/11 at 12:16:57, christianF wrote:
I never said you did. Stop putting words in my mouth. What you did say is that reasoning can't even be applied to the question of whether or not Sygo is a first player win. And I quote, "You can't even argue one way or the other." A magical logic shield, lol What next?? |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Jun 9th, 2011, 1:28pm on 06/09/11 at 13:16:46, ocmiente wrote:
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Jun 9th, 2011, 2:14pm on 06/09/11 at 12:16:57, christianF wrote:
on 06/09/11 at 13:17:48, MarkSteere wrote:
on 06/09/11 at 09:56:55, MarkSteere wrote:
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Jun 9th, 2011, 2:50pm on 06/09/11 at 13:16:46, ocmiente wrote:
That much?? :D |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Jun 9th, 2011, 2:56pm on 06/09/11 at 13:28:48, christianF wrote:
Is it really a pity? Your "guest" thread has already bloated to proportions that dwarf the host forum. You remember - the Arimaa forum? |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by omar on Jun 9th, 2011, 5:42pm Quote:
Mark, I'm afraid I have to ask you to stop posting here. I have warned you before and you have again violated the posting guidelines. So please refrain from posting. Thanks. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by Sconibulus on Jun 9th, 2011, 11:20pm In response to the initial premise, I'll admit that while I can't claim to have played any piece-placement games skillfully, it does seem that black has an advantage in these games, because of the balancing mechanism in question. Basically, it feels to me as if Black has a move in hand, and loses far less from exercising his option early as compared to White, because he still gets a growth step. Basically, it seems that White's window of success on growth-starting is much smaller than Black's, while Black also has the minor advantage of being able to be in a reactionary position in the early placement stage (assuming Black exercises the limits on the growth-starting window in order to gain the first move on White as well) |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Jun 10th, 2011, 7:01am on 06/09/11 at 23:20:45, Sconibulus wrote:
1. The complexity of the game itself. 2. Tactical threats early on, mainly threats to isolate and kill a particular stone or the group it is intended to form. The first requires getting to grips, strategically, with the fast growing rate and the tactical implications. Any mistakes made may have a greater impact than the value at stake in terms of the balancing mechanism. There are as yet no strong players. The second one may force you to grow in a local conflict whereas you'd rather place a single stone in view of the overall position. The example below has moved beyond Black's prerogative because he cashed in on the second move, but it may wel happen very early on, before growth has taken place. In the current game (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/players-section/Serve.cgi?file=Sygo1306162773.html) my opponent initiates a local conflict with 7. ... E8. Two moves on I felt compelled to grow for defensive reasons, and my opponent did not follow suit. My stones are fairly densely packed in the bottom left section and may yet be forced to connect (depriving me of growing options). By placement he now has 9 groups, while I have 8. In the local conflict things look save, so I felt I should follow suit this time with placement (10. D12 that's as far as it stood when I posted this). The game also illustrates that it isn't simply a 'placement stage' and a 'growing stage'. Symple has no capture and suffers from these tactical disruptions to a lesser degree. But Sygo is more fun :) . I'll ponder your remarks carefully. I don't know if you have a point, but that may very well be. I'll have to sleep on it. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Jun 11th, 2011, 3:13pm on 06/09/11 at 23:20:45, Sconibulus wrote:
I've slept on it and I fear I don't see matters any different than before. For arguments sake, let's assume Sygo's move order advantage mirrors the one of Go, say six points. 'Pushing the button' means for white that he uses a turn to grow his groups instead of placing a single stone, for black that he uses a turn to grow his groups and place a single stone. In a more or less regular opening position, after five moves each, both would probably have claimed influence in corners and along sides, but barring tactical involvement, stones would still be wide apart. In such a position, life and death being no issue yet, what is a single stone worth, as opposed to a 2-stone group? One point for the extra stone for sure. But there's no difference in the rate of growth, so the rest is 'influence'. I don't know, but for argument's sake let's say that's worth one point too. So a 2-group in such a position would be worth two points more than a single stone. Here's a table (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/arena/sygo/615) with subsequent positions in terms of numbers and some commentary. I'm not entirely sure of the value of the second parameter (i.e. "a 2-group in such a position would be worth two points more than a single stone"), but the general idea is clear and I don't see any difference in the 'size' of the window wherein to push the button, for white or black, nor in the weight of the decision. I also fail to see a 'reactionary position' that would work in black's favor. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Jun 18th, 2011, 7:38am on 06/10/11 at 07:01:09, christianF wrote:
The game (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/players-section/Serve.cgi?file=Sygo1306162773.html) ended after white-21 by resignation. My opponent lost a local battle after the cut-off of the black stones at E8 and E11 and secured not quite enough territory in return. At white-19 I start a new group bottom right and black doesn't reply immediately, but even now I'm not sure it lives. You can't create eye-space by capture in Sygo. Maybe I could have gotten some life in it with one eye, supported by a seki situation around a black attacker, but black would lose (by a small margin) even if he kills it, so my opponent thought the best of it. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Jun 21st, 2011, 8:04am For those interested in combinatorial games like Clobber (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clobber) and Konane (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Konane), especially from a programming point of view, here's an interesting development regarding Grabber (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/the-pit/grabber-578). Greg Schmidt of The Axiom Universal Game System Project (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/axiom) wrote this: Quote:
Grabber is basically, but not entirely, 'Konane columnified'. Disregarding boardsize and 'columnification', the differences are: 1) In Konane both players remove one man initially and under rather strict conditions, in Grabber both remove two men initially. 2) Multiple capture in Konane is restricted to the direction of the first capture. In Grabber it is not. I mention this in case comparisons are possible. I'm not up to date in game theoretical issues regarding move order advantage in Clobber or Konane, nor of the current state of programs. Here's what I answered for a first impression (between brackets) and Greg's reply: Quote:
I've asked Greg to run 4x4 tests removing two men each initially, to see if anything changes in the move order advantage. For the same reason I've asked to run a few 6x6 tests with one man each removed. I'll keep you posted. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Jun 21st, 2011, 1:20pm on 06/21/11 at 08:04:11, christianF wrote:
Tweaking a combinatorial or combinatorial style game for first move advantage is like adding a fourth line to a haiku. I think it subtracts more than it adds. Of course it's your game and you can do whatever you want. Just my outlook on the general topic. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Jun 21st, 2011, 2:56pm To get things in perspective, I've never considered Grabber as more than a combinatorial quickie. It is a rather inconsequential game that now appears to reveal a clear bias, for no immediately apparent reason. For a game that's an interesting property, worthy of investigation. As Greg pointed out, odd/even boardsize seems to reverse the move order advantage. The test with 2/4 men removal are to see if the advantage stays the same or reverses. I presume the former, but then, I presumed there wouldn't be much of a move order advantage to begin with. And that was a wrong assumption too. In other words, I've got no clue. That's the interesting thing. Where does the advantage 'reside'? Is there something like a NIM-like algorithm possible? P.S. Does anybody know why Clobber is played on a 5x6 board? Did it perhaps have a similar issue? |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Jun 21st, 2011, 3:21pm on 06/21/11 at 14:56:18, christianF wrote:
A "combinatorial quickie" is more likely to have a problem with bias than not. It's the simplicity, and it's also the size. Combinatorials are expected to be small. A 5x6 board with Go stones is typical. I.e. very small, though there's no reason a scalable combinatorial can't be made larger - something that would probably, but not certainly, clear up the problem in this case. A program's measure of move order advantage is also a measure of the program's strength. Without knowing that, the stated advantage is meaningless. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Jun 21st, 2011, 3:40pm on 06/21/11 at 15:21:47, MarkSteere wrote:
...especially with a combinatorial, which would typically be a lot easier for a computer to evaluate than a person. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by lightvector on Jun 21st, 2011, 4:08pm on 06/21/11 at 14:56:18, christianF wrote:
If you're really looking to see if there's a parity issue going on, it might also be interesting to examine 4x5, 5x6, and 5x7. Who wins on 3x3, 3x4, and 3x5? |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Jun 21st, 2011, 4:19pm on 06/21/11 at 16:08:01, lightvector wrote:
I'm just as curious as you are - with even for blue and odd for red, where to go on 4x5 I wonder ... Edit: The behaviour seems to be invariable with regard to the number of men that are removed initially (i.e. 2 or 4): Quote:
Greg came with more interesting info that I'll have to look through first. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Jun 25th, 2011, 7:12am Grabber 4x5 turns out to be a blue win regardless whether 2 or 4 men are removed initially. That in itself is no surprise - it's always one or the other. The real surprise is the a-symmetry in the first place. 5x5 is a white win and 6x6 is a blue win (regardless of the number of initial removals). Axiom 'confirms' so much by already leaning one way or the other at a very modest ply depth. This suggests that a game on a 5x6 board is tricky either way. However, I lose against Axiom 6x6 red or blue so instead of considering the human factor - how many people play Clobber or Konane anyway, for that matter - I'd rather understand where the a-symmetry resides in the first place. Slow to understand as I am, I need tables. I love tables. So I've started to categorize the truth of small 2nx1 boards (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/the-pit/617), and I'll follow up with nx2 boards. Just to see what's happening. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by Sconibulus on Jun 25th, 2011, 1:12pm Isn't it likely that the player with the advantage varies based on the number of squares on the board, whether that number is even or odd? if this is right, 4xanything should be a win for blue, and 3x5, 3x3, 5x5 should be a win for red. (Axiom is capable of solving the game up to this size I think?) |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Jun 25th, 2011, 1:54pm on 06/25/11 at 07:12:26, christianF wrote:
It's not a surprise to me. I've long known of this effect which I call Nim-superposition. In crude, generic, and non-scientific terms, a combinatorial game that ends when someone doesn't have a move is only big enough for n number of turns (for a given board size). If n is odd, the game is a win for Player 1. If n is even, it's a win for Player 2. on 06/25/11 at 07:12:26, christianF wrote:
No, Christian, this does not suggest anything of the sort. As in Nim, every number is a win for Player 1 or a win for Player 2, with none of the numbers being "tricky either way". |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Jun 25th, 2011, 1:56pm on 06/25/11 at 13:12:38, Sconibulus wrote:
What's interesting is that the program 'leans' towards the winning side quite early, while still at a modest ply-depth. If 5x6 and 6x7 show this behaviour too, it would mean you're most probably right. There's one problem with the conjecture: 5x5 is a red win while the centersquare is blocked, so the number of squares was even, even then. P.S. Arty was in the process of implementing Grabber at iGGC. I've asked him to postpone that because of the extend of the move order advantage. Interesting as that may be in itself, I think there are better alternatives for iGGC. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Jun 25th, 2011, 2:33pm on 06/25/11 at 13:56:49, christianF wrote:
What "extent"? Just because a program wrung out some small boards? I'm sure Clobber would be just as easy to wring out at the same sizes, but people still manage to enjoy Clobber somehow. Just program it with a range of board sizes, offering a trade-off between timeliness and move order advantage. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Jun 26th, 2011, 12:26pm Move order advantage in Grabber seems firmly embedded in small boards and my conjecture is that it will stay that way. On 2nx1 boards (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/the-pit/617) and nx2 boards (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/the-pit/618) the game is definitely 'feeling blue'. Of course the game is flexibly scalable so at a sufficiently large scale humans meet the limits of their powers of calculation, yet I feel the a-symmetry is too much of a bad thing. Barring the discovery of a format where things even out in terms of the numbers of won/lost positions - and that's not likely, given the picture emerging from small boards - I feel Grabber is flawed. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Jun 26th, 2011, 2:34pm on 06/26/11 at 12:26:06, christianF wrote:
It's your call. An overwhelming first move advantage certainly ruins a game. At first I thought you were just buying into the program data, but I now sense it's more than that. As you said, Grabber was only a "quicky combinatorial" so no great loss. Monkey Queen (with pie) may have a slight second move advantage, though the data is insufficient to make a determination. Player 1 W/L/D= 41/45/0 at Game Site X. Monkey Queen rule sheet: http://www.marksteeregames.com/Monkey_Queen_rules.html |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Jun 27th, 2011, 12:50pm on 06/26/11 at 12:26:06, christianF wrote:
Move order advantage is firmly embedded in all abstract games if the board is small enough. Rive can get away with small boards because of its massive stone recycling, e.g. 5x3x3 (29 cells). But even Rive has its limits. Rive rule sheet: http://www.marksteeregames.com/Rive_rules.pdf on 06/26/11 at 12:26:06, christianF wrote:
The "asymmetry" you're referring to is more of a normal thing than a bad thing. Possibly even a good thing. I hate to see a designer bowled over by program data. And I don't even think Greg was trying to bowl you over. You're bowling yourself over at his expense. I love Greg. He's done an outstanding job of programming a bunch of my games. MSG downloads: http://www.marksteeregames.com/MSG_downloads.html |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Jun 27th, 2011, 3:24pm It's like, "I found a ten dollar bill but I don't like it because it smells like money." You designed a combinatorial that behaves like a combinatorial. What's the problem? |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Jun 28th, 2011, 10:39am Grabber is a given game, which landed out of nowhere as "Konane columnified" on my table during coffee (of course), so I don't complain. But I consider it flawed. Of the possible initial positions on a 4x3 board, three quarters is a win for the second player. I feel this shadow is a long one, falling over even sized nxn boards as well as nx(n+1) boards (and actually over all sizes, it seems). Not that I want to discourage players: Greg's Axiom program is quite stong enough to beat me regardless of color, and at MindSports we'll keep it in the Pit just the same, but with the addition of these pages and a short commentary regarding its large move order advantage. 2nx1 boards (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/the-pit/617) nx2 boards (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/the-pit/618) nx3 boards (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/the-pit/619) I feel it's not much of a signboard though, and I've asked Arty to consider an alternative for iGGC. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Jun 28th, 2011, 12:53pm on 06/28/11 at 10:39:33, christianF wrote:
I haven't seen anything that supports that claim. on 06/28/11 at 10:39:33, christianF wrote:
1. 4x3 is teensy. Checkers, which is too small, has 32 squares - a lot more than 12. Of course Grabber has the third dimension, but stacking into that space doesn't create enough extra game tree to compensate for the teensy 4x3. 2. At least 3/4 of the first moves in Hex are wins for Player 1 - at any board size. Hence the pie rule. No biggy. on 06/28/11 at 10:39:33, christianF wrote:
One day you're promoting magical games and the next you're withdrawing a seemingly normal game from iggc development because of a perceived "long shadow". You gotta get centered. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Jun 28th, 2011, 1:49pm on 06/28/11 at 12:53:52, MarkSteere wrote:
You're probably not smoking enough pot, lol. sfffffffff..... |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Jun 28th, 2011, 2:26pm on 06/28/11 at 12:53:52, MarkSteere wrote:
You're trying to shoot an eagle while saving a sparrow - how centered can you get. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Jun 28th, 2011, 3:07pm on 06/28/11 at 14:26:41, christianF wrote:
I shot down a magical phoenix, an outlandish claim about a game's behavior, because it was casting a long shadow. The only negative thing I ever said about Sygo was that its balancing mechanism was an aesthetic Hiroshima. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Jun 28th, 2011, 3:53pm on 06/28/11 at 15:07:15, MarkSteere wrote:
...and that it's not my fault if Sygo's a dud, a direct response to you blaming me for Sygo's dudliness. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Jun 30th, 2011, 10:49am For those interested in Sygo, my Taiwanese opponent and I are getting better. In our new game I'm black and I'm cashing my prerogative at move 4 (growing three, placing one). Apart from previous arguments about move 4 being about right, white was trying to isolate the upper left black stone. Black 4 simultaneously attacks white's last placed stone and white 5 came as a surprise: if I grow to keep d12 alive, I can't create a new group and the I'll be lagging behind. So I felt forced to placement of a single, while dragging the most influence from the undead stone at d12. Local tactics are thus upsetting the vague division between a 'placement' and a 'growing' stage. To secure his grip on d12 and the upper left side, white decides to grow instead of placing a new single. I consider d12 a sacrifice and place at g15, securing the upper left corner and taking the lead in the number of groups. White 7 I feel is not so good. It tries embryonically to wall of the center so 8. ... j10 seemed appropriate. White and black 8 are both growing moves, to create 'shape and body' After these security measures, the positions seem save enough for further placements, and black 9 simultaneously attacks the white 2-group below the center. White 10 aims to connect (often dubious because it takes away growth potential) ... I'm not sure what to do yet. June 30, and this (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/players-section/Serve.cgi?file=Sygo1308962018.html) is where we are. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Jun 30th, 2011, 12:39pm on 06/30/11 at 10:49:13, christianF wrote:
The topic was a little fresher last year. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by RonWeasley on Jul 1st, 2011, 10:46am on 06/28/11 at 15:07:15, MarkSteere wrote:
No, you didn't. Fawkes circled Hogwarts after Dumbledore was killed and was not seen again. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Jul 1st, 2011, 12:40pm on 07/01/11 at 10:46:38, RonWeasley wrote:
Severus Steere, the half-blood inventor, go figure that ;) Juli 1st: we're five moves onwards (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/players-section/Serve.cgi?file=Sygo1308962018.html) and I won a tactical battle for the center, trapping two white groups without connecting my own, keeping up the potential for growth. Consolidation seems the best strategy now, while invasion at the right side ... well maybe at the right time, but I see no immediate need. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Jul 1st, 2011, 1:42pm on 07/01/11 at 12:40:17, christianF wrote:
Phenomenal architecture is my reality. No conjuring necessary, though it must seem like magic to some. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Jul 1st, 2011, 2:53pm on 07/01/11 at 13:42:32, MarkSteere wrote:
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Jul 1st, 2011, 6:40pm on 07/01/11 at 14:53:53, christianF wrote:
How can you look at a game like Fractal (http://www.marksteeregames.com/Fractal_rules.pdf) and ever question my architectural intuition? Abstract game design doesn't get any more intuitive than Fractal, unless it's another MSG (http://www.marksteeregames.com/index.html) game, like Flume (http://www.marksteeregames.com/Flume_Go_rules.pdf). Sheer architectural intuition. You'd know that if you had any. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Jul 2nd, 2011, 2:01am Your journey in intuitive design oddly coincides with the path of endless tweaking. You're like Nick Bentley with Ketchup. Explain. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Jul 2nd, 2011, 3:46am on 07/02/11 at 02:01:00, MarkSteere wrote:
It was Nick's intuition that told him that something wasn't quite right and it is to his credit that he listened and waited for the game to reveal what it wanted. That the eventual unfolding of the game's true nature turned out to be a simplification doesn't surprise me at all: if the system is sound, the rule will be there. Nick also takes into account all the right criteria - not everybody always does. P.S. Oust, Flume, Atoll, Fractal maybe, all excellent games. I'm not saying your approach doesn't coincide with a good game, every now and then. But then, Monkey Queen? I feel something isn't quite right. Cage? I think something is definitely wrong. Rive? Well to keep it in Harry Potter terms, liquid boredom. (great architecture though ;) ) P.P.S. My opponent resigned our last Sygo game (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/players-section/Serve.cgi?file=Sygo1308962018.html) on move 16. * Come to think of it, Cyclix (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/how-i-invented-games-and-why-not/late-arrivals-a-final-whispers#cyclix) had a minor fix. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Jul 2nd, 2011, 1:48pm on 07/02/11 at 03:46:50, christianF wrote:
rofl From the Symple announcement(s): "The only thing playtesting suggests is to set the parameter '2n' at n=2." From the Symple rule sheet: "Values between 4 and 12 would seem to give the most interesting play." In other words, "What do I know? Go figure it out." lol Hanniball was a flailing tweakfest, and after all that flailing it's still draw prone. Haniball already has an 8% draw rate among beginners, which most everyone still is at a total game count of 124, at Game Site X. This does not bode well for advancing Hanniball players. on 07/02/11 at 03:46:50, christianF wrote:
Jeez, I hope it isn't as bad as Grabber, which was suddenly deemed so vile it had to be yanked from Game Site X development. Or draw graveyard Recyclix (recycled/mutilated Monkey Queen). on 07/02/11 at 03:46:50, christianF wrote:
*Ya' don't say. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Jul 2nd, 2011, 2:21pm on 07/02/11 at 13:48:29, MarkSteere wrote:
Making the basic parameter optional gives players a choice in changing the character of the game. A very novel mechanism. But indeed, what do you know. on 07/02/11 at 13:48:29, MarkSteere wrote:
Yes, quite right, Hanniball and YvY weren't part of the latest wave though. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Jul 3rd, 2011, 9:37am We've put Nick Bentley's game Ketchup (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/the-pit/ketchup-620) in the Pit at mindsports. There's no applet yet because we've developed a substantial pipeline filled with competing priorities. But we're working on it. P.S. Sometimes people summarize ideas accurately and concisely, like J. Mark Thompson in his 'Defining the Abstract' (http://www.thegamesjournal.com/articles/DefiningtheAbstract.shtml). I'm a great admirer of that capability, that's why I want to emphazise Nick's summary of his approach of Ketchup: Quote:
In the process he mentions a couple of drawbacks that J. Mark Thompson fails to mention, not so much of "depth" itself, but of the way it may present itself to a novice. I can well remember my first encounter with Go, in the late sixties (the stone age in terms of spreading a game). 'Hard to figure out' and 'intimidating' certainly came to mind. I agree with Nick that Ketchup stikes a fine balance between depth (as yet unmeasured, here's where a good intuition may be required) and accessibility. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Jul 6th, 2011, 8:00am A good summary is one thing, a good metaphor is another. In trying to explain the significance of Sygo, please envision the appearance of the first helicopter. Balancing the basic a-symmetry of Sygo's first player advantage by an a-symmetry that runs counter to it, and that is embedded in (and thus provided by) the mechanism itself, is like the tail rotor of a helicopter. Not only is the flight mechanism different (that is: the move protocol), but the same mechanism is used to balance the inherent deviation. Apart from its working perfectly, I find that aesthetically pleasing. Sygo is fast, so a new game (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/players-section/Serve.cgi?file=Sygo1309622648.html) between RY and me is well underway. Note that RY pushes the button on his second move, which I consider too early. However, you can't create eyespace by capture in Sygo, so you generally need more 'body' to live. RY's invasion of the upper side, combined with the black stone on P12, forced me to invest in defensive placements in both upper corners. Now his center influence looks promising. My last move was 7. G8, strengthening the left side and eyeing the center. Additional: Black's 8. ... M15 starts a local tactical battle in which I had to grow and attack it, or K14 would be lost. Black cannot afford placement of a single stone either so here we have a full-fledged growing battle. Additional: Black 11 is a single placement again. Now white, in order to capture the hooked 3-group, cannot grow, because black then could connect with h14 (growing one group) and i14 (growing the other). That would be fairly fatal. So must white play 12. H14 himself. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Jul 8th, 2011, 1:40am After 17 turns in our latest game (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/players-section/Serve.cgi?file=Sygo1309622648.html), the cake was divided, and white is a couple of points behind. Bummer. However, black's top group surrounds a 3x5 area. Certainly enough to get one eye, but if I can construct a seki in the other, I might just have enough to win. Maybe black can capture the invading stone(s) while keeping enough eyespace, but it's worth a try, hence 18. I18. Edit: On his 17th move, black should not have connected at H16, but instead should have grown both groups separately, for instance at G18 and J17, to create eyespace. As it is he has a bad shape for eyespace and only one growing option. You can't get eyespace by capture, so building 1-point eyes is important. Eyes consisting of more points may be prone to 'seki-invasion'. Consider a group with a 1-point eye and a 2-point eye, then the latter can be invaded by the opponent. His stone cannot be captured, nor can it capture, so the opponent grabs one point and spoils two (because the vacant point in the seki is neutral). That's the general idea behind seki invasions. So considering the score this should be interesting. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Jul 9th, 2011, 3:02am game (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/players-section/Serve.cgi?file=Sygo1309622648.html) With 19. ... J18 Black threatens an eye at K19 with 20. ... J19. If white moves 20. J19 himself, black can make a 'seki-eye' by moving 20. ... I17, because a white move at K17 would then be suicidal. Given that the remaining part of the area would now bring white no more than a seki too, white decided to allow the eye at K19 by growing both white stones. Now, if white can turn the remaining area into a seki, which appears possible (but I'm not a very good player and this is uncharted territory), he does so with at least an extra white stone. Immediate capture of the two white stones would prevent black from completing the eye, and would thus probably lose. The growing move also allowed white to strengthen his 'shape' elsewhere, in particular in the top right section, to prevent invasion (whether it would actually have a chance of success or not - it's uncharted territory so I'd rather be on the safe side). Additional: after white 21, black needs both G18 and H17 to make a second eye, so white's invasion succeeded. The seki points are just enough to tip the scales. P.S. Luis Bolaños Mures, Luigi at RGA, directed me to a page at Sensei's Library about the othellonian method of capture in Go (http://senseis.xmp.net/?ReversiGo), its advantages and problems. The main problem is that you can't create eyespace by capture, that's why Luis' own new variant Goncrete (http://www.lifein19x19.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=45&t=4182) introduces a simple but somewhat artificial mechanism to remedy that. That in itself isn't new either: othellonian Go variants like Medusa (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/the-pit/medusa-540) and Lotus (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/the-pit/lotus-538) also employ an artificial 'life insurance'. Sygo escapes the need for anything artificial because a player can combine several moves in one turn to create eyeshape, inherently reducing the problem to proportions that fit the general strategy and tactics. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Jul 9th, 2011, 11:13am game (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/players-section/Serve.cgi?file=Sygo1309622648.html) Unfortunately for white the position had a detail I had overseen: black's access to H19, making G19 his second eye. So white 22 is a formal move of recognition, and sad as it is to lose the game, the tactics were hopefully instructive. As usual I got only myself to blame. Instead of looking better I assumed I had it figured out, and I hadn't. I could have saved the seki by not connecting on move 21 (I17), but moving at G18 instead, at the risk of losing the two stones at J/K17. Greed blinds, I feel like Dumb & Dumber all in one :P . Yet a nice beginner's game, fast and pretty clear cut in the strategic phase, where black did obviously better. Then he made a mistake at move 18, allowing me to launch a seki invasion, and I blew it at move 21. ----------- On another note, my opponent surprised me with what I take to be the Taiwanese wiki entry of Congo (http://zh.wikipedia.org/wiki/%E5%89%9B%E6%9E%9C%E7%9B%B8%E6%A3%8B), a Chess variant made by my son Demian. The game is going on thirty while its inventor is going on thirtyseven. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Jul 10th, 2011, 1:32pm I've assembled a few thoughts about 'othellonian capture' in Go variants, a kind of provisional overview open to additions, corrections and/or suggestions. Please have a Go @ it: Othellonian capture in Go variants (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/arena/sygo/621-othellonian). |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Jul 11th, 2011, 3:44pm on 07/03/11 at 09:37:52, christianF wrote:
We've seen charaterizations like "a flailing tweakfest" here, but as long as there's a real game to discover, tweaks may be the only way to approach a theme and a mechanism that is reluctant to unveil itself. I thought Nick's last version of Ketchup (http://nickbentley.posterous.com/ketchup-30) made a pretty neat and balanced game, and so did Nick, judging from the title. Fortunately there's some wisdom floating around in the abstract games community like "If you find a good move, look for a better one", and that applies to inventing too. I admire Nick's intuition and the courage to change what "woudn't change anymore". A slight change of perspective, a simplification actually, brought to light the more organic core of the game, because the right to conditionally move three instead if two stones now doesn't hinge on a dead count anymore, but on a specific action of the opponent. So I thought I'd mention the final version (no sarcasm implied, I really believe so): Ketchup 4.0 - I've changed the rules again. This is just stupid. (http://nickbentley.posterous.com/ketchup-40-ive-changed-the-rules-again-this-i) |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by SpeedRazor on Jul 12th, 2011, 2:33am When I saw your post Christian, my first inclination was "No, Ketchup is [finally] perfect! You can't change the rules, Nick, unless you change the name!" (Salsa? LoL) But after reading them, I can't wait to try this variation! In the Depth vs. Clarity debate, Ketchup was very deep ... but not so clear. This simple new rule might even that out some. In the Decisiveness vs. Drama debate - (earlier Christian post) - I didn't like that Ketchup seemed maybe not so balanced here. Too decisive: I don't want to drop any stones at all, until I can see the victory. Think Nim. This new rule might add some Drama to the game (and time on my clock!) Also, incidentally, it might be construed that it was not a rule added, but taken away. "Perfection is achieved, not when there is nothing more to add, but when there is nothing left to take away." |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Jul 12th, 2011, 7:17am on 07/12/11 at 02:33:56, SpeedRazor wrote:
That's a nice quote and a deep truth. The implication is that there must be something to "take away from" in the first place. I think Ketchup is as interesting as its process of invention. Some games pop up ready. I won't bore you with examples in my own career, but it is clear that Piet Hein and John Forbes Nash came up with the same Hex because there is only one Hex (for variants, consider the quote). Other games may be far more reluctant to reveal themselves, either in their spirit or in their mechanics. Few doubt the spirit of Go, but after three milennia or thereabouts, people are still tweaking at its fringes to have it behave properly, even if the players won't. There are many inventors and they make many mistakes (yours truly not excluded) and consequently there's a lot of tweaking going on. If a notion of a new game, in terms of a theme and mechanics, leads to a solid core once "there's nothing left to take away", then tweaking may lead to that core. Or it may not. Star, Superstar, *Star and YvY were all off the mark, and if Benedikt hadn't literally talked me into finding the core of the group penalty theme, Symple would probably not have existed. Note that Symple emerged because I took something away! As did Emergo, for that matter. If a notion of a new game is wrong, and there's nothing to tweak towards, then you may end up with Frankenstein's monster: all seperate parts and no life of its own. That's why tweaking has a bad reputation. Nick's game leaves little doubt about his intuitive notion: he definitely sensed a beautiful new game, a natural organism - only thing was how to capture it, and this has been a reluctant cookie to say the least. Now that it's all cleaned up and polished, we have a new definition of territory and new mechanics to match, and a beautiful game awaiting indeep investigation. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Jul 13th, 2011, 10:29am Sygo (http://ppt.cc/jGxW) in the Chinese wiki (courtesy of Dandolo). |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Jul 15th, 2011, 6:07am We've presented Symple as a possible next AI challenge (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/arena/symple/586-about-symple#programming) in terms of game programming, more in particular in terms of Monte-Carlo evaluation and its refinements. Part of the reason is its branch density, but that's not all, or Medusa (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/the-pit/medusa-540) could long ago have been presented as such, and Arimaa was also developed with such a feature in mind. But Medusa is a Go variant with an artificial life criterion (natural as it may feel) and is played on a sub-grid of a hexhex board that does not particularly stand out for clarity. And Arimaa isn't a uniform mechanism, which is perfectly justifyable, but not what I have in mind concerning the 'human versus computer' issue. I prefer uniform games along the lines of Go, Hex, or Havannah, to name a few. Symple and Sygo both comply, but for the reasons mentioned below I prefer Sygo for humans and Symple for bots. Here's the part we added to 'About Symple'. There's also a reference on our homepage (mindsports.nl). Quote:
And no, I'm not offering a bet this time - if at all, I'd be 75 by then and I'd have to play a lot to get to an acceptable level. And I prefer Sygo. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Jul 17th, 2011, 5:44am on 07/15/11 at 06:07:00, christianF wrote:
Edit: That I hope was entertaining. White 17 was a mistake in more than one sense. As a seki invasion it's a three point difference because then too, the black group lives. So its timing would have to be in the endgame - there are more pressing issues to address at this point. Moreover it wasn't a seki: after M9 and capture at K7, the black group has two solid single eyes. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Jul 17th, 2011, 9:41am Ed has finished and launched the applet of Nick Bentley's new game Ketchup (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/the-pit/ketchup-620), so you can play (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/players-section) this intruiging new game at mindsports now. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Jul 17th, 2011, 10:04am Meanwhile Dandolo's powers of recuperation are admirable, so here's another new game (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/players-section/Serve.cgi?file=Sygo1310913150.html) of Sygo you may enjoy. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Jul 21st, 2011, 5:20am I've played my first game of Ketchup (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/players-section/Serve.cgi?file=Ketchup1311006200.html) at mindsports and got crushed. Ed's strategy of keeping a large second group and the option to connect it to his main group was in effect before I fully realized my position was doomed. This is very much a strategy game, as opposed to a tactical one. Of course I will next time try to apply such naive thoughts on strategy as I now have, as every beginner would, and get crushed again at times, no doubt. Tactics will evolve to a higher resolution as strategies deepen. This game will outgrow hexhex5 pretty soon, as far as I can see. It has an excellent balance between strategy and tactics, feels altogether organic, has a natural simplicity and a nice pace. It is something of a coincidence that Nick and I more or less simultaneously came up with group-based territorial games that feature a new move protocol with an embedded balancing mechanism. None of them are in need of a pie, if at all able to profit from one. It must have been in the air. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Jul 21st, 2011, 6:24pm on 07/21/11 at 05:20:41, christianF wrote:
Or in the gas. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Jul 23rd, 2011, 2:30pm Programming Symple Here's an update. I've had several responses from Havannah programmers and I'll pick one by the programmer of the strongest bot, that provides a good outline. Quote:
So that's not too pessimistic. Though the branching factor is impressive, it's not a main obstacle since the program can easily break down a sequence of like colored placements and consider them one by one. Yet, for comparison, playing against the best bots still reveals very good programs playing mediocre games of Havannah. I should know, because my current rank at LG is #21. How mediocre can you get? But I still beat the bots. RAVE is a programming language able to handle huge amounts of data in a way that suits the search protocols, but that's about all I understood so far. Any insights are welcome. Edit - I replied: On the face of it it would seem easier than for havannah. But I'm not convinced that it indeed is. The bot would break down a multimove to individual moves and take them one by one. Humans consider them in relation, during 'processing'. Moreover the sequential approach takes calculation time for every separate move. The Voronoi diagrams are directly linked to the value of the group penalty. 'P' determines how much space a new group must have available to grow to (at least) neutral in the final count. I'll have to read a bit more about RAVE and the role it plays in the programs. I'm not in any particular hurry. Symple is a game with an innovative move protocol that brings some unusual dilemmas to the world of 'simple games that are hard to program'. A real challenge as far as I can see. It may well be that Sygo is even harder to program (tactics run a very long trajectory, you can kill a group long before it actually dies) and in that case I think programmers will figure that out themselves eventually, and hopefully find it more challenging than Go. But Symple is the fundamental representative of its theme. Sygo isn't. And, though chess programmers might disagree, I feel advances in game programming should be made against games that are as 'basic' as possible. The only thing to learn from Chess programming is Chess programming, not how the human mind plays. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Jul 24th, 2011, 4:22pm Programming Symple Here's another update. I appreciate that Timo Ewalds, programmer of Castro (a strong Havannah program) has no objection to be cited on the subject. So here he elaborates regarding my answer. on 07/23/11 at 14:30:25, christianF wrote:
Quote:
They would show which groups are next to each other and may be worth joining and suggesting which empty areas are big and worth attacking. Quote:
Quote:
Quote:
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Jul 30th, 2011, 8:11am Here's an endgame position in Pommel (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/the-pit/622-pommel), a checkers variant invented by Michael Howe of Connecticut, USA in 2010. It has two interesting features found in no other checkers variant, linear capture and compulsory alignment with opposing pieces for captains (kings). http://i55.tinypic.com/ojp3dz.gif Several games contributed to Pommel's emergence. Hexdame (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/arena/hexdame/) inspired the general concept of checkers on a hexagonal tesselation. Dameo (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/arena/dameo/) inspired linear movement. Linear capture by leaping however, is unique to Pommel. Mark Steere's Mad Bishops (http://www.marksteeregames.com/Mad_Bishops_rules.pdf) inspired the "movement to align" rule for captains, the rule that eventually goes a long way in preventing the game from ending in a draw. But does it go all the way? The game has no hard finitude: the position shown allows cycles. The question is does it have soft finitude? A game has soft finitude if and only if both players are required to cooperate to reach a draw. Zillions gives a white (to move) win in 13 in the above position. Zillions doesn't make mistakes in establishing a win (I haven't tried to find it, the info comes from Michael). So this position gives no clue regarding the general question of soft finitude versus no finitude. What is required to declare a game non-finite is a position where one player can force a draw against the best opposition. A nice puzzle for those who like puzzles :) Pommel rules (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/the-pit/622-pommel) |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Jul 30th, 2011, 2:58pm on 07/30/11 at 08:11:41, christianF wrote:
I'm not buying your "soft finitude" nonsense, Christian. Soft finitude does exist, but only in games with a random element such as Backgammon. Not in abstract games such as Pommel. One could definitely have a non-cooperative draw in an abstract game anointed "softly finite" by the intuitive one, lol, in a manner inexplicably unintuited. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Jul 30th, 2011, 3:50pm on 07/30/11 at 14:58:49, MarkSteere wrote:
Since according to you it exist only in games with a random element, and since it can exist only by defining it, please enlighten us with a definition. Since it can exist only by defining it, there's nothing to keep me from doing so in the realm of abstract games. So I gave a definition, if only to clarify the Pommel puzzle. That the position contains cycles makes that players can cooperate to reach a draw (for whatever reason). Your own Cage has no cycles (how could it) hence the players reach an end regardless of their intentions. I'm not sure if you understand the difference, but let's say you do. The latter case one could call 'hard finite'. So Pommel is not 'hard finite'. In that case it must be 'non-finite' or 'soft finite'. 'Non-finite' means that there are cycles that can be enforced by one side, like keeping a king in check in Chess. 'Soft finite' means that one side can break any cycle and win. In Jump Sturdy (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/the-pit/jumpsturdy-576) a one piece against one piece game is always a win for one side, but both pieces can move sideways, so nothing prevents the players from endlessly doing so. It's finite, unless both players cooperate to reach a draw. Soft finite by definition ... there's nothing to buy, really. Claiming not to buy this nonsense shows the genius of showing one's intelligence by hiding it ??? . |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Jul 30th, 2011, 4:44pm on 07/30/11 at 15:50:37, christianF wrote:
Great. In a game of Checkers with only one checker on the board, the guy with no checkers loses. You've made a point. It's your burden to you to prove Pommel is soft finite, Christian, not the burden of others to disprove it. It's your claim. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Jul 30th, 2011, 4:54pm on 07/30/11 at 16:44:57, MarkSteere wrote:
on 07/30/11 at 15:50:37, christianF wrote:
on 07/30/11 at 16:44:57, MarkSteere wrote:
on 07/30/11 at 08:11:41, christianF wrote:
Or are you dyslexic? |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Jul 30th, 2011, 5:22pm on 07/30/11 at 16:54:55, christianF wrote:
Who said I was a genius? I thought Kris Burm was the genius. on 07/30/11 at 16:54:55, christianF wrote:
Entirely not. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MHowe on Jul 30th, 2011, 7:22pm I am the inventor of Pommel. Personally, I accept Christian's definition of soft finitude as both precise and useful. Neither he nor I claim that Pommel has this property, despite Mark's attempt to put such words in our mouths. I wondered about it to Christian and he wondered about it here. I think it will be extremely difficult to prove that it does have soft finitude. Proving that it does not only takes one counterexample, so that will be easier, although it will take analysis or a brute force search to prove that there is no forced win in the counterexample. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Jul 30th, 2011, 7:31pm on 07/30/11 at 19:22:57, MHowe wrote:
I rest my case. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MHowe on Jul 30th, 2011, 7:38pm No, Mark, your "case" misrepresented the issue in the first place. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Jul 30th, 2011, 8:08pm on 07/30/11 at 19:38:03, MHowe wrote:
lol, Leave some bait for Christian. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MHowe on Jul 30th, 2011, 8:26pm Baiting is not my game. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Jul 30th, 2011, 9:01pm on 07/30/11 at 20:26:12, MHowe wrote:
I'm not asking you to leave new bait, Mike. Just stop eating what's there. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MHowe on Jul 30th, 2011, 10:30pm Now that was pretty funny. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Jul 31st, 2011, 12:18am on 07/30/11 at 22:30:03, MHowe wrote:
:D I may have been a tad hasty reading and responding to Christian's post. Being right all the time has made me complacent. Christian has accused me so many times of "misrepresenting" unspecified things, that if I've now finally, at long last, actually misrepresented something, I don't care. That being said, and getting back to the subject, I love Christian's definition of soft finitude. I think it applies perfectly to a wide variety of gambling games. Trouble is, I've never seen an abstract game fitting the description. Name one abstract game that has soft finitude. And I don't mean a trivialized non-game with two pieces on the board. If you can (truthfully and convincingly) do that, I'll stfu (on this particular topic). Let's let Christian field this one, Mike. With your phenomenal mastery of logical debate, and I mean that in all sincerity, you might convince me of something illogical. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by lightvector on Jul 31st, 2011, 2:09am If by "any one player can break a cycle and win" we mean instead that "any cycle can be broken by at least one player and still win" (depending on the game, one may need a further qualification that the cycle in question is relevant to optimal play from the opening position), then a number classic games have soft finitude. To give a few examples... 5x5 go with only simple ko prohibition (no long cycle or "superko" prohibition) is one such game. Both players may cooperate to produce longer cycles of captures and recaptures, but the optimal lines of play do not depend on any long cycles. I believe 6x6 go has been solved also, with the same conclusion. 7x7 has not been formally solved, but it is almost certain that it too has no dependence on long cycles. And on larger boards, while long cycles are possible, they are very rare in practice. Ataxx on a wide variety of board sizes also. Both players can prolong the game indefinitely by only jumping their pieces, but this does not appear to be optimal in practice, nor is it optimal for solved board sizes, and either player can unilaterally choose to stop and eventually force the game to end. Chinese checkers (a suitable version with rules to prevent a player from indefinitely blocking his home area) also has soft finitude as well. Cooperative cycles are possible, but obviously are not optimal play. Arimaa is a game that appears to exhibit a property similar to soft finitude in practical play. Of course, it is not known theoretically because we don't know optimal play. But in practice, nearly all games by strong players end with a winner after a reasonable number of moves, and nearly every position occurring in practice seems to provide strong ways to make progress for at least one player. Yet, both players could cooperate to make the game last essentially forever just by shuffling pieces. Strictly speaking, the 3-fold repetition rule would prevent a truly infinite game, but would not stop a game from lasting billions of moves if the players cooperated to this end. Chess and some of its variants, even without the "50 move rule" are still theoretical candidates, because it has not been disproven that one side or the other can force checkmate from the initial position. Although, practical evidence suggests that optimal play is more likely to lead to a draw. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Jul 31st, 2011, 5:30am on 07/31/11 at 00:18:05, MarkSteere wrote:
on 07/31/11 at 00:18:05, MarkSteere wrote:
In Checkers, depending on the position, the player who is able to take opposition may even win a one-on-one kings endgame. Pommel is unique in that a one-on-one kings subgame is hard finite: the alignment rule makes that one of the players will have to expose his captain and the other must (!) capture. No cycles. The unusual thing is that the position in the post that started this subject has 4 pieces and indeed does allow cycles. http://i55.tinypic.com/ojp3dz.gif So players can cooperate towards a draw: The "if" is necessary for soft finitude. The question remaining is the "and only if". Zillions gives a win in 13 for whoever starts. It makes that this particular subgame has soft finitude, but it still leaves matters inconclusive with regard to soft-finitude for the game as a whole. A white swan doesn't mean swans are white. But matters would be settled by a black swan, of course, that is: a position in which a player can force a cycle against his opponent's best opposition. Like a king in a tric-trac corner in Checkers for instance. The problem if you don't find a forced cycle is: how do you prove it cannot exist? The outcome doesn't affect the necessity of a rule like 3-fold: cycles may occur in a soft finite and a non-finite game alike. Why is this interesting? Endgames in Draughts variants are notoriously tricky. I've had the honor of working with one of the greatest endgame authorities in 10x10 Draught, Leo Springer (http://toernooibase.kndb.nl/opvraag/liddetailp.php?SpId=4104&Id=f&taal=1), whose father, the late Ben Springer (http://www.damz.nl/cms/?option=content&task=view&id=201), was world champion from 1928-1931 (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/on-the-evolution-of-draughts-variants/history#strategy). Leo made me see just how tricky endgames are, and he made a number problems for Hexdame (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/arena/hexdame/78-more-problems) and Dameo (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/arena/dameo/70-endgames) for which I'm ever grateful because he's so much better and faster than I am. Knowing how tricky they are, and finally realizing the impact of compulsory alignment in endgames (I was a bit slow there I must confess, I've known square Pommel for some time without fully realizing the impact), I predict that this brand new monkey in the cage will make endgames a very rich and interesting class all by themselves. That's why the finitude issue is important. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Jul 31st, 2011, 7:25am Black is black? Here's a position, not all that different from the previous one, that may or may not be the black swan, but in any case is illustrative in terms of my previous post. I'll get to that as soon as I've finished walking with the dogs and in the meantime leave it for your consideration: http://i55.tinypic.com/14o9kcz.gif Done. Let's first establish that although none of the pieces are aligned with the opponent, the position is legal. It can for instance (but not only) occur after successive promotion on A6 and G4. Let's say it's white's turn. Concerning exchange two things should be considered by the player initiating it: 1. A capturing captain isn't obliged to align, but rather obliged to stop immediately behind the jumped piece. 2. The resulting 1x1 position is hard finite and one players will win, so the initiating player must take care he's the one. Considering that a sacifice makes no sense and barring symmetry, white has two moves available in the diagram, 1.A13 and 1.A14: http://i55.tinypic.com/2vl3a8n.gif http://i54.tinypic.com/289htgh.gif I'm making this up while going, I'm not sure where it leads, just intruiged and bored by sidetracking. Please correct me if I'm wrong, this isn't my forte. 1.A13? Here black's exchange GB4 wins: 1...GB4 2.A3xC5 G9xB4 3.A6B7? B41+ 3.A64? BG4+ 3.A63? B49+ 1.A14? Here black's exchange G9B4 wins in a similar matter. Conclusion: this subgame too is soft finite and gives no decisive answer regarding the game. Another conclusion is that if a player in a one-on-one captains endgame is forced to align with an 'infield' opponent, he will lose: he can align only under cover of the boardedge, and the infielder takes the opposite end of the line. Yet another conclusion is that Pommel, if not indeed free of draws (that's the issue here), makes draws very unlikely. At the same time it is a real Draughts variant, so proving draws cannot occur (unless both players cooperate towards the result) would make it quite unique. Cage (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/on-the-evolution-of-draughts-variants/draughts-variants/579-cage) is hard finite, but no Draughts variant, as Benedikt Rosenau and I argue in On the Evolution of Draughts variants (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/on-the-evolution-of-draughts-variants/). |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MHowe on Jul 31st, 2011, 11:22am Christian, Zillions almost immediately found a win in four for the new position you proposed, so you were correct that it was not the counterexample we're looking for. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MHowe on Jul 31st, 2011, 11:40am on 07/31/11 at 00:18:05, MarkSteere wrote:
No worries, Mark. Looks some some possible examples have been put forward. And if I ever convinced you of something illogical, it would be accidental. And if we discovered it I would retract. Always just looking for the truth. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Jul 31st, 2011, 11:50am on 07/31/11 at 11:22:54, MHowe wrote:
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Jul 31st, 2011, 12:39pm on 07/31/11 at 02:09:29, lightvector wrote:
No, no, no, no, no. Christian's definition of "soft finitude" is succinct, objective, and very clear. (Did I just say that?) There's no room for equivocation. "A game has soft finitude if and only if both players are required to cooperate to reach a draw." [snip lightvector's exhaustive diatribe answering wrong question] |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Jul 31st, 2011, 12:58pm MS: "I love Christian's definition of soft finitude... Trouble is, I've never seen an abstract game fitting the description." on 07/31/11 at 05:30:58, christianF wrote:
It's too late Christian. You carelessly uttered something perfectly sensible. "A game has soft finitude if and only if both players are required to cooperate to reach a draw." You can't take it back now and inanify it. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by lightvector on Jul 31st, 2011, 1:08pm Actually, most of the games I presented do answer the right question, although I wasn't as clear as I could be about the definition. A infinite cycle that neither player is willing to relent on, is in many games (such as Ataxx) considered to be a draw. Sometimes, the versions of the rule set may not explicitly state this case, of course, but the reason is precisely because it is not needed, because of this property - a draw can only be achieved by cooperation, that is, at least one player can always break a cycle to win. If the game provides no other ways to draw, then this definition, which I used, is equivalent to Christian's definition. The statement "any one player can break a cycle and win", which I rejected, is actually the odd definition out. It would be very strange to require that for every cycle, *both* players have a way to deviate from that cycle and win. If the game contains only cycles where player A can deviate and win, but where player B would actually prefer to cycle (such as if deviating causes B to lose), then the game still has soft finitude, because cooperation is still required to achieve a draw. If player A refuses to cooperate, he can win, rather than draw. Additionally, the definition "both players are required to cooperate to reach a draw" leaves unspecified whether this is to apply for every legal game state, or whether only from the opening game state. Interpreted the second way, it could also allow games that contain mandatory infinite cycles but where none of those infinite cycles can occur following optimal (or merely even "strong") play by the winning side from the starting position. Either definition is interesting. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Jul 31st, 2011, 1:19pm on 07/31/11 at 07:25:20, christianF wrote:
Got that right. Hard finitude, which defaults to the simpler "finitude" in abstract games, is not a badge of dishonor. Picture a state of the art American tank. Brutish yet sophisticated. on 07/31/11 at 07:25:20, christianF wrote:
This is a potentially serious issue. You're telling me that Cage doesn't meet the arbitrary, English language definition of "variant" by a couple of foreigners? lol It must be a bragging point in Europe. "My English is so good, I have to instruct Americans on proper discourse, [chortle, guffaw]." |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Jul 31st, 2011, 2:46pm on 07/31/11 at 13:08:14, lightvector wrote:
Lightvector, it isn't: "A game has soft finitude if and only if both players are required to cooperate to reach a draw in optimal play on a tiny board, but, if, and, but, and, if, but, but, and, if......" It's simply: "A game has soft finitude if and only if both players are required to cooperate to reach a draw." Are you saying that a non-cooperative, cyclic draw can't occur in Ataxx? Not to "put words in your mouth", Lightvector. I'm just trying to glean some meaning from among all the buts, ifs and ands. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by The_Jeh on Jul 31st, 2011, 3:12pm on 07/31/11 at 13:08:14, lightvector wrote:
You must also be careful with the word "cooperate." Two fallible players might both believe that to deviate from a cycle leads to their own loss, even if one of them actually has a forced win by doing so. In a sense, they are not trying to "cooperate," yet the game is not doing its job of judging their play. (Edit: Well, maybe it is punishing the player that could win for not seeing the win.) Presumably that is why Mark prefers hard finitude, not that I myself am attracted to it. But I know what you are trying to say by "cooperate." Also, I would abstain from defining "soft finitude" in terms of "cycles." Endless shuffling is not "cyclical." Rather, I would say soft finitude exists if "a forced win exists from all reachable game positions, but from the initial position players could choose moves extending the game forever (for practical purposes)." Finally, I might add that the term "soft finitude" itself does not include any hint that you are applying it only to games that are forced wins from every position. A finite game might also conclude in a draw, so you need to refer to more than just the game's finitude. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Jul 31st, 2011, 3:38pm on 07/31/11 at 13:19:48, MarkSteere wrote:
We also have the considered opinion that compulsory capture is at the heart of its spirit. See for instance the chapters "Did Alquerque have compulsory capture?" and "I'll huff and I'll puff and I'll blow your house down" in the history section (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/on-the-evolution-of-draughts-variants/history) of "On the Evolution of Draughts Variants". Cage has no compulsory capture and no spirit. It may be considered a shuffle variant or something, but not a draughts variant. All in the best of spirits, but that's our opinion :) . P.S. I'm surprised this comes up now. We've always stated it in the rules (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/on-the-evolution-of-draughts-variants/draughts-variants/579-cage). Allow me to Quote:
Pommel is so unique because it is a real draughts variant that appears to have soft finitude, which is very unusual for a draughts variant. Ossetian Draughts (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/on-the-evolution-of-draughts-variants/draughts-variants/504-tama_o) is hard finite and drawless and has no compulsory capture, but it has "no legal move" as its object. It's slow and lacks combinatorial power. It's a lot like Cage in that respect, but it needs far less rules. Stapeldammen (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/on-the-evolution-of-draughts-variants/column-checkers/488-stapeldammen) is a hard finite drawless column checkers variant that has compulsory capture, even precedence of majority capture, but it also settles for "no legal move". Pommel requires elimination. I like that. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by lightvector on Jul 31st, 2011, 4:16pm on 07/31/11 at 15:12:10, The_Jeh wrote:
Yes, I agree, I dislike the ambiguity in the word 'cooperate' as well, which is why I worded my original post only in terms of optimal play ("forced wins"). If there is a weaker interpretation of 'cooperate' that still works, it would be interesting. But it would almost have to include the case where both players really do believe that continuing the cycle is best, because otherwise, every deterministic game with any reachable cycle fails the definition of "soft finitude", making it less interesting of a definition than the version I gave. I also agree that there are issues with what different rules may or may not define to be draws, which is why I again focused on just the issue of endless repetition, which is frequently (but not always) considered to be a draw in games where it is possible. I'm a mathematician, so to me, endless shuffling is cyclical. It's just that the cycles are very very long. ;) |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by The_Jeh on Jul 31st, 2011, 4:41pm on 07/31/11 at 16:16:42, lightvector wrote:
I'm (going to be) a mathematician, too. Of course you're right about the endless shuffling being a cycle. On the other hand, for practical purposes, cycling every trillionth move is not the same as doing so in a humanly reasonable way. That is, it feels right to say Arimaa is softly finite. But there are two problems. First, cycling endlessly is technically disallowed, as you mentioned. However, players can cooperate to create extremely long cycles that we term "shuffling." So, you're right, it's still a cycle, but it doesn't feel like one. Pragmatically, the repetition rule only disallows relatively short cycles. If we admit that Arimaa is effectively "cyclic" because of shuffling, there is still another problem with calling it soft finite. There is one known position where shuffling is optimal play: rabbits on the 4th and 5th ranks blocking each other. But it still seems wrong to take away its soft finitude status because of one exotic position that is trivially avoided. That takes us back to your optimal play considerations. Of course, in the case of Arimaa, any hard definition of soft finitude is hard to attach to it with proof. I don't know if there's a way to reconcile what I would subjectively consider "soft finite" with an objective definition. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Jul 31st, 2011, 4:46pm on 07/31/11 at 15:38:06, christianF wrote:
Cage captures my spirit. I took the ubiquitous Checkers jump and built a minimal rule set around it. Cage is a game of jumps, my way. Cage is also a game of assured annihilation. No secondary, horse manure object of being the last to move in an impasse is needed in a well architected game such as Cage. Does Cage capture the spirit of Checkers? I certainly hope not. Compulsory capture is a game tree shrinking, unpleasant necessity in Checkers. There'd be rampant impasses without it. Non compulsory capture allows a larger, richer game tree. Christian Freeling has confused the utilitarian compulsory capture rule for a hallmark of "spirit". |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Jul 31st, 2011, 4:53pm on 07/31/11 at 15:12:10, The_Jeh wrote:
Havannah and Sygo are examples of hard finite games that can end in a draw, but the definition doesn't contadict that in any way. Jump Sturdy (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/the-pit/jumpsturdy-576) happens to be a clear example of what I consider a soft finite game, and I could give many more (but in full awareness that examples do not validate a definition, I'll give just one). Jump Sturdy is a race game in the Breakthrough and Murus Gallicus tradition, that is you meet, eliminate a couple of opponents left and right and wait for the slaughter to allow you to try for the back row. Eventually you may be down to one-on-one. If not, then someone must have made it. The two remaining pieces may move sideways, but one of them has a win and it is never difficult to establish who that is. The only way to reach a draw is if both refuse to move forwards. That's non-sensical, but legal (as so many things). That's what brought me to the definition, and if there's a more practical and better one I'll gladly accept it. It's not that my life depends on it ;) . |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Jul 31st, 2011, 5:01pm on 07/31/11 at 16:46:39, MarkSteere wrote:
The spirit of Draughts? Here's the spirit of Draughts (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/on-the-evolution-of-draughts-variants/history#strategy), and only one of its many faces. Can you give one face of the spirit of Cage? (it suddenly seems fitting by the way, I've always liked the name). |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Jul 31st, 2011, 5:26pm on 07/31/11 at 17:01:13, christianF wrote:
It's a tactical, combinatorial style game - not everyone's cup of tea, not even particularly mine. on 07/31/11 at 17:01:13, christianF wrote:
Among the hundreds of Draughts variants, Cage is the only true game of annihilation. The gulf between us wouldn't be so vast if you had an appreciation of architecture. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Aug 1st, 2011, 2:40am on 07/31/11 at 17:26:55, MarkSteere wrote:
on 07/31/11 at 17:26:55, MarkSteere wrote:
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Aug 1st, 2011, 8:14am on 08/01/11 at 02:40:18, christianF wrote:
Wow! I think you've earned youself an ice cream cone, Christian. on 08/01/11 at 02:40:18, christianF wrote:
Yes, I'm sure I could, if I were so inclined. on 08/01/11 at 02:40:18, christianF wrote:
lol, You don't know the meaning of the word. on 08/01/11 at 02:40:18, christianF wrote:
Of course. Like Turkey Grabber. I don't know how one "inhabits" a grabbed turkey, Christian, but... maybe I'm better off not knowing. on 08/01/11 at 02:40:18, christianF wrote:
Cage wasn't designed to be "inhabitable", Christian. It was designed to be a bloody game of annihilation. How many (true) games of annihilation do you have, Christian? Surely you can name one. Or is that above your architectural pay grade? |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Aug 1st, 2011, 9:54am on 08/01/11 at 08:14:50, MarkSteere wrote:
on 08/01/11 at 08:14:50, MarkSteere wrote:
Ah, yes. But no, you can't, because the fierce beauty of the best Draughts combinations relies on (but not only on) compulsory capture. A Cage combination would have all the hallmarks of a sliding puzzle. Neat maybe, but hardly beautiful. on 08/01/11 at 08:14:50, MarkSteere wrote:
on 08/01/11 at 08:14:50, MarkSteere wrote:
Take hard finitude versus soft finitude for instance. I'm not inclined to force players to a hard wired finish if sensible play from at least one side leads to a finish. Taking that into consideration, Trounce (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/the-pit/trounce-574) is a game of annihilation. Requiring a hard wired finish would do little more than add a possibly complicated rule to resolve a non-issue. The point being that insisting on what you consider "pure", i.e. no draws and hard finitude, may actually mar a game. You're a victim of dogma. It makes things simple. Just follow the rules and the game will have 'great architecture'. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Aug 1st, 2011, 4:34pm on 08/01/11 at 09:54:18, christianF wrote:
If it were that simple, anyone could do it. Even you. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Aug 1st, 2011, 4:48pm on 08/01/11 at 16:34:33, MarkSteere wrote:
Despite that, there are a lot of good inventors, and you're merely one of them. If you're in any way special it would be because you hold your criteria above all other criteria, not because your games are better. You're satisfied with what you consider 'good architecture'. Never mind the game. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Aug 1st, 2011, 5:00pm on 08/01/11 at 16:48:16, christianF wrote:
In a way I feel bad. Here you are, striving for equality. And here I am, knowing that isn't possible. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Aug 1st, 2011, 5:42pm on 08/01/11 at 17:00:28, MarkSteere wrote:
What about writers? musicians? artists? Loads of good ones. How many would 'strive for equality'? A 'competition' between inventors is your personal hang-up, courtesy of your deeprooted feelings of superiority. Thank you for considering me, but no thanks. Feel free to be as superior as you like. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Aug 3rd, 2011, 4:08pm on 07/02/11 at 03:46:50, christianF wrote:
Thank you. And not "maybe" for Fractal (http://www.marksteeregames.com/Fractal_rules.pdf). Fractal was engineered to be awesome, and it is. It's a crime that Fractal isn't programmed anywhere. on 07/02/11 at 03:46:50, christianF wrote:
That's a lot of "now and then", lol on 07/02/11 at 03:46:50, christianF wrote:
It bothers you that I invented it. on 07/02/11 at 03:46:50, christianF wrote:
For an unpretentious, combinatorial style, finite decisive game, the only thing that really could be wrong with Cage (http://www.marksteeregames.com/Cage_rules.html) would be turn order advantage, and there doesn't seem to be an issue with that. on 07/02/11 at 03:46:50, christianF wrote:
Sorry you had an unpleasant experience with Rive (http://www.marksteeregames.com/Rive_rules.pdf), Christian. In my case, Rive has turned out to be just about my favorite game. I play it every day on the turn based game site GamesByEmail (http://www.gamesbyemail.com/). I always make my Rive moves first, and then time permitting, I make my moves in Oust (http://www.marksteeregames.com/Oust_rules.pdf), Atoll (http://www.marksteeregames.com/Atoll_rules.pdf), and a variety of other MSG (http://www.marksteeregames.com/index.html) games which are also programmed at GBE. on 07/02/11 at 03:46:50, christianF wrote:
Yes, Rive does have great architecture. No "though ;)" required. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Aug 3rd, 2011, 10:13pm on 08/03/11 at 16:08:35, MarkSteere wrote:
One example of outstanding architecture translating directly to outstanding gameplay. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Aug 4th, 2011, 5:54am GoogleGroups is seriously down, so why not. on 08/03/11 at 22:13:27, MarkSteere wrote:
Fractal? I have some reservations. Where's the 'architecture'? I wouldn't accuse Hex of having and architecture: once you see the idea, there's nowhere you can go except Hex. Unless you want to apply archtecture by adding something, as some have tried, unfortunately. Fractal is much the same: the idea for the board and the name fit like a glove. But is that architecture? The rules are much like Hex, that is, the idea shapes them. So I wonder if the concept of architecture applies at all. Connection games are notorious for a first player advantage. I see no pie or other balancing mechanism in Fractal. That makes me wonder. Making moving compulsory in a game where moving is never disadvantageous is something I would not lightly consider. The game is there for the players, not vice versa, and as a rule I presume players' intentions to be fair towards each other and towards the game. I wouldn't accuse Havannah of having an architecture either. It's a lucky merger of three winning structures, that's all the architecture to it. After the rules thus emerged, Havannah turned out to have one of the smallest drawmargins in the business. That was never intentional, but it was factual. Havannah's strategy and tactics are thus that beginners cannot reach a draw. A draw, other than base-4 or -5 hasn't happened yet. Base-8 or higher it could only result from a game between two high-ranking players. But it has never happened. Two things would happen if it did: The game would be implicitly of a very high standard, and it would be instantly famous. Isn't that great? Now what would your dogmatic approach regarding 'architecture' make of this? Draws being unacceptable? One can't even make a simple draw prevention rule for Havannah, so what 'solution' would you suggest? |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Aug 4th, 2011, 1:43pm on 08/04/11 at 05:54:55, christianF wrote:
Oust would be my second choice of a game showing the equivalence of architecture and gameplay. It's just more apparent in Fractal. on 08/04/11 at 05:54:55, christianF wrote:
If Fractal doesn't have architecture, none of my games do. Fractal practically defines my concept of architecture. Problem In Hex - Center area cells are much more valuable than acute corner area cells. Think, think, think, think, BOOM - Fractal. There's nothing more to architecture than that. Just turn your brain on and let it run until you either hit paydirt or burn out. on 08/04/11 at 05:54:55, christianF wrote:
Whatever architecture is, it isn't something you tack on to an existing design. You can't add architecture to a game like Havannah that doesn't already have it. Yes, Fractal is a variant of Hex, but it was designed with a singular objective from the ground up, resulting in arguably a superior game - just as Atoll is arguably superior to Hex. on 08/04/11 at 05:54:55, christianF wrote:
To me, the pie rule is ubiquitous. I recommend its use in all games, certainly all of my own. It's a matter of etiquette more than anything else. Player 1 [grinning, salivating, and greedily rubbing hands together]: "Woo hoo I won the coin toss. Now I'm going to grab the biggest apple in the barrel." Player 2: "Wrong." I just don't feel the need to keep adding "This game uses the pie rule" to all my rule sheets. Fractal certainly doesn't depend on the pie rule to anywhere near the degree that Hex does, but, as I said, it should be part of the game. on 08/04/11 at 05:54:55, christianF wrote:
Christian, you've been harping your "architecture = dogma" pitch for weeks. Nothing could be further from the truth. You do raise a semi-valid point though. "Can a draw susceptible game have architecture?" No. To me it can't. But since there's no precise definition of game architecture, I suppose it can apply to draw susceptible games - for you, lol on 08/04/11 at 05:54:55, christianF wrote:
I don't make "draw prevention rules", Christian :) |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Aug 4th, 2011, 2:07pm on 08/04/11 at 13:43:10, MarkSteere wrote:
Apart from that the restriction placed on non-capturing baby moves in Monkey Queen looks a clear draw prevention rule to me (as well as an overdone one, but that's another matter). You obviously reject Havannah along with about all traditional great games, by declaring a jewel of drawmarging into a flaw in the game. I fear I have an altogether more considerate approach to draws, in general. It's like the salt in a dish (rather than arsenic, as you doubtless feel). And yes, some games look like a dish in salt, but that doesn't mean there's anything wrong other than the amount. I like draws if the margin is small, better even than no draws at all. I've even started a thread about it at RGA. Not that anyone could read anything new, for the last three days or so :P |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Aug 4th, 2011, 2:13pm on 08/04/11 at 14:07:28, christianF wrote:
Get a newsreader, and stop using google groups. I already read and responded to your Aug 3 post claiming credit for Monkey Queen, using my newsreader (Newsrover). Now both posts are gone because you initiated yours with google groups. Google groups actually harms rec.games.abstract. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Aug 4th, 2011, 2:29pm on 08/04/11 at 14:13:45, MarkSteere wrote:
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Aug 4th, 2011, 2:32pm on 08/04/11 at 14:07:28, christianF wrote:
Well sure. Monkey Queen could be viewed as one giant draw prevention rule. It's a bass-ackwards point of view that shows zero concept of the forces that shaped Monkey Queen. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by NickBentley on Aug 4th, 2011, 4:14pm I'm butting in because I'm bored. The MQ move restriction seems distinctly unSteere-ian. It seems like the very kind of rule that the Mark Steere I know would ridicule. Also, it feels awkward to play with. When I make a move, I *feel* the extra cognitive load that comes with confirming whether each of the moves I'm considering conform to the move restriction. That reduces my enjoyment of the game. Between enjoyment and formal drawlessness, I'll always take enjoyment. (don't get me wrong, if the game were often drawn, that would reduce my enjoyment too) I think the rule illustrates two of my beliefs: 1. Move restrictions probably aren't good if they require more than about zero mental overhead to parse. 2. The structure of a game should be built around not only criteria like drawlessness and balance, but also (and in fact more importantly) around how our psyches work and what feels good. These things can't be operationalized, but they're important. Grain of salt though: I've only played once. I know I have no right to comment on anything. BIG grain of salt then. ps we gotta find a better a more permanent forum for these discussions. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by SpeedRazor on Aug 4th, 2011, 7:42pm Who would be great to write their blogs here? In no order: Cameron Browne, Kris Burm, Omar Syed, Christian Freeling. Nick, your game Ketchup is a work of genius, and anything you write here is appreciated [by me], among others. As long as you are a fan of Arimaa, I see no reason for you to not be a member of this Forum... Note: you don't have to be good at Arimaa to be accepted here. I've read books on Bridge, Backgammon, Gin Rummy, and the wiki-book on Arimaa. I suck at them all! I'm probably not dumb: my chess rating in all three time categories has climbed to over 2K. Nick, if you're an Arimaa fan, your input is very welcome here in this Forum :) Hopefully, one day, your name belongs in the same list of the Four Geniuses I'd mentioned above... |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Aug 4th, 2011, 8:00pm on 08/04/11 at 16:14:23, NickBentley wrote:
You don't know me very well, Nick :) Intricate mechanisms that ensure finitude are more the rule than the exception at MSG (http://www.marksteeregames.com/index.html). Byte (http://www.marksteeregames.com/Byte_rules.pdf) Cage (http://www.marksteeregames.com/Cage_rules.html) Diffusion (http://www.marksteeregames.com/Diffusion_rules.pdf) Oust (http://www.marksteeregames.com/Oust_rules.pdf) Rive (http://www.marksteeregames.com/Rive_rules.pdf) Tanbo (http://www.marksteeregames.com/Tanbo_rules.pdf) What sets Monkey Queen (http://www.marksteeregames.com/Monkey_Queen_rules.html) apart for me is simply that it's a Chess variant. on 08/04/11 at 16:14:23, NickBentley wrote:
No, we don't. Get a newsreader and have instantaneous, reliable access to rec.games.abstract. Don't worry, I'll continue to repeat that until you eventually notice what I'm saying. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Aug 4th, 2011, 8:02pm on 08/04/11 at 19:42:26, SpeedRazor wrote:
Zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz on 08/04/11 at 19:42:26, SpeedRazor wrote:
rofl |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by megajester on Aug 5th, 2011, 12:38am on 08/04/11 at 20:02:26, MarkSteere wrote:
Hey I thought we banned this guy |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Aug 5th, 2011, 1:00am on 08/05/11 at 00:38:20, megajester wrote:
lol, You can't ban your own flies. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Aug 5th, 2011, 3:09am on 08/04/11 at 16:14:23, NickBentley wrote:
on 08/04/11 at 20:00:18, MarkSteere wrote:
I don't feel this addresses the point Nick is trying to make. Oust is an exception in that it doesn't have a rule labeled "draw prevention", but MQ and Cage have it flashing in neon. The mechanisms involved are drains that suck the forces together, fixed in Cage, mobile in MQ. I feel that's fairly blunt, rather than 'intricate'. As said, your answer doesn't address "the extra cognitive load" presented by having to check for what is basically unnatural behaviour. Of course the same might have been said when someone decided long ago that a chess pawn would move different from the way it captures. In other words, players might eventually feel it to be 'natural'. But I doubt that, quite frankly. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Aug 5th, 2011, 5:20am on 08/04/11 at 14:32:20, MarkSteere wrote:
Here's how the forces began: Quote:
After claiming that the inspiration came from Amazons, later, I did remind you of this mail. That was interpreted as me "claiming credit for the invention of MQ", or suggesting jealousy: on 08/03/11 at 16:08:35, MarkSteere wrote:
Or, after criticizing the game at RGA: Quote:
MQ is not a stacking game except by your definition (you redefine a lot to be 'right'): Quote:
To win you must either: 1. Kill the enemy queen or 2. Deprive your opponent of legal moves by leaving him with a queen of height two, no babies, and nothing within line of sight for said queen to kill. To use one of your favorites: an aesthetic Hiroshima. Just to not be wrong. What's the matter with you? Regarding the restriction rule on babies, there's a much simpler and natural way to corner the queen, not by forcing the whole battle down the drain, but by weakening the over-mobile queen. My feeling is that if you: 1. restrict it to the king's move if moving out of check, and 2. disallow giving birth if moving out of check (as well as if capturing) you'd reduce the draw margin to near zero. Here I touch on Nick's point: seeing the restriction on movement and birth if a queen is in check, comes naturally. But it doesn't eradicate draws. That's no problem for a game, but it certainly appears to be a problem for you. For the record, people who like draws (if only in modest amounts) are usually nicer :-* . Also for the record, no I don't claim any credit for MQ. I'm glad for you for inventing it and sad for the way you marred it to fit your box of dogmata. But for better or worse, it's all yours. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Aug 5th, 2011, 10:17am I think the only games that ever really inspired me were Go and Reversi, which got me into design twenty years ago. Amazons, a game I certainly admire, only "inspired" me in the sense that I needed a fun game for the rec.games.abstract contest, Amazons is fun, queens are fun... How about a game with queens? Christian, would you be surprised if your self-described "children's game", Monkey Trap, never entered my mind during Monkey Queen's development? Or that you're utterly incapable of "inspiring" me in any sense of the word? lol Because of the obvious, yet superficial, similarity between Monkey Queen and the profoundly uninspiring Monkey Trap, I offered to name my game similarly and borrow your primate theme, again in an effort to make my game fun for the contest. You leapt at my offer. If you now feel that endlessly quoting my offer all over the Internet elevates your fame somehow, feel free to press on with that. Ironically, while you're desperately claiming all the credit you can for Monkey Queen, you neglect to credit Don Green for his Snail Trail, virtually identical to but preceding your Monkey Trap. Instead, in your Monkey Trap rule sheet, you note the "obvious affinity with Walter Zamkauskas' Amazons", rofl With all your vast powers of intuition, Christian, here you are "intuiting" Don Green's game. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Aug 5th, 2011, 11:20am on 08/05/11 at 10:17:39, MarkSteere wrote:
on 08/05/11 at 10:17:39, MarkSteere wrote:
It was on the spur of the moment and it took me two minutes. The obvious affinity with Amazons occured to me afterwards, and the 'virtually identical' Snail Trail ... you're making this up along the way, right? The profoundly uninspiring game led you to react thus: Quote:
P.S. I just cite recorded facts, and you might as well address the issue (instead of your 'issue'). |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Aug 5th, 2011, 12:41pm on 08/05/11 at 11:20:49, christianF wrote:
Yes, they can. And if there were ever an instance of me being inspired by you, people could cite that instance. on 08/05/11 at 11:20:49, christianF wrote:
Christian, in the English language there's a huge difference between inspiring and amusing. You've amused me countless times, usually at your own expense. But you continue to be a non-inspiration in game design - at least for me. on 08/05/11 at 11:20:49, christianF wrote:
There's only one. But if there were other Mark Steeres, they too would find you uninspiring. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Aug 5th, 2011, 1:11pm on 08/05/11 at 11:20:49, christianF wrote:
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Aug 5th, 2011, 2:08pm on 08/05/11 at 13:11:51, christianF wrote:
I reflexively shun conventional wisdom as a matter of policy, never more automatically than with "Nick, [you], and others", lol |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Aug 5th, 2011, 2:22pm on 08/05/11 at 14:08:03, MarkSteere wrote:
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Aug 6th, 2011, 3:53am on 08/04/11 at 16:14:23, NickBentley wrote:
I'm not sure butting in was the right remedy ;). How about a new contest? Corey Clark reminded me that I even had suggested a theme (a misere, i.e. "lose to win" game that is not made by reversing the object of a regular game). I had forgotten about that. But I'm open to any theme as long as the contest serves conventional wisdom by having a public vote. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Aug 6th, 2011, 9:34am on 08/06/11 at 03:53:53, christianF wrote:
What was wrong with the last contest? Oh that's right. You lost. If you can't win it, rig it. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by NickBentley on Aug 6th, 2011, 10:35am I wasn't aware that the stacking contest ever concluded. Who won? I also started a contest on rec.games.combinatorial. There were a lot of submissions, and it appears a couple of good games among them, but that contest didn't resolve either because nobody could be bothered to send in their votes. I don't think I'll have the time to run a good contest (or even one that concludes in a timely manner) p.s. christian: just wrote a little more about a game we were talking about - http://nickbentley.posterous.com/more-morro |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Aug 6th, 2011, 10:49am on 08/05/11 at 13:11:51, christianF wrote:
on 08/06/11 at 09:34:05, MarkSteere wrote:
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Aug 6th, 2011, 11:10am on 08/06/11 at 10:35:55, NickBentley wrote:
You can find the results of last year's contest here: http://groups.google.com/group/rec.games.abstract/browse_thread/thread/323d336c511edeb1# Or wait for Mark to rewrite history. Morro seems somewhat hard to approach indeed. Should it be opaque like Othello, then it may still be interesting like Othello. A rule stating that a player may drop a number of stones up to and including the number of the longest row would rid you of "If there aren't enough empty spaces left to do so, just fill up the board". The must then must be may of course, but since you stress the importance material advantage, my question would be: Is there ever an incentive to not place all stones? P.S. It's not like Othello, there's no volatility, and it's not tactical (as opposed to strategical) because the strategy is neither obvious nor opaque (because everything remains 'solid', not 'fluid' as in Othello). |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by NickBentley on Aug 6th, 2011, 11:58am "You can find the results of last year's contest here: http://groups.google.com/group/rec.games.abstract/browse_thread/thread/3 23d336c511edeb1#" A tie! Too funny. "Morro seems somewhat hard to approach indeed. Should it be opaque like Othello, then it may still be interesting like Othello. A rule stating that a player may drop a number of stones up to and including the number of the longest row would rid you of "If there aren't enough empty spaces left to do so, just fill up the board". The must then must be may of course, but since you stress the importance material advantage, my question would be: Is there ever an incentive to not place all stones?" Good question. I think there may be. Specifically, there appear to be instances where placing all your stones will force you to take the lead when you don't want to: i.e. taking the lead will give your opponent enough stones seal a victory where he would not otherwise have been able. So the question is: would giving a player a choice make the game better or worse? I don't know. Do you have a sense? I'll definitely test it. Great suggestion. "P.S. It's not like Othello, there's no volatility, and it's not tactical (as opposed to strategical) because the strategy is neither obvious nor opaque (because everything remains 'solid', not 'fluid' as in Othello)." Well the strategy isn't obvious, but my jury's out on whether it's too opaque. One possibly redeeming aspect is that when they first play, new players seem to have a clear strategic idea: to just sort of "race" to the longest row. It's totally wrong but I regard it as a good thing when a game provokes in players a clear motivation to do some particular thing right away, even (and especially) if that thing turns out to be wrong. My worry is that after you get past that stage, there might be a long fallow period during which strategic insights are few and far between. That could be discouraging. p.s. how to generate quote boxes here? |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Aug 6th, 2011, 12:00pm Timo Ewald's Castro_bot invited me for a base-7-8-9 game of Havannah, to test some improvements, and what did I think of its handling of rings. I think three classic rules apply for handling its handling: Carefully, carefully, carefully. But it isn't quite there yet, considering the 2012 games are base-10. Base-7 (http://www.littlegolem.net/jsp/game/game.jsp?gid=1356817) Base-8 (http://www.littlegolem.net/jsp/game/game.jsp?gid=1356815) Base-9 (http://www.littlegolem.net/jsp/game/game.jsp?gid=1356818) |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Aug 6th, 2011, 12:11pm on 08/06/11 at 11:58:04, NickBentley wrote:
on 08/06/11 at 11:58:04, NickBentley wrote:
on 08/06/11 at 11:58:04, NickBentley wrote:
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by NickBentley on Aug 6th, 2011, 12:21pm on 08/06/11 at 12:00:39, christianF wrote:
Can you elaborate on what "carefully" means? I'm very curious, since, you know, I have a big interest in Havannah's loops. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Aug 6th, 2011, 12:28pm on 08/06/11 at 12:11:10, christianF wrote:
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by NickBentley on Aug 6th, 2011, 12:30pm Quote:
It's a tricky issue. Testing needed. Quote:
Well, Othello sort of has this. Totally naive players often at first try to flip chips to their color as much as possible. And then realize that's the wrong idea, and then comes the fallow period. It's a little more difficult to see your way past the initial wrong idea in Morro, but still, the process of doing so is not so interesting that it will compensate for foggyville, if indeed foggyville is what follows, IMO. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Aug 6th, 2011, 12:35pm on 08/06/11 at 12:21:04, NickBentley wrote:
I'm careful by experience: if you're one too late you'll find that the bot will make no mistakes. It's weakness is in the strategic realm not in the tactics (though it missed my ring threat in the base-8 game ... but I consider that a bonus for being careful :) ). |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Aug 6th, 2011, 12:41pm on 08/06/11 at 12:30:23, NickBentley wrote:
Still it's the solidity of Morro that makes it very different from Othello. My recent experience with Sygo (as earlier with Medusa and Phalanx for instance) confirms that the human mind (well, mine at least) can handle multi moves much better than Othello moves. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by NickBentley on Aug 6th, 2011, 12:42pm Quote:
On trivially small boards (3x3, 4x4) it definitely happens naturally. Consider a 3x3 game where player 1 opens in the center. On his next turn, he has no choice but to create a 2-row, but not enough power to stop player 2 from forming a 3-row on his next turn, which ends the game. The same thing appears to happen on 4x4 boards. It appears that if player 1 plays singletons until he's forced to make a 2-row, he often is forced to give player 2 the victory. There comes a point where he doesn't want to place any more singletons, but he has to, and so he loses. I think Player 1 can force a win on 4x4, but he appears to have to form a 2row early to get it. I'm not sure about this. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Aug 6th, 2011, 12:44pm Mark Steere wrote: "What was wrong with the last contest? Oh that's right. You lost." on 08/06/11 at 10:49:57, christianF wrote:
Ok, you did win the contest. (?) |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Aug 6th, 2011, 12:46pm on 08/06/11 at 12:42:51, NickBentley wrote:
Base-3 Havannah isn't all that interesting either, nor base-4 except for bots. I seldom play below base-8 and in fact I was a bit anxious about the base-7 Castro offered. But it lost rather quickly. So these small board proceedings do not usually reflect what's going on. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by NickBentley on Aug 6th, 2011, 12:47pm Quote:
With this I agree. That's the consideration on which I hang my hope that Morro will turn out to be good after all. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by NickBentley on Aug 6th, 2011, 12:50pm Quote:
Right. I point out the effect on small boards just to make it clear how the mechanism might work. I've no clue about the frequency of it's appearance on large boards. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by NickBentley on Aug 6th, 2011, 1:03pm Quote:
That base-8 game is strange. What was the bot thinking? Is this a monte carlo bot or something else? |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Aug 6th, 2011, 2:03pm on 08/06/11 at 13:03:38, NickBentley wrote:
Regarding the base-8 game, 28.E5 was wrong of course. It should have been at I6, allowing me to run E5-H6-G6 followed by E5. If he dives into the triangle at E4 I play D4 and allow the cut at E3. There's a ring threat at D2 he can use to push to C2 and then I must block at B2 and I'm in a predicament of sorts. So I was lucky :) . P.S. MCTS, as far as the 2012 Havannah match is concerned, came to the rescue of the AI world. There has never been 'something else' because havannah provides little to nothing to go on in terms of traditional alpha-beta evaluation. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Aug 6th, 2011, 5:03pm on 08/06/11 at 12:44:33, MarkSteere wrote:
It's "What was wrong with the last contest? Oh that's right. You lost. If you can't win it, rig it". Try to stay focused. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Aug 7th, 2011, 4:07am on 08/06/11 at 13:03:38, NickBentley wrote:
I usually do not try to exploit specific weaknesses by counting on them. I rather play as I would against a human because counting on a specific blind spot usually leads to a weak move. But if it doesn't spot simple ringthreats by the opponent, I can imagine the word spreads quickly among the contestants. With the 2012 match just around the corner, there's still some serious work to do for the AI community it seems. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by NickBentley on Aug 7th, 2011, 9:29am It would seem so. Although there wouldn't be much satisfaction in beating bots who make mistakes like that. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Aug 7th, 2011, 9:38am on 08/06/11 at 17:03:03, christianF wrote:
Christian Freeling: "Can someone coordinate a contest that I refuse to participate in unless it meets all my demands?" During the last contest you couldn't heap enough praise on coordinator, Daniel Schultz, even reprimanding others for not praising him enough. Then you lost the contest. Your reaction? Something like "I don't feel like I'm a part of this contest." Not part of the contest?? The time to withdraw your game is when the contest is still ongoing. Not after you've already lost. Now, four months in advance of the next Annual Winter RGA Game Contest, you've begun your campaign to dump Daniel. Is that enough "innuendo" for you? |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Aug 7th, 2011, 10:00am on 08/07/11 at 09:38:38, MarkSteere wrote:
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Aug 7th, 2011, 10:02am on 08/07/11 at 09:29:47, NickBentley wrote:
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Aug 7th, 2011, 2:28pm on 08/07/11 at 10:00:20, christianF wrote:
:-X |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Aug 9th, 2011, 9:45am Chess and Arimaa, Go and Symple, Humans and Bots Intro I've always been interested, not so much in how good Chess or Go programs might become, but in why some games are so much harder to program than others. The answer should take into account that some games are much harder than others for humans too. I don't mean that Chess is harder than Tic-tac-toe, but, still by example, that Explocus is harder than Hex. Both are very simple structured games. Hex (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hex_(board_game)) is easy to read for the human mind (like it's easy to ride a bike, I'm not talking about winning the Tour de France) and hard for computers, whether by alpha-beta search (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alpha-beta_pruning) or by MCTS (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monte_Carlo_method#Games). Explocus (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/the-pit/explocus-527) is hard for humans, but a very simple evaluation function and a fairly shallow alpha-beta search already render a program that is near invincible against humans. It's implemented on the Zillions engine (http://www.zillions-of-games.com/cgi-bin/zilligames/submissions.cgi/15480?do=show;id=1491). Considering the game's stucture it's save to assume that MCTS will lead to a similar result. So the degree of structural simplicity is neither linked to how difficult a game will be for humans to play, nor to how difficult it will be to program. The human mind simply reads certain patterns a lot easier than others. Blindfold Chess (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blindfold_chess) is easier than blindfold Draughts (http://nl.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blindsimultaandammen) (the link is dutch of course :) the table shows Year - Place - Player - #Games - #win - #draw - #loss - score - time). It has been suggested that the reason is that the Chess set of pieces is polyform and the Draughts set is uniform. I know little about blindfold Hex or Go, and I would argue that blindfold Explocus is humanly impossible. "Blindfold Arimaa" on the other hand, though it shows no hits in Google yet, may be just around the corner. I'm sure players like Chessandgo or Fritzlein consider positions in their mind while not at the board. Multistep moves and the human mind Arimaa was constructed to be easy for humans (in the 'riding a bike' sense) and difficult for computers. It was achieved by a Chess type structure and 4-step moves. What Arimaa is for Chess, Symple may prove to be for Go: very similar in structure, but with multiple steps per move, at least optionally. This is based on the feeling, if not actually the experience that some inventors have, that multistep moves pose a bigger problem for bots than for humans. Omar used it in Arimaa, Nick Bentley uses it in Ketchup (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/the-pit/ketchup-620) and is still playing around with it. I used it before in Medusa (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/the-pit/medusa-540), Phalanx (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/the-field/468-phalanx) and Mu (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/the-field/470-mu), and recently in Symple (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/arena/symple/) and Sygo (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/arena/sygo/). So I feel that Chess and Arimaa are in a competition of sorts regarding the effect of multistep moves, and so imo. are Go and Symple. Or that at least is what I hope. A comparison Chess and Go are revered traditional games, Arimaa and Symple are new. Chess and Arimaa use similar polyform sets of pieces on identical boards, Go and Symple use identical uniform sets of pieces on identical boards. Chess and Arimaa are human constructions employing chosen mechanics, Go and Symple are 'organic' mechanisms of which the basic ideas point naturally to their implementation. Chess and Arimaa programs mainly use traditional evaluation and alpha-beta pruning, a method of limited value in Go and (presumably) Symple. Quote:
Go and (presumably) Symple employ Monte-Carlo Tree Search (MCTS), a method of limited value in Chess and Arimaa. Quote:
The advent of MCTS changed it all right. Without it the Havannah challenge would never even have been accepted! The difficulties encountered by the traditional evaluation methods arise in many other games, Symple and Sygo among them. Without MCTS (which does benefit from increased calculation power), attempts to program these games would most likely result in a dead end. Chess and Go have one-step moves, Arimaa and Symple have multistep moves. Is this part of an evolution towards games that elude programming efforts? Chess has about 10^47 legal positions, Arimaa has about 10^43 (promotion makes up for much of the difference). In terms of game-tree complexity however, the number of leaf nodes (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leaf_node) in a full width decision tree, Chess must do with a mere 10^123 where Arimaa scores 10^402 (here (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/the-pit/minimancala-567)'s an example full width decision tree appearing if the mouse is moved over the bare tree). These numbers are taken from Game complexity (wiki) (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Game_complexity) and should be considered with caution. Yet the difference is clear. How about Go and Symple? Go has about 10^170 legal positions and a game-tree complexity of about 10^360. Symple will not differ dramatically in terms of legal positions. That's a finite number. But Go's game-tree is not. Cycles force measures to make it finite, while Symple's game-tree is finite. If we trim a Go tree to 360 ply (just imagine it's finite), then Go has the bulk of the leaf nodes towards the end, while Symple has the same number of possible leaves after 60 ply or so. The tree is far less deep, but of course accordingly wider. What about the game-tree complexity? Quote:
Symple's branching factor is impressive but foggy. Say it's 10^8 (where a player on average has 10 groups and 8 places to grow each one). With an average length of 2x30 moves that would make 10^480. But that's a misleading figure in terms of programmability because the steps in Symple, other than those in Arimaa, can be made irrespective of their order. That makes that the move can be broken down to individual steps without much loss of accuracy. Acknowledgement I've made this comparison for the fun of ordering my thoughts about the similarities in relation between Chess and Arimaa on the one hand, and Go and Symple on the other. In addition I want to direct the attention of the programming community to Symple, rather than to Sygo. Symple can't be simplified, at least not as a multi-step moves game. Its bare-bones character makes it an interesting game for the MCTS programming community. Sygo will eventually get the attention it deserves of its own accord, as Havannah did. And by then I hope the progress made in programming Symple will turn out to be useful. And talking of useful: Useful links Game complexity (wiki) (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Game_complexity) Analysis and Implementation of the Game Arimaa (http://www.unimaas.nl/games/files/msc/Cox_thesis1.pdf) Move Ranking and Evaluation in the Game of Arimaa (http://icosahedral.net/downloads/djwuthesis.pdf) Computer Go - Obstacles to high level performance (wiki) (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Computer_Go#Obstacles_to_high_level_performance) Go and mathematics (wiki) (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Go_and_mathematics) Computer Chess (wiki) (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Computer_chess) |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Aug 9th, 2011, 2:03pm on 08/09/11 at 09:45:19, christianF wrote:
OT - Just commenting on multistep moves in a general sense, not necessarily relating to the "human mind", lol I like multistep moves in attack sequences. But just arbitrarily grouping ordinary moves into multi-move turns is bad architecture. 1. Contrary to popular cluelessness, grouping more moves into less turns does not increase game tree size. 2. In fact, just the opposite effectively happens. Imagine a 60 move game grouped into two 30 move turns. Not much of a game, is it? The more moves per turn, the less interaction. The first 20 moves of your 30 move turn probably wouldn't be real strategic. The order in which they were taken wouldn't matter, a huge redundancy factor, effectively shrinking the game tree. on 08/09/11 at 09:45:19, christianF wrote:
Oh enough with this "Arimaa was constructed" drivel. I construct games. (Flume (http://www.marksteeregames.com/Flume_Go_rules.pdf), Rive (http://www.marksteeregames.com/Rive_rules.pdf)) Arimaa was designed, and rather arbitrarily at that. on 08/09/11 at 09:45:19, christianF wrote:
Oh yeah. Total destiny. You're resting on your Havannah laurels. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Aug 9th, 2011, 2:33pm on 08/05/11 at 14:08:03, MarkSteere wrote:
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Aug 9th, 2011, 2:38pm on 08/09/11 at 14:33:34, christianF wrote:
You said it, not me. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by The_Jeh on Aug 9th, 2011, 2:54pm on 08/09/11 at 14:03:29, MarkSteere wrote:
What makes you think a 60-move game would still take only 60-moves to complete if the number of moves per turn changed? It could be more, it could be fewer, or it could stay the same. Besides, the distinction between "multistep" and "single-step" is superficial. It depends on how the game is perceived. Any "multistep" game can be represented as a "single-step" game having an isomorphic game tree. What matters is the branching factor, not the number of pieces moved per turn in the game's representation. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Aug 9th, 2011, 3:04pm on 08/09/11 at 14:54:26, The_Jeh wrote:
Right, and that's (almost) all I was trying to say. Additionally, in crude, generic, and non-scientific terms (because that's all I've got): All else being equal, which of course it wouldn't be, but... a 60 turn, 60 move game would be a lot richer than an "equivalent" 60 move, two turn game. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Aug 9th, 2011, 3:07pm on 08/09/11 at 09:45:19, christianF wrote:
on 08/09/11 at 14:03:29, MarkSteere wrote:
So that's exactly the implication of what I said, and it follow's a known pattern: presenting common knowledge as "cluefull" as opposed to everybody else's cluelessness, and implying that the poster isn't aware of this or even thinks the opposite. Still Mark, I'm desparately trying to take you serious. Really. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Aug 9th, 2011, 3:08pm on 08/09/11 at 15:07:12, christianF wrote:
Bazinga! ;D |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Aug 9th, 2011, 3:12pm on 08/09/11 at 14:33:34, christianF wrote:
...and just to hopefully discuss abstract games. I can't sugarcoat every point of contention, Christian. There are just too many of them. What are you so testy about? Sygo? on 08/09/11 at 09:45:19, christianF wrote:
The months of interminable Sygo hype would be more convincing if it weren't entirely from you. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Aug 9th, 2011, 3:37pm on 08/09/11 at 15:07:12, christianF wrote:
You have a tendency to direct insults at yourself, Christian. In this case, a rather complex one. I was only commenting on multistep turns in a general, off topic sense, having nothing to do with what you were talking about. A clue might have been the very first thing I said: "OT - Just commenting on multistep moves in a general sense". |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Aug 9th, 2011, 4:17pm on 08/09/11 at 15:37:31, MarkSteere wrote:
Yes and I commented on one of these comments you made on multistep moves in a general sense, in which you were displaying common knowledge as your exclusive insights (as opposed to general cluelessness), and implying that I somehow said the opposite, whereas I said precisely what everyone knows: you press about the same number of positions (though not the exactly same positions) in less plies. But why bother indeed. Consider my missing replies to be "Yes Mark, you've learned me all you could, finite insights rule". |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Aug 9th, 2011, 4:41pm on 08/09/11 at 16:17:41, christianF wrote:
[head spinning] Christian, I pop in on lightheaded breaks in between saxophone practice. I jump on a few grenades and toss a few of my own. There's no malice aforethought, and certainly no sophisticated plots 8) I'm not trying to "catch you in your own web", or anything of that nature. Even if I were so inclined, that'd be way too complicated for me. OT means off topic. I barely read what you wrote, and had zero understanding of it, as usual. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Aug 10th, 2011, 12:33pm on 08/09/11 at 16:17:41, christianF wrote:
I know. It's my fault Sygo's a dud. Christian, I can't make your game a dud. Only you can do that. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Aug 11th, 2011, 7:19am I invite everyone who'd rather judge for themselves to challenge me at mindsports. Just register (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/players-section), tick Sygo in the prefs and choose 'challenge'. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by NickBentley on Aug 11th, 2011, 7:25pm ps Christian: more progress on Glorieta - http://nickbentley.posterous.com/revised-game-glorieta-20 |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Aug 12th, 2011, 3:22am on 08/11/11 at 19:25:14, NickBentley wrote:
About 'chicken' you write: There are two general ways to keep neutral stones from being too close together: 1. Impose a rule limiting how players use neutrals. 2. Create an initial layout of neutrals to ensure a good game. You would clearly prefer (1) but next explain why (2) is better. I agree that fixed neutrals solve the problems regarding clogging and even may become a parameter for the strategy/tactics balance. But you'd still prefer (1), if only ... So 'if the system is sound the rule will be there' may still hold (but it's a rule of thumb of course, no law of the universe). I'm sure the current version would be interesting in terms of gameplay, but I fear you will not lose the nagging feeling that you're missing something. The "YvY" feeling if you like (where I missed that the theme wasn't 'connection' at all). Finally a philosophical point regarding "If there's never a reason to decline, it may as well not be an option". If you remove the "not" it generally speaking sounds more logical to me. I like freedom and options, and dislike restrictions and obligations, especially if they explicitly force me to do something I'd do anyway. It's a philosophers' problem though. Practical people wouldn't care ;) . |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Aug 12th, 2011, 8:08am Christian Freeling - Rendong You : aug6-aug12 : 180-181 (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/players-section/Serve.cgi?file=Sygo1312612566.html) |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by NickBentley on Aug 12th, 2011, 11:02am Quote:
Yeap. Quote:
Probably so. It may be that in some sense, the "system isn't sound". I may be trying to shoehorn something into existence that doesn't want to exist. Loops on hex boards aren't natural, after all. In fact my dream is a symmetrical goals loop game without draws that doesn't require neutrals or any other kind of 'extra'. I still have no idea how to do that. I post Glorieta because it's as close as I've gotten to my ideal so far, and I've done a lot of looking. The gameplay has gotten to a good place, but the design aesthetic isn't completely there. You can be sure I'll keep at it. I have a list of "holy grails", and this design challenge has vexed me for so long that it's made that list. That means I'll be thinking about it either until it's completely solved or I die. For the record, I've never been able to succeed in any challenge from the list. Quote:
This is an interesting question for me. One issue I fret over is how a game's rules will be received by new players. I want to give new players a sense of direction right from the get-go. I'm thinking especially of players who don't think about abstract games all day long. If I provide an option which would never actually be useful to the players, wouldn't it only result in extra confusion and obscure any sense of direction that they might form? This is the thinking the lead to the omission. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Aug 12th, 2011, 12:44pm on 08/12/11 at 11:02:05, NickBentley wrote:
I feel loops are very natural on a hexboard. The problem is that you can't make them if you just say "let's place alternately and see who makes the first loop". Something must be added or taken away and there seems to be little left to take away. It's a challenging idea and that's exactly why I'm not going to think about it. Not succeeding makes it a waste of time, and succeeding would take the ground from under your feet. Benedikt actually pressed me to consider the existence of an essential group penalty game so I don't feel all that guilty for finding it. It would be different in this case. It doesn't seem easy, but it never does till the missing idea emerges. And then, in retrospect, it often seems so easy. Take some time off before you reconsider :) on 08/12/11 at 11:02:05, NickBentley wrote:
Never crossed my mind, but come to think of it, yes, a lot of people are more comfortable with that, I suppose. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by NickBentley on Aug 12th, 2011, 1:04pm Quote:
To the latter possibility: not really. I don't feel much propriety about games any more. If you happen to dream up an answer despite your best efforts not to, I'll be happy just to learn there's an answer. In fact you may be in a good position to provide it, since you've been near this part of design space before. Quote:
Yes, I think I'll go work on some unrelated game ideas. That seems to be the most effective form of "time off" for me. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by NickBentley on Aug 12th, 2011, 3:50pm Christian: I'm reading the "evolution of droughts" essay. It's shaping up to be great! Especially helpful for me, as I know little about this part of design space. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Aug 13th, 2011, 6:28am on 08/12/11 at 13:04:15, NickBentley wrote:
Symple was perceived hexagonally, but soon shifted to square and morphed into Sygo, which is essentially square (diagonal cuts, eye-space and the like). You never know where you may end up. At the same time Sygo has severely reduced my ambitions to go out for anything new in the near future. For the time being I'll be happily resting on my laurels :) on 08/12/11 at 15:50:20, NickBentley wrote:
Americans got stuck in Checkers I think, but of course it's much wider than that. However, it's not exactly 'uncharted', to put it mildly. At the same time Michael Howe recently invented Pommel (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/the-pit/622-pommel), introducing linear capture in a Draughts type game. Ever since I considered the idea of linear movement in Draughts (which after gathering dust for 15 years resulted in the two-minutes invention of Dameo), I had rejected the idea to extend it to capture. Yet Michael found a way to embed it naturally, so there's still some 'space' left :) |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Aug 13th, 2011, 11:11am on 08/13/11 at 06:28:28, christianF wrote:
Sygo is not a laurel. Sygo is an overhyped, bad game. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Aug 13th, 2011, 1:26pm on 08/13/11 at 11:11:41, MarkSteere wrote:
Apparently the things you don't care about now include your credibility. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by SpeedRazor on Aug 13th, 2011, 1:45pm on 08/13/11 at 13:26:04, christianF wrote:
Loki had some? In the Pantheon of the all-time great abstract game design artists, would MSG be mentioned in the first thousand?! Sorry Christian, just absorbing yours and Nick's banter... (This stuff is Golden; the recording of the genesis of games. 'Could you imagine if someone had taken out Leonardo's notes from the trash?...) |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Aug 13th, 2011, 3:02pm Mark Steere wrote: "Sygo is an overhyped, bad game." on 08/13/11 at 13:26:04, christianF wrote:
The Emperor's game. Only those who are honest enough and credible enough can appreciate Sygo. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Aug 13th, 2011, 3:08pm on 08/13/11 at 13:45:12, SpeedRazor wrote:
Who's Loki? on 08/13/11 at 13:45:12, SpeedRazor wrote:
rofl |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Aug 13th, 2011, 3:29pm MSG (http://www.marksteeregames.com/index.html) games were designed for the centuries. Flume (http://www.marksteeregames.com/Flume_Go_rules.pdf) will thrive long after flavor-of-the-month games like Arimaa have been grouped into an obscure, historical footnote. Sygo? An ugly duckling fell out of a tree, landing on a rock. Never had a chance. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Aug 14th, 2011, 2:45am on 08/13/11 at 15:29:04, MarkSteere wrote:
"Michelangelo" (http://groups.google.com/group/rec.games.abstract/browse_thread/thread/7e3a2068abd73910/d14d8affdbd99448?lnk=gst&q=michelangelo#) on 08/13/11 at 15:29:04, MarkSteere wrote:
Note the url: "Flume_Go_rules.pdf". Nowhere at MSG is a similar addition made. What does it mean? It means the global switch from Go to Flume is just a matter of time, and then Go will be a historical footnote. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by SpeedRazor on Aug 14th, 2011, 8:56am on 08/13/11 at 15:08:03, MarkSteere wrote:
Rofl? I love rofls! Especially with butter and syrup. Yum! |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Aug 14th, 2011, 6:18pm on 08/14/11 at 02:45:27, christianF wrote:
"go" is my personal, file naming abbreviation for goban. on 08/14/11 at 02:45:27, christianF wrote:
http://www.marksteeregames.com/Oust_Go_rules.pdf on 08/04/11 at 19:42:26, SpeedRazor wrote:
Compared to Christian? No, you're probably not. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Aug 15th, 2011, 2:11am on 08/14/11 at 18:18:26, MarkSteere wrote:
P.S. Not that Atoll isn't a great game, but it's a bit like Hexdame, isn't it? A good translation of the same rules to a different board, but hardly any independent significance. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Aug 15th, 2011, 9:49am on 08/15/11 at 02:11:57, christianF wrote:
Oh sure, lol. Apart from Atoll's magnificent architecture, they're practically twins. on 08/15/11 at 02:11:57, christianF wrote:
"...that I'm capable of perceiving." Don't look now, but your egocentricity is showing. Atoll is a perfect generalization of Hex to all even segmented boards (>=4). Insignificant to you, perhaps, but most glorious to me. Something I said in rga bears repeating: "I'm not the artist Michelangelo was. I'm not the discoverer Christopher Columbus was. I'm not the scientist Albert Einstein was. But I am the abstract game designer [your name here] will never be." |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Aug 15th, 2011, 10:08am on 08/15/11 at 09:49:25, MarkSteere wrote:
Repeating the obvious doesn't make it more obvious. on 08/15/11 at 09:49:25, MarkSteere wrote:
Yes, Atoll is "Steere scalable" instead of scalable. Most glorious. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Aug 15th, 2011, 11:32am Mark Steere wrote: "I am the abstract game designer [your name here] will never be." on 08/15/11 at 10:08:08, christianF wrote:
It is obvious, yes, but that doesn't stop people from trying. (Bill Taylor, Corey Clark, you,...) There can be only one. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Aug 15th, 2011, 12:25pm on 08/15/11 at 11:32:53, MarkSteere wrote:
"- the last one will receive all the power of all the Immortals who ever lived ..." (Meanwhile life goes on all around you) |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Aug 15th, 2011, 12:41pm on 08/15/11 at 12:25:01, christianF wrote:
Life goes on within me. I've been mulling game ideas over for months. Nothing has passed muster though. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Aug 15th, 2011, 2:05pm on 08/15/11 at 12:41:00, MarkSteere wrote:
Well, you're the one. I've been staring down dead end streets and they're not very inspiring, even less so if you feel you have to surpass yourself while considering that impossible in the first place. That's a b!tch isn't it? I hope you succeed though. Fortunately I've been blissfully vacant lately. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Aug 15th, 2011, 3:05pm on 08/15/11 at 14:05:39, christianF wrote:
Yes, but that's the price you pay if you want to stay in the game. If I shoot 100 arrows at a target, hitting a bullseye with shots 3, 49, and 53, shot 101 will probably not be a bullseye. And shot 101 will seem extra sucky because I've hit bullseyes in the past. But, you never know. Shot 101 might be a bullseye. I can see no reason to strictly rule that out. And even if it isn't a bullseye, so what? |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Aug 15th, 2011, 3:18pm on 08/15/11 at 15:05:04, MarkSteere wrote:
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Aug 15th, 2011, 3:29pm on 08/15/11 at 15:18:48, christianF wrote:
Statistically, my next game will probably just be ignored. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Aug 15th, 2011, 3:46pm on 08/15/11 at 15:29:10, MarkSteere wrote:
Last time I added a couple of ornamental ones specifically for that. Worked great! ;) |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Aug 16th, 2011, 7:40am Benedikt Rosenau, who has stayed out of the debate till now, has come up with what appears to be a splendid handicap system for Symple based on different group penalties. In the same mail he said that he almost felt the game's co-inventor. He's right of course: without him there would have been no Symple and no Sygo (and no Charybdis or Lhexus either for that matter). So we have absolutely no problem with shared copyrights and I've made the corressponding modifications at mindsports. Symple (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/arena/symple/) © Mindsports / Benedikt Rosenau (zickzack "at" gmail.com) |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Aug 16th, 2011, 9:38am on 08/16/11 at 07:40:56, christianF wrote:
Benedikt has agreed to my using our recent correspondence, so I'll start as recently as yesterday with part of his mail: Quote:
Quote:
Quote:
Quote:
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Aug 17th, 2011, 10:48am >Depending on the group penalty set, the tactics differ on how one blocks an opponent worming into your own territory. Yes, that's a truly innovative parameter in the realm of abstract board games, 'scalable tension'. I stand corrected by coincidence. Luis Bolaños Mures posted a new game (http://groups.google.com/group/rec.games.abstract/browse_thread/thread/af9e536c29ab32e2#) at rga and Nick Bentley linked it to one of his called Odd (http://nickbentley.posterous.com/one-of-my-better-games-odd), which turns out to have a 'scalable tension' parameter. Just my luck ;) |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Aug 17th, 2011, 11:22am on 08/17/11 at 10:48:14, christianF wrote:
I give up. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Aug 17th, 2011, 12:55pm on 08/17/11 at 11:22:30, MarkSteere wrote:
Not that I would mind, but it's Odd because it's so Symple: Note: One can change the character of the game by increasing or decreasing the minimum size a group must have in order to be counted at the end. Try minimum sizes 4, [5], 6 or 7. Odd (http://nickbentley.posterous.com/one-of-my-better-games-odd) Note: This parameter P is central to the theme. The applet allows it to be set at 2, 4, 6 ... 32, but values between 4 and 12 would seem to give the most interesting play. The nature of the game's strategy changes with the choice of the parameter. Symple (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/arena/symple/585-symple-rules) |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by NickBentley on Aug 17th, 2011, 4:06pm Doesn't *Star also have a similar thing with its group penalty? http://www.boardgamegeek.com/thread/404644/re-worded-rules Each player gets -2 points for each group he has on the board. I think Ea Ea, the designer, wrote somewhere about changing this number (natch, I can't now find it) Speaking of which, I've never really understood all the weird esoteric details of *Star. I've played a version where you simply get one point for every edge space occupied and -2 points for every group on the board, regardless of whether it touches an edge, and it played great. In fact I enjoyed this simple version more than the original. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Aug 17th, 2011, 5:07pm on 08/17/11 at 16:06:46, NickBentley wrote:
Imo. it was all meddling with a concept that was falsely perceived to be about "groups with certain connections" with a group penalty, Star, *Star, Superstar and YvY alike. This thematic hierarchy of penalizing a set of groups satisfying certain connections kept all these games from reaching the essence of either the group penalty or the connection theme. The latter already knows Y and Hex as quintessential implementations, so at that end it's no surprise. At the 'group penalty' end Symple emerged as the quintessential implementation by abandoning the connection theme ad simply penalizing 'groups'. That made the penalty the central parameter and making it variable was an inevitable step, although it took me some time to realize that. In the other games it was set at 2 or 4 because it could hardly be recognized as the essential variable, the focus being on the connection aspect. The arbitrariness of it was one of the nagging thoughts that made me feel I missed something, the same feeling Benedikt conveyed in his mail that started the whole thing (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/how-i-invented-games-and-why-not/late-arrivals-a-final-whispers#symple). So yes, you could make the penalty variable in Star et all, but it would be the wrong environment, I feel, and the connection aspect would get in the way of clarity. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by GregS on Aug 19th, 2011, 8:15am on 06/27/11 at 12:50:49, MarkSteere wrote:
(I realize I'm coming in late on this thread) I'd just like to mention that I had not planned on performing any computer analysis of Grabber until Christian noticed that during computer vs. computer self-play, the 2nd player was predominantly winning. At that point, we suspected a bug in the program. I searched high and low and could not find any problems and began to suspect that the behavior was inherent in the game. That in turn led to a number of experiments in trying to solve (i.e. exhaustively search) various sized games. The 6x6 indicated a win for 2nd. Solving a game through exhaustive search should remove the AI from the equation and other artifacts such as the order in which the moves are generated. Having done so should also raise the confidence that the behavior is due to the game itself, not it's implementation. Still, there's a nonzero probability that the results are off (and the last thing I would want to do is to draw faulty conclusions about someone else's game based on my own error) , however I've run out of further avenues to explore. About the only thing I can think of at the moment, would be for someone else to independently program the game and attempt to confirm or refute my results. -- Greg |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Aug 19th, 2011, 10:27am on 08/19/11 at 08:15:41, GregS wrote:
Thank you for running the tests. So 6x6 is a second player win. I would have been very surprised indeed if it had been the other way around. Don't worry about faulty conclusions. I'm convinced it's the game. What I don't understand is the why. It seems counterintuitive considering the tempo switches that occur (a simple choice between single or multiple capture with the same piece may imply such a switch). So it's good to realize one's intuition may be totally off the mark. on 08/19/11 at 08:15:41, GregS wrote:
I fear the result would be the same. Thanks again for your efforts, I'll include the provisional conclusions in the Grabber section at mindsports. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Aug 22nd, 2011, 5:58am How about that, another contest. It's called http://farm6.static.flickr.com/5128/5297931680_035aabca03.jpg (http://danielsolisblog.blogspot.com/2010/12/thousand-year-game-design-challenge.html) and it's organized by Daniel Solis (http://danielsolisblog.blogspot.com/p/resume.html) who has quite a few games to his credit himself, this challenge listed among them. The challenge isn't limited to abstracts, in fact it is: Quote:
I've entered Sygo (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/arena/sygo/) and added a game Ed and I were playing at the time as an example game (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/players-section/Serve.cgi?file=Sygo1312612760.html). The game has finished now. Entries are limited to one per contestant and Mark entered Flume (http://www.marksteeregames.com/Flume_Go_rules.pdf) which I consider a good choice. Mark didn't fail to mention that all his games are made for the centuries and that all the other contestants' games may as well be disregarded: Quote:
Which should make it easy for Daniel and his wife ;D . P.S. I'm glad to see that Nick Bentley entered his game Ketchup (http://nickbentley.posterous.com/pages/ketchup). I'd also like to see Luis Bolaños Mures' new game Yodd (http://groups.google.com/group/rec.games.abstract/browse_thread/thread/af9e536c29ab32e2#) in the contest, because it is imo. a connection game of some significance, and some independent significance at that. |
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Title: Starting with Black, players take turns placing on Post by christianF on Aug 22nd, 2011, 11:25am on 08/22/11 at 05:58:57, christianF wrote:
Why beat around the bush. Yodd is played on a hexhex board. Luis mentioned that base-5 would probably be too small so how about this: http://mindsports.nl/images/stories/arena/oust/hexoust_board.gif. Now the beauty. How's this for simplicity, not to mention originality: Rules * Starting with Black, players take turns placing one or two stones of any color on empty cells. On his first turn, Black can only place one stone. * At the end of each turn, there must be an odd number of groups on the board. * Players can pass their turn at any moment, unless it violates the previous rule (this means Black can't pass on his first turn). * When both players pass in succession, the game ends. The player with less groups on the board wins. Draws are not possible. Note that there's no actual counting involved in the 'odd # of groups' rule: just keep it odd. I'll leave it at that, so as not to spoil anyone's fun in trying to figure this one out. P.S. I'm glad to say that Luis did indeed enter Yodd (https://docs.google.com/viewer?a=v&pid=explorer&chrome=true&srcid=0B3gpl2WT8ufWZGQ4ZTVjYTAtY2YwNi00OWRkLWE2ZWItYjA1ZThjNGE5YjI0&hl=en_US&pli=1) in the contest (http://danielsolisblog.blogspot.com/2010/12/thousand-year-game-design-challenge.html). |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by NickBentley on Aug 22nd, 2011, 12:44pm I agree that Yodd a) is a good concept; and b) should be added to the contest. For those interested, I've looked through the entries so far and commented on the ones that caught my eye: http://nickbentley.posterous.com/games-of-interest-from-the-1000-year-game-des |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Aug 22nd, 2011, 1:17pm on 08/22/11 at 12:44:27, NickBentley wrote:
I can't comment on games outside my conceptual framework, but next to the ones mentioned earlier, I particularly like Cartography (https://docs.google.com/viewer?a=v&pid=explorer&chrome=true&srcid=0B9Rkp07Lpl5kZWI1MjlmZjctNzdhNC00YjdjLTkxNTAtYmUxMDQ4ODAyM2Q0&hl=en&authkey=CP-v5sAK&pli=1) by Benjamin Mohr. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Aug 24th, 2011, 10:55am on 08/22/11 at 11:25:08, christianF wrote:
Stavropol Checkers (http://boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/62923/stavropol-checkers) are checkers or colomn checkers variants where players on their turn are allowed to move with either side. You may move opponent's pieces in the same way as he or she would be allowed to move. It's a game that in my experience induces acute schizophrenia. I hadn't seen this protocol in any other game, till now. Misere Checkers (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Misère#Mis.C3.A8re_game), or 'give-away checkers' are variants whereby the object is reversed, leading to a dramatically different strategy. Not my cup of tea either. So if someone had told me about a game that uses the Stavropol protocol (and even extending it to moving with both colors in the same turn), and that has a misere complement (i.e. playing for the most groups) that is in essence identical to the original, I guess I'd have had a hard time believing that. Yet when it happened it didn't take all that much time (though definitely some time) to grasp it. On top of that it is arguably the quintessential 'dynamic goal non-parity connection game', so I think we got an important game here. We'll implement it at mindsports as soon as possible. The rules for Yodd (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/the-pit/yodd-623) are already present. Note that Luis also provided rules for the square version, called Xodd (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/the-pit/xodd-624). |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Aug 26th, 2011, 9:10am These are interesting times, both in the Chinese notion (I've been told that "may you live in interesting times" is a Chinese curse) and in the realm of inventing abstract games, in particular quintessential ones. Quintessential Benedikt Rosenau recently accused me of coining the term ("An insightful term you introduced to ludology"), but I'm not sure I did. Acually I'm still wrestling with its meaning because its less than sharply contoured. Let's try a loose definition. Quote:
Let quintessential in the following mean arguably quintessential, but think in terms of Occam's Razor: all rules should be necessary and sufficient. Although quintessential games are not necessarily the most rewarding to play, they are always interesting and they have a way of surviving all trends and hypes. Here's a list with examples of what I consider quintessential games. Feel free to make further suggestions or to argue against any of the ones listed. Note that "checkmate" isn't a theme that lends itself to a quintessential implementation, whatever the mechanism. Elimination Checkers has elimination as its main theme, but cannot do without the "no legal move" safety net. Its mechanism could be made simpler (by making it both single step and single jump) but time shapes games to give maximum reward in play, not to make them quintessential, and this little deviation of 'most basic' doesn't count (say I ;)) especially in the light of descendants like International Checkers or Shashki, that are about as far away from quintessential as it gets. Focus, invented by Sid Sackson, is quintessential for the mechanism involved. However, the square grid board is effectively a 5-story high octagon which may be considered rather exotic. Oust, invented by Mark Steere, has a most elegant mechanism of placement capture, equally suited for the square and the hexgrid, independent of size or shape of the board. The rules are 'necessary and sufficient' and the game is drawless and finite by nature. A perfect mechanism based example. Emergo, invented yours truly. What can I say? There are five more or less well known games that employ the 'column checkers' mecanism. Bashni is based on the Russian checkers variant Shashki, Lasca is based on Checkers, Stapeldammen is based on International Draughts, Grabber is based on Konane. Emergo is based on nothing but the mechanism and the theme. Territory Go is the quintessential game of single placement and capture by eclosure. It is uniquely suited for the square grid. It's rules are self explanatory and so is its main problem: cycles. Rules to prevent cycles are unwanted necessities, but necessities just the same. It doesn't make a game less quintessential, but it does make it less elegant. Reversi/Othello is the quintessential game of single placement and 'custodian capture by reversal'. A quintessential game with 'capture by enclosure and reversal' doesn't appear to exist, although Sygo comes near. Dots & Boxes, first published in 1889 by Édouard Lucas (of the series), and Flume, invented by Mark Steere, may both be considered quintessential, using the same theme in combination with a mechanism that is named after the first, but more implicitly and elegantly implemented in the second. Symple, invented by yours truly, is quintessential for a territorial theme based on 'group penalty': awarding points to every stone, but substracting a penalty for every group. The accompanying mechanism is an inherent move protocol named after the game. Its descendant Sygo comes very close to being a quintessential territory game of 'capture by enclosure and reversal', but it combines this mechanism with Symple's move protocol, which, however seamlessly, makes it more of a lucky merger than a quintessential game. It relates to Symple much the same way Havannah relates to Hex. Connection Hex (Piet Hein, John Forbes Nash) and Y (Claude Shannon, Craige Schensted, Charles Titus) are quintessential connection games for their specific boards. In contrast, Havannah is a lucky merger. The quintessensial connection game for the hexhex board is as yet elusive, and the square board has a load (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/the-pit/query-548) of connection games, but none of them quintessential. With one notable exception that comes next. Xodd and Yodd, invented by Luis Bolaños Mures, are also quintessential connection games for their specific boards. It's the same game square or hex, independent of size or shape (don't get finicky on me here). It's theme is 'group count' and the freedom of it's 1-2-2 ... move protocol is astonishing, the only restriction being that the total count be odd at all times. Breakthrough/Race In this theme Halma, invented in 1883 or 1884 by George Howard Monks, may be considered quintessential, as may games like Dan Troyka's Breakthrough or Robert Abbot's Epaminondas and doubtless a few others. How many of the above are younger than a century? And how many were invented this century? These are interesting times :D. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by NickBentley on Aug 26th, 2011, 9:42am I nominate Slither by Corey Clark (formerly known as Particle Bond) for quintessential connection game on a square board. http://www.boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/75957/slither http://files.boardgamegeek.com/file/download/7no8v61gje/Slither_by_Corey_Clark.pdf? There have been several equally-simple solutions proposed for the cross-cut problem on square boards, but Slither is the only one that does it with in a way that improves the game. It improves it dramatically, IMO. As a result it's my favorite game of any kind. It's weird because it's more or less my Game-of-the-Century, and yet it doesn't get any more attention than a billion other games. Me no understand. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Aug 26th, 2011, 10:40am on 08/26/11 at 09:42:37, NickBentley wrote:
You very recently mentioned the same somewhere and I had a quick glance at iGGC. It says: * A player may (but is not required to) choose to move one of his stones already on the board to an orthogonally or diagonally adjacent empty intersection. * A player must place a new stone of his color on any empty intersection of the board. After the turn is complete, all of a player's stones that are diagonally adjacent must also be connected orthogonally (otherwise the player's last move is illegal). I read "must also be connected" as an action, not as a position, so I thought ... how? shift them all to points where they are orthogonally connected? And forgot about it. Now I see how I misinterpreted it :P . And now it makes sense. I can see how these two simple rules give birth some very interesting tactics and that strategy in consequence is far from immediatly accessible. Indeed a sorry circumstance that I didn't understand the game earlier. As to being quintessential, it is indeed the simplest implementation of a chosen theme and a chosen mechanism, so yes I agree. But then there may indeed be a couple of others in the list, like Twixt, Crossway, Gonnect or indeed Query. Being quintessential may not be all that uncommon and in any case it's neither necessary nor sufficient to make a game great. It's good you point out we may have missed a great one. I'll put it on the list for mindsports, but we're rather behind on schedule :(. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by NickBentley on Aug 26th, 2011, 10:52am Corey is not the best rules-worder. You should have seen his first draft. The move rule allows connections to break and reform in mysterious, scintillating ways. The other square connection games all feel to me more or less hex-ish, but with an extra rule added on to resolve the crosscut problem. But Slither feels like a whole new thing. It's just...stunning. After I began playing it, I could design games for a while, because it was just like "How will I ever approach THAT?" It's the only game which has ever had that affect on me. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by NickBentley on Aug 26th, 2011, 10:55am *couldn't* design games for a while |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Aug 26th, 2011, 11:34am on 08/26/11 at 10:52:27, NickBentley wrote:
That's very fortunate, I'd hate to see a good inventor fall prey to catatonic worship ;). Slither is the result of merging a clever condition and, for a connection game, a clever move protocol. Combining simple things the right way can on occasion make you strike lucky. And there's an endless supply of new simple things and an endless number of ways they can be combined. So don't worry. By the way, you can modify posts, beats rga :). |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Aug 27th, 2011, 9:49am on 08/26/11 at 09:42:37, NickBentley wrote:
I missed it despite knowing Corey for some time. I misread the rules, and worse, I didn't ask myself why they didn't seem to make sense. Why? I think it's a combination of lazyness and the sheer volume of square connection games. That being remedied, it's not hard for me to see I missed an outstanding game. Actual movement is not a common tool in this type of game and Corey's merging of the modest but flexible king's move with placement brings a combinatorial element to the game that leaves just the right amount of clarity. The true 'find' of the game - simply forbid 'bare' diagonal connections - resembles Luis' solution to the parity problem (just keep it odd) and my moment of insight in the group penalty theme (simply penalize groups, period). Simplification is a strong tool. I feel Flume is simpler than Dots & Boxes, but if someone had asked me whether I thought D&B could be simplified, I'd probably have said no. I tried to bring "checkmate" to its essence and came up with Chad. A year later I stumbled upon Shakti without the intention of finding a chessgame. Life is weird and game inventing isn't an exception :) As to "me no get it", if I miss a game that's right under my nose, players with a less immediate feel for games might just as easily do so. You said it: there's a billion, and it's not grandest theme either. P.S. I've put it in the Pit (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/the-pit/slither-625), part of a growing number of games waiting for an applet. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Aug 27th, 2011, 4:54pm on 08/27/11 at 09:49:20, christianF wrote:
Flume is certainly simpler than Dots and Boxes, though that wasn't the design goal (see below). Flume is lumped in with other "Dots and Boxes games" and rightfully so. I do that too. But... the Flume acorn fell a little farther from the D&B tree. For example, there are no dots in Flume. Or boxes. Flume has simpler rules, a much bigger game tree, and is a distinct game. As well, the long chain parity principle of D&B doesn't translate. on 08/27/11 at 09:49:20, christianF wrote:
I'd have said no too. I've always thought of D&B as a model of simplicity. Flume started out as a hex hex game, just because I happened to be messing around with the hex hex board at the time. The idea was to limit the number of connections you could form with onboard stones (when adding a stone of your own color), irrespective of stone color. This caused walls and tunnels to form, and I said "Hmmmm. This looks like Dots and Boxes." Boom, done. Well, almost. There needed to be a perimeter of green stones to make it work. Experience and (yes) intuition enabled me to clear a hurdle that undoubtedly stopped others before me on a similar path. One final, cynical touch. When I finished the hex hex Flume rule sheet, I wondered how coattail riders (such as Bill Taylor) could run off with my design. "Aha!" I said. "They'll make it square." So I beat them to it. My cynicism paid off because the square version is better. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Aug 28th, 2011, 3:20am on 08/27/11 at 16:54:57, MarkSteere wrote:
In fact it should be "Dotts & Walls". And it allows an example of the kind of question that one should ask in a quest for simplification: "What if the dots doubled as walls?" And that's more or less what you did, although you didn't arrive at it via D&B. On a less than cynical note: one shouldn't need an archenemy to translate any find to different grids ;). In fact I immediately advised Luis to have a close look at the square version of Yodd (while assuming that he had already thought of that) because I had a vague notion that it might be an even better game. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Aug 31st, 2011, 3:51pm Here's a simple stacking game that came up tonight. I've called it "Pyle". Board 8x8 (10x10), 8 (10) white checkers, 8 (10) black checkers. Two players. Player One places all pieces on the board in such a way that every row and every column contains exactly one white man and one black man. Player Two next decides whether he wants to move first, in which case Player One chooses color, or play with a particular color, in which case Player One moves first. Players in turn move one piece. In the game black stacks and white stacks arise, but no mixed stacks. Men and stacks are called pieces. Pieces may never move over other pieces, regardless of color. Pieces may not land on opposing pieces. Pieces may land on pieces of like color, forming stacks. Single men move diagonally. Doubles move orthogonally. Triples move both orthogonally and diagonally. Pieces higher than three may not move. Object: Be the first to make a stack of 8. If both players end up with two stacks of 4 the game is a draw ;) . Three others of my games employ this opening protocol, that allows a player to carefully study both sides of an initial position before presenting his opponent with it: Swish & Squeeze (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/the-pit/553-swish-squeeze) InSight (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/the-pit/insight-575) |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Sep 1st, 2011, 6:40am I've renamed it Pyryx (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/the-pit/626-pylyx) and it's in the Pit (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/the-pit/) now. I've added a few lines on strategy. How did I invent it? I was thinking about games, because of the 1000-year challenge (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/how-i-invented-games-and-why-not/late-arrivals-a-final-whispers#pylyx). As Clapton once said: "just to keep my hand in shape" :) . |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Sep 1st, 2011, 9:37am I'm open to criticism and Phil Carmody had some at rga. Quote:
To which my answer was two-fold: Quote:
But also: Quote:
This should counteract Phil's sense of stalemate without affecting the game's basic simplicity. It may not solve every conceivable stalemate, in particular the intentional blocking of a piece 'all around'. You'd need three pieces to block one in a corner, but then of course you have to get one in a corner first, and who would go there voluntary? Or choose an initial position with a 'blockable' piece in the corner? So you'd need more, say 5 pieces to block a piece on the edge. That would not seem all that easy either. Moreover it can only be tried as an intentional draw strategy. So I'd say the jury is open on the drawishness of the mechanism. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Sep 1st, 2011, 9:56am on 09/01/11 at 09:37:08, christianF wrote:
Who are you, and what have you done with the real Christian Freeling? |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Sep 1st, 2011, 10:02am on 09/01/11 at 09:56:48, MarkSteere wrote:
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by Sconibulus on Sep 1st, 2011, 10:04am Having the ability to split stacks would almost guarantee cycles, it seems to me. Have you considered upping the number of pieces on the board per side to about twelve, so that a solitary trapped piece doesn't necessarily mean that you can't win? I think this would probably end up making the game quicker, more frenetic, and more tactical, but that's not necessarily a bad thing. Nick: Have you considered an empty board, and allowing, instead of a placing move, a singleton of your colour to move to an adjacent square, potentially combining with another singleton of any colour. If there exists a double containing both colours, that piece behaves as a neutral. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Sep 1st, 2011, 10:26am on 09/01/11 at 10:04:08, Sconibulus wrote:
By the way, please look again at About Symple (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/arena/symple/586-about-symple). The balancing rule simply offers both players a tade-off between the move advantage and a limited amount of growth. It was poorly worded and that may have led to your interpretation (not to mention Mark's vehement attempts at ridicule). In actual play it works - attention Mark ;) - perfectly. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by Sconibulus on Sep 1st, 2011, 10:45am It seems like it'd only take four pieces to block a piece on the edge, if splitting is allowed, which frees the other four to get in a position to win. If you have two doubles sitting on, let's say c2 and e2 with a singleton trapped on d1 whenever a rescue is threatened by a double the piece can split to b1, d3, or f1. A treble could go to rescue, thinking to penetrate the pyramid then split, I think that a portion of it could always remain trapped. This would also leave open a fairly straightforward combination if they could bring other doubles to the area, say for example d2 and d3. This seems like a strategy that's fairly likely to work pretty well, but might also lead to cycles s the opponent tries to rescue the piece and your blocking maneuver is practically forced. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Sep 1st, 2011, 10:57am on 09/01/11 at 10:45:15, Sconibulus wrote:
You may be right, let me sleep on it. Suggestions are welcome, but it's easy come easy go. Anything less than simple (in particular rules that "wear their intent on their sleeves") isn't worth it. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Sep 1st, 2011, 12:26pm on 09/01/11 at 10:45:15, Sconibulus wrote:
Sleeping on it takes too long, but a walk with the dogs made me reconsider your example. Not only the 'blocker' gets extra flexibility by the option to split stacks, the 'liberator' also profits. Consider, in your example, the diagonals intersecting at D2. A single on both of them, or two singles on either, or a double on either, would all allow the liberator to get a double on D2 in two moves. Move it to D1 and escape with a triple seems a good plan. Meanwhile the blocker is unlikely to be constructive in his own right, being occupied with blocking and all. The only thing I hate to lose is the commitment that was implied in building a 3-plus stack in the version without the split option. Of course the rule could be that a 3-plus stack, apart from being the final destination, is out of the game, but that would in the current rules mean an extra rule. As it is the game keeps its basic simplicity, and there's a strong incentive to build where you're high already, so if it's no absulute commitment, it's at least a strong declaration of intent. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Sep 7th, 2011, 9:22am The initial position: the 'Marquisian Method' The Marquisian Method to balance a game is named after a 19th century French Draughts player who made money by offering opponents a similar choice in a particularly nasty endgame of which he knew every nook and cranny, and betting on the outcome. The main characteristic of the method is that it allows the player who makes the initial position, to present an in-deep studied piece of homework. It is therefore not a true balancing method, yet it takes that form in games between less experienced players. In the case of more experienced players, the fun for Player Two is to figure out the nasty tricks his opponent has woven into the position, and try to let him fall into his own traps. Games employing the Marquisian Method are Pylyx (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/the-pit/626-pylyx), InSight (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/the-pit/insight-575) and the twin games Swish & Squeeze (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/the-pit/553-swish-squeeze). There was some discussion about Pylyx's opening protocol at rga, in particular: did it have a name? Not that I know of, so I've coined it the "Marquisian Method", and added this short explanation to the rules of the games mentioned. Concerning Pylyx, I felt that a player bend on it, and given a chance, might try to wall in a single on the edge completely. Not that it would be in the game's spirit, nor that it would be easy, but if it can happen it will happen, so I've solved the problem by adding a 'sidebar' of ten squares to each edge, that are excluded from the initial set-up, but included in the playing area. http://mindsports.nl/images/stories/sidedishes/moregamesbycf/pylyx_d01.gif In the case of "the position of the Marquis", the main character presented a position of which he knew the truth. If he landed on the 'good side' he would have a win, while on the losing side, he would trust his opponent to fall for one of the many traps the position harbored. In the games employing the method, "the truth" will not be known to either player. That's the basis of the method's effectiveness as a balancing mechanism. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Sep 8th, 2011, 7:14pm on 09/07/11 at 09:22:32, christianF wrote:
This sounds like the refuse given to hogs. No apples, therefore oranges. How does "hidden truth", whatever that even means, imply any sort of balance? Neither player having a clue when to exercise his option is a recipe for poor clarity, not balance - if such a thing could even exist in an abstract game independent of board size, which it couldn't. Consider for comparison Hex with pie. For a given skill level, including understanding pie and having knowledge of highly equitable starting moves, second turn advantage will converge to (effectively) zero with increasing board size. Nothing hidden yet perfectly balanced. Now contrast your game. Something hidden and no evidence of balance. It would be well within the realm of the ordinary for a game to have a hidden yet powerful turn order advantage. You've "discovered" some sort of nonsensical correlation between hidden things and balance. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Sep 9th, 2011, 12:08pm Symple (http://www.boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/106341/symple) and Sygo (http://www.boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/106350/sygo) have been listed at BGG, courtesy if Benedikt Rosenau. on 09/08/11 at 19:14:29, MarkSteere wrote:
As usual when it comes to simple facts, you're clueless. Zermelo's theorem states that every abstract two-player perfect-information zero-sum game is completely determined. What does that mean? It means that the truth - in terms of win/lose or draw - for every legal position (including an initial position) is an estabished fact. We may not know it, but nothing we can do will change the result if we ever were to actually find it. That's why Schaeffer et al could announce "Checkers is a draw". Theoretically the truth of a position can be arrived at via a simple algorithm (but "infinitely lenghty" and therefore useless in all but the simplest games). First draw the entire game tree: http://mindsports.nl/images/stories/sidedishes/moregamesbycf/networkmm0.gif This one is of MiniMancala (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/the-pit/minimancala-567), a game small enough to actually finish the algorithm. Small enough too, to add the rules here: The board consists of two rows of two 'pits'. There are two players, north and south. Each player controls the two pits on his side. In the initial position each pit contains two beads. Any player starts. Players move - and must move - in turn. On his turn a player selects one of his own pits, takes out all beads, and distributes them one by one in a counter-clockwise direction over the other three pits. If the pit contains more than three beads, the fourth (seventh) falls in the same pit as the first. If a player on his turn finds both his pits empty, he has lost. You see the initial position at the top. 'Moves' exit left and right and enter at the top of the resulting position. After you've finished you find all leaves, position from which no move exits. There are two leaves in this tree: these you know the 'truth' of. From there you start coloring backwards: winning move green, losing move red, draw move blue: http://mindsports.nl/images/stories/sidedishes/moregamesbycf/networkmm1.gif The pulsating loop is the draw cycle. Now you know the truth of every position, and all strategy, and all tactics, are reduced to: * If you see a green exit, choose green * If you see no green exit, choose blue * If you see no blue exit either, you're screwed. So that's the truth I'm talking about. But I use 'truth' also in a less formal matter, so don't get confused ;) on 09/08/11 at 19:14:29, MarkSteere wrote:
Again, when it comes to simple facts, you're clueless. Did you really consider what I wrote? If so you'd have discovered that of the three games I mention, one actually doen't employ it. Others may have noticed it (but were too polite to mention it, I presume) but InSight (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/the-pit/insight-575) uses an extended pie, not the 'Marquis'. The difference is that in InSight, the side to move in any initial position is Black. So the second player chooses to be Black, and move, or to be White. That being said, Pylyx and the Swish/Squeeze indeed employ the Marquisian Method. It's not all that different, and we may even consider an extended pie for both, because the Marquis is less easily implemented in an applet. Use a pie in Pylyx and Player One presents a similar initial position, only now with white to move. Now Player Two can choose to move first, and know he consequently plays white. In the Marquis he can choose to move first, but he doesn't know yet which color he will play. On another note: I used it in Swish/Squeeze, and I can assure you that these have been playtested extensively at Fanaat, because they were comfortably short and interesting games between to fill the waiting periods between larger multiplayer games. Nothing wrong with the balancing mechanism. It has nothing "hidden" - whatever are you talking about? - and Player One will have to present a position that is not clearly advantageous to one player, because then Player Two will obviously choose that color despite moving second. So it's tricky, but it is definitely an effective balancing mechanism. If you don't believe it, try it. Finally, the 19th French Draughts player had a famous position as I described. Of this position he knew the entire truth (as described above: complete knowledge of a sub game), and his trickery was based on this knowledge. That's different with positions we can devise in Pylyx. What part of that do you not understand? I made a simple game for people to enjoy, I hope you don't mind. I can assure you it is interesting enough despite the fact that it doesn't meet your criteria. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Sep 9th, 2011, 1:17pm on 09/09/11 at 12:08:59, christianF wrote:
Not just any barrel of red herrings. A pulsating barrel of red herrings, lol I must have touched a nerve. Christian, the months are turning into years and you're still not fooling anyone. Don't you think it's about time to roll up your threadbare magic carpet? |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Sep 9th, 2011, 2:25pm on 09/09/11 at 13:17:58, MarkSteere wrote:
You asked about what I meant with the 'truth hidden in the game tree'. I explained what I meant by it. You answer with ridicule because you can only answer with ridicule. Repetition doesn't exactly make it more meaningful, if it ever is in the first place. Now go invent something brilliant and be vocal about it, or blow a saxophone, or take a ride. I'm not worth the trouble. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Sep 9th, 2011, 5:02pm on 09/09/11 at 14:25:15, christianF wrote:
I asked you how hidden truth causes balance. on 09/09/11 at 14:25:15, christianF wrote:
You answer with red herrings because you can only answer with red herrings. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Sep 13th, 2011, 1:39pm Science is not a carefully worded statement, endlessly quoted and alluded to, month after month, year after year. Science is a dialog. In science, you create a hypothesis and support it with evidence, theoretical or empirical. People challenge your hypothesis. You defend your hypothesis. In your case, Christian, you make a claim, totally unsupported with evidence of any kind. When the inevitable challenges to your claim arise, you make no effort to intelligently defend your claim. Instead you attack. You dismiss all challenges as "ridicule" - a plot to discredit you. People who challenge your claims are themselves non-credible. That isn't science, Christian. That's paranoia. When you respond to a challenge with "How do I get rid of you?", can you see how that would impact the credence of your claim? |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Sep 13th, 2011, 3:34pm on 09/13/11 at 13:39:55, MarkSteere wrote:
One last time: what, according to you, is my claim? Please be as concise and to the point as possible. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Sep 13th, 2011, 5:11pm on 09/13/11 at 15:34:35, christianF wrote:
on 09/07/11 at 09:22:32, christianF wrote:
Was that concise enough? Can you explain how not knowing perfect play, including who wins on any particular turn, forms "the basis of the method's effectiveness as a balancing mechanism"? No more red herrings, Christian. No more pulsating loops. Present evidence that your "balancing mechanism" does anything of the sort. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Sep 14th, 2011, 9:52am I hear the hills are nice this time of year. Don't forget TP. Christian: "Where are the hills? Please be as precise as possible." |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Sep 14th, 2011, 12:45pm on 09/14/11 at 09:52:17, MarkSteere wrote:
See, that's what I mean. Not a moment did I anticipate a straight answer. You've made yourself ridiculous by being the last to recognize the working of the balancing rule in Symple, and incapable of admitting to it. I made a simple claim regarding Symple: Quote:
If you disagree, please argue one way or the other or leave it alone. Since you can't do the first, I suggest the latter. I must smell intoxicatingly delicious from my a-ss because you follow it everywhere, and I can't even place a comment anywhere without you breaking in with distracting and uncalled for nonsense. Like a dog. Your crititicism isn't worth a dime and it's invariably destructive. You've bothered me with 'refuting' a claim you made up yourself, for almost a year now. Whatever makes it so important is a mystery to me but your cowardly mentality interferes deplorable with any constructive dialogue. Thanks for sharing your thoughts, but endless repetition doesn't make them any more interesting. Consider me to unimportant to comment on. Please. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Sep 14th, 2011, 1:45pm on 09/14/11 at 12:45:38, christianF wrote:
I gave you a straight answer, Christian. You asked me what your claim was, and I told you, three posts before this one. Scroll up. I asked you to explain your claim, which request you promptly ignored. on 09/14/11 at 12:45:38, christianF wrote:
Yes, I disagree, Christian. And I did argue against your statement in rec.games.abstract. In response, you fled the group for a few weeks and pretended not to notice my argument on your return. Bottom line: Either Player 1 or Player 2 will never have the option to "trade turn order advantage against limited growth" because he will never have the advantage to trade with. Your statement is utterly absurd and unbelievably ridiculous. on 09/14/11 at 12:45:38, christianF wrote:
I know, Christian. I'm the villainous Ridiculer, foiling my opponents by incessantly ridiculing them until they become despondent. on 09/14/11 at 12:45:38, christianF wrote:
I consider you worthwhile, Christian. You're a notable designer and you're perpetrating fraud on our shared audience. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Sep 14th, 2011, 2:20pm on 09/14/11 at 13:45:01, MarkSteere wrote:
If you had turn order advantage on any particular turn (and you had some way of knowing that) you sure wouldn't trade it for anything, such as "limited growth". Nothing in a game is worth more than turn order advantage. To assume otherwise would be phenomenally absurd. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Sep 14th, 2011, 6:46pm on 09/14/11 at 12:45:38, christianF wrote:
That seems like a fair assessment. Christian, I look at your "balancing" mechanism and it has "unbalanced" written all over it. Mainly, it's unequal goals. That jumps out at me like a beer can tossed onto my front lawn by a passerby. You've created an oddball sente/gote apparatus that you wishfully believe is a balancing mechanism. What you've really got, at best, is a game salvaging mechanism - a very kludgy game salvaging mechanism. It's an unbalanced Hiroshima - an aesthetic Armageddon that torched one half of the city worse than the other half. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by Sconibulus on Sep 15th, 2011, 10:40am on 09/14/11 at 14:20:04, MarkSteere wrote:
Nothing in a game is worth more than turn order advantage? Several of our players will be glad to hear it, and see your evidence. Here we all were thinking it'd take years, probably decades to wrinkle out a color advantage. (assuming your most recent post is directed at the most recent game, rather than another comment on Symple) On a different note, how is this type of setup step in a movement game practically any different than a pie rule in a placement game? |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Sep 15th, 2011, 11:44am on 09/15/11 at 10:40:59, Sconibulus wrote:
It's a question of semantics. With TOA, you're winning simply because it's your turn (or not your turn). TOA is usually evaluated for the first turn of a game, such as Hex with pie, but TOA can be considered on any turn. You're playing Game X, it's your turn, and you're winning. You have the advantage. What else do you want? on 09/15/11 at 10:40:59, Sconibulus wrote:
The pie rule works. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Sep 18th, 2011, 11:02am Got a strange letter, postmarked "The Hills". All it says is, "You're a coward!" [Three weeks from now] Christian: "As I was saying, the real beauty of my mechanism is players being blind to the 'truth'. This causes balance to take place...." |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Sep 28th, 2011, 1:27pm Luis Bolaños Mures' game Yodd (http://groups.google.com/group/rec.games.abstract/browse_thread/thread/af9e536c29ab32e2#) can now be played at mindsports.nl (Player Section, prefs). |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Oct 1st, 2011, 12:04pm Don't worry :'( Be happy :D |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Oct 2nd, 2011, 4:54pm Players are blind to the "truth", as defined by Christian, in every game. In Hex with pie for example, the best starting moves have been catalogued for various board sizes, so you do know the truth, that Player 2 has the advantage, for the first two turns. Depending on the quality of Player 2's first move (which may be simply invoking pie) Player 2 could lose his advantage immediately. Unless you have a catalogue of first and second moves in Hex with pie, players are blind to the truth after the second turn. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Oct 3rd, 2011, 12:27pm There is a relationship between balance and hidden truth (i.e., the truth of which player currently has the advantage). Balance hides the truth. Not the other way around, Christian. Hidden truth doesn't cause anything, never mind balance. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Oct 4th, 2011, 9:43am We've had the most glorious indian summer in the Netherlands, with the heat record for the warmest october day since measurements began. And it lasted for almost two weeks. I've taken my leisure, sitting in the sun in front of the house most of the day, with Kobus for an excuse. Basking in natural light stimulates his vitamin production and besides, he likes it. He's slithering in the enclosure in front of my house, surrounded by a 1 m. high wooden fence. Not exactly an obstacle for a 4 m. burmese of 30 k. http://i53.tinypic.com/2z65dgo.jpg Mindful of dogs, cats, children and the like, I can't leave him unguarded. But he's a nice conversational item for whoever passes by, and the children love him, from a safe distance. The most unusual thing happened. I lost all my belongings in the 2000 SE Fireworks disaster in Enschede (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Enschede_fireworks_disaster), including genealogy documents (both copies of originals and digital ones) going back to a wedding of an ancestor in Amsterdam, 1691, and lines leading to the source of the name Freeling (named after a region around Brugge, Belgium, called the "Vrije" from which the "Vrijelingen" fled north to avoid the Spanish revenge after the Union of Utrecht (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Union_of_Utrecht) had taken place). Anyway, all gone, all gone, all gone ... or so I thought. But while cleaning the house before it was beyond the attempt, I stumbled over a dusty pack of CD roms that came, obviously, from Ed, while reinstalling stuff months after the disaster. One of them contained a complete back-up of all data, including filenumbers and locations of all relevant documents, and the complete ancestry and decendancy as far as I had figured it out, in a program called Gene, running under Mac OS9. I still can run OS9 :) All there, all there, all there, imagine that. Then it occured to me that I was actually bored stiff playing the game inventor. So I quit. I'll keep playing of course, and I look forward to the 2012 challenge. I'll also post houshold messages, such as that Jump Sturdy (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/the-pit/jumpsturdy-576) will shortly be available at mindsports. More games will be made available by and by. I had one concept under consideration that I will try to complete, but not right now. Luis and Nick have seen a provisional implementation, and Luis confirmed my suspicion: it's not entirely what I am looking for yet, but the idea is worth to let it mature and reconsider later. Much later as far as I can see now. So, it was fun while it lasted, bye for now :) http://i53.tinypic.com/acxwdt.jpg |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by rbarreira on Oct 4th, 2011, 1:19pm on 10/04/11 at 09:43:08, christianF wrote:
Well let's hope you don't happen to faint while it's free and leave it a chance to escape... |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Oct 4th, 2011, 1:41pm on 10/04/11 at 09:43:08, christianF wrote:
No worries. See you in a couple weeks. http://www.marksteeregames.com/pictures/saxpic1.jpg |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Oct 4th, 2011, 3:02pm on 10/04/11 at 13:19:43, rbarreira wrote:
http://i55.tinypic.com/2s7cdo8.jpg No-one ever fainted, although a slightly hysterical woman considered it for a moment, a couple of days ago. But other than the usual escapees, Kobus is well known and respected in the street where I live. He's lived here for seven years now and all neighbors know he's kind of hard to miss and easy to handle. Anyone could do it, although not anyone would :) . The danger isn't so much him getting out, and I actually let him sometimes, usually to return to his room. http://i34.tinypic.com/259bn8y.jpg The danger is more like a cat jumping in. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Oct 6th, 2011, 9:53am The first Jump Sturdy game (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/players-section/Serve.cgi?file=JumpSturdy1317829176.html) We're not exactly head of the pack, appletwise, but Jump Sturdy will be the first of our applets to detect a formally won position and terminate the game automatically (because the criterion isn't all that difficult). Other applets will follow by and by, depending on the complexity of establishing a formal win. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by qswanger on Oct 7th, 2011, 9:36am After seeing all of these pics of snakes I'm reminded to ask Christian what he thinks of the relatively new game "Slither". It's been on iggamecenter for a while now and was just recently implemented on LittleGolem. I quite like it. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Oct 7th, 2011, 11:14am on 10/07/11 at 09:36:36, qswanger wrote:
That's a great game. When I first encountered it (as 'Particle Bond'), I misinterpreted the rules and filed it mentally as a dime a dozen square connection game (see a collection of those at my own dime a dozen game Query (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/the-pit/query-548)). Then it became Slither, which is quite an improvement in itself, and Nick Bentley started flooding it with enthousiastic comments. So I considered it more carefully and saw the solution to the diagonal cross problem by a simple rule that in itself achieves much more than solving that particular problem. It creates a path for clever tactics and deep strategic planning. Brilliant indeed in its simplicity! We feature it at mindsports (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/the-pit/slither-625) but it is still awaiting an applet. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Oct 7th, 2011, 12:52pm on 10/07/11 at 11:14:14, christianF wrote:
I like Slither too. Good architecture. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Oct 7th, 2011, 1:12pm My own solution to the diagonal cross problem is the most elegant. In Crossway (http://www.marksteeregames.com/Crossway_rules.pdf), players are simply precluded from crossing the same point. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by qswanger on Oct 7th, 2011, 1:25pm Hi Mark, I remember reading the rules of Crossway quite some time ago, but I have not had the opportunity to play it yet. Whether or not it is "the most elegant" solution to the diagonal cross problem, I'm not so sure. To my mind (which likes things to be simple) I think only having to look at and worry about the positioning of my own stones when determining if a move is legal or not is simpler than having to look at both mine and my opponents stones to see if the combination of the two would preclude a placement. I don't know if simple is the same thing as elegant and I'm definitely not saying (and can't say at the moment) whether one game is better than the other. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Oct 7th, 2011, 1:52pm on 10/07/11 at 13:25:48, qswanger wrote:
It isn't, but in the context of solving a long standing problem, simple goes a long way toward elegant. No solution could be simpler than Crossway (http://www.marksteeregames.com/Crossway_rules.pdf). |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by qswanger on Oct 7th, 2011, 3:20pm I wonder if there is an objective definition of "simple", or whether at least a component of the definition of "simple" is subjective. To my mind saying that there can be no diagonal only connections between any pair of stones in Slither is simpler than saying there can never be any crosscuts in Crossway because the condition you check for to determine the legality of your move in Slither involves only checking one's own stones, not also that of your opponent's as in Crossway. True there is the optional 1-space slide move before you make your mandatory stone placement, which does add an extra rule, but with the addition of this extra rule I am not sure that it makes for a less elegant solution. I'll make a guess and say that sometimes two simple rules in one game can add up to be simpler overall than a single rule in another game if that single rule requires condition checking that is less intuitive than either of the other two in the other game. Know what I mean? What's intuitive for one person maybe is not so much for someone else. So perhaps there is no clear, uniform, objective definition of "simple". I will just have to try Crossway to know for sure for me, but as of right now checking the state of one's own color stones is twice as easy/simple as checking the state of two players' stones. I want to say that my intent is not to inflame anyone here. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Oct 7th, 2011, 4:03pm on 10/07/11 at 15:20:24, qswanger wrote:
lol, Ya' don't say. That's twice rules of Crossway (http://www.marksteeregames.com/Crossway_rules.pdf). Crossway is simpler than Slither, your semantic argument notwithstanding. Crossway has a simpler rule set, no matter how you word it. on 10/07/11 at 15:20:24, qswanger wrote:
I am. As a solution to the so called diagonal cross problem, a simple solution is an elegant solution. Crossway is about as simple as a game can be, exceeded in simplicity only by the likes of Hex. Not Slither. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by qswanger on Oct 7th, 2011, 6:12pm Well, that settles that. I'm still not any closer to understanding what "simple" means. :( I would love to hear your definition. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Oct 7th, 2011, 6:58pm on 10/07/11 at 18:12:07, qswanger wrote:
Not complicated, as with extra rules. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Oct 8th, 2011, 5:22am on 10/07/11 at 15:20:24, qswanger wrote:
I do :) For one you don't consider a slide and next go looking for a place to put your stone. It's combinations of the two you consider, within the strategic framework of any particular game. Corey's find is an extremely lucky merger that he doubtlessly induced by careful reflection on a number of mechanisms suited for the general theme. The theme isn't all that exceptional, but when this particular combination appeared in his mind, he must have realized that it gave rise to much more than just the solution to the cross cut problem. That must have been an enlightning moment! |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Oct 10th, 2011, 7:10pm I happened to notice the Havannah (http://www.mindsports.nl/index.php/arena/havannah) announcement on Ludoteka (http://www.ludoteka.com/games.html), Christian. Congrats :) That's an awesome site, albeit in Spanish, mainly. If I had a game there, I'd probably learn Spanish. Se habla? |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Oct 11th, 2011, 1:34pm on 10/10/11 at 19:10:21, MarkSteere wrote:
Ludoteka (http://www.ludoteka.com/games.html) just got more awesome. Cephalopod (http://www.marksteeregames.com/Cephalopod_rules.pdf) is now played there. I flew through my first couple of games. Move updates are lightning fast. The wait for opponents is mere seconds. The years pass and you see how your games fare in the world. Cephalopod (http://www.marksteeregames.com/Cephalopod_rules.pdf) is rock solid - a favorite of players, game site programmers, and AI programmers. Tiempo para aprender español ;) |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Oct 11th, 2011, 6:21pm on 10/08/11 at 05:22:36, christianF wrote:
Certainly luck played a role, but it takes more than a song and a prayer. It takes talent. Corey tossed the playbook out the window and invented an original connection game. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Oct 13th, 2011, 8:13pm Cephalopod (http://www.marksteeregames.com/Cephalopod_rules.pdf) is played almost continuously at Ludoteka (http://www.ludoteka.com/games.html), usually in a continuous series of lightning fast rounds. Like popcorn popping. I watched two players play Cephalopod non-stop for three hours while I practiced my saxophone. It was phenomenal and beautiful. Here was this awkwardly named, awkward game I invented five years ago come to life in the form of giant popping dice across the room on a laptop screen. This is where real real time makes a difference. Of course, for the magic to happen, you need a decent Internet connection. But if you live in 2011 and have a job, this shouldn't be an obstacle. There are usually only one or two Cephalopod boards going at once at this stage. Cephalopod's rise to prominence at Ludoteka will be an awesome spectacle. The opening page clearly shows how many people are currently playing each game. It's simply a matter of time. Cephalopod is addictive in the right setting. The real real time, huge player pool at Ludoteka is the right setting. It should be noted that most of the players learn by playing. It should also be noted that that's ok. They're up on speed and down on boring rule sheets. But Cephalopod is simple enough that, with a little guidance, you can just about figure it out. In a year there will be a handful of players who can annihilate you while investing no time in their moves. In two years there will be more. Cephalopod is a special game. That's undeniable. But it needs the right setting, as I said. It's funny the power the game site programmers have. The guardians of the gate. We need them but they need us too. What would they have without designers? Backgammon. Italian [bleeping] Checkers. Tie me down. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Oct 14th, 2011, 7:40pm I thought I saw Havannah being played at Ludoteka, but it turned out to be Havanian Tute, lol What are the odds? Not to gloat, but I just spent 19 years being snubbed, condescended to, dismissed, ignored, and denigrated - most recently by a certain person. My architecture-centric design approach is routinely derided. Enter Cephalopod, marvel of modern game architecture, pitched into a death arena to fend for itself. The impassioned court of public opinion - exactly what said certain person has always pined for. Imagine my pride of craftsmanship, watching Cephalopod hit the ground kicking butt and taking names. An event is unfolding of utmost significance - maybe not to said certain person, but to me. The skill levels in Cephalopod are advancing much more rapidly at Ludoteka than I had anticipated. It'll be weeks, not years, before a cadre of lightning fast, invincible (except to each other) players forms. Architecture is real. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Oct 16th, 2011, 11:31am The epic battle between architecture and intuition rages on at Ludoteka. In a historic turning point, Cephalopod buried Havannnah up to its neck in a cornfield and ran over it with a flail shredder. Now Cephalopod is rigging a wire from the tractor to the Havannah carcass to jerk it out of the earth. Stay tuned..... |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by NJames on Oct 16th, 2011, 2:25pm on 10/14/11 at 19:40:10, MarkSteere wrote:
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Oct 18th, 2011, 3:16pm Cephalopod (http://www.marksteeregames.com/Cephalopod_rules.pdf) is now firmly rooted at Ludoteka (http://www.ludoteka.com/games.html), and it's growing. It isn't coming down off a puny, novelty surge. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Oct 19th, 2011, 4:55pm Cephalopod (http://www.marksteeregames.com/Cephalopod_rules.pdf) addiction is now epidemic at Ludoteka (http://www.ludoteka.com/games.html). I played two lightning rounds with a lady, each of us winning one, and then I tried to leave for lunch. "Tenqo que ir," I said, and left the game. Immediately there was a personal challenge popup before me. I declined it but it was immediately followed by two more. I accepted the third one because I could see she was jonesing. I walloped her and she disappeared, apparently satisfied. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Oct 21st, 2011, 8:36pm What happened to Cage (http://www.marksteeregames.com/Cage_rules.html) and Monkey Queen (http://www.marksteeregames.com/Monkey_Queen_rules.html) at MindSports (http://www.mindsports.nl/)? I thought it was all about the games. It was the 11 months of holy grailish hint-claims, Christian. Nothing more. I wasn't the only one fed up with the incessant Sygobabble. It was out of control. Just for comparison, several people have marvelled at the ingenuity of Corey Clark's Slither. Slither is a real phenomenon. It isn't Corey Clark self-marvelling. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Oct 22nd, 2011, 1:36am It took a while for people to warm up to Slither. Some, including myself, found it interesting right away. Others, including Christian, did not. Generally, I think it's a good thing if it takes a while. I'd rather hear thoughtful, reflective opinions formed over time than instantaneous ones. It also takes time for intelligent people to happen along and discover your game. Oust didn't really take off strategically until Rod Jackson led the way. If the hoards fall in love with a game while they're tearing off the shrink wrap, then it's probably something asinine like Tamsk. No offense to the designer of Tamsk, but let's face it.... |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Oct 22nd, 2011, 6:56am on 10/22/11 at 01:36:54, MarkSteere wrote:
Slither=Particle Bond, Jackspritz=Corey Clark (http://groups.google.com/group/rec.games.abstract/browse_thread/thread/7e3a2068abd73910/cabae265d6e6ab3e?lnk=gst&q=likes+of+particle+bond#cabae265d6e6ab3e) |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Oct 22nd, 2011, 8:29am As for household messages, we've removed three games from mindsports. Monkey Queen was included to help facilitate a level playing field for a contest, not because it is a good game (it's a good concept though). For the enthusiasts, it can be played at iGGC. Cage was included to show something draughtslike, and drawless and finite and all, that has nothing whatsoever to do with Draughts. That's a silly reason. Pommel was included because it is an interesting hexagonal Draughts variant with two novelties: linear capture by leaping and compulsory alignment by captains (kings). However, to our regret the inventor decided to withdraw it. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Oct 22nd, 2011, 12:32pm on 10/22/11 at 08:29:40, christianF wrote:
Michael succumbed to his own guilt after running off with Mad Bishops (http://www.marksteeregames.com/Mad_Bishops_rules.pdf). I'm getting a pinched nerve from all the coattail riders. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Nov 14th, 2011, 6:50am on 10/22/11 at 08:29:40, christianF wrote:
Well ... no more. Fortunately the inventor decided to reverse his decision, so Pommel is relisted (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/the-pit/pommel-628) at mindsports. An applet is still in the pipeline. Following a suggestion made by Pascal Huybers, a dutch Go player, the applets of Symple and Sygo now highlight the last move made. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Nov 17th, 2011, 5:21am The 16th Computer Olympiad (http://www.grappa.univ-lille3.fr/icga/event.php?id=43) will start tomorrow in Tilburg, the Netherlands. Three Havannah bots will participate, Timo Ewald's 'Castro', Richard Lorentz' 'Wanderer' and 'Lajkonik' by Marcin Ciura and Piotr Wieczorek. I've played against all, and lost against all, occasionally. For the incrowd (where I'm in the outcrowd) here's Richard's Improving Monte-Carlo tree search in Havannah (http://dl.acm.org/citation.cfm?id=1950332&preflayout=flat). Here's the Havannah page (http://www.grappa.univ-lille3.fr/icga/tournament.php?id=246). I regret to see that no Arimaa bots (http://www.grappa.univ-lille3.fr/icga/tournament.php?id=249) have entered the contest. Here's the livestream (http://199.66.238.51/channel/icga-2011) of the event. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Nov 17th, 2011, 9:04pm on 11/17/11 at 05:21:09, christianF wrote:
I regret to see that no MSG (http://www.marksteeregames.com/index.html) games have entered the contest. Omar, Christian, stop congratulating yourselves. You're not "Leonardos" lol |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Nov 18th, 2011, 4:17pm You think Arimaa and Havannah are harder for computers than Oust? Guess again. AI programmers don't have the first clue how to tame counter-intuitive Oust. |
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Title: ft to right: rl] Post by christianF on Nov 26th, 2011, 8:14am Computer Olympiad Tilburg http://i42.tinypic.com/2i96xk8.jpg Castro won (http://www.grappa.univ-lille3.fr/icga/tournament.php?id=246) the tournament between the bots. Ton won base-8, white and black, against Castro en Lajkonik, while Richard had already left. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by qswanger on Nov 26th, 2011, 8:48am 2001 or 2011? :) |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Nov 26th, 2011, 9:22am on 11/26/11 at 08:48:53, qswanger wrote:
Ah, scuzi, if this were a 2001 image, I might not have stood a chance in 2012 :) |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Nov 26th, 2011, 10:40am Ludoteka daily turnout for November 25, 2011: Cephalopod - 48 Havannah - 17 |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by omar on Nov 26th, 2011, 5:10pm on 11/17/11 at 05:21:09, christianF wrote:
I guess the Arimaa bot developers don't like to travel :-) |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by Arimabuff on Nov 27th, 2011, 4:40am on 11/26/11 at 17:10:12, omar wrote:
I am guessing neither do their wallets... |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Nov 27th, 2011, 5:40am on 11/27/11 at 04:40:12, Arimabuff wrote:
There's a point. Physical presence should not be necessary in this day and age, and more in particular not for next year's match. Good connections and transparent procedures will be enough to keep everyone happily at home or wherever. Meanwhile Marcin Ciura has created a Google+ Havannah page (https://plus.google.com/105607364226084069219/posts). If you have a G+ account, you can add it to your circles. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Nov 28th, 2011, 7:31am on 10/07/11 at 15:20:24, qswanger wrote:
Maybe this (http://groups.google.com/group/rec.games.abstract/browse_thread/thread/2544d5be139ab1fe#) helps. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Nov 28th, 2011, 8:50am on 11/28/11 at 07:31:39, christianF wrote:
Why all the excitement about Crossway? I'm too old for this. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Dec 5th, 2011, 7:02am We've rearranged mindsports somewhat, in particular the ArenA (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/arena) and the Pit (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/the-pit). We've removed superfluous games like Hexbushka and Hexdameo (actually Hexdame (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/arena/hexdame/) is kind of superfluous too, considering that Draughts players are square thinkers). We've kept International (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/arena/draughts/), Anglo-American (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/the-pit/593-anglo-american-checkers) and Russian (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/the-pit/594-russian-draughts), but omitted the likes of Spanish, Italian, German, Thai and a couple of others. They are still covered in On the Evolution of Draughts Variants (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/on-the-evolution-of-draughts-variants), but without applets. So we're trimming down a bit, giving priority to completing the applets for the current games. Ed has also turned his attention to the app world, because PC's seem to go the way of the dodo, eventually. And so will I, so I've decided to call it a day as far as inventing games goes - yes, again, I'm determined ;) . I'm glad the 'art' or 'science' of inventing abstract games, however small its niche in the grander scheme of things, is very much alive. I'll follow it with the utmost interest, in particular the approach of Luis Bolaños Mures who seems to have a knack for simple 'organic mechanisms' of a highly original nature, and I hope to contribute something less than silly, now and again. As far as the quest for a game that is finite, drawless and perfectly balanced, Symple (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/arena/symple/) complies, without being the result the that particular quest (rather of Benedikt Rosenau's quest for the 'quintessential group penalty game'). Its balancing system is the most sophisticated in the realm of abstract games yet, but being embedded in a particular move protocol, it is not as widely applicable as a pie. The move protocol itself however is not game specific, as Sygo (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/arena/sygo/) and Charybdis (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/the-pit/charyb-568) show, but it has a natural affinity with the 'territorial'. Consider it to be in the public domain now. I've argued before that being finite, drawless and balanced is neither necessary nor sufficient to make a great game. Symple is significant in a game theoretical sense. It has a very simple structure without capture, an innovative move protocol, a high speed, a character that varies with its group penalty and an unreal branch density. It would seem and ideal touchstone for the programming community. It offers deep strategy with no particular preference for drama, yet is not devoid of it. Connecting two groups in a penalty-10 game makes a 10-point difference. Winning or losing them might be considered dramatic. But I prefer Sygo because it features capture and all the drama associated with it. Moreover I like its ever so small marging for draws (resulting from the possibility of 'seki'). Generally speaking I have a slight preference for games that can end in a draw if they're not making a habit of it. I'm not sure where the obsession with decisiveness that's in the air originates. Havannah provides a clear example of how a drawmargin may actually enhance a game. I'd warn against excessive cyclophobia too ;) . cheers, christian |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Dec 5th, 2011, 6:57pm on 12/05/11 at 07:02:01, christianF wrote:
This is sad. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Dec 5th, 2011, 8:20pm on 12/05/11 at 07:02:01, christianF wrote:
Dog[?] a. ma b. doo c. all of the above |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Dec 5th, 2011, 9:17pm Evidence, Christian. That's all I ask. That's all anybody asks. No more stale dogma. No more links to stale dogma. Example first player win rates from Game Site X: Tanbo - 50.00% Hex Oust - 51.17% Square Oust - 49.62% As you can see, Christian, I'm no stranger to balanced games. Tanbo's TOA is more than a coincidence. Data from megasite ItsYourTurn also demonstrates a Tanbo TOA consistent with zero percent. You'll never find a game more balanced than Tanbo, and guess what. No balancing mechanism required. Just solid architecture. That's all it takes, Christian. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Dec 11th, 2011, 2:20pm Dieter Stein's Volo Barring Chess variants I've always supported what is loosely called 'organic' mechanisms. Where does the 'organic' come from? It may be from asking the right question after finding a promising mechanism: "what does it want?". I was reminded of this recently by the implementation of Dieter Stein's game Volo (http://spielstein.com/games/volo) at BoardSpace (http://boardspace.net/english/index.shtml). Dieter took the basic rules for flying in a flock of birds (don't try unless you're a bird): * Move in the same direction as your neighbor * Remain close to your neighbors * Avoid collisions with your neighbors and translated them to a hexgrid. The "what does it want" question is answered almost implicitly: unite. Admittedly the sky is a freer board than a hexgrid, so what remained was still something of a puzzle, but I think Dieter did an excellent job. Adding birds or having them fly following simple rules feels natural enough, and tactics follow suit. There's capture, yes, but it is double edged as in LOA, that is, you can capture an opponent into victory. Of course nobody would be that stupid, but that's precisely what makes it part of tactical considerations. Strategy is too evasive a subject for me yet, but Dieter gives a 9- stone example that is decisive: http://spielstein.com/images/games/volo/example_2.png Orange to move and win in 5 half-moves. This suggests there's some important strategic thinking required early on, and it also suggests a good global/local interrelation. Volo appears to be soft finite, that is, two dedicated opponent's with a draw as their common goal, could probably find ways to proceed forever. So could they in Go, Chess, Draughts, Shogi ... in fact hard finite games like Othello and Hex are at best peripheral, so Volo is in the best of company. It can also end in a draw, in modesty it would seem. I dare say I like that. :) |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Dec 11th, 2011, 8:10pm on 12/11/11 at 14:20:29, christianF wrote:
How many times have we seen designers falsely represent their infinite games as finite (Christian)? But never the other way around. Must be the allure of the "periphery" ;) |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by SpeedRazor on Dec 12th, 2011, 8:30pm Dude, what is your friggin' problem?! Leave Christian alone. It's like your his groupie, or stalker, or something. Did Christian not bang you correctly at some gaming convention after-show? Did you [like] invent a game or something, and now are jealous? Then make your own website! You're putting the trash in Ameri-trash. Omar, rightly so, gave Christian a nice place to leave his ideas, writings, inventions, and musings, a place (besides his own cool website :) ) to reside for posterity. I'm grateful for this. But I'm starting to get sick of coming here because of your sick obsession. Does even ONE person like to see this trolls' jealous, banal, mundane tirades posted only seconds after Christian posts something very nice - (like above) - ? If so, please respond here now... Omar, you've asked him to leave this website ever-so-nicely. It's now time to ban his IP address. Sorry that I may have been a little crass... ~ Zephyr ~ |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by froody on Dec 12th, 2011, 9:07pm on 12/12/11 at 20:30:28, SpeedRazor wrote:
I like trolls. I haven't caught up on this thread yet, but I like all words and ideas. I hate people that try to censor words and ideas. I will comment further when I find out exactly what's going on and what kind of troll this is. On further inspection this looks like a very high quality troll. *hat tip* |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by froody on Dec 12th, 2011, 9:15pm Why did Omar ask him to leave? Are you afraid of his words and ideas or has he done something immoral? |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Dec 12th, 2011, 10:57pm on 12/12/11 at 21:15:41, froody wrote:
All of the above :) |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Dec 13th, 2011, 12:15am on 12/12/11 at 20:30:28, SpeedRazor wrote:
Outlandish claims are harmful. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Dec 13th, 2011, 12:42am on 12/12/11 at 20:30:28, SpeedRazor wrote:
Abstract game design is a part of who I am. That'll always be true, even after I go pro on the sax. -Mark (http://www.marksteeregames.com/MSG_game_index.html) |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by froody on Dec 13th, 2011, 5:10am on 12/12/11 at 22:57:10, MarkSteere wrote:
What immoral thing did you do to arimaa.com? |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Dec 13th, 2011, 6:31am on 12/13/11 at 05:10:07, froody wrote:
I questioned the dogma of Christian Freeling. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by froody on Dec 13th, 2011, 6:49am Asking questions is never immoral. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Dec 13th, 2011, 8:01am on 12/13/11 at 06:49:32, froody wrote:
That may be, the point however is that there's no dogma on my part, it's all projection. Here's how it works. For years now Mark has advocated, if not insisted, that games should be finite, drawless and balanced. That's his dogma. Though I agree on 'balanced', I disagree on the other two. That would be my 'dogma'. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Dec 13th, 2011, 9:16am on 12/11/11 at 14:20:29, christianF wrote:
Finitude is an interesting subject. The number of legal Chess positions is finite. Large beyond comprehension, but finite. From that point of view the number of routes between them is [beyond comprehension]^n, but still finite. For the sake of the finitude argument, this is not interesting. The understanding is that a game is 'infinite' if the tree contains cycles. Without any particular disregard for facts, one could note that Chess, Shogi, Go and Draughts are infinite, but that millions of players worldwide don't seem to care. What's wrong with these people? On the other hand there are finite games like Tanbo or Rive, that would make players wish they were finite indeed. Cycles do not make games 'infinite' because finitude has a human component that is disregarded in the above definition. Humans can terminate 'infinite' games because they're intelligent. An example Take a Chess board and place a black pawn and a white pawn somewhere around the center. The pawns move and capture as usual, but have the additional option of moving one step sideways. What do we have? The smallest possible Jump Sturdy (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/the-pit/jumpsturdy-576) endgame. - If the pawns are in opposition, the player to move can only move sideways and can be captured. - Otherwise one pawn will be first to reach the back row and win. So despite having cycles, the game is finite for intelligent humans, and less than intelligent ones, and so on, all the way down the scale, till eventually we find one person who wants to protect all others from their natural inclination of aimlessly moving pawns sideways. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Dec 13th, 2011, 10:16am What triggered the major meltdown, you ask? Me and Dieter Stein discussing his game, Volo, in rec.games.abstract. MS: Volo is interesting, as I said on the first day of its announcement here. It's also infinite. ... DS: You're right, I really missed that. MS: No worries :) |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by froody on Dec 13th, 2011, 1:04pm SpeedRazor said that Omar has asked MS to leave. Is that true? Why? |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by megajester on Dec 14th, 2011, 2:07am on 12/13/11 at 13:04:59, froody wrote:
Scan this page (http://arimaa.com/arimaa/forum/cgi/YaBB.cgi?board=other;action=display;num=1236541162;start=435) and the next one. I can also testify that he made some very obscene posts that were subsequently deleted. He's been relatively well-behaved since. Emphasis on "relatively". Edit: Actually, he'd been warned before (this page (http://arimaa.com/arimaa/forum/cgi/YaBB.cgi?board=other;action=display;num=1236541162;start=180) and subsequent ones). |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Dec 18th, 2011, 3:24pm Our multi-player section was 'the Field'. It's gone now. It contained three games. Chinese Checkers has been removed. I won't apologize to the Chinese, because the name was coined by an American for a German game. 'Oriental' was fahionable at the time. Phalanx (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/the-pit/phalanx-632) has been moved to the Pit. There it awaits a two-player applet. Multi-player Phalanx is a game thriving on ad hoc collusion, treaties, treason, diplomacy, agreement or disagreement, over the board. That disagrees with turnbased play. Mu (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/arena/mu/) has been moved to the ArenA. Mu is not collusionproof, but neither is life. If you can't win, you can at least live. Mu requires more than mindsports applets currently provide, so a halfway step will be the release of a generic two-player implementation that will give players a first opportunity prepare for the multi-player implementation that will be build within the same framework later. [Edit] We've also provided the Grand Chess (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/arena/grand-chess/5-grand-chess-games?start=2) and Havannah (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/arena/havannah/340-games?start=1) applets with new graphics. That leaves as far as the ArenA is concerned only the Glass Bead Game with old graphics, and an old structure in which the pits have coordinates, but the beads inside them not. Hence moves must be entered manually and cannot be tried out. Which is totally unsatisfactory, so here's the (hidden) background of the new applet, 2x5 pits and 2 collecting cups in the middle, and precise coordinates for every individual bead. http://mindsports.nl/images/stories/arena/glassbeadgame/gbg_grid_overlay.gif So the Glass Bead Game will be the next step. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Dec 19th, 2011, 9:50am There seem to be two extremes in terms of how games should be judged, at either end of the spectrum. On the one end there's the Pro-Human Association arguing that games must go through a long process of modifications and finetuning to become reliable. Deep flaws are not in the habit of exposing themselves up front. "Look what happened to Draughts" they say. It took a century of play to expose a flaw that wasn't more than a faint shadow when the rules were established. Which of course is true. On the other hand there's the Church of Hard Finitude. They argue that modifications and finetuning aren't necessary if the "architecture" is right. And the architecture is right if and only if the game is finite, drawless and balanced. No need to check - we're a church, believe us. "Look what happened to Draughts" they say. Infinite, infested with cycles - what do you expect? Which of course is also true. Without cycles there wouldn't be a draw in the first place. Why don't Draughts players turn en masse to Ossetian Draughts (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/on-the-evolution-of-draughts-variants/draughts-variants/504-tama_o) instead, one might ask. Weird guys, those humans. I did become more interested in the subject only recently, busy as I was either with inventing games, or not bothering about them at all, as the case might be. As it happens, I can identify with both sides, to a degree. So I'll sharpen my powers of provocation and put in the occasional post. Now I must go and feed my dog - or did I just do that? |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Dec 19th, 2011, 11:12am on 12/19/11 at 09:50:14, christianF wrote:
Your dog food is growing stale, Christian. Stop whining about finite games. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Dec 19th, 2011, 2:00pm Infinite games are dime a dozen. <---------- Read it and weep. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Dec 19th, 2011, 10:22pm on 12/19/11 at 09:50:14, christianF wrote:
You can use my nail file. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Dec 20th, 2011, 7:47am 1. on 12/19/11 at 09:50:14, christianF wrote:
Is this true? Not convincingly so, I'd say. Chess has gone through a long process of evolution and still bears the scars of modifications that wear their purpose on their sleeves, like castling and en passant capture. In a wider context, it developed from Sjatransj which in turn developed from Chaturanga. That may be called a long process of modifications and finetuning. Draughts? We're in the process of writing On the Evolution of Draughts variants (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/on-the-evolution-of-draughts-variants). That should answer the question. Mancala's come with decidedly different rulesets. The various branches that have developed from times immemorial doubtless underwent many modifications before they came to their current form. So the Pro-Human argfument certainly holds for these families of games. But there are also counterexamples. Go didn't change all that much, and it rivals mancalas in ancienty. Nine Men's Morris may wel be the oldest game in the world - for compelling evidence have a look here (http://circleddot.blogspot.com/) - and all the while it didn't change except for a variant called Morabaraba, where diagonals are included. Considering the suggested minimum age of the game, some ten thousand years, that's not a whole lot of modifications and finetuning. But hey, says the Pro-Human League, could anyone have predicted that? I'd say yes, at least to a degree, based on the structure of the games. The point being that they are right for some games, sometimes, not for all games all the time. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Dec 20th, 2011, 10:29am 2. on 12/19/11 at 09:50:14, christianF wrote:
Is this true? Not convincingly so, I'd say. Which games for one, according to this criterion, would have to be excluded before Hex arrived on the scene? All games. Right, thank you. So this is either nonsensical or revolutionary and the question would be why any inventor would restrict him or herself this way in the first place. The answer is given implicitly: good "architecture" is necessary and sufficient to guarantee a great game. And making a system finite, drawless and balanced is necessary and sufficient for good architecture. Simple as fruitpie. The "necessary" implies that not only the traditionals have bad architecture, but even games like Othello, Twixt, Havannah or Sygo, that are all hard finite but on rare occasions allow a draw. It would seem that their rejection is based on irrational grounds. Apart from that kind of religious fundamentalism, there's nothing wrong with wanting to invent finite and drawless games if you feel that way, in fact it's more of a challenge than allowing for cycles and draws, because it's more restrictive and it may make it harder to handle turn order imbalance. Because any move in any position in a drawless games can only be winning or losing, and that includes the first move. Without a certain bandwidth for draws, this may lead to a more acutely felt advantage for one side, and a balancing mechanism may (and often will) be required. So it's probably harder to work within this framework. The question remains, are the games better? If one rejects all games that do not comply, the answer is implicitly yes. But why would anyone do that? Many feel that to make a great game it is neither necessary nor sufficient to implement hard finitude and exclude draws. Great games that don't comply are all around them to prove it. There's also a fair amount of crippled games that do comply. There are most likely great new games that are finite and drawless and balanced, but in that case they don't have the means to prove it yet. Here's the catch with comparisons: all ancient games have long histories, and one doesn't have to employ any visionary powers to see what they're about because it is common knowledge among experts and thus eventually among laymen too. New games don't have all that. This lack of knowledge is what the Pro-Human Association is pointing at. That's why inventors like to view a new game in a hypothetical setting, where it has a history, a large playerbase, a substantial library and an assorted selection of grandmasters to back it up. If only. So predictions are difficult, yet not as baseless as the PHA suggests. Though one cannot predict all aspects of all games, one can predict some aspects of all games and all aspects of some games. But not right now, later. 8) |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Dec 20th, 2011, 11:38am on 12/20/11 at 10:29:19, christianF wrote:
Yes, Christian. Exactly. You heard what Nick Bentley said in rec.games.abstract. "I think the concept [of Rive] is awesome, especially knowing how hard it is to make a good heavy cycling game (it's a task at which I've failed miserably a schmillion ways)," You don't just say, "I know. I'll pound out a pseudo cyclic stone placement game." Unless you're me. There can be only one. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Dec 20th, 2011, 11:49am awesome... (http://groups.google.com/group/rec.games.abstract/msg/5d304664ece69aac) |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Dec 20th, 2011, 3:55pm You don't have to like it. You only have to admire it. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by SpeedRazor on Dec 20th, 2011, 5:42pm on 12/20/11 at 07:47:33, christianF wrote:
A little over 500 years ago an accepted castling rule-set was codified and that is what we use today. (I think it was the Italians' version?) I think that they only got it half-right, though. For symmetry, it seems to me that the queen should be able to castle too! Did they mess up? I've been studying chess openings using the Queen • Can • Castle • Too rules for a couple of years now, and I've noticed something interesting. Some of the broken openings - not all - are fixed! Broken opening in the sense that black can almost guarantee a draw. An example is the Queens Gambit Declined (Lasker variation). 1. D4 D5 2. C4 E6 3. NC3 NF6 4. BG5 BE7 5. NF3 H6 6. BH4 0-0, and now Q-Q precludes the Lasker variation (7. ... NE4 and two pairs of minor pieces are exchanged, etc.). I've found an amazing amount of other examples... Queen • Can • Castle • Too just seems more elegant and maybe, even more organic. Maybe it might one-day be implemented. Hope I didn't digress too far from your excellent treatise Christian. Edit: I just noticed that I didn't explain what Q-Q means. Just like O-O means that the king castles to the short-side, and O-O-O means the King castles to the long side, Q-Q and Q-Q-Q mean the same thing for the queen. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Dec 21st, 2011, 2:24am Christian, you've steadfastly condescended to my architecture centric design philosophy as "hunting", etc. But now that architecture is all the rage, suddenly you're waxing authoritative on the subject. Your tragic circus of tapdancing, handwaving and backpedaling only reveals your profound ignorance. Newsflash, Christian. From the perspective of a true architect, you don't know jack! |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Dec 21st, 2011, 5:21am on 12/20/11 at 17:42:27, SpeedRazor wrote:
That's too much praise really, I'm just trying to finetune my thoughts on the 'predictability' aspect. That was more or less the theme of the thread, initially, and there has been some serious criticism worthy of consideration. As to the Queen castling, I should first and foremost repeat that I'm not good at Chess. Actually even that is an understatement, so any amount of examples is more or less wasted on me. But from an inventor's point of view your suggestion is interesting in that it expands opening options on both sides, and that the rule would appear more 'generic' and less a means to an end. The argument that Black can less easily go for a draw has two sides to it - what if white can go more easily for a win? That might influence balance. I'm not saying it is, and on intuition (what else would I have) I'd say it isn't: black's options are equally extended. Fritzlein has more than once touched on this: it is extremely hard to predict what the effect of rules or rulechanges in chessy systems, including Arimaa and Grand Chess, will have in the long run. Another notorious example is Draughts. The official rules were established, more than a century ago (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/on-the-evolution-of-draughts-variants/history#halt), and they were magnificent, opening an unparalelled world of mindboggling combinations. Few could have foreseen the Swamp of Draws it would end in a century later, at least at top level match play. And top level match play is the crown jewel for media attention. Draughts is terminal and in denial of it. If they had implemented the rule that is now proposed by the Killer Draughts (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/arena/draughts/382-killer-draughts-rules) proponents, Draughts might not have had the same problems. Of course that rule, demotion of kings after capturing the last piece (actually even somewhat stricter) is also a clear means to an end. Dameo is essentially build on the same ruleset, but doesn't have the same problem due to its orthogonal orientation. If anything, it proves that the Pro-Human Association has a point and that some games may be in a continuous proces of evolution. But, I must tread carefully here, not all games. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by froody on Dec 21st, 2011, 5:21am Remember to add 'IMHO' before and after everything Mark says. You'll be fine. Sticks and stones can break my bones... |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Dec 21st, 2011, 5:46am on 12/21/11 at 05:21:58, froody wrote:
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by Eggman on Dec 21st, 2011, 6:03am on 12/21/11 at 02:24:04, MarkSteere wrote:
http://xtupload.com/image-AF8C_4EF1CAC1.jpg |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Dec 21st, 2011, 9:34pm I don't get butthurt, Yoda. I give it. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by froody on Dec 22nd, 2011, 1:38am In terms of trollwarz this was a tactical error, Mark. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by Eggman on Dec 22nd, 2011, 5:48am on 12/21/11 at 21:34:16, MarkSteere wrote:
The only time I've ever seen anyone as butthurt as you was when my little niece figured out she's not really a princess. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Dec 22nd, 2011, 7:01am Why I'm thankful to Luis Bolaños Mures Luis invited me to a game of Symple (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/players-section/Serve.cgi?file=Symple1324293888.html), accompanied by an unobtrusive mail: Quote:
Since the rules explicitly stated that passing was allowed and that successive passes ended the game, this is a very forgiving way of putting it. Yes, players could agree to a draw by passing with an equal count. That's not exactly in the game's spirit, but under tournament conditions it could become a problem. I hadn't even considered that because a Symple tournament seemed far from imminent, but there was this point regarding draws by mutual agreement. So I considered compulsory movement in the sense that a player must (instead of 'may') either place an isolated single, or grow any or all of his groups. As it turned out, this minute change has deep consequences for the endgame. Whereas the main consideration regarding invasions used to be whether they could be advantageous, they now should be regarded in terms of whether they could be forced. If the board fills up, there may come a point where it has become impossible to grow because all a player's groups are fully enclosed. In that case, instead of simply leaving vacant territory to the opponent, the player is now forced to invade it, and be penalized for it. It implies that at a certain stage it may not be advantageous to grow all one's groups, in order to save growing options and prevent being forced to create new groups. This of course comes at the price of the very stones (read points) that are not placed. In other words, where Symple used to suffer from a a certain lack of drama, compulsory placement turns this around in a rather dramatic fashion, with a sharp increase of tension towards the endgame (in a balanced game). So where I've always argued that Symple lacked the drama associated with the really great games, this minute change turns it into a great game after all! And that's why I'm thankful to Luis Bolaños Mures :-* . I've made the necessary modifications in the rules (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/arena/symple/585-symple-rules), the About (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/arena/symple/586-about-symple) and in How I invented ... (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/how-i-invented-games-and-why-not/late-arrivals-a-final-whispers#symple) . |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Dec 22nd, 2011, 8:52am on 12/22/11 at 05:48:16, Eggman wrote:
lol, Sorry about your niece's butthurt. I'll try to be more careful next time. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Dec 22nd, 2011, 9:00am on 12/22/11 at 07:01:56, christianF wrote:
[scream] |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Dec 22nd, 2011, 9:13am 3. on 12/20/11 at 10:29:19, christianF wrote:
Noughts & Crosses is point in case for the latter. Disregarding actual strategy, Othello doesn't suffer from a large amount of unpredictability either. Predictability depends on the game. One doesn't have to be a genius to see that Hex is hard finite and decisive. That's predictable without any playing experience. If one happened to be familiar with connectivity on the hexgrid, one could add that playing the game would by no means be trivial and basic knowledge of game trees would lead to the conclusion that any move in any position, including the initial empty board, would either be winning or losing. One might even reason towards a first player win, because John Forbes Nash' non-constructive proof isn't all that hard to follow and might be produced without any playing experience. That's quite a lot of predictable aspects that don't rely in any way on experience. Another thing that can be seen at first glance is that in terms of strategy the game can only go in one direction: deeper, either to the point of being solved, as it is for small boards, or on and on. The depth of the abyss may not be immediately evident, but in the absence of draws there's nowhere else to go. That's where I dwelled in relative ignorance for a long time. For a reasonably strong player like me, playing against really strong players was a sobering experience. One of them, my friend Benedikt Rosenau, paraphrased a famous quote by Edward Lasker thus: Quote:
Tongue in cheek of course but with an undercurrent of seriousness: unlike Hex (that is, barring turn order advantage), Go does indeed have structural problems that require regulation. Given the basic idea of placement and capture, and concluding that groups can live, one would for instance encounter cycles (ko, superko) and stalemate (seki). Both can be solved, as all Go players know, and the provisional solutions that would have suggested themselves would maybe have lacked the refinements that now govern superko and komi, but they would largely have been self evident and satisfactory. Given some thought and cycles and seki being covered, one might conclude that Go's behaviour would not be all that more difficult to predict: like Hex, the game has nowhere else to go than deeper. Again, these predictions do not actually require any playing experience. They aren't even very helpful in actual play. So, given that the long term behaviour Chess type games, Draughts type games and Mancalas is difficult to predict and has often been shaped by past modifications, and that the same behaviour of Hex and Go is far easier to predict, while these games are not subject to modifications, or at most peripheral, what's the difference? |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by Eggman on Dec 22nd, 2011, 9:24am on 12/22/11 at 09:00:37, MarkSteere wrote:
Yeah. Just like little Amanda. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Dec 22nd, 2011, 10:24am on 12/22/11 at 09:24:45, Eggman wrote:
The only difference is that she would probably have less trouble understanding Symple's balancing rule. ;) |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Dec 22nd, 2011, 11:45am Intelligent life forms in the universe undoubtedly play variations of Chess and Go. The capture-by-replacement of Chess and the capture-by-surround of Go are just as fundamental as the Hex principle, and more obvious. The Oust (http://www.marksteeregames.com/Oust_rules.pdf) principle was obvious to me, an intelligent life form. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Dec 22nd, 2011, 12:43pm on 12/22/11 at 10:24:30, christianF wrote:
She would certainly be the first to understand it. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by SpeedRazor on Dec 22nd, 2011, 6:39pm Thanks for pointing out that Edward Lasker quote about Hex, Christian, I was just thinking that! (Essentially, that any intelligent extraterrestrial civilization would likely also have discovered Hex; hey, it was discovered independently twice here on Earth.) As simple as it is, I wonder if Hex is the most complex ASG that would be universally discovered in totality - not a variation? Let's hope not... |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Dec 22nd, 2011, 8:33pm on 12/22/11 at 18:39:57, SpeedRazor wrote:
Flume (http://www.marksteeregames.com/Flume_Go_rules.pdf) is universal. First comes Dots and Boxes. Then comes Flume - a related but distinct game. It's a question of arbitrariness, a function of complexity. Hex is very non-arbitrary, although it can be played on a variety of tessellations. Flume is more complicated than Hex and more arbitrary, though still clearly universal. Lariat (http://www.marksteeregames.com/Lariat_rules.pdf) is universal. It's the ugly sister in the HYL triad because of its unbalance, but it's also arguably the simplest of the three. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by Eltripas on Dec 22nd, 2011, 8:37pm I used to think that this thread should be closed for the sake of the Arimaa Forum, now I think that it should be closed for the sake of humanity. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Dec 22nd, 2011, 8:58pm lol |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Dec 23rd, 2011, 7:14am 4. on 12/22/11 at 09:13:52, christianF wrote:
I don't think there's an easy answer, and certainly not a universal one. Despite speculations to the contrary, I'd like to keep it down to earth. Also, I'd like to discuss predictability of game behaviour on structural grounds rather than on the behaviour of known games that may be related. One might make some tentative predictions regarding Grand Chess or Dameo, because of their similarity to Chess and Draughts, but that's not all that interesting in general terms. Chess type games are easy to invent, 'assemble' might be a better word, and can easily be made to behave in a satisfactory way in the short run. At the same time they're hard to make even remotely interesting and long term behaviour may reveal unforeseen problems. Of course most will never suffer 'long term behaviour'. If we may call Arimaa 'chess type', then it will be one of the very few games that actually gets to that point, which makes it all the more interesting. The predictability of Draughts type games ... may I leave it at the swamp of draws Draughts eventually got stuck in, after many decennia of satisfactory behaviour? The problem is that Draughts variants more often than not feature men and kings. They're not uniform (that is: with only one kind of pieces). Make one uniform, like Ossetian Draughts (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/on-the-evolution-of-draughts-variants/draughts-variants/504-tama_o) and it's predictably finite and drawless. Predicting the behaviour of finite and drawless games is easier, but the games themselves are not necessarily better or the International Draughts community would be playing Ossetian. Draughts, despite its current problems, is still a far better game than Ossetian. Mancala's are mostly uniform but not organic, even if 'organic' isn't precisely defined. Their behaviour depends on how a particular ruleset aligns with the calculus involved and how happy the players are with it. Many of the various rulesets will probably have evolved through trial and error. Predicting whether a new mancala will behave at least interestingly would seem very difficult. Only games that are both 'uniform' and 'organic' seem to align favorably with a certain degree of long term behavioural predictability. This set would include most but not all quintessential games, that is, games that have a mechanism that suggests its own theme and provides the essential implementation of it. Chess games are never quintessential, and for Draughts, only Checkers might be considered as such (Turkish Draughts has too many aspects that are not 'essential' to the implementation of 'orthogonal' draughts, like the method of capture or the long range kings). And Checkers in fact happens to be fairly predictable, including of course its cycles and draws (not to mention fairly solved, but that's another matter). But take Hex, Go, Othello, Emergo, Yodd, Symple or Oust, all uniform and organic game systems, and long term perdictability can be based on the observation that these games have nowhere to go but deeper. The same holds for many more that are uniform and organic but not quintessential. Among games that were discussed in this very thread only recently, Ketchup, Volo and Sygo comply: one can clearly see the contours of deepening strategy and refinement of tactics even though one inevitably faces all appropriate beginner's hurdles in actual play. The one thing that has been flagrantly disregarded here is turn-order balancing rules and mechanisms. There are a lot of those, and different ones at that, even in the above selection of games. Which games need them and which don't, interesting questions, and no, I don't know all balancing mechanisms, let alone all the answers. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by Boo on Dec 23rd, 2011, 8:07am Quote:
Oh no! Just let the trolls fight it out! Who is the king of arimaa forum? FIGHT! FIGHT! FIGHT! |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Dec 23rd, 2011, 8:31am on 12/23/11 at 08:07:41, Boo wrote:
I'm sorry, but this isn't the Arimaa forum but a small niche. Though I didn't start the thread, it has my name in the subject line. I try to provide some interesting content, but if I fail, reading it isn't compulsory, and if you feel it doesn't matter all that much, so do I. I'm not interested in fights, even less in posters who indulge in them or try to fuel them. If you want to share some insights regarding predictability of game behaviour, a subject that would naturally interest game inventors, you're welcome. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Dec 23rd, 2011, 8:54am on 12/22/11 at 20:37:03, Eltripas wrote:
With 80,000+ views, humanity doesn't seem to agree. Of course this may be for all the wrong reasons, but I'll take the risk. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by Boo on Dec 23rd, 2011, 11:55am I don'y know what is "predictability of game behaviour". How well would the game sell? How quickly will it get bored? Something else? Anyway I guess this one might be of interest to you: http://gen.lib.rus.ec/book/index.php?md5=D862FFE595CF2B38A62F05F555AA111E |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Dec 23rd, 2011, 12:47pm on 12/23/11 at 11:55:12, Boo wrote:
There are no books for what we do. Nor could there be. Such a book would no sooner be written than obsolete. |
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Title: ract gamesto argue that Post by christianF on Dec 23rd, 2011, 1:15pm on 12/23/11 at 11:55:12, Boo wrote:
Selling is not an issue to me, or to many other designers for that matter. Kris Burm would like to have that kind of predictability, no doubt, and I have no issues with that either. But his designs have commerce written all over it, and though they're not bad, they always feature 'special' equipment you wouldn't have lying around somewhere. Whether players would get bored quickly is certainly an issue, but it may be subjective. It's about how a game would behave in the long run and I once trumpeted around that I could see that. Which wasn't quite true. Yet I made quite a few games in seconds, literally. Grand Chess, Dameo and Sygo, none of which underwent any significant changes. Others took merely a few hours, Havannah, Emergo, Symple, Mu. Havannah and Emergo have been thouroughly tested, Symple and Mu haven't. That's a nice test. Symple also shows that it's easy to miss an essential point, as the recent rule change shows. Not an obvious point, but I shouldn't have missed it. Anyway, I'd like to argue that the long term behaviour of some games can be predicted to a great degree, while for others it's near to impossible. Just to see if there's some workable division possible. I haven't all the answers, I'm merely organizing my thoughts. on 12/23/11 at 11:55:12, Boo wrote:
It certainly is, although my career as an inventor has come to an end. Ed and I are wrapping it up at mindsports.nl and Mu is our intended farewell gift to the abstract games community but it requires a more potent applet than the one we currently use, so I can predict my brains out ;) while Ed works on the applet. |
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Title: Re: ract gamesto argue that Post by christianF on Dec 23rd, 2011, 1:50pm on 12/23/11 at 13:15:23, christianF wrote:
Neither Symple nor Mu required any physical material. Symple materialized in one moment in half sleep, after thinking about it for a day or so. Mu materialized in a nightly bikeride home, after having been introduced to Martin Medema's monumental 'Atlantis' and concluding it was 'crooked'. To make Symple simple, you have a Go board, two players (w&b). On your turn you either: 1. place one stone not (orthogonally) adjacent to a like colored one, making a new 'group', or ... 2. grow any or all (but at least one) groups by one stone. When the board is full you get one point for every stone and are penalized P points for every separate group. P is even (the applet offers 2-12) so there can be no draw. Disregarding a balancing rule that's it. Think about it. Mu (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/arena/mu/) is a territory game, a game of growth and movement, an elimination game and a connection game at the same time. It is one basic organism operating over a diverse terrain that takes shape and changes in the proces of playing. It has a fairly simple strategy but tactics of unparalleled complexity and resourcefulness. It's a multi player game that isn't collusionproof, but neither is life, and you wouldn't dismiss it for that. In Mu you can live, even if you're Mark Steere. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Dec 24th, 2011, 6:03am Regarding the introduction of compulsory movement in Symple (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/arena/symple/), I had already implemented it before Benedikt and Luis were convinced. Luis for instance wrote: Quote:
Benedikt wrote: Quote:
These 'hot' and 'cold' issues, and 'fairly hot' and 'reasonably cold' are new to me. I replied Benedikt to that effect: Quote:
Back to Symple. What difference does it make? No difference in unbalanced games, but unbalanced games aren't interesting. It gets really interesting if and when games are close. Here's Benedikt's next mail and my reply: Quote:
Not any more. Instead of being mere 'vacant territory', these pockets become traps ready to receive compulsory invasions. Keeping sufficient growing options in the endgame is now vital. Hey, I'm predicting stuff ;D |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Dec 24th, 2011, 7:57am 5. on 12/23/11 at 07:14:21, christianF wrote:
If the thing is balanced - that's a big one, especially in drawless games, where any move in any position is either winning or losing. There are quite a few balancing systems and I'm probably I'm far from complete here. In fact there are two questions: 1. which games need them, and 2. which form might they take? Not all games need balancing mechanisms. In games with a tactical nature, capriciousness is sometimes enough to blur out any notion of turn order advantage. Othello might serve as an example. It's not wholly tactical, because there are some advantageous subgoals to be reached, and that's probably the reason for the lasting interest. But it's highly tactical and I've never heard of any turn order advantage. Some games may be strategic but with any perceivable advantage lost in longiloquence. If you enter a bicycle race from Berlin to Paris, a couple of yards for a headstart don't really matter. Try Tanbo for an example. Be sure to take enough provisions. For those games that for whatever reason need a balancing mechanism, what do we have. That's not rethorical - I'm sure this list will be far from complete, so please post what you feel is missing: 1. Pie (Hex, Havannah, others) 2. Extended pie/Marquisian Method (Pylyx, InSight, Swish & Squeeze) 3. Initial move restrictions (Renju et all, Hexade, others) 4. The 1-2-2 move protocol (Connect6, Yodd, others) 5. The 1-2-2(3) move protocol (Ketchup) 6. Komi (Go, variants) 7. The Symple protocol (Symple, Sygo) You can find most of the above games at mindsports.nl (http://mindsports.nl/) usually with external links to appropriate sites. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Dec 24th, 2011, 1:19pm on 12/24/11 at 06:03:52, christianF wrote:
Your knowledge of game architecture can be written on a matchbox, Christian, in large print, with plenty of room to spare. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Dec 24th, 2011, 2:13pm on 12/24/11 at 07:57:57, christianF wrote:
No game has more fabulous architecture than Tanbo (http://www.marksteeregames.com/Tanbo_rules.pdf). But it's a little boring to play. Or it was, I should say. Enter Arty Sandler. Arty suggested and implemented a smaller board (13x13 down from 19x19), packing the initial 16 stones more densely. Huge difference. Thanks Arty :) And yes, Tanbo is still a long game, even at that size. 140 turns isn't unusual. But so what? Why the big premium on "shortening games"? Sure, if your game is crap, shorten it. Tanbo owes its extraordinary balance to three things: pseudo cycling, lengthiness, and good luck. You never know a game's balance until you play it out and gather stats - unless you're Christian Freeling ;) |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Dec 24th, 2011, 2:33pm We've been asked permission by the organizers to use Symple as the game for the 2013 CodeCup Challenge (http://www.codecup.nl/intro.php), a permission we're happy and honored to give of course. MindSports has provided a game before. In 2003 (http://archive.codecup.nl/2003/) Caïssa was the featured game, but programming Caïssa, in our opinion, is a piece of cake compared to programming Symple. This hopefully will help propel Symple into the "touchstone' section of AI development, where we foresaw a place for it right from the beginning. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Dec 25th, 2011, 8:14am 6. on 12/24/11 at 07:57:57, christianF wrote:
In finite drawless games, any opening move is either winning or losing. The pie is based on a human perspective. Although we know that a move 'on offer' is either winning or losing, we don't usually know which is which. And even if we do, that may not bring us any further. http://webdocs.cs.ualberta.ca/~hayward/hex/hexPix/8x8.png Here for instance all black cells are winning for black and the white ones lose. The image is from the University of Alberta Computer Hex Research Group (http://webdocs.cs.ualberta.ca/~hayward/hex/). A bot knows a move is winning because it has checked all the lines originating from it. We know it because the bot proved it but without the lines, that's pretty stale knowledge. Two bots playing against one another on the above board wouldn't have any use for a swap. The swap is based on human inability to know the truth. We have to rely on intuition or at best on human knowledge about the general division of winning and losing moves, like the above diagram. There are some conditions for a pie to work. First and foremost a game must have 'questionable' opening moves, and preferably also bad ones, to allow a range of 'questionables'. Even the bots have their 'questionables', but in Hex they're nibbling them away at a steady pace. Here's where they were a couple of month back: http://webdocs.cs.ualberta.ca/~hayward/hex/hexPix/9x9some.png The grey cells aren't solved yet, but they undoubtedly will be in the near future. Note the general division: in 8x8 exactly half the moves win, and both divisions suggests that generally speaking black opening moves near the black sides are losing. That's the kind of knowledge one can extrapolate on. If there are no bad opening moves, a pie doesn't work. In 9x9 Slither for instance, you can safely swap any opening move because even corners are good - this is a recognized problem in the game. Scaling may come to the rescue, and winning a game of Slither is not an easy task in the first place, so a pie on 13x13 may well be effective, for the time being. But scaling may not be as effective as one would hope if the division of winning and losing moves is off balance. John Forbes Nash' non-constuctive proof that Hex is a win for the first player can word for word be applied to Atoll. http://www.hexboard.com/images/atoll_adapted-design380.png The question would be however, whether the winning and losing moves are as evenly divided as in Hex, both in number and in their distribution. There are for instance no clear sides to stay away from. A pie might not work, which led the inventor to omitting it altogether because, I quote, it doesn't need one. Never mind John Forbes Nash. :P Generally speaking a Pie is very effective if the conditions for it are met, which actually isn't all that often. Whether or not the game can end in a draw, or even whether it is finite or not, is hardly an issue. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Dec 25th, 2011, 9:02am 7. on 12/24/11 at 07:57:57, christianF wrote:
An extended pie offers a player basically the same choice - accept the last made move as your own, or move against it - but with more pieces on the board. Here's a basic expample: http://mindsports.nl/images/stories/sidedishes/moregamesbycf/insight_d01.gif Player One made a position with 4 white and 3 red stones, each occupying a free row & column. It's red to move now. Player Two next decides whether he will play white or red. If he chooses white, then it's Player One's turn to move, if he chooses black, then it's his turn to move. To understand the principle, one doesn't even have to know the rules (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/the-pit/insight-575). The 'Marquisian Method' differs in that the color to move has not yet been estabished: http://mindsports.nl/images/stories/sidedishes/moregamesbycf/swishsqueezed1.gif This is a bead capturing game (or 2 actually (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/the-pit/553-swish-squeeze)). Player One made a position with 3 white and 3 black rooks, all on the edge, and 19 beads in the inner area. Capture ten. The choice for Player Two is either to move first, in which case Player One chooses which color he will play, or to play with a particular color, in which case Player One moves first. This slightly favors Player One, because he can make an indeep study of the position, while weaving all kinds of tactical tricks into it. So it isn't really a balancing mechanism. But its fun. ;D Although an extended pie is widely applicable, it's not widely used. It's main advantage is what one could call a 'higher resolution': there are far more positions possible than with a simple pie, and studying specific openings indeep, a common strategy in Hex, usually isn't possible because of the sheer number of them. But one could as well argue that this is the main disadvantage. Imagine Chess with an extended pie rule. Like Fischer Shuffle Chess it would eradicate any need for opening preparation. But would Chess players want that? |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Dec 25th, 2011, 10:30am on 12/25/11 at 08:14:11, christianF wrote:
Wrong, professor Weinerschnitzel. With pie, you select the first move with the smallest absolute value of advantage, whether positive or negative. In your Hex diagram, the correct first move might very well be a black cell - a "good" opening move. There's no requirement whatsoever of "bad opening moves" for the pie rule to work. on 12/25/11 at 08:14:11, christianF wrote:
Except for you, Christian, lol |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Dec 25th, 2011, 10:39am 8. on 12/24/11 at 07:57:57, christianF wrote:
N-in-a-rows are famous for fun and first player advantage. If they're taken too seriously, the whole circus may go downhill in a frenzy of modifications fueled by some perceived importance. Consider Renju (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Renju) and let me quote: Quote:
An extended pie of sorts, followed by a truckload of restrictions, have fun. :P Restrictions are necessary by the nature of a ruleset, but that should never be an invitation to indulge in their bluntness. If necessary, they should be applied with minimal intrusion. Hexade (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/the-pit/hexade-532) puts a slight restriction on the first player at his second move. Emergo (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/arena/emergo/) for the first player on his first move. For initial move restrictions to work at all, this is about the extend to which they should go. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Dec 25th, 2011, 12:56pm 9. on 12/24/11 at 07:57:57, christianF wrote:
This is a very generic and reasonably fair move protocol, that could for instance be adapted for Chess or Draughts or even Go. Not, in those cases, without regulating check or capture, but possible all the same. The much wilder Progressive Chess (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Progressive_chess) testifies to that. But by its nature it favors a race, in particular by placement, because numerical the last player will always be in the lead. The best known example is Connect6 (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Connect6), which has proven to be quite fair in the long run. And that's not much of a surprise. I dare say that two recent inventions, Luis Bolaños Mures' Yodd (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/the-pit/yodd-623) and Nick Bentley's Ketchup (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/the-pit/ketchup-620) will turn out to be equally balanced. Nick extended cleverly on the 1-2-2. In Ketchup, if you take the lead in terms of achieving the object (which is creating the largest group), your opponent gets to move 3 instead of 2 on his next turn. So here the balancing system provides extra negative feedback that extends over the length of the game. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Dec 25th, 2011, 2:20pm 10. on 12/24/11 at 07:57:57, christianF wrote:
This is a kind of pecuniary compensation for moving second in Go, or similar games based on acquiring points, blunt, practical and completely lacking in style. In Go it is employed for lack of an alternative. Thinking about that, I figured a 3-stone pie might work, say two blacks in an Orang Utan formation against a properly placed white, but I can't be the first to have suggested that or a dozen other alternatives for that matter, and all rejected no doubt. It works, games get decided. Is it fair? For starters, to get anywhere near 'fair', the value should result from massive amounts of results between more or less evenly matched high level players. But even then, it is arbitrary (http://go.wikia.com/wiki/Komi). As the most natural thing in the world Wiki states "To prevent ties, komi always includes half a point. In Japan the standard Komi is 5.5 points, though in the U.S.A it is 6.5." Who could imagine a draw between evenly matched grandmasters? It's so much better to have a situation where the same game is a win in the USA and a loss in Japan. This is a bookkeepers rule in a world where bookkeepers rule and where draws are ruled out, on practical grounds by tournament organizers, on cultural grounds by the Japanese and on traumatic grounds by the founders of the Church of Hard Finitude. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Dec 25th, 2011, 3:46pm on 12/25/11 at 14:20:13, christianF wrote:
The Church of Hard Finitude gave us Oust (http://www.marksteeregames.com/Oust_rules.pdf). -Leonardo |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Dec 26th, 2011, 10:56am Occam's Razor and Shogi wisdom There's this Shogi proverb, "If you find a good move, look for a better one". The same holds for games. The wisdom of the advice is quite transparent, yet one tends to forget: good moves are tempting, and so are good games. There's also Occam's Razor (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Occam's_razor): never make unnecessary assumptions. As a game inventor I'd put that in N E O N. By now it should be clear that in the case of Symple, both Benedikt and I forgot the first and violated against the second. The hunt was for the quintessential 'group penalty' game. The force behind it was the existence of several connection games that employed 'group penalty', but always based on awarding points to groups connected to the edges in certain ways, never on the size of the group itself. This smelled of unnecessary assumptions and eventually led to the birth (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/how-i-invented-games-and-why-not/late-arrivals-a-final-whispers#symple) of Symple, and everybody was happy except Mark Steere. The game was quintessential - no unnecessay assumptions - and the hunt was over. This was sheer complacency, fueled by the fact that there didn't seem to be anything wrong with it, except ... a certain lack of drama. As J. Mark Thompson points out in his Defining the Abstact (http://www.thegamesjournal.com/articles/DefiningtheAbstract.shtml): "It should be possible for a player to recover from a weaker position and still win the game. Victory should not be achievable in a single successful blow; the suspense should continue through an extended campaign. Otherwise an early disadvantage makes the remainder of the game uninteresting". "Like a big ship slowly heeling to one side", as I put it myself, characterizing Symple as 'interesting' and 'significant', all within the very relative importance of abstract games of course, but not 'great'. At the same time I considered it a self explanatory game, so there's not much one can do about it: quintessential games, for better or worse. "are what they are". Therefore I didn't consider it a problem, let alone contemplate a fix. 'Group penalty' is an elusive theme with a terrible name. In its previous incarnations - *Star et al - it was a mix of static and dynamic connection, static in the sense of connecting to the edges, dynamic in the connecting of groups. Symple, instead of counting the number of edge-cells a group touches, simply counts the size of the group. Thus it replaces the static connection theme by 'territory' (i.e. groupsize), while the dynamic connection theme remains intact. The trap The trap we fell into was this: we considered 'territory' in a Go-like perspective because 'shape' was a key concept: surround vacant points in such a way that no advantageous invasion is possible. If you can no longer add to the score, pass. In the end, after successive passes, completely surrounded territory is yours. No need to fill it in while the other player keeps passing. The game was devoid of any zugzwang. In retrospect, that was the source of its lack of drama: if you could accumulate small advantages it was often possible to hold on to them because the tactical means to turn the tables were quite modest. So games would peter out in small strategic victories. Then came Luis with his question regarding compulsory movement, and though it referred to a tournament technicality, an agreed double pass in an even score, I couldn't help considering it. And then it dawned on me that we had made unnecessary assumptions because in the initial concept, points were awarded in two ways, a positive and a negative one: 1. One point for every stone on the board. 2. Minus P points for every group on the board. There's no mention of vacant points, other than their implicit fuction. We introduced them by considering territory in a Go-like perspective and in consequence 'vacant territory' as inherent in the concept. Next we had of course to regulate it. We abandoned Occam's Razor. Out of the trap There's no need for any regulation if moving is compulsory. That's a simplification, because you have to explicitly rule moving either way, whether compulsory or optional, but the vacancy problem now regulates itself - the hallmark of a quintessential game. Hot and cold This is a fashionable distinction to make ... afterwards. In hot games you'd always want to move, say Hex, in cold games you'd sometimes rather not, say Oust. In terms of inventing I don't care one way or the other. But clearly, compulsory movement in Symple suddenly leads a hot game into a cold finish. If growing options have run out, compulsory movement requires a new group to be started, bringing 1-P points. Not a position one would volontarily enter, though no more dramatic than seeing an intended connection being cut by the opponent either. Moreover, you can see it coming from fairly far away and take precautions, such as going easy on the growing, especially in the concave sections of one's groups, to save growing options for the endstage and avoid being forced to invade. Here's another trap to avoid: considering the new rule in terms of the old strategy. Benedikt was sceptical about the change and raised the question whether it "would be a tool or a randomizer", painting an image where a player at the end of the game suddenly would notice the problem. That, in my opinion, is not how it works: strategy has to be modified to meet the requirements of a now predictably cold and suddenly quite dramatic endgame. The same holds for another objection: Quote:
Symple is hot up to and including the middle game where the first shadows of cooling may take 'shape', literally. In unbalanced games, the outcome isn't of any interest. In balanced games a 'reverse race' as Benedikt describes is dramatic in tactical terms, but it's not as if all groups are surrounded at the outside and all have vacant points on the inside. In a balanced game it's a limited phase involving a limited number of groups, and the tactical conclusion of a prior strategy. The new rule may lengthen the avarage game by maybe ten moves each. That's still less than 50. If length be the measure, how 'tedious' is Go in comparison? |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Dec 26th, 2011, 11:17am on 12/26/11 at 10:56:28, christianF wrote:
...a thirteen month hail of champagne corks. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by clyring on Dec 26th, 2011, 12:38pm on 12/26/11 at 10:56:28, christianF wrote:
The tedium this references is what might happen if both players know there is no space left of sufficient size to profitably invade but have many small spaces on the board... The optimal strategy would seem to be for each player to fill in these holes one stone at a time until one player runs out of holes to fill and is forced to lose points by invading. If there are enough such small holes this may drag on for quite awhile... Since the game is 'hot' until near the end anyway, perhaps a remedy for this potential problem would be to change
to
...such that this dull phase of the game would really only add 5-10 turns and not many more. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Dec 26th, 2011, 1:30pm on 12/26/11 at 12:38:04, clyring wrote:
I'm not wholly sure what to make of "under the current rules, there are no legal placements for a growing stone on any ungrown group after the turn ends", but forcedly growing all groups (groups that have no vacant adjacent points are excluded implicitly) might throw out the baby with the bathwater. There would no longer be any strategic judgement involved, on whether or not to grow a particular group. 'Scaling' the amount of growth between the implied 'advantage versus risk' is a strategical consideration. Moreover, I feel restrictions and obligations should always be kept to a bare minimum, and under the current rules you are obliged to put at least one stone - if more are allowed, that's optional. Also, I don't quite see how a game with a one stone pace in one particular stage would suddenly be dull. What about games that have the same pace during the whole game? Like most games? ??? The current game between Luis and me (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/players-section/Serve.cgi?file=Symple1324293888.html) is played under the new rule and might serve as a tentative reality check. Luis has used black's prerogative on his 4th move, taking three grown stones as the compensation for lagging one behind in the number of groups. If he had declined at that point, then I would have grown four stones next, and I would have lagged behind instead. That's the nature of the balancing rule. Now we're in the placement stage for a while, but since it is a P-8 game, keep in mind that groups must at least grow to four stones to be 'neutral'. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Dec 26th, 2011, 3:34pm on 12/26/11 at 12:38:04, clyring wrote:
"Game heat" was precisely defined by brilliant combinatorial game theorists who know everything about game analysis and [fbleep] squat about game design, which latter category seems to include you. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by clyring on Dec 26th, 2011, 7:48pm on 12/26/11 at 13:30:38, christianF wrote:
To give you an idea of what I mean, I'll provide an example: http://i.imgur.com/ypAdV.png(EDIT: Assume that P>4) However artificial this position may be, I shudder at the thought that positions with similar properties may eventually crop up regularly in high-level match play. A slow game pace in and of itself, as in go, is not bad, but having players mindlessly lay down 1 (or 2) stones in their own territory for dozens of turns is uninteresting, I'm certain you will agree. As for "In the sense that, under the current rules, there are no legal placements for a growing stone on any ungrown group after the turn ends," I refer to this situation: http://i.imgur.com/IrnxV.png White can grow any of their groups in particular, but not all of them on the same turn. However, on further thought, perhaps a simpler phrasing would work as well and perhaps even add some tactical trickery involving 'almost-surrounded groups...'
Black to play and cut http://i.imgur.com/gesHY.png |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by SpeedRazor on Dec 26th, 2011, 8:25pm Mark is going to get a woody over that, Clyring. Your pattern is in the same sequence as his opus, his swansong, Tanbo - "The greatest abstract ever", or some such. (Actually, 16-stone Tanbo plays better, not on an 19x19, or 13x13, but on an 16x16 torus. No edges: stones on the boundary aren't partially "bounded" to start.) Put that in your pipe and smoke it, "architect". |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Dec 26th, 2011, 9:30pm The disjoint border connections of the torus are an aesthetic issue, as well as a clarity issue. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by SpeedRazor on Dec 27th, 2011, 1:43am on 12/26/11 at 21:30:47, MarkSteere wrote:
Toroidal Go Board: It would seem that if you took a Go board and let the lines wrap around to each other in 3D so that there is no edge, and each line is endless, that there would be a problem in the corners, that they should be triangular, or something - a "disjoint border" as you mentioned. But this is not the case with a torus: every node is equal to every other node. There are no borders. http://www.boardspace.net/images/handmade/go-torus.jpg But you are right that clarity can be a problem; especially with poorly made boards. With good boards, looking close, this is not a problem. Actually, it's easier to see the 3D model the more stones there are. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Dec 27th, 2011, 5:34am Wow, did you actually make that? |
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Title: rogramming Symple Post by christianF on Dec 27th, 2011, 6:19am on 12/26/11 at 19:48:37, clyring wrote:
Yes I do and you may be right. On the other hand the position is indeed artificial. Whether or not you are right might soon be established. Symple games aren't that long, not even now, and if this becomes a repetitive and annoying phenomenon, well, then I was wrong and we can return to the optional movement version. There is nothing wrong with it in terms of rules, except maybe the legal draw after a successive pass in an even score position that started this discussion in he first place. But I would regret the impied lack of drama. on 12/26/11 at 19:48:37, clyring wrote:
Yes, here white can grow at most one, otherwise the original 'centergroup' will grow at more than one point, which is illegal. I still don't quite see what is problematic about that. As to growing "as many as possible of one's groups", that would be all groups that have vacant adjacencies. But since growing one may imply not being able to grow another, unclear situations might arise. on 12/26/11 at 19:48:37, clyring wrote:
B3 and B4 (legal since neither black group gets more than one stone at its original adjacent vacant points) would separate the four whites. Add F2 and F5 and you prepare a second cut, with white's potential growth at the three rightmost groups reduced to one stone (if he wants to connect the two rightmost ones). Yes? What makes me trust the current ruleset is its minimalism and rigid logic. Quote:
That's pretty concise. And there's one more thing about it: handling the 'cooling' stage must be an absolute crime in terms of MCTS (never mind traditional evaluation and alpha-bèta pruning). Programming Symple and simple programming must be very different worlds. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by clyring on Dec 27th, 2011, 8:13am on 12/26/11 at 19:48:37, clyring wrote:
on 12/27/11 at 06:19:59, christianF wrote:
You have the right move, but not the full answer... If you assume the growing rule to be my proposed alternative, then white cannot legally connect at F3 or F4 on their move because doing so would allow for only 3 of the onscreen groups to be grown while growing all 4 of them is possible, thus allowing black to completely cut off the middle group(s) on his next move. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Dec 27th, 2011, 8:52am on 12/27/11 at 08:13:55, clyring wrote:
That's why I fear for disagreement over the interpretation of a player "growing as many as possible of his groups by one stone". Figuring out the maximum doesn't seem to add to clarity. As for the example, you consider white's turn after black has moved B3-B4-F2-F5 I presume. The A-colomn is now isolated. The rightmost three groups could grow two stones max.: G1(G6) combined with D3(D4). Connecting at the F-column would allow only one and therefore be illegal under your suggested rule. I don't think this adds to clarity - very complex situations would have to be 'sorted out' on maximizing growth. Usually, if at all. I want obligations to be as unintrusive as possible. As far as compulsory movement is concerned, having to place at least one stone does comply with that. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Dec 27th, 2011, 9:01am on 12/27/11 at 01:43:02, SpeedRazor wrote:
Interesting :) I had assumed you were talking about a square board torus representation where one edge disjointly connects to the opposite edge. I'd be willing to give Tanbo a whirl on your wire board. As you said, it would eliminate edge bounding. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Dec 27th, 2011, 9:03am What's that tiled board in the background? |
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Title: Re: rogramming Symple Post by christianF on Dec 27th, 2011, 9:28am on 12/27/11 at 06:19:59, christianF wrote:
That's not the best way to put it, maybe. What I mean is that humans can anticipate on the cooling stage by timely creation of 'good shape' for it. That's where any MCTS program, in so far as it can have 'clues', would be clueless. It's like the MCTS Havannah bots, only worse: they're pretty good at tactics and immediate goals, but clueless regarding strategy. |
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Title: Re: rogramming Symple Post by MarkSteere on Dec 27th, 2011, 2:56pm on 12/27/11 at 06:19:59, christianF wrote:
Champagne anyone? |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Dec 28th, 2011, 8:37am Nick Bentley made it to the finals (http://danielsolisblog.blogspot.com/2011/12/finalists-of-thousand-year-game-design.html) of the Daniel Solis' 'Thousand-Year Game Design Challenge', the rest of us didn't. :'( Ah, well, there'll be another one in a thousand years. Congrats Nick, hope you win the prize! :) |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by NickBentley on Dec 28th, 2011, 12:13pm on 12/28/11 at 08:37:32, christianF wrote:
Thanks Christian! I'm excited, though I hope this doesn't send me into one of my productivity-killing tailspins of game design. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Dec 28th, 2011, 1:58pm Symple - the "complacent" game that "there is nothing wrong with". Sorry, Christian. I don't mean to complain, but it's a fiasco. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by omar on Dec 28th, 2011, 3:22pm Congrats Nick. I'll be rooting for Ketchup. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Dec 28th, 2011, 3:32pm on 12/28/11 at 13:58:20, MarkSteere wrote:
If anything was wrong with Symple, it would be this: players could legally pass on successive turns at an equal score. Disallowing a pass at an equal score would solve that 'problem'. Considering compulsory movement in terms of having to at least place one stone made me observe that: * this minor point wouldn't exist * the rules would be simplified because 'vacant territory' wouldn't exist and would need no regulation (because 'counting' is regulation) * it would strongly influence the game's character by changing the nature of the endgame and therewith the whole game So I'm not fixing anything, I'm trying to find out what the organism 'wants' and I tend to trust the simplest possible impementation, which in this case would be the current. But there are doubts about that and I allow for the possibility that I'm wrong. That's a concept that normal people are familiar with. If in doubt, consult your shrink. P.S. Citing "unclear situations might arise" as anything other that my view on a rule suggestion made by Clyring was very smart, congrats. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by NickBentley on Dec 28th, 2011, 3:53pm on 12/28/11 at 15:22:29, omar wrote:
Thanks Omar :) |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Dec 28th, 2011, 4:54pm on 12/28/11 at 15:32:53, christianF wrote:
No quotes necessary. It is certainly an aesthetic problem, as would be an additional rule to "solve" it. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Dec 29th, 2011, 12:44am on 12/28/11 at 16:54:11, MarkSteere wrote:
No quotes neccessary there either. I hope you've finally come to terms with the fact that you didn't invent Symple. Sorry to stumble on your "holy grail" accidentally. You can stop barking and peeing everywhere I walk now. Get out of the "productivity-killing tailspins of game design" as Nick calls it. No-one would like have the likes of Rive as his final contribution to game-design, or whatever you call your matchbox philosophy. :P |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Dec 29th, 2011, 1:37am on 12/29/11 at 00:44:40, christianF wrote:
I'm only barking and peeing where you've already lifted your leg. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Dec 29th, 2011, 2:11am And stop blaming me for your poor productivity. [revolted head shaking] |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Dec 29th, 2011, 2:47am on 12/29/11 at 02:11:41, MarkSteere wrote:
No productivity at all actually, I'm thoroughly enjoying being on the sideline, free from any annoying ambitions. In 2012 there's the Havannah Computer versus Human Challenge, in 2013 Symple will be the game for the CodeCup Challenge (http://www.codecup.nl/intro.php), which will at least provide some more insight regarding its programmability, and we still got Mu (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/arena/mu/) as a new enigma in the world of abstract games. That's quite enough games to suit me for the forseeable future. I could make fun of you of course, but I won't. Let it be known that any such interpretation would be seriously misleading! |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Dec 29th, 2011, 2:31pm In summary: 1. No abstract game is free of zugzwang. It's just a matter of degree. 2. No abstract game is perfectly balanced. It's just a matter of degree. Imperfection is essential, both in games and in the people who play them. Games wouldn't be games without imperfection. It's something to embrace, not eradicate. Ideally, i.e. in a finite, scalable, and otherwise well architected game, turn order advantage is inversely related to board size. It's a tradeoff, balancing lengthiness against TOA. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Dec 29th, 2011, 2:35pm on 12/29/11 at 14:31:00, MarkSteere wrote:
You're a point in case. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Dec 29th, 2011, 5:41pm For designers, imperfection is a choice. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Dec 30th, 2011, 5:35am on 12/29/11 at 17:41:44, MarkSteere wrote:
Mark Steere Games - Imperfection by Choice! (http://www.marksteeregames.com/index.html) |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Jan 1st, 2012, 6:15am I wish all posters and viewers a fruitful, creative and above all happy new year. :-* Mindsports has added 13x13 and 15x15 applets for Symple (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/arena/symple/). The choice is given in a menu if you start a game. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Jan 1st, 2012, 7:58am on 12/26/11 at 12:38:04, clyring wrote:
on 12/28/11 at 15:32:53, christianF wrote:
The doubts in question are well worded by Clyring and the first game (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/players-section/Serve.cgi?file=Symple1325156770.html) I play(ed) under the current rules suggests that the least intrusive form of compusory capture may indeed add little more than delayed moves serving the same strategy with little difference in the outcome. Small tactical differences if players have an unequal number of groups are irrelevant with regard to the main focuspoint in that phase: how much room does each player have left to grow. Mutually slowing down doesn't alter the outcome of that to any significant degree. So we did indeed make growth, if chosen, compulsory for every possible 'live' group (to borrow a convenient Go term). |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Jan 2nd, 2012, 6:16am The game behaves as it intended but now the applet doesn't. The game between Jos and me (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/players-section/Serve.cgi?file=Symple1325156770.html) ended in a draw! :o A quick count got met to 146-143 for black, so the applet has lost a couple of black points along the way. We'll try to find & fix the bug asap. Edit: OK, bug fixed, the first forced invasion under compulsory capture was the final stone of the game. For drama it would have been better if it had resulted in the reverse score. ;D |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Jan 3rd, 2012, 9:37pm Rive (http://www.marksteeregames.com/Rive_rules.pdf) is a very cool game, Christian and Nick's complaints notwithstanding. I played a few rounds with Daniel in person the other day and we both enjoyed it thoroughly. Rive was engineered for massive recycling. So you have a full size game on a tiny board with a correspondingly small number of full size Go stones. It's the perfect travel game (or restaurant table game). That's why the Shibumi contest is so bass ackwards. In twenty years and at least that many games, only two of my games, 3x5 Cephalopod (http://www.marksteeregames.com/Cephalopod_rules.pdf) and 3x3x5 Rive, are really small because of massive recycling. The Shibumi set is only half the size of those two games. Yes, you have the extra color, but... |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Jan 4th, 2012, 11:17am Symple for (and by) symple minded beginners (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/players-section/Serve.cgi?file=Symple1325585232.html) |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by NickBentley on Jan 4th, 2012, 11:32am on 01/03/12 at 21:37:14, MarkSteere wrote:
I really want to like Rive. Can you provide some strategy considerations or ways to think about the game so that I can see into it a little? To be fair to Shibumi, the system was chosen specifically so that it could be represented with a 64-bit integer, so that Cameron can run his game evolution algo efficiently with it. So it's not about choosing the best materials for game design;it's about choosing the best materials for software development. And the future of the software is no doubt to design games for systems larger than Shibumi. All in all, I've got no problem with the approach. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Jan 4th, 2012, 11:43am on 01/04/12 at 11:32:55, NickBentley wrote:
Never mind the game, but why would you really want to like a game? Hey, I don't like this game, but I really want to! ??? |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by NickBentley on Jan 4th, 2012, 11:53am on 01/04/12 at 11:43:41, christianF wrote:
Because I too like the idea of "massive recycling" (as Mark calls it), and I want to see what a good one looks like. It remains possible that, though Rive is terribly opaque to a n00b like me (which is indeed a weakness from my point of view), a bit of strategic insight might allow me to see redeeming qualities of which I'm now unaware. At the least, if it does turn out to be the failure that it at first seemed, exploring it further will help me understand what's required to make a good recycling game. Because Mark's games are thoughtfully composed, they help me to think about game design even when they're nuts ty to play. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Jan 4th, 2012, 1:45pm Marcel Vlastuin is a Dutch programmer with extensive experience in game programming, and organizer of the yearly CodeCup Challenge (http://www.codecup.nl/intro.php). His MCTS based Symple bot is the first to give a P4 base-15 game a try (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/players-section/Serve.cgi?file=Symple1325421168.html). Strategically the program has little eye for securing connections. I on the other hand was probably a bit too fast, in particular the 3-stone connection at W18. I should have placed H8 elsewhere. I connected to slow down growth as is required at a certain stage, to secure internal liberties and win the race to force the opponent to invade. But now (at move 20) I'm so slow that my opponent can catch up in the scoring. He'll be forced to invade at some point, and though that's precisely what I'm aiming at, I'm less flexible in the response than I should have liked. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Jan 4th, 2012, 2:03pm on 01/04/12 at 11:17:57, christianF wrote:
Oops. Didn't mean to hijack your topic... |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Jan 4th, 2012, 2:23pm on 01/04/12 at 11:32:55, NickBentley wrote:
All I know about Rive is how to lose gracefully, which I did with Daniel every time. Rive is fun even when you lose though. It's a game of territory, not annihilation. You just get a lower score. You don't get wiped out, which can ruin your whole day. Oust is particularly brutal on the loser. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Jan 4th, 2012, 3:11pm on 01/04/12 at 14:41:51, MarkSteere wrote:
It must be love, love, love ... http://img.youtube.com/vi/XftXrk32TUE/default.jpg |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Jan 5th, 2012, 2:03am The rules of Rive (http://www.marksteeregames.com/Rive_rules.pdf) are extraordinarily difficult for most, otherwise intelligent people to comprehend - conceptually simple though Rive is. Rive's stone placement rule, honed by an exchange of emails with RWS: "A group here is comprised of interconnected stones of both colors. If you can place a stone in isolation, you must do so. Otherwise your stone must be placed adjacent to up to three groups, of which the largest must be as small as possible." A common misinterpretation: "So you just have to connect to the smallest group. Right?" |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Jan 5th, 2012, 11:11am I've put up a couple of example games (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/arena/symple/633-example-games), the second one against Jos Dekker (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/players-section/Serve.cgi?file=Symple1325585232.html), a Penalty-6 game, among them. It gives a good impression of the 'crunching phase' at the end. We've finished it for the gallery, but the endscore difference was already clear to both at move 40. The cut at F12 (white 33) was probably decisive and should have been plugged by black at the previous turn. Marcel's program lost its first game, but now I'm up against a new version (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/players-section/Serve.cgi?file=Symple1325768737.html) that has been improved on four points. I'm very interested in its development, or in any bot development regarding simple organic mechanisms for that matter. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Jan 5th, 2012, 12:31pm on 01/04/12 at 11:32:55, NickBentley wrote:
It's a multifaceted marketing blitz worthy of Kris Burm. And it's a big load of shibui. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by clyring on Jan 5th, 2012, 1:09pm on 01/05/12 at 11:11:02, christianF wrote:
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Jan 5th, 2012, 1:14pm Shibumi's ballyhooed "depth" will never materialize due to insufficient boardspace. I.e. board size, piece count, variety, complexity, etc. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Jan 5th, 2012, 1:42pm on 01/05/12 at 13:09:58, clyring wrote:
It's a bit more complicated than that. The cutting stone cost me 5 points (1 for the stone -6 for the penalty). It cost Jos 6 points (that the connection would have given). So far I win 1 point. But that's not the main issue. 33. F12 'saved' white a liberty for the crunch: I did not have to fill in any of the internal liberties of the bottomleft group. If 32. F2-S15-M1-I2 would instead have been F2-S15-M1-F12 (it's the same group) then he would have gained 6 for the connection (while I would have gained 6 for not having to place an isolated stone anymore), but more importantly I2 would have remained vacant for crunchtime! So plugging would have given him an extra liberty and taken one from me (because I would have had to grow at move 33). That's 9 against 8 liberties instead of the 10 against 7 we were now at, at move 40. That's only counting the two biggest groups of course, the rest are plugged in the proces. That would have meant only one forced black invasion instead of two, and may have cost black the game, I'm not entirely sure about one or two points there. game (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/players-section/Serve.cgi?file=Symple1325585232.html) |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by clyring on Jan 5th, 2012, 2:05pm on 01/05/12 at 13:42:36, christianF wrote:
on 01/05/12 at 13:42:36, christianF wrote:
on 01/05/12 at 13:42:36, christianF wrote:
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Jan 5th, 2012, 2:16pm on 01/05/12 at 14:05:42, clyring wrote:
Subsequent play was only to finish the game for the gallery, we agreed on the outcome well before move 40. So I might have won after all, if black hadn't blundered, that's good to know. I like to play, but I hate to analyse, thanks. :) |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Jan 6th, 2012, 1:30pm In all the shibui philosophy discussion, there's been no mention of shibui economics. Ironic because it's obviously the primary consideration. The next larger (yet still puny) size is 83 percent more expensive to produce. How to manage turn order advantage on a tiny board 1. Massive recycling a. 3x5 Cephalopod (http://www.marksteeregames.com/Cephalopod_rules.pdf) b. 3x3x5 Rive (http://www.marksteeregames.com/Rive_rules.pdf) 2. Initial, pseudo random phase a. 9x9 Flume (http://www.marksteeregames.com/Flume_Go_rules.pdf) (about half filled at resignation) b. Typically small Dots and Boxes |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Jan 6th, 2012, 2:33pm Luis programmed Flume (http://www.marksteeregames.com/Flume_Go_rules.pdf) for Zillions, btw. He left out the green stone border with my blessing. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarkSteere on Jan 6th, 2012, 2:43pm I don't have hard finitude and soft finitude and al dente finitude. I have only finitude. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Jan 6th, 2012, 2:49pm on 01/06/12 at 14:43:17, MarkSteere wrote:
I hope it's not terminal. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Jan 7th, 2012, 2:50pm Symple (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/arena/symple/) at mindsports now offers players a choice between boards 11x11 to 19x19. I've won my second game aginst Jos Dekker (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/players-section/Serve.cgi?file=Symple1325782315.html), indicating that I'm not too bad for a beginner. We've started up another one (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/players-section/Serve.cgi?file=Symple1325942076.html) that is already well on its way. So far so good, what about Marcel's bot? Well ... I lost the second game (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/players-section/Serve.cgi?file=Symple1325768737.html), so I'm glad to confess it does rather better than I had expected. First of all, it cares about 'initiative'.
The balancing rule makes that the 'initiative' can be traded for a couple of points + 'influence' by either player at any moment. You grow these very points, and the resulting 2-groups have more liberties than singles, hence the increased influence. Marcel's bot now acts on this intelligently. While in the first game (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/players-section/Serve.cgi?file=Symple1325421168.html) it immediately took a 1-point compensation for white's initiative, it now values 'initiative' much higher. White 4: white can grow his groups and have '3 plus influence' for leaving black the initiative. Or he can place a single and keep the initiative. He does the latter (F14). Black 4: black can grow his groups and place a single, and have '3 plus influence' for leaving white the initiative. Or he can place only a single and leave white the initiative, aiming for either getting the initiative at white-5 or else the option on '4 plus influence' should white decline to grow. I decided for the former (M3-M9-D13-M13), because offering white '4 plus influence' seemed an offer he wouldn't decline. Was it? I'll never know, but white's next move showed the bot did 'know' what it was given the compensation for: it didn't grow (which would have been bad: black would get the initiative for only one grown group less) but kept the initiative, which is the point of the whole exchange. The working of this sophisticated balancing mechanism, in which the stakes increase at every move and in which timing depends on boardsize, on the height of the penalty and on the actual position, is 'understood' by the bot in as far as it acts intelligently on it. That's more than the one human who doesn't understand it can claim. To excuse him in his own words: "There can be only One". ;D And not only does the program take the balancing mechanism in its stride, it played a strong game throughout, from my point of view. Of course we both made mistakes, and I made one or two more, and I'm a beginner and all that, but this is a strong bot, especially (but not only) in the endgame tactics! I'm very glad to have an unemotional and constant leveled opponent to test strategical and tactical ideas against, and I'm learning a lot. Next to Havannah, with the Challenge and all pending, Symple will be my game for the forseeable future. :) |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by omar on Jan 7th, 2012, 11:06pm Any news about when the Havannah challenge match is going to be? Have any dates been set yet? |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Jan 8th, 2012, 3:35am on 01/07/12 at 23:06:11, omar wrote:
Neither the organizers nor I found it advisble that I should be part of the organizing committee, so frankly I don't know. But you can contact Ton van der Valk about it. He's the head of the committee. You can reach him via: HexBoard.com (http://www.hexboard.com/). |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Jan 9th, 2012, 4:37pm Why there is no sharp division between a 'placement' and a 'growing' stage (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/players-section/Serve.cgi?file=Symple1326292630.html) :o Symplebot (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/players-section/Serve.cgi?file=Symple1326112065.html) - CF (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/players-section/Serve.cgi?file=Symple1326112065.html) (1 - 0) CF (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/players-section/Serve.cgi?file=Symple1326111910.html) - Symplebot (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/players-section/Serve.cgi?file=Symple1326111910.html) (0 - 1) Symplebot is programmed by Marcel Vlastuin. (And not a bad job either. :( ) |
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Title: Re: Post by christianF on Jan 15th, 2012, 6:54am There was a question by Megajester concerning applet display at mindsports. If you're using Explorer 9 you should put it in 'compatibility mode', presumably in the prefs (I never use Explorer, so that's a guess). |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Jan 15th, 2012, 9:17am Ah, the quiet, the rest, and still a fair couple of views. Now that I'm retired (you'd better believe it) I'd like to return to a subject that this thread was about in the first place. It has everything documented and the period is mirrored in Late arrivals and final whispers (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/how-i-invented-games-and-why-not/late-arrivals-a-final-whispers), with 16 games listed, two of which matter (in so far as abstract games matter). Of these two Sygo (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/arena/sygo/) is a fast, modern and streamlined Go variant based on othellonian capture (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/arena/sygo/621-othellonian). It's a great game, trust me, but there's nothing mysterious about its strategy or tactics: you go deeper, but in not entirely unfamiliar waters. The other one is Symple (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/arena/symple/), and that's the one I'd like to talk about in this context: on 03/08/09 at 18:30:08, Fritzlein wrote:
And believe me, I can well understand these arguments. But before I go into them, better than I did at the time I hope, I'd like to give a recap of Symple's discovery/invention that I posted at BGG in the AI Game Design: The Shibumi Challenge (http://www.boardgamegeek.com/blogpost/6931/ai-game-design-the-shibumi-challenge) thread that was started by Cameron Browne as an experiment in automated game design. It raises such questions as "Did Ludi invent or simply discover Yavalath and its mechanism?", where Yavalath is a game the rules of which were the result of a game-creating/-finding program called Ludi. Or, "Do the rules make the game or vice versa"? Those are good questions. Here's the recap: Finding Symple (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/arena/symple/) In 1983 Craige Schensted (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Craige_Schensted) aka Ea Ea published Star. Thematically it combined 'static connection' (as in Hex) with 'dynamic connection' (as in LOA and more recently Ketchup and Yodd). It had groups called 'stars' that could grow and gather points by static connection, while being penalized a fixed number of points for being stars in the first place. So connect two of them and save a penalty, that's the 'dynamic connection' part. It had its charm and promise, but something wasn't quite right. The inventor sensed that and eventually came up with *Star, 'the game that all the others wanted to be'. Whether that be true or not, it was an improvement, and the phrasing suggests that *Star was seen as the 'quintessential' implementation. A uniform game is organic if its mechanics and its theme align naturally, quintessential if every rule is 'necessary and sufficient' for its implementation. Occam's Razor is the key instrument to strip any preconceived 'assumptions' during the process of invention or discovery. The one 'preconceived assumption' with regard to the quintessential implementation of a game is that it exists. You don't have to invent it, just find it. This notion was what Ea Ea and Benedikt Rosenau and I had in common, but neither Benedikt nor I thought it was *Star. Neither was it Superstar or YvY, my own 'not quite' games on the theme. Where is it? October 2010 Benedikt mailed: Quote:
I replied that these issues, whatever issues, didn't interest me that moment because I was caught up in Draughts' evolution, but Benedikt insisted: Quote:
Tell me about it. The only thing that kept his quest at the back of my mind was the notion that we had missed something: What to leave out? You're unlikely to find a quintessential implementation by adding something to anything. We found Emergo, by removing the 'checkers' part (initial position, forward orientation and promotion) of column checkers, watching the columns interact of their own accord. Thus it became the only column checkers game that did not emerge as the 'columnification' of an existing game. Less is better. I looked at 'group penalty' from that angle: what to leave out. Not the 'dynamic connection' part, because it is at the basis of the group penalty idea: connect two groups and get one penalty less. What about the static part? The "a) you score by taking certain fields" part? It began to morph: "you score by taking certain fields ... by growing". Yes, sure, implicitly ... "you score ... by growing". How about that. It's less and it's inherently logical! Could that be the key removal? Why should "certain fields" be taken? Isn't the most natural score of a group its size? Of course it is. It implied a thematic shift from being a blend of static- and dynamic connection to a blend of territory and dynamic connection. Territory measured as groupsize. This seemed a good step, but it didn't make a game yet. I was thinking hexagonally and 1-move turns: start growing groups and connecting them while preventing the opponent to do so, slow, same growth rate and regarding strategy ... is there any? Boring. Occam's Irony The problem with a 'vision' is that it's just an instant where everything fits. I had been wrapping my mind around the new basic concept for a few days, when one night while drifting off to sleep I got one fleeting glimpse of what was to become the Symple move protocol. I thought ... "so simple, what's wrong?" and submerged. The next day I remembered and without more ado mailed Benedikt: Quote:
After Benedikt's suggestion not to use both options in the same turn, now the core of the main strategic dilemma, the game soon turned square, and as a bonus a highly sophisticated turn-order balancing mechanism was found to be embedded in the move protocol. Where could it go wrong? Well, it already had. Occam's Razor, for te occasion turned out to be double edged. It made me remove the "taking certain fields" condition, but enthousiasm about that made me blind for an unfounded assumption I had unwittingly made. And when the game turned out to lack drama, and I was the first to acknowledge that, I held it for an inherent property. Quintessential games "are what they are" and all that. But it was a bug posing as a feature and I had failed to listen carefully. Sh!t happens. Do the rules make the game or vice versa? The vision I had has two interesting aspects to it. The first is that I saw the 'organism'. Do the rules make the game or vice versa? Both are possible, obviously. Ludi rendered Yavalath by trying random rule combinations, and Yavalath clearly has an 'organic' quality about it. Symple was conceived as an organism, and only the next day did I formalize what I'd seen. Reverse process, similar result. The second aspect concerns my assumption. I saw groups working together to secure vacant territory too small to invade. Remember a new group gets a penalty, and depending on its height ('-2' had soon become '-2n') invasions may be unprospective. Implicitly I saw territory in a Go-like perspective. That was wrong. It led to the 'pass' as a legal move, it gave each his territory, area counting, it was mostly strategy with modest tactical means and it had 'no particular preference for drama'. Nothing was actually wrong with it, just that I was slightly disappointed with the result. A game would develop "like a big ship slowly heeling to one side", as I put it at the time. Now where did I go wrong? I made an assumption that is inherent in Go. Go has capture and is implicitly first and foremost about vacant territory, area counting notwithstanding. That's how it slipped into Symple and required 'regulation'. But Symple is not Go and it is not inherently about vacant territory at all. Symple counts 'Points minus Penalty' and measures territory as groupsize, not as vacant points. Vacant points are, much like Othello, only meant to occupy. That's what I should have considered at the time - some form of compulsory movement. Fortunately Luis Bolaños Mures gave that push, and it shows how subtle one can screw up. Here are some example games (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/arena/symple/633-example-games). The mcts_bot is programmed by Marcel Vlastuin. We now think the Devil invented Symple and made us find it. You may sometimes sense his presence if you play! christian Star (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Star_(board_game)) *Star (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/*Star) Superstar (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/the-pit/superstar-552) YvY (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/the-pit/yvy-555) Symple (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/arena/symple/) |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Jan 16th, 2012, 8:34am Invention or discovery? Craige Schensted (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Craige_Schensted) aka Ea Ea not only published Star but also, according to wiki, has 'invented' the connection game Y (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Y_(game)), together with Charles Titus. They may have been preceded by Claude Shannon (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Claude_Shannon) who in any case found it independently. That's two parties 'inventing' the same game. Piet Hein (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Piet_Hein_(Denmark)), according to wiki, has 'devised' the connection game Hex (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hex_(game)). According to the article the game was 'independetly re-invented' by John Forbes Nash (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Forbes_Nash). That's again two parties 'inventing' the same game. Both games are arguably quintessential connection games. Isn't it fairer to say that each of the games was independently 'found' or 'discovered' by two different parties? I'm not trumpeting the Truth here, just painting the landscape. I'm pretty sure both 'inventions' started with suddenly 'seeing' the game. After that, how much is there to formalize? Boardsize for one, but considering that part of the 'invention' ... well. There's the corners to consider, and as it turns out, making them belong to both sides allows for the most concise phrasing of the rules that should govern the idea. Being placement games without cycles or capture, it should also be clear that the first player has 'the initiative' and that in order to be fair there should be some balancing mechanism to compensate the second player. Enter the Pie rule (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pie_rule), in itself a dubious case of 'invention versus discovery'. If these games were to miraculously disappear from the face of the earth and the minds of its inhabitants, would they emerge any differently? Don't get me wrong, for the fast majority of games I'd go with 'inventions', but there is a small minority that is so elementary and self-explanatory, that some distinction between inventions and discoveries would in my view serve clarity. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Jan 16th, 2012, 10:57am Predictability on 03/08/09 at 18:30:08, Fritzlein wrote:
To paint the landscape, again, Fritzlein appears to consider Arimaa, if not the measure of game inventing, at least as a game that is great by all measures. I'm not disputing that. But predictability, or indeed lack thereof, isn't the same in every game. What about Hex, Y, Havannah or indeed Go itself? Nowhere to go but deeper To start with the latter, so much is known now about the game, and nomenclature is so elaborate, that you can pick any Joseki and say that you "can't believe that anyone could have foretold the intricacies of it". That's not an entirely fair argument is it? It's right in a suggestive way: indeed, the intricacies of a particular Joseki that has been shaped and molded by experience could not have been predicted. But what about the emergence of such joseki? Once the basic behaviour of the game is clear, you might ask "where can it go?" (no pun intended). In Go the situation might not be immediately clear, because the basic concept involves capture, cycles and different ways of counting territory - aspects with consequences that are not entirely self-explanatory. But these being settled by concensus, where can the game go but deeper? And doesn't that include the natural emergence of cornerfights? What else can there be than ongoing refinement of strategy and tactics? In Hex there's no capture, or cycles, or counting and no draw. Same question. The answer is two-fold: either such a game is solved, as small small versions of all of the above games (excluding Arimaa (?)) are, or one must go deeper. In human terms, in doing so one will invariably find an ongoing refinement of tactics and strategy. That's as predictable as getting wet in the rain. No special powers needed. In the case of Hex one might also strongly suspect that strategy will go deeper, but not much wider, for lack of a clear dilemma that would allow different approaches and different styles of play. In Go, though more difficult to assess, standing at its cradle one might yet have suspected that its strategy would be not only deep but also wide as an ocean. That would have required some 'special powers' maybe. Such as 'seeing' the game in the first place. Assembling games There's one reservation I've always made: organic games can be very predictable in certain aspects of their behaviour because they're mostly uniform. Predictions regarding the behaviour of Chess variants or similar multi-piece games are usually not very reliable because they can be made to 'work' with relatively little effort. These games are 'assembled' from various pieces and rules, and never 'discovered'. The more experience one has in putting the right parts together, the sooner it will lead to presentable games. It may be equally hard however to discover their qualities as their bugs, if any. They need elaborate testing to get out 'of the woods'. Even Fritzlein for instance, feels Arimaa may not be quite beyond suspicion yet, if I remember correctly. Draws and cycles can be a b!tch. But I'm writing this in the context of predicting Symple's behaviour and character in so far as I've come to understand it. Since draws and cycles don't play a role there they won't bother us. The effort would be meaningless if I weren't convinced of Symple's enduring significance as a strategy game that is both deep and wide, and as a touchstone for AI development. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Jan 18th, 2012, 7:50am Predicting Symple (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/arena/symple/) Symple is finite, decisive and has a highly sophisticated turn order balancing mechanism. The answer to question "Where can it go but deeper?" would appear to be "nowhere", and while Fritzlein's argument ... Quote:
... may have some truth to it, it may also be the result of only looking at the surface. By seeing something under the surface, no special powers needed, emergent complexity can be obvious from the start. The thematic dilemma Mindsports summarized the difference between strategy games and tactical games thus: Quote:
Different styles of play are rooted in the strategic dilemmas a game presents and the different approaches made possible by them. For them to emerge, the dilemmas must be present in the first place. A game without them is not a strategy game. Few games, if any, have one thematically embedded like Symple. The counting in Symple has two legs:
2. The group count The second one is connection based and it has a variable value in the sense that every group always counts as 'minus P' points, where P is an even number. The best way to serve 1. is to grow fast. A quest for fast growth implies needing many groups which leads to a high penalty. The best way to serve 2. is to connect as much as possible, saving penalties but reducing growth which leads to less territory points. The requirements of style Sometimes one has to grow or place a single, just to follow suit, and much depends on timing. But there is no strict division between a placement and a growing stage, and whether a player is more inclined to do one or the other, or whether he prefers fast growth and a high penalty to reducing the growth rate and lowering the penalty, these considerations will eventually give rise to different styles of play. That's the subjective part of it. There's also an objective part: the higher the value of P, the higher the relative importance of connections above growth. Extreme values may throw the relation between the two off balance, though the mathematical implications may be interesting, but there a substabtial range that gives natural gameplay under various heights of the penalty, with different degrees of emphasis on growth versus connection. Marcel Vlastuin's MacBook Pro runs the program on one core (2,6 GHz) and at the time of this base-15/P6 game (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/players-section/Serve.cgi?file=Symple1326111910.html) took some 3 hours for an opening move, about 10 minutes for an endgame move. The game is a fairly close call where I ended up with one group after white_23. Black at the time had 7 groups, yet he creates a new one with black_23. I'm 25 points ahead at that time, but the slow growth rate will get me and after black_30 I'm foced to invade. Remember I'm a beginner, so bad judgement inevitably plays a role. But even so, the contours of the different ways to approach the game are already clearly visible. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Jan 18th, 2012, 9:13am Invasions & Shape To get away from the heavy heavy stuff, let's illustrate some basics about invasions and shape. Inevitably groups grow into gridlock, having less and less external liberties, because those are the ones you'd like to grow first, and relying more and more (for better or worse) on internal liberties for growth. Here's a very simple example, no external liberties involved.
He therefore invades at D7. White has no other option than to attack the invader (a counter invasion allows black to grow both groups, choking the invader in the process). Black is now P+1 down. 3. Black grows both groups (E7 F3), white blocks at C7 (black P down). 4. Black grows both groups (E6 D2), white fills in his last liberty (black P-1 down). 5. Black grows B1, white must invade (black 1 up). 6. Black grows F2, white must invade (black P+1 up). Of course white's answer after the black invasion should have been to resign. It shows how important shape is in the endgame: you'd want as many internal liberties as possible, but each one with as little as possible neighbors. Again, everything in Symple appears to be double edged. There's an obvious consequence to the above: once established as inevitable, an invasion should take place sooner rather than later, to maximize the invader's impact. Now imagine this situation embedded in an endgame (and if it's not close, there's no endgame), surrounded by other groups, possibly still with external liberties, and spiced by threatening connections and invasions. Add the fact that local answers often have an immediate 'global' impact (because of compulsory growth of all possible groups), then you may get some idea of the intricacies of endgames. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Jan 19th, 2012, 8:28am The lay of the liberties Of course there are variations on the above theme. Each of the next diagrams is the same in that white is one point up and it's black's turn. Can he win by invading?
Crunch time Crunch time comes when most or all external liberties have been taken. Now the speed at which the internal liberties are filled if both start 'plugging' matters. Since forced invasions may be an inevitable result, the outcome of a 'plugging race' is crucial. Basically the groups with the highest number of liberties matter: the rest of them are plugged in the process. If you pit a group with six liberies against two with four liberties, the former wins because the latter are plugged simultaneously. Connect the two and suddenly the six group is pitted against a group with eight liberties. So to keep the option on a group with much breathing space, you must plan it early on. As it happens I've got an example: CF - Symplebot (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/players-section/Serve.cgi?file=Symple1326575956.html). At white_17 I included J6 to prepare a connection between the two groups on the right and the center. Black answers with an interesting 'invasion' at I2. Don't let the 8 points penalty fool you: the connection is 'for the taking' for black. The invasion does cost him a growing round but allows extra future growth into the white bottom area, and it also saves internal 'breathing space' for crunch time. But it also allows the connection white aimed at: after white_18 there are five white groups, four of them virtually connected, and nine black groups of which two pairs are virtually connected. So white is P (8 in this game) ahead in future 'reduced penalties' and after black_18 he's 22 points ahead in the count. That's a 30 point buffer against black's faster growth rate. Given enough breathing space that should be enough. But I'm still an absolute beginner, so we'll have to wait and see. Next day and a few moves onwards Black_19 is an invasion at the only external liberty of the white bottom group that white could have taken without connecting. I can connect at H5, simultaneously isolating the black invader, but I decided to grab four more external libeties keeping the option to connect. Black follows suit, but must fill two important internal liberties in the process (A2 and F14 are both in groups that have many liberties to spare at crunch time - and it's about crunch time). White_21 gives me three more external points. Black cannot take both E5 and H5 so the connection is secure. However, if black takes H5, he will connect and save a penalty. But to do so he must grow and thus further plug his bottomleft and topleft groups. Since I have more liberties, black, for fear (virtually speaking) of losing the plugging race, decides to invade at L10. I'm not sure about the value of that - it saves internal liberties, but at the price of a penalty, and it doesn't threat an immidiate cut. White_22 therefore allows me to take another external one at O15 and take the connection at H5, which saves a double penalty since I connect and isolate at the same time (as opposed to connecting at E5). Black_22 catches up in growth. Note that black has an additional 8 points secured because two bottom groups are virtually connected. His topleft group has 7 liberties and is 'invadable'. The big white group has 7 internal liberties that are not so easily invaded, and a couple of external ones (including the central ones, of which either G7 or G8 may be considered to render another internal one). Local events with global impact Given white's lead, he would probably win despite a growing rate of one stone a turn. But invading, if at all, must be done now, and I'd like to see it work out. Never mind that black can cut at L8 now, saddling me up with another 8 points penalty. So white_23 invades at B15. Note how local events have an immediate global impact. Next to saving liberties, the very point of the invasion is that if black responds to the invader, he must grow his other groups too. Thus his breathing space is dwindling. Meanwhile white still has G7 or G8 to create one more internal liberty. As far as I can see black has not even a remote chance to catch up. Edit: Friday evening (Saturday morning actually) And indeed he doesn't. Note that white's advantage in this endgame is the result of the connection he prepared at white_17 by including J6. This is the kind of thin tactical line that can easily be missed by MCTS. The importance wasn't the eight points saved, nor that it slowed down white's growth rate. The importance was to establish a large group with a generous amount of internal liberties to prepare for crunch time. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Jan 21st, 2012, 7:19am The future of Symple (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/arena/symple/) Regarding the future of Symple I can safely say that it will survive me. Most game invented these days probably will ;D . I've enjoyed the quest for it tremendously especially the vicious attacks by Mental Mark, for whom the game for some reason seems to be important. He's now actually paying posters to support him. I also appreciate that Symple's co-inventor has warned me that compusory movement is 'ugly' and that I'm in severe danger of being subjected to 'ridicule'. That may be. I give my games and insights, and I don't take anything away from anybody. I'm a game inventor, I listen to games, that's how Symple revealed its character. If I were to listen to people, I might as well have become a psychologist. I'm also well aware that elegant tactical games are fun without raising a treshold. Symple is a strategy game: it will only reveal its secrets to those willing to learn that there's 'more to it than meets the eye'. It's a game you cannot try without being tried by it. Once again I want to thank Omar for starting what turned out to be my 'blog', more or less. I really appreciate that. Viewers who are interested can play or watch Symple (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/players-section) at mindsports. I'll keep you posted about Symple's adventures in the 2013 CodeCup Challenge (http://www.codecup.nl/intro.php). |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Jan 24th, 2012, 10:22am Invitations for invasions at crunchtime Here's an example taken from actual play (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/arena/symple/635), to illustrate the difference that an invasion at the right moment may make. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by SpeedRazor on Jan 25th, 2012, 3:10pm Wow, I just noticed that this thread has crossed 100k views! I think that it almost needs an [ongoing] Table of Contents - (LOL), as it has touched on so many interesting and diverse topics over the years by the Original Poster, Omar; the Author, Christian; the various Contributors, Us; and even a Heckler or two ;) All in all, a worthy endeavor I should say... |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Jan 27th, 2012, 8:03am on 01/25/12 at 15:10:43, SpeedRazor wrote:
Thanks SpeedRazor :) I'm no expert, but I play against MCTS bots regularly. By the nature of the approach, the method quickly points in a crude general direction, so 'fairly strong' is usually a realistic target in the short run. There are also specific weaknesses. Thin but long tactical lines easily drown in the multitude of play outs, and also the programs tend to be 'near sighted' in that circumferential strategical moves aren't easily spotted as such. I'm fairly good at Havannah, so there I'm better equiped to exploit these weaknesses than in Symple. My approach in Symple is based on the premiss that the emphasis should be on keeping planned connections secure and isolating the bots groups. When approaching crunchtime, having at least one group with a fair number and a good distribution of internal liberties is important. At the same time, actually connecting one's groups leaves the remaining group with limited growth potential, and dangerously inflexible when it comes to countering invasions, whether by growth or by placement. So you get screwed (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/players-section/Serve.cgi?file=Symple1327075621.html) sometimes. Note that it's my turn and I'm 11 points ahead. To clarify, the white topright and centergroup are not yet connected. I can't 'neutralize' by invading at N7 because O7 is also a connectionpoint. That's another 10 points plus for white. The combined white group has 7 internal liberties against the black one's 2. Black is bound for two or three forced invasions. That's another 20 or 30 minus for black. No need to establish the exact count, screwed. :P |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Jan 29th, 2012, 10:23am Smooth Calculator I'd like to express my appreciation of Marcel Vlastuin's mcts-based Symple_bot. There's nothing like an emotionless calculator when it comes to revealing tactics, or flaws in one's thinking about tactics. Symplicated? Symple is a newly discovered organism that strategically speaking is unusually wide. "Better a bad plan than no plan" seems to actually summarize a player's choices. So I made plans, giving somewhat more weight to connectivity than to growth, because the latter is more direct, while the former involves long term planning. And we're experimenting with different penalties in an upwards direction, which would appear to support such a strategy. I don't give much a priori thoughts to tactics. If the system is sound you'll usually not be able to imagine the situations you actually encounter. Here's an opinion that I found annoyingly ignorant with regard to the behaviour of games like Symple, that "have nowhere to go but deeper". Quote:
Annoyingly because a) it's never that simple and b) the opinion is based on looking at a middlegame position of Symple old style (without compulsory movement) and then suddenly switching to compulsory movement. That is wrong because Symple now develops a very different kind of middlegame in preparation of crunchtime. Distribution of internal liberties, both within a group and over the several groups, is a leading strategical issue. You simply don't get 'old style' middlegames where distribution didn't matter all that much, if at all. Plugged in the process? Remember this? on 01/19/12 at 08:28:05, christianF wrote:
I'm glad to admit after my last game against Symple_bot (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/arena/symple/633-example-games#example_2), that it's a bit more complicated than that. It always is, isn't it? I followed my 'connectivity' strategy, aiming at connecting late and creating a group with enough breathing space to survive crunchtime. I didn't do so bad either, not even in retrospect, because I lost by a mere 5 points on the last forced invasion. But for a long time I seemed to have the better of the game, and a white_22 I was 58 points ahead, with three goups (but black has two or three secure options to connect against white's one more or less secure connection point at J7). I'm low on internal liberties, but there are still quite a few external ones. Black at that moment has 10 groups and is rather low on internal liberties too. White_22 and _23 are 'penalty exchanges'. I isolate two groups at the cost of creating two, plugging a couple of potential liberties in the process. I still thought things were looking pretty good. I'll leave Symple_bot's handling of the subsequent finer points for you. I may have made mistakes in the endgame, but I can't really find any and I'm still recuperating. :-/ |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by NickBentley on Jan 29th, 2012, 6:44pm This stuff is great Christian. I wish more designers would describe the evolution of tactics and strategy following the invention of their games. I can't try out every game in the world, and reading stuff like this helps me to decide which to play. I want to have some sense of whether I'd like the tactics/strategy before I play, and I'm not much of a "game whisperer" so I need help. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Jan 30th, 2012, 7:30am on 01/29/12 at 18:44:29, NickBentley wrote:
Hi Nick, Usually I don't and for good reasons: I'm not that much of a player. I wasn't much inclined to try Symple before the introduction of compulsory movement, because although I saw its 'significance' (quintessential, innovative move protocol, embedded balancing mechanism), it felt like Sygo without capture or drama. That's a bit different now, and I'll keep posting about it, but please take into account that I'm not any brighter than the next guy where it comes to playing. The main motive is wanting to understand the games nature in a strategic sense, and I'm not anywhere near, but I'm enjoying it tremendously. Playing against Symple_bot reveals all kinds of nice tactics in the process and its strength increases towards the endgame. No lack of drama in that phase so far. After next year's CodeCup Challenge (http://www.codecup.nl/intro.php), there will be a lot of Symple programs and Marcel warns me that some may well be considerably stronger that Symple_bot. And one will win of course. But to provide a context for the results, there should be a match between the winner and the best human player. I would hope that I'm not the best human player by then. ;) |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by NickBentley on Jan 30th, 2012, 10:35am Luckily, it doesn't matter if the strategy considerations are very deep. They just have to be better than I can conjure in my own head without having played, which is a pretty low bar to clear. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Jan 31st, 2012, 1:56pm Here is a Base-11 Penalty-8 Game (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/players-section/Serve.cgi?file=Symple1327255798.html) against Luis, with some commentary, though not all of it game related. Considering the boardsize, white_3 is probably a mistake. Instead of taking the center I probably should have grown both white men, preventing black from taking his prerogative as he did in the actual game, whereby the stone at E4 is a killer with regard to white's centerstone. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Feb 8th, 2012, 9:14am Wikito Ergo Sum (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christian_Freeling) ;) |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by SpeedRazor on Feb 8th, 2012, 4:29pm on 02/08/12 at 09:14:51, christianF wrote:
Awesome! |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Feb 17th, 2012, 9:51am on 02/08/12 at 16:29:36, SpeedRazor wrote:
Not to mention Senseito Ergo Sum (http://senseis.xmp.net/?ChristianFreeling) ;) It's an informative collaborative site about Go and anything in its periphery and I've uploaded short descriptions of five games that may be considered Go related. Havannah, though hardly Go related, was already present some considerable time. There have been a couple of Go related inventions lately, notably Loose (http://senseis.xmp.net/?LooseGoVariant) by Luis Bolaños Mures and Redstone (http://senseis.xmp.net/?Redstone) by Mark Steere. Luis' game is an improvent of Reversi Go (http://senseis.xmp.net/?ReversiGo) and the result of a long standing wish to create a Go variant without cycles. Loose features othelloanian capture (http://senseis.xmp.net/?OthelloanianCapture) and solves the associated difficulties in the quest for life in a most elegant way: by turning 'false' liberties into 'true' eyes, in a capture. Mark symply ;-) wanted to create a Go variant - an inventor's gotta do what an inventor's gotta do. That it would be free of cycles is no surprise. That it is not really territory game but a game of annihilation is no surprise either. I'll restrict my provisional judgement by saying it takes something of both worlds. I'm, among other things, still wrestling with Marcel's Symple_bot. Current games: AI-CF (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/players-section/Serve.cgi?file=Symple1328796430.html) and CF-AI (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/players-section/Serve.cgi?file=Symple1328796467.html). Edit: Black won both, but at least my 'connection inclined' strategy paid off in the one I won. Spring is in the air and my raccoon dog Daisy is pregnant. :D |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Feb 18th, 2012, 11:46am HexSymple (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/the-pit/symplehex-566) can be played at Mindsports (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/players-section) now. Here's a first example game (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/players-section/Serve.cgi?file=HexSymple1329575273.html) (in progress). |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Feb 25th, 2012, 2:56pm For the record, my Go-related stuff (http://senseis.xmp.net/?ChristianFreeling) can now be found at Sensei's. P.S. I wouldn't call Havannah Go-related, but that page (http://senseis.xmp.net/?Havannah) was made long ago, presumable in the wake of Hex, which after all isn't all that Go-related either. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Mar 1st, 2012, 9:04am "I've got a new player that uses one tenth of the current calculation time, possibly without loss of strenght. I've got reasons to believe that it will play differently though." This message by Marcel came with a challenge for this game (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/players-section/Serve.cgi?file=Symple1330586738.html) so that might be interesting. As of the time of the edit, two days delay. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Mar 2nd, 2012, 9:52am Another thing, I'm currently playing a Sygo game (http://www.lifein19x19.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=38&t=5583) at Life in 19x91 (http://www.lifein19x19.com/) against one of the site's moderators, using their Go diagram code format. The game is mirrored (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/players-section/Serve.cgi?file=Sygo1330690211.html) at mindsports. I've already come to experience by playing against another strong Go player (http://senseis.xmp.net/?Slarty), that the broader strokes of strategy translate very well (in other words I lost (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/players-section/Serve.cgi?file=Sygo1329944326.html), and quite decidedly so :-/ ). |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Mar 5th, 2012, 10:16am on 03/01/12 at 09:04:35, christianF wrote:
I just now found out that Marcel has a nice website (http://members.casema.nl/marcelvlastuin/engels.htm) and that we have at least one musical hero in common. :D |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Mar 8th, 2012, 6:42am By a considered request of a member of the Life in 19x19 forum (http://www.lifein19x19.com/forum/) we've implemented Hexsygo (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/the-pit/hexsygo-637) after all. My initial reserve - I consider Go a very square game because other grids seem to lack the same visual clarity - already had become less, because despite the absence of the diagonal crosscut Hexsymple proved more intruiging than I had anticipated. These were considerations by said member: Quote:
So all in all, including for completeness' sake, we implemented it. An applet will be operational shortly. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Mar 9th, 2012, 3:32am First time ever I guess to see a thread with more replies than views. It must have broken some barrier. ;D |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Mar 10th, 2012, 5:43am How about this (https://groups.google.com/forum/?fromgroups#!topic/rec.games.abstract/dlt6CiLFQZM)? Luis posted it at rga: Quote:
Did any Arimaa players ever come across this one? For such a tightly wrapped game it has an amazingly similar feel, with a random setup and the combined moves. And as easily improvised anywhere as Tic tac toe. :) |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by ocmiente on Mar 10th, 2012, 1:27pm on 03/10/12 at 05:43:52, christianF wrote:
Yes, it's been mentioned here before: on 05/31/10 at 04:01:05, gatsby wrote:
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Mar 11th, 2012, 5:21am on 03/10/12 at 13:27:20, ocmiente wrote:
That was Luis too, I had missed it, thanks. :) Meanwhile, in the wake of the one for HexSymple, we've made an applet for HexSygo (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/the-pit/hexsygo-637). I've played a game of HexSymple (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/players-section/Serve.cgi?file=HexSymple1329575273.html) now and it offers slightly different tactics, tightly interwoven with an obviously deep but somewhat less clear strategy. A square grid offers more strategical grip and in my experience makes 'visual thinking' easier, at least where territory games are concerned. In connection games it may be different and for me the connectivity issues in HexSymple were less of a problem indeed than staking out territory. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Mar 21st, 2012, 2:20pm To keep an eye on its evolving strength towards the 10 game match this summer, I challenged Castro_bot (http://www.littlegolem.net/jsp/info/player.jsp?plid=21870) to a base-10 havannah game (http://www.littlegolem.net/jsp/game/game.jsp?gid=1432494), me playing second, no swap. It's still no genius in strategy, but its tactics seem to have grown somewhat more circumfencial and possibly a bit nastier - I was offered a nice selection of well camouflaged mistakes to make, but if it doesn't get much trickier I'm cool with it 8) . |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by omar on Mar 22nd, 2012, 3:09pm on 03/21/12 at 14:20:16, christianF wrote:
Nice win. I have also been keeping an eye on bot Castro and have played it several games this year. It is getting quite strong and I fell for some of it's traps. My win rate is only about 50% against it. Are your official games going to be postal or live? Is it going to be played online or offline? It would be great if you could post a Havannah challenge page on your site with details. Also I would like to do a live interview with you maybe a few days before the match and also again after the match is over. Would you be up for it? |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Mar 23rd, 2012, 9:17am on 03/22/12 at 15:09:06, omar wrote:
If I had 'm :). Ton van der Valk is organizing the event and I'm not involved in any way. You can contact him via http://www.hexboard.com/ (or maybe you already did). on 03/22/12 at 15:09:06, omar wrote:
P.S. Richard Lorentz' Wanderer (http://www.littlegolem.net/jsp/info/player.jsp?plid=21160) is more of a one trick pony, juggling ringthreats in and out of season in our current game (http://www.littlegolem.net/jsp/game/game.jsp?gid=1434040). Remarkably, keen as it is on creating them, spotting them seems less of a priority. :o |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by SpeedRazor on Mar 23rd, 2012, 8:31pm Quote:
This is a very good idea, Omar ;D Actually, it Rocks! |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Mar 24th, 2012, 4:22am on 03/23/12 at 20:31:38, SpeedRazor wrote:
No, the Foo Fighters rock! ;D Ten years ago, Chess programming was approaching its current status of grandmaster level. This seemed to end an old debate. Programs would soon be better at Chess and by implication would eventually be better at any abstract game. Or so mainstream concensus dictated. Why did that bother me? Come to think of it, it must have been the teacher in me, or worse. Let's leave Chess out of it and ask a different question. Havannah (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/arena/havannah/) and Explocus (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/the-pit/explocus-527) are both simple games. Havannah is very difficult to program. I know of no significant program that uses the traditional method of evaluating positions and running them through an alpha-beta search. In terms of the challenge, Monte Carlo 'came to the rescue'. But Monte Carlo has inherent limitations and additional heuristics are required to improve its efficiency. Yet Havannah is easy to read for humans. Explocus is equally simple, but hard to read for humans. I expect this to be a game where both methods would work (the traditional one certainly does), and both would render programs that would be all but invincible from a human perspective. And without all that much effort. So even simple games may show huge differences in programmability, and many are the reasons why, but to my knowledge none of them pinpoints a fundamental difference, if any, between programs and humans. ??? And that's funny. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by omar on Mar 25th, 2012, 10:54am Yes, I did get in touch with Tony back in January of this year, but he didn't have any specific information other than it would be sometime in the second half of the summer of 2012. I think planning and organization of this event should be done soon. I'll contact Tony again to see if he has any more info. BTW, how was Tony selected to organize the event? |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by omar on Mar 25th, 2012, 11:05am on 03/23/12 at 09:17:39, christianF wrote:
Thanks Christian. I was thinking of doing it through the Arimaa radio page: http://arimaa.com/arimaa/radio/ You would need to install the TeamSpeak client on your computer, instructions are here: http://arimaa.com/arimaa/gameroom/teamSpeak.html |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by omar on Mar 25th, 2012, 11:09am on 03/23/12 at 20:31:38, SpeedRazor wrote:
Yes, I think this is an important event which should be recorded. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Mar 25th, 2012, 12:58pm on 03/25/12 at 10:54:51, omar wrote:
He volunteered and I was only too happy to accept. Ton has a genuine interest in hexgames and is a brilliant player. He also has a far bigger network than I have, though I introduced him to some additional people now involved in the organization, like the games club "Fanaat" (Fanatic) at the University of Twente. on 03/25/12 at 11:05:10, omar wrote:
Great, even works on my old OSX Mac. But I don't think an interview from my homeplace would be all that interesting (though I could wrap Kobus around my neck :) ). More appropriate would imo. be to do it before or after a game in the Fanaat gameroom, so we would have to install it there. That'll be no problem, I'm sure. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by omar on Mar 30th, 2012, 11:27am Good to hear you were able to get TeamSpeak working. I have some questions regarding the details of the challenge match. But I'll start a new thread for that. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Mar 31st, 2012, 10:39am We (that is: Ed) upgraded the Symple applet to show the penalty, the # of stones and groups and the score. http://i41.tinypic.com/261dnp0.png If this particular score appears uneven, please not that the big white has 28 vacancies left, the biggest blacks both 7 (in the bottom one, one will be taken by white). If white refrains from invading black can plug 3 groups the next 4 moves, then 2 groups for a further 3 moves, that's 18 points. In these 7 moves, white can plug 8, that's 8 points. So the total difference up to that point will be black's current 70 points lead, plus another 10 (the 18-8 ) At that time black must start invading with still some 21 white holes to plug, say ten each, with penalty 8 that's 80 points penalty for black ... Thrillsville! ;D cly ring (US) - christian freeling (nl) (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/players-section/Serve.cgi?file=Symple1328222367.html). |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by clyring on Mar 31st, 2012, 9:15pm The score is indeed not very uneven and the side that looks 70 points behind actually wins. Your count of black leading by 80 points and then losing exactly that many to the penalty is obviously incorrect since symple is drawless- there were two errors in your counting. 1) White earns one point from growing their K5 group inside the black territory on their current move. 2) The big white group is actually two groups separated at F16 and G15. White will earn 8 points more than you predicted by connecting them on their current move, making the final score a white win by 9 points on the line you give. However, that line is suboptimal for black (!) and with correct play on both sides from the position you show, white only wins by 5 points. I'll leave you to figure out exactly why, but I will give you a hint: Your very next move, black 35, was a mistake. EDIT: I'm also willing to perform a chain undo to that point if you want to use it as an example game. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Apr 1st, 2012, 5:27am on 03/31/12 at 21:15:47, clyring wrote:
For me that's good ;-) . I hate analysis because for me thinking from the general to the specific is like riding a bike uphill, while generalizing away from the specific is something I can do freewheeling handsfree. Thus I became an inventor rather than a player :) In this case I had a feeling of impending doom, but I just wanted to show that the 'score' displayed during a game can be very misleading to the casual observer. I think the game illustrates that splendidly - no lack of drama! on 03/31/12 at 21:15:47, clyring wrote:
That won't be necessary, but I appreciate the analysis of a player and I hope it will draw more interest in this strategically mysterious game. Thanks for the game and congrats with a victory well deserved :) . P.S. I'm starting to get to grips with Marcel's bot too and even with my slow learning curve I think I will start winning on a regular basis soon. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by clyring on Apr 1st, 2012, 8:25am Thanks. I understand your not wanting to do analysis, but if it were 'just' analysis, I would do it myself and tell you instead of asking that you do it yourself. My goal for the endgame has largely been to find the general by looking at the specific. In this case, it illustrates an endgame concept that I don't think you understand yet- one that allows you to make a 4-point mistake even so late in the game that your intuition would tell you that you have no need to think. Nothing is ever that symple... ;) Fortunately, in this position you only have two distinct options- placing in my territory and growing in your own territory. I've told you that growing is not correct- I think it's best if you find out why placing in my territory for the next 14 moves should be better on your own. You just might learn something. ;) |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Apr 1st, 2012, 8:52am on 04/01/12 at 08:25:40, clyring wrote:
Given my playing abilities I can't afford to ignore any advise and your generalization is just what I need as a kind of rule of thumb. I had considered the differences but they failed to sufficiently come into focus. Now I'll consider them more in deep in my next games. If you care to play another I would be honored :) . |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Apr 1st, 2012, 9:32am on 04/01/12 at 08:52:17, christianF wrote:
I'm honored :) christian freeling (nl) - cly ring (US) (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/players-section/Serve.cgi?file=Symple1333289532.html) |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Apr 3rd, 2012, 9:43am My all but inseparable companion for eleven years has died today. http://i42.tinypic.com/21ctv9c.jpg Troy 1999-2012 This photo has been taken a week ago. He was thirteen and had a tumor the size of a grapefruit, which caused him no pain and didn't interfere with eating and subsequent functions yet. But it started to interfere with the functioning of his hind legs. He had to walk slowly and slept some twenty hours a day in the last weeks. His last week was full of the smell of spring and extra snacks and attention. I miss him dearly. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by Dolus on Apr 3rd, 2012, 11:09am I am sorry to hear that, but glad to hear that his last week was a good one. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by omar on Apr 3rd, 2012, 11:21am Sorry to hear about that. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on May 24th, 2012, 10:18am This thread miraculously keeps attracting viewers. I almost feel obliged to bring some news. For the Havannah Challenge we hope to set a date next week, and the CodeCup Challenge will present Symple as its 2013 game shortly - the organizer is currently caught up in school exams I presume. The one new development is that Ed has started on the Mu applet. Mu is a simple, complex, versatile and flexible organism. It was basically conceived during one of those nightly bikerides home, after a night at the games club Fanaat, where you suddenly find yourself in the street where you live, without any recollection of the ride itself. No checkers involved, just let the thing explain itself. Mu is a territory game, a connection game, a elimination game, a race and block game, in fact thematically it harbors about everything except Chess and it can be played with any number of players (though a two player version is a likely stepping stone). It has been played once, some 30 years ago. Barring the change from a compact lay-out to a non-compact lay-out, it hasn't changed, not even after all physical signs of its existence were wiped out in the SE Fireworks disaster in Enschede, the Netherlands, in 2000. You can't lose a self explanatory organism. So calling this my magnum opus and predicting one of the most unusual abstract games ever is somewhat awkward. Consider it my farewell gift to the abstract game community. It would not be possible without an applet so I hope Ed's efforts to make one that is fit to handle the game's complex behaviour are successful as well as appreciated. They certainly are by me :) . I've updated the rules (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/arena/mu/) (examples of chain reactions, minor changes where wording was less than clear, a bug in an example). |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on May 27th, 2012, 5:20am I noticed that at BGG the year of invention of Martin Medema's game Atlantis (http://boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/18105/atlantis) is said to be 1980. That cannot not be right. http://cf.geekdo-images.com/images/pic1240647_t.jpg Atlantis: note the compact lay-out of the board segments. Martin's memory may or may not be better than mine, but since Mu's conception was directly based on it, and immediately following it (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/how-i-invented-games-and-why-not/organic-mechanisms#mu), both games have the same date. In my case all material evidence of Mu disappeared in 2000. This afternoon I'll take a bikeride to Fanaat, first time in two decades or so, to see if Martin is even still alive. At my age, if you don't see an old acquaintance for a couple of years, there's a fifty fifty chance they're dead. P.S. Nowadays it's only a three mile ride to the university. Beautiful weather and a lively campus full of students enjoying the descent of the holy spirit. I received my fair share: the transmission of my bike got stuck in low gear. Fanaat is housed in this building called the Bastille (http://www.studentunion.utwente.nl/about-su/buildings/bastille.html). http://www.studentunion.utwente.nl/content/afbeeldingen/r_bastille_3_edited_1.jpg To prevent the holy spirit from entering, it was closed over pentecost. Hallelujah. So Martin's state of being, or lack thereof, remains as yet inconclusive. He may be alive, he may be dead, like Schrödinger's cat. P.P.S Fanaat itself dates Atlantis 1986 (http://www.fanaat.utwente.nl/?content=Catalogus&ID=385&cat=Spel) - they may have some record. And indeed, come to think of it I left Fanaat in 1986 (in the flesh that is, I'm an honorary member) because of the fairies and trolls flooding the place, and that was indeed not long after Atlantis' arrival. And who cares anyway 8) . |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on May 30th, 2012, 3:20am I had a reality check at Fanaat yesterday. Its homebase, the 'Belletrie Library', is now situated in a larger section of the Bastille called the 'Dragon's Cellar'. The all male occupancy was clearly focused on in social interaction around thematic games in which one could be captain of industry, or move merchandise around the world, or create civilizations. Two of those present had ever heard of Havannah and none had ever heard of the Monte Carlo programming method - mind, this is a university of technology. I felt I was wasting my time there. Martin Medema, by the way, is still among the living. "Part of the inventory" as it was put. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on May 30th, 2012, 3:51pm It looks like the Havannah Human versus Bot Challenge will take place in the period end of August, beginning of September, live at iGGC, courtesy of Arty Sandler. I count Castro (Timo Ewalds), Wanderer (Richard Lorentz) and Lajkonik (Marcin Ciura) in. I'm in the dark about a possible German entry, but I'm playing against a new opponent at LG (kenzopower, no info) who plays like a bot. And not too bad either, for a bot. 'Kenzo' is a dice game. 'Kenzopower' is 'Monte-Carlopower'. It plays only Havannah. It's a failed Turing test :) P.S. Not that 'failed' after all, or at least not in that sense: turns out Kenzopower is a player called Max with a bot-like preference for tactics :) . |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Jun 7th, 2012, 9:16am So Luis asked me at iGGC how I would describe Mu (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/arena/mu/) in one sentence. I immediately replied "A simple organism operating on a complex terrain". Because that's what it is. The organism emerged in a number of steps in which I was hardly involved, though I sparked the process at the game club Fanaat (http://www.fanaat.utwente.nl/?content=Info) at the University of Twente, by drawing attention to a game called "Explosion" featured in issue 55 of Games & Puzzles Magazine (http://boardgamegeek.com/wiki/page/Games_and_Puzzles_Magazine). Martin Medema was the one to combine this mechanism with the move protocol of Sid Sackson's Focus (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/the-pit/focus-529), to a simple hybrid with an extremely capricious behaviour, called Explocus (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/the-pit/explocus-527). Then, a couple of months later as far as I remember, he came with the monumental game Atlantis (http://boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/18105/atlantis). It featured the organism that now operates uncurtailed in Mu. Atlantis is a crooked game (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/how-i-invented-games-and-why-not/organic-mechanisms#mu). I realized that on the way back, an eight-mile nightly ride of which I had no recollection at all, afterwards. The question that triggered the concept of Mu was this: "What do you use explosions for, to build something or to clear something?" and the answer was clear. Martin had released a spectacular new organism on the wrong kind of terrain, one that wasn't fitting its will and intent adequately. Now for all the right or wrong reasons, Mu has remained dormant for more than a quarter of a century. That's about to change. The bottleneck was the mindsports applet. Mindsports uses one generic applet for all games, like a car using the same engine and chassis for different bodies. Sometimes that's tricky, like the 'layered' boards of Caissa and Shakti. The trick was to consider the tiles on these boards as 'pieces' and keep up an elaborate administration. The new applet has the 'layered board' as a build-in feature. It will now be used for all games, even if they don't use it. I can say it works fine for Caissa and Shakti. Mu is more than a layered board, but now that this particular hurdle has been taken, a two-player applet should follow soon. Mu is a tribute to freedom, human playfulness and organic design - even the board is 'organic'. It's the very anti-thesis of the elaborate restrictions and forced decisiveness sought after by the Church of Cyclophobia and Hard Finitude. It appears 'complicated' to a disorganized mind, but simple and complex to an organized one. It fits Prince's qualification "make the rules and break them all 'cause you're the best". It was conceived, standing on Martin's shoulders, without the use of a single checker, precisely because it is an organism, rather than a mechanism with different parts (however cleverly assembled). It lived through its 'annihilation' in the SE Fireworks disaster, re-emerging in my mind as if nothing had happened. It was tested only once, more than a quarter of a century ago, but never in the current 'organic lay-out' and the implied opening protocol. It allows you to get from say here: http://mindsports.nl/images/stories/arena/mu/mu_d02.gif (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/arena/mu/639-after-six-rounds) to say here: http://mindsports.nl/images/stories/arena/mu/after_move_7.gif (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/arena/mu/639-after-seven-rounds) after seven rounds (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/arena/mu/639-after-seven-rounds). It's worth keeping an eye on ;) . |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Jun 16th, 2012, 8:22am If abstract games matter at all ... Of the fortynine games at mindsports that I invented or co-invented, twelve made the ArenA (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/arena) and eight of these, I feel, "matter, if abstract games matter at all". Of these, seven are 'organic', but what precisely does that mean? Did you have trouble identifying the one that is not? If not, then there's an 'intuitive notion' involved. All of them feature uniform pieces, and only two of them allow a second kind of piece by promotion. Two others are pure placement games, a type of game not usually associated with any 'organic' quality. That is, untill you see a game in a one minute timeframe. Go players know the strong sense of 'movement' a game can induce. A game obviously doesn't need to feature actual movement, to feel organic. I don't use the word "as opposed to ...". My approach does not concern itself with finitude and drawlessness as a priori conditions, but Symple, Havannah and Sygo come close enough. On the other hand, games resulting from the 'finite and drawless' approach may be highly organic, like Mark Steere's Oust. So 'organic design' is not the only or even a 'superior' alley, but it's my favorite and it has some characteristics (a high success rate not among them) . So what is 'organic design'? Quote:
It's later now, so let's try. Metaphorically speaking, I'd say that an organic game is an 'inspirited mechanism'. You start with pieces and a protocol regulating placement, movement and/or growth (if applicable) and interaction with its opposing equivalent. Once you've found one and absorbed it, try to figure out what it is and what it wants. Neither is trivial and both are to be subjected to the scrutiny of Occam's Razor at all times. The summit is a self-explanatory organism revealing itself in the simplest possible terms: a quintessential game effectively eliminates the inventor from the process of inventing. An example Here's what Ralf Gering (http://boardgamegeek.com/user/FiveStars) wrote about Emergo (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/arena/emergo/): Quote:
Ralf studied Culture and Religion at Tübingen University and graduated in 1999 (Master of Arts). He is also a highly acclaimed authority on mancala games and draughts variants. He thinks column checkers is a draughts variant. He has a high regard for the majority opinion and sees games as subject to human arbitrariness, not as inspirited mechanisms with an intent of their own. Like this: Quote:
In this metaphor, column checkers is the animal, while checkers is the cage. Column checkers was born and bred in captivity, with Bashni (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/the-pit/608-bashni), Lasca (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/the-pit/609-lasca) and Stapeldammen (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/the-pit/stapeldammen-588) (literally 'column checkers') providing the cages. It was denied its own nature, its own identity, and forced to take on a false one. Strangely enough, Lasca has Ralf's full mark of approval. The game may be extremely susceptible to opening analysis, tedious, crammed, self-hampering and, excuse me, outright boring, but it comes highly recommended by authority and majority. Jawohl. Emergo is in fact 'All Kings Lasca', albeit with an interesting opening protocol instead of a crammed initial position. It is so much freer, there's so much more room to breathe, that it feels elated in comparison. But that, to Ralf Gering, is castrated. His approach breathes a deep-felt dislike of freedom. This is what happened when I was introduced to Stapeldammen by Ed van Zon, because, as he put it, "some beautiful things are going on there". He showed me two aspects:
So these are aspects of organic design: recognize a thing for what it is, and don't let the place where you found it, or the manner of its finding, fool you. Respect it as if it were alive and listen to it. Don't start with a cage and force the animal to fit. 2b continued, probably |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Jun 18th, 2012, 1:39pm Immunized ... The two player version of the Mu applet is under construction. Now that I've finally allowed the game to take over, it didn't hesitate. What a surprise. I'm getting impatient (not that it helps, Ed will work at his own chosen pace) and can only concentrate on things close to the subject. Organic design for instance, as a time killer :P . Conceiving Mu - a dialog on a bike There are things about Mu that I sometimes have difficulty explaining:
The first pillar: the basic organism The basic organism goes back to Sid Sackson's Focus and is based on a form of positive feedback: a column - a single included - moves as far as it is high. We're not concerned with bicolored columns, just with single-colored ones like these: http://i47.tinypic.com/14t0nis.gif Here are some men arbitrarily divided over 6 columns. Consider it to be one organism. Like an ant colony it answers to a single mind: yours. It can split or merge, go this direction or that, crawl or jump, and it can display efficiency in that there's a minimum number of step in which it can do things like:
The second pillar: the basic terrain The basic terrain goes back to an obscure seventies game in which a square would 'explode' if it would hold as many men as or more men than the number of its adjacent squares, ejecting one man to each of these, leaving the remainder behind, if any. It was called "Explosion" and was featured in issue 55 of Games & Puzzles Magazine (http://boardgamegeek.com/wiki/page/Games_and_Puzzles_Magazine). We had experimented with it before at Fanaat, including the hexversion, but on this particular night Martin arrived with a board made up of 7-cell segments, like this: http://i45.tinypic.com/16bhdol.gif It allowed for boards of different sizes and shapes and a 'one move per segment' protocol, that would enable move combinations without having them get out of hand. Note that even this compact hexagonal lay-out has 18 'capacity-3' cells along its edge. These will already 'explode' if they get to hold a 3-men column. Growth (will kill you) Under the explosion protocol, the maximum height of a column would be 5 on a centercell, 4, 3 or 2 along the edge, limiting the columns' range accordingly. The game started with each player occupying one cornersegment filled with 7 men, one on each cell. It allowed each player to explode a first (capacity-3) cell on his second move. In Atlantis, explosions provide the growing mechanism: If a cell explodes, it ejects one man to each of its neighbors (letting any remainder evaporate - that made me raise an eyebrow right away). Next the cell becomes a 'well', growing one man each turn untill it reaches capacity for a second time. Then it explodes again and turns into a 'crater' - a solid obstacle. That, as it turned out, is a critical growth rate. The negative side of positive feedback Here's the thing about positive feedback: you have to keep it controlled or it will spin out of hand. Wells and craters were no longer 'territory', that is: these cells did no longer count as neighbors. Now say you're a cell and your neighbor explodes: you get an extra man and at the same time lose a neighbor. Your capacity decreases while the load increases. That's "Chain Reaction" flashing in neon. Add that these chain reactions are most likely to creep inwards from the corners and edges, fueled by the wells, and the picture is clear: you're first and foremost trying to get away from your own wells, with whole sections along the edges eventually turning into craters and 'sinking into the sea' behind you ('cratered segments' were removed entirely). With any luck, you could secure some territory with targeted explosions, at a safe distance from each other, in the remains of what used to be a large board. I thought it was a rather pathetic object and a game that seemed designed with the sole purpose of hampering itself. Although I don't remember, capture must have been by replacement - the alternatives are 'absorption', which would send positive feedback completely through the roof, and 'one-for-one' removal, which would weaken both the attacker and the victim. Not good in a multi-player game. But the segments crumbling into the 'sea' still dominate the recollection of my first impression. It was a strange night and I finally took my bike and went home in a state of confusion. 2b continued |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Jun 19th, 2012, 7:30am Immunized ... I must have sleepbiked on autopilot. I re-entered reality in the monochromatic orange light of an arterial road about half a mile from my home, about two o'clock in the morning. My legs were still peddling. Mu was born. I felt elated. I had left Fanaat with conflicting impressions. On the one side there was this beautiful organism, versatile, fexible, efficient, volatile and capricious. What did it want? That was the key question. Certainly not the crippled fight to secure some space on a sinking island, fighting another sorry bunch of natives, driven onwards by explosions and crumbling edges of one's own making. Not only the manner of erecting walls seemed wrong, but the place where they first appeared: in the players' own back, at the edge of the board. One needed growth, and low capacity edge cells were the only place to get it, initially. It was like building a wall against a wall. Meanwhile jumping to the center with high stacks to erect walls there, required making high stacks in the first place, without having them explode away accidentally in a chain reaction. In the center you'd need a 6-column for the first explosion, and next you'd need 5-columns for adjacent ones. But the attempted 'wall' would more often than not become an omni-directional 'blob' due to a chain reaction. Some way to build a wall. Then, somewhere along the way, it occured to me that explosions are used, usually, to clear an area, not to erect something. And then the vision came. Ask any inventor how a game came to be, and it will probably be a more or less rational and evolutionary story along a timeline. But you can't rationalize a vision, or at least not its appearance. So I'll rationalize in retrospect, but it all happened in a fraction of a second. Vision rationalized To clear an area there must be something to clear in the first place. So I imagined the above board filled with a top-layer of white draughtsmen, on which play began. Suddenly there were holes appearing by explosions. The holes grew bigger and bigger, like bacteria in a petri dish, and encountered one another and ... didn't merge. Instead black draughtsmen appeared to replace any white one the removal of which would cause a merger otherwise. An organically growing natural separation between different territories that would be occupied by the players' pieces. I envisioned the board still in the above compact lay-out and I could see the top-layer exploding away leaving behind a wall as a connected network spanning the whole board, dividing it in different sections. It was all in one vision, one moment, and it included the growth of a new man on every cell that had its top-layer blown away. It provided fuel for the very same chain reactions, but with the reverse effect: they would actually clear one's territory instead of taking it away. A 'one-man-per-explosion' growth rate would be substantial, but not critical. This, I felt immediately, was what the organism was made for. By the time I awoke, peddling, I had filled in most of the details: white draughtsmen would only have their own as neighbors, to determine capacity. The cells of territory they revealed when an explosion occured on them would have their own and those of the top-layer for neighbors. This would allow any overcapacity to remain 'in place' (much of the energy in Atlantis evaporated as 'overcapacity', that had bothered me immediately). Of course cells that became part of the wall could also have overcapacity. I realized there were men on the wall ... men that could travel the whole wall. Oh well, maybe not the whole wall, but they were there, and the question 'what would they want' had an obvious answer: remain involved. It was a detail that would solve itself, I felt. And it did, though it was not at all a 'detail', but rather the crucial key to invading territories! It goes to show once more that if the system is sound, the rule will be there. The next week I played the game against Anneke Treep, with the rules as they are now, albeit still in a compact lay-out. It is, as far as I know, the only game ever played. I lost. Epilogue The current procedure for making a board, as part of the game, came later. It solves the '5-players problem' and makes the game faster (due to a lower average capacity), with more room for opportunism based on local peculiarities. Now what ... ??? Mu on the brain and no applet yet ... come on Ed! :) |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Jun 21st, 2012, 1:22pm Having a mind with a mind of its own can be annoying :P . Meanwhile the applet progresses steadily - all my trials lord, soon be over. Here's a home industry superpaint example of an endgame position between two players. Both have ten men left, divided over several sections and the wall. Preliminary observations
http://mindsports.nl/images/stories/arena/mu/endgame_01.gif Yellow has a route to the rightmost section of the wall: build a 2-column on I6, jump with it to G6, build a 3-column on F6 and jump to C6, capturing the yellow man (if still there) and occupying both wall cells (while losing one man to oscillation).
http://mindsports.nl/images/stories/arena/mu/endgame_02.gif
http://mindsports.nl/images/stories/arena/mu/endgame_03.gif
http://mindsports.nl/images/stories/arena/mu/endgame_04.gif
http://mindsports.nl/images/stories/arena/mu/endgame_05.gif
http://mindsports.nl/images/stories/arena/mu/endgame_06.gif
http://mindsports.nl/images/stories/arena/mu/endgame_07.gif
http://mindsports.nl/images/stories/arena/mu/endgame_08.gif
http://mindsports.nl/images/stories/arena/mu/endgame_09.gif
http://mindsports.nl/images/stories/arena/mu/endgame_10.gif Red could not recapture B24x because of ... D7-B5 (exploding and capturing at B4)
http://mindsports.nl/images/stories/arena/mu/endgame_11.gif Red could invade here with G10-E8, having it captured and recapturing off the wall. The top section would become neutral and so would the section he just invaded: Yellow still can jump in with one man off the wall, because in the bottom right section he wins the three against two fight anyway, by exchange. So he doesn't need the extra man there. That's not worth it for Red.
http://mindsports.nl/images/stories/arena/mu/endgame_12.gif Yellow doesn't need the man on the wall anymore and moves it off the wal to D7. Now a red invasion is no longer possible. Yellow wins the three largest sections, Red two smaller ones, and the 2-cell section is neutral. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Jun 25th, 2012, 8:34am Quote:
For organic design one must be lucky or attentive enough to literally 'see' an organism as a whole, before the parts are charted, and next extract the rules from the top down. It's not choose & assemble, but look & disassemble. The fuzzy distinction between inventing a game and discovering a game runs along that line. That's it in a nutshell. Now with any luck the 2-player version of the Mu applet will be operational this coming weekend :) . |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Jul 1st, 2012, 7:12am on 06/25/12 at 08:34:16, christianF wrote:
Ah well, the optimist claims this is the best possible world, and the pessimist fears that's right. Structurally there are no bumps in the road, and the finish-line is in full view. But with multiple moves per turn, and the possibility of multiple explosions following a move, and the necessity to be able to step forwards & backwards through either or both, with the gradual transition of Virginity to the Commonwealth and the Wall, and considering the complex interaction of the pieces and the terrain ... there's an impressive administration to keep track of. Streamlining it takes some more time - a couple of days according to Ed. Expect my next post to be about the first game. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Jul 5th, 2012, 1:25pm Time for an update, here's a more or less representative game (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/players-section/Serve.cgi?file=Mu1341470280.html) between Ed and me. Not really though, because Ed is stuck between a daily job and working on the applet. I'm using his password to test it for bugs, occasionally successfully. It's a nice way to see the game actually behave in the same way that it did virtually for a quarter of a century. Red resigned because he lacks the 'menpower' to invade the large purple area. He's got 37 cells, Purple got 38. Strategically the game is rather 'quick and dirty' because of the bug search. The known bugs are all applet related, but there's one issue that is more fundamental: the current detection and handling of oscillation. Oscillation is a chain reaction that doesn't come to rest. In the rules it says: Quote:
As it happens, it isn't quite true. It just sounds true, like the words of a politician. Here's the idea: http://mindsports.nl/images/stories/arena/mu/oscillation_01.gif A 3-cell section of the Commonwealth. Each cell accepts at most 1 man, so the maximum number of men that can be placed without explosions is 3. And indeed, if one 3-column is placed on any one cell, there's one explosion, shooting two men to the neighboring cells, and leaving one man overcapacity behind: that's stable, so far so good. But ... http://mindsports.nl/images/stories/arena/mu/oscillation_02.gif Here, with the same number of men, the position keeps oscillating. And it gets better: A compact diamond can hold 6 men and be stable: one at each acute corner, two at each obtuse one. However the section can oscillate with 5 men! http://mindsports.nl/images/stories/arena/mu/oscillation_03.gif Of course I was getting curious whether it could be stretched any further, and indeed: http://mindsports.nl/images/stories/arena/mu/oscillation_04.gif On the left the maximum stable load of a triagle of six cells: 12 men. On the right a position that oscillates, using only 10 men. It is clear that detection of oscillation is far from easy, and that the way it is handled in the rules doesn't cover cases where a section oscillates with less than the maximum load. Not to worry though, it wasn't the most elegant way to handle it in the first place and we've found a better way. I'll modify it shortly. P.S. Joomla uses a fixed width, so the applet overshoots on the right. That's on the to do list: the buttons will be moved below the board instead of beside it. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Jul 6th, 2012, 9:55am Here's a better way to handle oscillation: Quote:
It's effective, and not as arbitrary as the previous way to handle it, and more importantly: it leaves the detection and handling of it to the player. That wouldn't seem too difficult, because as long as a cell is 'explosive', the player cannot proceed with a move. Where a 'click' effectuates a pending explosion, 'shift-click' now reduces the column's number of men by one. Implicitly, the shift-click works on any column awaiting explosion. However, barring terminating oscillation, trimming down a column is never advantageous in Mu. Here's another piece of homework using Ed's password. Not surprisingly this game (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/players-section/Serve.cgi?file=Mu1341573571.html) features oscillation :D . P.S. Quote:
Actually that's not quite true either ( ??? ), but there's the added disadvantage of losing one or more move options, not to mention that trimmimg a piece is only allowed to terminate oscillation. It's a rule for which the applet doesn't check though. In the meantime debugging has come to a provisional end, so Ed and I now have a real game (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/players-section/Serve.cgi?file=Mu1341595855.html) running. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Jul 8th, 2012, 2:58am It's remarkable how many people follow this thread, even more so that they all seem to believe me on my pretty blue eyes :P . You can actually play Mu (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/players-section) (turnbased) and check if it's anything like the thing I envisioned. But it's 'the horse and the water' revisited, be it that in my view Mu is such an enigmatic abstract, that I trust the water to eventually tempt the horse. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Jul 9th, 2012, 2:42pm I've heard the fear expressed that Mu, with multiple moves per turn, and at times multiple explosions per move, might be unmanageable. I'm not going to argue to the contrary, but riding a bike for the first time often doesn't seem all that manageable either, and yet we all learned it to the point that it feels the most natural thing in the world. To help those who stop short of actually trying, to judge for themselves, I'll comment on strategy in this game (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/players-section/Serve.cgi?file=Mu1341595855.html) against Ed (I've removed the dutch bug-related comments, since Ed fixed them). That's a bit awkward of course, because Ed will take notice. Let's hope it enhances the fun :D . |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Jul 11th, 2012, 4:08am Regarding 'manageable', I 'd like to point out that the strategic evaluation I gave at move 11, materialized in a fury of chain reactions that resulted in a division of the territory at move 16 in which I'm 6 cells down, but two men up and in control of the entire Wall. http://i47.tinypic.com/dmqtkp.png after move 16 (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/players-section/Serve.cgi?file=Mu1341595855.html) So now it's an elimination game in which Purple must conquer the whole board or lose on points. It's uncharted territory - I think Ed might be able to hold it. On the other hand, 2 against 1 is a win, so if Purple can manage an even exchange record, he will win. All very manageable, and fairly balanced for a game that in its opening stages - clearing Virginity - has all the hallmarks of a progressive game (in the middle game its still multiple moves per turn, but not progressively so). The manageability doubts have some basis in that Mu can only be played using an applet. Over the board play would hardly be manageable indeed. That's why we will introduce a light version next to the main one, that can be played using the applet as well as over the board.
This hardly affects strategy, but it tames tactics to a degree that makes it manageable over the board because chain reactions will result of this one move only and thus be limited in range. You need:
The difference between the games is not unlike the difference between Chess and Progressive Chess, where Chess is considered the 'light' version. Not that Chess is a light game, but neither is 'Mu light'. It's slower of course, with less furious tactics, but strategically just as challenging. Mu shows the hallmarks of a strategy game as they are characterized on mindsports (http://mindsports.nl/): Quote:
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Jul 11th, 2012, 2:11pm http://i47.tinypic.com/n5sz2s.png After move 18 (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/players-section/Serve.cgi?file=Mu1341595855.html) Well, this one's in the pocket pretty fast after all, and guess what:
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Jul 12th, 2012, 10:03am Luis suggesteded to make 'light' the main variant. I can see why. Light is strategy with appropriately wild tactics, as opposed to the inappropriately wild tactics of the 'main variant'. Light is more balanced in that the range of changes a player can accomplish is much smaller, giving the opponent time to react earlier, but likewise limited. So the pace is slower, which may suit those who consider the game too fast to be 'manageable'. But they'd miss the joy of bombing out of the blue, like the double jump of the purple 5-column that resulted in flattening the exit of Red's peninsula": http://i47.tinypic.com/n5sz2s.png (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/players-section/Serve.cgi?file=Mu1341595855.html) That was planned. In the position below, Red cannot capture all three purple men, so one remains. That is crucial, because it will mark the segment as 'occupied by purple', implying that a move may be made from it. But not by the remaining purple piece of course, but by the 5-column in the starting blocks here: http://i47.tinypic.com/2rw7pjb.png (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/players-section/Serve.cgi?file=Mu1341595855.html) Next move it will jump over the wall where it lands on a segment still occupied by Purple, from which no move has been made yet, and bingo. Mu is fun ;D . Mu velox and Mu levis Fast and Light in appropriaty Latin. I wouldn't make one variant the 'main' variant, so I've sub-named them differently. Since barring the different move protocol the rules are the same, it made the adaptation easy. We've moved the choice between the two variants from the applet to the prefs, making it two seperate games with seperate ratings. |
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Title: :) . Post by christianF on Jul 13th, 2012, 5:58am on 03/08/09 at 18:30:08, Fritzlein wrote:
Indeed I do :) . I have more than a quarter of a century of experience at 'being Cassandra' regarding Mu. Mu is an enigma and I'm sure it will attract some lasting interest by the abstract games community, but why did it remain dormant for so long? In 1986 at Fanaat, Martin's dominant personality pushed Atlantis while a couple of post modern hippies discovered the realm of role playing. When I left, hardly anyone noticed. Mu re-emerged iat mindsports in 2009 but was never actually noticed. Calling it my 'magnum opus' obviously wasn't much of a recommendation, presumably because no-one could see the game. Not the way I can 'see' a game, riding a bike in the middle of the night. Admittedly the rules seemed rather deterrent. It's easier to determine the rules from the vision I had of the game, than vice versa. To stay in that context: I've heard remarkably little of Fritzlein about Symple and Sygo (albeit far to much by a detractor whose insights, if that be the word, I care less about). Last year I posted some thoughts about predictability of game behaviour (http://arimaa.com/arimaa/forum/cgi/YaBB.cgi?board=other;action=display;num=1236541162;start=780#792) in reply to his objections, and indeed acknowledging some of them. In particular I'd like his thoughts regarding my argument that simple organic games - and I dare to include Mu here, despite its apparent complexity - have fairly predictable behaviour, because if they are balanced, they have nowhere to go but deeper. Symple and Sygo are implicitly balanced. Mu is not, but then, Chess isn't either, and Chess is far more serious than Mu. Any insights? P.S. In terms of turn order balance two-player Mu answers the requirements of a pie after the first player's first piece move. But that would mean taking the game far too seriously ;) . P.P.S. First Mu levis game (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/players-section/Serve.cgi?file=Mu_levis1342119949.html) |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Jul 15th, 2012, 3:09pm CodeCup Challenge 2013: Symple (http://www.codecup.nl/intro.php) |
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Title: Re: :) . Post by christianF on Jul 17th, 2012, 12:00pm on 07/13/12 at 05:58:50, christianF wrote:
Actually that's quite a stupid remark :-[ . I'm not all that used to not having my stupidity pointed out ... ;) |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by Boo on Jul 18th, 2012, 3:14am Quote:
You might consider implementing that in a website like www.yucata.de - which is free and accepts new games if someone cares to develop them. It has metaranking system which encourages players to try new games, so you should get some feedback also. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Jul 18th, 2012, 4:01am on 07/18/12 at 03:14:56, Boo wrote:
Yes indeed, thanks :) . I don't know how we could have missed that site, it is very much in the spirit in which we like to present games. We'll certainly include it in our links, give it some extra exposure, and contact them. * Mu is still more or less in its testphase, appletwise. There's a bit more to it than usual in the abstract games category. Yucata itself is obviously able to harbors games of an impressive complexity, so I expext some fruitful cooperation to be possible. We're considering a Mu_levis tounament in the near future with a Grand Chess set (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/get/game-material?start=1) for the winner and a Hexdame set (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/get/game-material?start=2) for the runner up. It'll likely be a straight knock-out system, 5 segments per player or thereabouts, and each player having Red once and Purple once, with the total territory count over both games deciding the winner in case of a draw. That might be equal too - let's hope that doesn't happen :P . In so much as learning to play Mu is like learning to ride a bike, we're learning (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/players-section/Serve.cgi?file=Mu_levis1342374418.html). * Done (http://mindsports.nl/). |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by Boo on Jul 19th, 2012, 5:20am Oh, I didn't know you have a similar site also. :) |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Jul 19th, 2012, 5:41am on 07/19/12 at 05:20:12, Boo wrote:
Yes, not all that user friendly as Yucatan (we're working on that) but very much in the same spirit. I'm very glad you pointed it out :) . |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Jul 20th, 2012, 4:17pm on 07/18/12 at 04:01:22, christianF wrote:
At move 11 Purple unfortunately chooses the lesser starting point, 'lesser' for two reasons:
Red gets a man on the wall and pulls up reinforcements [27, 28] while Purple tries to reorganize. Red's penultimate move is a trick shot :o . We've started a new one (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/players-section/Serve.cgi?file=Mu_levis1342805047.html) with 2x7 segments. Edit: Purple won (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/players-section/Serve.cgi?file=Mu_levis1342805047.html). Due to a bug, the comment at Purple's last move doesn't show up in the applet (it does in the table with the move record though). It says: "Not likely, we've got equal forces, and any attacker will find defenders waiting. The cells where Purple could attack are fairly obvious, not to mention limited, and claiming the four cells is enough for Purple." In velox, the attacker can combine moves. In levis you can't. So the cells where Purple could attack are easy to determine. None of them allows a move that would result in an explosion in red territory, and that's what Purple would need at the very least, otherwise any attacker will simply be eliminated on arrival. So a 'grand attack' is out of the equation here. Nor is it needed. Purple has 40 cells, Red 42, but Purple wins the fight over the 4 'neutral' cells on the left. Red cannot provide reinforcements, while Purple can plug it ... well, not ad infinitum, but easily long enough to capture it. Red of course must defend, because Purple now occupies the section alone, making it his territory regardless of who is on the wall. After a few exchanges, Red will be out of ammunition. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Jul 27th, 2012, 8:42am Not everything about Mu was 'self-explanatory'. If it leads to dicrepancies, the best strategy is to find a solution that serves the spirit of the game. A bit of luck helps. In this particular case the low capacity of emerging cells of the Wall posed such a discrepancy. If cells of the Wall would behave like cells of the Commonwealth, then
So the replacement of growth by the acceptance of an extra man cuts both ways. It makes getting men on the wall an art in itself (and not something that is granted by automatic growth), while ensuring that - barring a single cell section - the men will actually be able to stay on it instead of being blown away. It seems a fair exchange and it works as intended within the vision I had developed on the nature of the 'men on the Wall', after considering that aspect the day after the night before. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Jul 27th, 2012, 9:58am Another aspect worthy of consideration is turn-order balance. If Mu were played on a 'normal' board, which would imply symmetry, then the first player would have an advantage. So what's different here? The difference is that the initial speed of growth often outweighs the advantage of moving first. And it is the second player who may have the better options there, since he is the last player to add a segment to the board. Consider this: http://i48.tinypic.com/2010pd2.png >>> two moves on >>>http://i48.tinypic.com/nb90l5.png Note that the first two cells outside the starting segment are capacity-4 and -5 respectively. Now make that two capacity-5 cells, and growth already slows down a bit: http://i45.tinypic.com/wukqpz.jpg >>> two moves on >>>http://i50.tinypic.com/1fjudd.png Build the starting segment in any further, and initial growth will be ever slower. So both players will consider the factor 'speed', and 'isolating' the starting segment as much as possible will be one of the considerations. In that particular respect, the second player has the option to do that most effectively with his last segment. There are other considerations, like access to the center, the presence of concave low-capacity bends in the nearby edges, particular good places for a wall to emerge, the possibility of the opponent's starting segment being too close by, and other 'local peculiarities', but speed will always be important and the second player has the better options to achieve that. I have no clue how it will turn out eventually, just pointing at circumstances that make a more or less accurate evaluation of turn-order advantage less than trivial. Meanwhile we've started an 8-segments pp game (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/players-section/Serve.cgi?file=Mu_levis1343236437.html). |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Aug 3rd, 2012, 12:55pm Ok, that (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/players-section/Serve.cgi?file=Mu_levis1343236437.html) was fun. By now it may be clear to some that Mu levis is a game, and an enigmatic one at that. Moreover, it fits the traditional idea of a board game in that it can actually be played in the traditional fashion. As said before, you need
Mu velox is not a traditional board game in the above sense, but rather a representative of a new breed of board games that, for whichever reason, need an applet if they're to be played properly. That is: if they can be played properly at all ;). And that's what we're going to find out, now that we're a bit more familiar with levis. So here's a 8-segments pp Mu velox game (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/players-section/Serve.cgi?file=Mu_velox1344015550.html). |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Aug 5th, 2012, 10:29am Ed has aken care of yet another loose end in the ArenA. Here's the (hidden) background of the new Glass Bead Game applet, 2x5 pits and 2 collecting cups in the middle, and precise coordinates for every individual bead. http://mindsports.nl/images/stories/arena/glassbeadgame/gbg_grid_overlay.gif Move notation hasn't changed, but the applet is now clickable. Here's the same example game (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/arena/glass-bead-game/440-an-example-game) as before, but in its new housing. Edit: Not to distract from the 8-segments pp Mu velox game (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/players-section/Serve.cgi?file=Mu_velox1344015550.html) though, which shows that velox tactics, though incalculable if the game were to be played at the traditional coffee table, are serving strategy well enough, and do not at all derail the game but rather amplify it's spirit. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Aug 22nd, 2012, 12:27pm While you're letting Mu sink in (or why else would so many read this stuff) you may enjoy another velox game (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/players-section/Serve.cgi?file=Mu_velox1345655473.html), this time a 'base-10' one. Don't worry, it's like a rollercoaster, thrilling all the way, but it always keeps on track 8) . Another thing:
Actually there's more indispensable than that. Ed will implement a triple 'forward/backward' option:
This feature may be a bit complicated to implement, so please bear with us :) . |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Aug 26th, 2012, 11:48am There are those primary observations regarding strategy and tactics that one can make in virtually any new strategy game. In Mu velox the first game (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/arena/mu/#velox) gave a rather blunt example of the danger of progressing blindly forwards. The theory behind it is that if two sections of the Commonwealth, controlled by different players, close in on each other, the virgin cells between them increasingly lose capacity, amplifying chainreaction sensitivity, so as a rule of thumb
Here's another primary observation. Purple moves second and has a slower start in terms of 'growth per turn' because he has less low-capacity cells in the immediate vicinity to work with: http://i46.tinypic.com/xlzfio.png (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/players-section/Serve.cgi?file=Mu_velox1345655473.html) Yet he has already won! Red could have progressed much further on move_23, but it would have meant getting too close (see the argument against that above), allowing Purple to eject a wall that he doesn't even have to occupy (though he can in some variants). The best Red has at move_23 is to hold back, but that's enough too for Purple: Red has dug his own grave in the initial positioning of the segments, and now he can rest in peace :'( http://i48.tinypic.com/4lk7k1.png (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/players-section/Serve.cgi?file=Mu_velox1345655473.html) So this is a major strategic disaster (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/players-section/Serve.cgi?file=Mu_velox1345655473.html) on Red's behalf, and an important idea on Ed's account. The lay-out phase must be reconsidered, and the starting segment's position must be put before the speed of growth it may generate. The center may be slow on growth, but it's fast on controlling key areas. That's a whole new ballgame, and one that may make any turn-order advantage even more difficult to determine. P.S. Of course these new insights beg for immediate application so we've started a new one (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/players-section/Serve.cgi?file=Mu_velox1346000730.html) :) . |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Aug 30th, 2012, 10:55am In new games, all players are beginners and there's no-one to explain strategy, so tactics and short time considerations dominate. In retrospect new insights may hardly deserve the name "paradigm shift" because the initial approach to the game was totally naive. This game (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/players-section/Serve.cgi?file=Mu_velox1345655473.html) was a clear demonstration of "position" over "speed" when it comes to negotiating a good starting segment. "Speed" derives from a low-capacity starting vicinity, in particular single segments at the end of 'tubes'. As it turned out however, you don't need much speed if you start in the center, provided you can block the opponent's tube or direct him to an unprospective area in terms of territory. Actually it's so obvious that the question "why didn't we see that before" presents itself rather emphatically. So what are the provisional variables now, regarding the quest for a good starting segment:
So how did that pan out in our current game (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/players-section/Serve.cgi?file=Mu_velox1346000730.html)? http://i45.tinypic.com/2w7mfx4.png (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/players-section/Serve.cgi?file=Mu_velox1346000730.html) This is the situation after purple_15: ten placements and five removals each. Purple's trump card is #6, near the center and very well situated against Red's #1, 2, 3 and 4. Previously Purple had 'shielded' this segment from further extensions by placing the now empty segment to the SE of it. Red's segment #5 however, is very well situated against Purple #6, but its high-capacity profile works against it. Using the immediate adjacency to start with a capture could lead to a one- or two-men exchange, which would seem to favor Purple, because he has access to two capacity-3 cells for starters. Whether or not Red would start with a capture, the question is: can Purple grow fast enough to inflict some initial damage? If Red #5 can block Purple to the NW, Purple would have to go around the other side of the lake, through a single connection bottleneck. That he would get the SE section (the tube with Red #4) in the process, is hardly enough compensation if Red is fast enough around the topside, which would almost certainly be the case. So Purple's alternative is #9, or even #8, depending on Red's further removals. Update: Ed didn't like the looks of it and removed #5 so I got my prefered starting segment. Note: This is all velox, did I mention I like velox? ;) Nevertheless, the consideration regarding segment placement and the removal of starting options would appear very similar in levis. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Sep 2nd, 2012, 10:52am Velox is a bit like sumo wrestling: if you're caught on the wrong foot, there's an immediate collapse (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/players-section/Serve.cgi?file=Mu_velox1346000730.html). Red 27 was a death blow from which Purple coudn't recover. "Position over speed" would seem to need some nuance too. In the previous game (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/players-section/Serve.cgi?file=Mu_velox1345655473.html) Purple was close enough to block Red's tube-exit. In the latest one this wasn't the case, and Red's move_25 gave the emerging wall a wrong turn, from Purple's perspective. That was the strategic pivot, 'the wrong foot' for Purple, so to say. Characteristically, for better or worse, Mu is completely devoid of specific opening theory. Strategy is ruled by as yet immature considerations, tactics reveal themselves by example. Velox has a powerful positive feedback: more growth, more segments, more combinatory power, more growth. That too may be considered for better or worse. I'm all for deep strategy and sublte tactics in a well known and largely explored context, but every now and again a bit of opportunistic streetfighting is refreshing ;) . |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Sep 6th, 2012, 6:26am Organic design is a rule in nature, and as far as animals go, there are sometimes tamed variants (dogs, cats, rabbits, homing pigeons, horses) and untamed ones (wolves, wild cats, hares, wood pigeons, horses). So it isn't quite out of the ordinary that an organic game would show a similar division. Mu_velox may appear unbalanced, judging from the games so far. I could argue that a beginner on a bike does likewise, but that doesn't quite cover it. Velox will as far as I can see always guarantee a large amount of sweeping victories. It's the suma wrestling syndrome: once off balance you tumble into the gorge. Whether or not the balance will in the long run favor the first or second player is a tough question. Mu_levis is much more a strategy game. Combinations aren't possible in a single turn and thus will meet with the intermediate replies of the opponent. So the resolution of the effects of action and reply is much higher. As is predictability: in Levis the result of one move, in terms of a subsequent chain reaction, is easy to 'read'. In Velox, the combinations that may be possible in a single turn, are not. Strategy must be based on experience and intuition, tactics are fierce and unforgiving as our last game (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/players-section/Serve.cgi?file=Mu_velox1346000730.html) less than subtly illustrated. Here's a new one (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/players-section/Serve.cgi?file=Mu_velox1346607889.html), wish me luck ;D . |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Sep 13th, 2012, 5:53am The first cars looked like stage coaches without a horse. Likewise, the first online abstracts looked like boardgames without a physical board. I'm no expert at social interaction. I like my relative solitude and haven't touched a physical board in the last decade or so. So I won't comment on what is lost in online play, as opposed to over the board play. But something is won. Playing online is more convenient (unless of course one finds social interaction 'convenient') and you can do a few things that you can't do at over the board play. That being the case, there's no reason to somehow limit these options.
P.S. Please consider the above metaphor as such - I'm not implying that say Go is an 'old car'. At the same time I'm not so sure about Chess and very sure about Checkers ;) . |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Sep 16th, 2012, 9:20am So Red won the last one (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/players-section/Serve.cgi?file=Mu_velox1346607889.html), and the first one played in full awareness of the speed versus position dilemma regarding segment placement. http://i50.tinypic.com/24dixx0.png (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/players-section/Serve.cgi?file=Mu_velox1346607889.html) Purple valued 'position' maybe a trifle to optimistically because it eventually had to outweigh a double disadvantage: a slower start while moving second. It was clear from the onset that he had to cut through the central string of lakes somewhere. That didn't quite work out, though Red was forced through a very narrow channel, that left him with no straight route to the bottomleft territory. If he hadn't had the one invasion point, a shooting pimple of sorts, to slow Purple down, he might easily have lost the race for it. http://i48.tinypic.com/15enps.png (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/players-section/Serve.cgi?file=Mu_velox1346607889.html) The final position came after a double pass. Red has 79 cells, Purple 54, with a more or less corresponding count of forces. Red would naturally maybe rearrange a bit and pass. What if Purple had refused to pass? Red has no incentive to invade, nor a profitable way to do so. He must at least enter a 2-column that is pushed out of the pimple only to be captured. The captor next can move out of the line of fire. Invading with 4 or more means occupying 4 cells without making a capture. Lets put it a bit sharper: if red had no man on the wall he wouldn't be able to invade at all. So if Purple keeps moving, he can either pass or make the occasional move, but the game doesn't end. Purple can't invade himself, because he ends on one segment, facing a reply that can make use of at least three. That's a nogo. Of course this is silly, but what if the territory differs by only one or two cells, with about equal forces? That's one bordering on 'tournament rules', and who has the burden of proof. I'm still considering it - Go has had similar issues for as long as it exists, so there's hardly any hurry. Meanwhile the balance of velox still hangs in the balance, so to say, but this much is sure: if velox doesn't derail, then levis is balanced by implication. It's not by chance that we fight with the wild one to see if it can be tamed. So here we go again (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/players-section/Serve.cgi?file=Mu_velox1347789326.html). |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Sep 18th, 2012, 6:21am Maybe it's worth mentioning that the CodeCup 2013 test competitions (http://www.codecup.nl/competitionlist.php) have started. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Sep 19th, 2012, 3:40am Also: Ed has finished the AYU (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/the-pit/ayu-636) applet and this simple intruiging game by Luis Bolaños Mures (http://boardgamegeek.com/boardgamedesigner/47001/luis-bolanos-mures) can now be played (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/players-section) at mindsports. 'Simple' refers to its structure - Ayu may well be considered a quintessential 'approach' game. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Sep 22nd, 2012, 1:23pm So here we go again (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/players-section/Serve.cgi?file=Mu_velox1347789326.html) ended in Sumo style, Red overrunning Purple. With the current opening protocol, the first player may arguably have have an advantage, though Purple probably chose the wrong strategy by investing in an early sidetrack, a segment that seemed promising for quick growth because of its low average capacity. But it took too long to get it started, and when it did, being trapped between the lakes interfered deplorably with speedy development. In case there should be any question about the current protocol as a vehicle to a balanced starting position, Mu can use a pie rule protocol instead. Since it is equally easy to make a starting position in which Red loses than one in which Purple loses, it is also possible to make a balanced position, in which Red's advantage of moving first has been counterbalanced by Purple's better position. So if ...
This being said, we'll leave Velox for the time being, but if any of the obviously large number of viewers likes to try, we've recently lifted the ban on playing ;). We're entering the quieter realm of strategy again, see the camera follow us in slo-mo (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/players-section/Serve.cgi?file=Mu_levis1348337647.html) 8) . |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Sep 23rd, 2012, 6:40am The current opening protocol was chosen because it was clear from the onset that Mu could be played with more than two players. Being triggered by Martin Medema's Atlantis (http://boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/18105/atlantis), how could it not. There will be no multi-player applet for Mu in the forseeable future. So Velox might benefit from a switch to the pie-rule as mentioned above. It is only applicable to the current two-player version, but since multi-player Velox would probably end up in total chaos anyway, who cares? Levis is another matter, because contrary to Velox it lends itself excellently for both over-the-board-play and for multi-player games, and these have no use for a pie. So we'll stick to the current opening protocol, since in Levis it serves any number of players equally well. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Sep 29th, 2012, 6:54am So a levis game can be rather uneventful (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/players-section/Serve.cgi?file=Mu_levis1348337647.html). After Red_18 it looks like Red has plenty of time to get to the conflict zone around the one-cell lake first, and Red_19 seems to confirm this view. At move 20 Red even acts on that by taking a move to activate reinforcements from the back. That must have been a wrong decision. Purple_20 brings a couple of strong columns in alignment, and Purple can subsequently paste a wall - not with any piece on it, but it seals off the majority of the territory, so who needs a piece on it? Contrary to that, our new game (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/players-section/Serve.cgi?file=Mu_levis1348842504.html) came out of the placement stage with a totally different dilemma. Red is condemned to a cut-off strategy and Purple must figure out if he can get fast enough out of a tube to overrun his opponent. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Sep 30th, 2012, 1:46pm Fritzlein is right in that you can't foresee everything. Mu's rules capture its spirit, but the opening protocol, the way to achieve an initial position, defines a strategy based on the 'speed vs position' dilemma. Two forces radiating out for a head-bang encounter, where one comes out victorious & never mind the rest of the game. The crucial phase is sifting out the right starting segment. In our current game (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/players-section/Serve.cgi?file=Mu_levis1348842504.html) Purple had three tubes, each of them capable of fast growth. Yet each of them would have lost to the central Red segment. The segment Purple eventually selected was much slower but better positioned. This became clear after a few moves, and the game was essentially over after that. It's the Sumo wrestling syndrome, and fun as it may be, it justifies some reflection on the opening protocol. An initial position with one filled segment finds its basis in Atlantis. It was one of the anchors for the thoughts that led to Mu's discovery. There was no other basis and it works out fine if you like Sumo wrestling and take the fact that it doesn't quite seem to serve Velox in the bargain. Which I don't like to do, actually. In terms of change, my first thoughts usually are to omit something, rather than to add something. So I suggest to reflect on omitting the entire 'clearing' stage, and proceed with movement right away, that is: after the second player has placed his final segment. One advantage is that Levis and Velox would have the same protocol. Velox might even profit from a progressive movement stage: after the second player has placed the last segment, the first player makes one move, then the second makes two, then the first makes three, and so on till both arrive at 'one move per segment' as usual. Another advantage is that it is a simplification (not to mention that the current protocol could remain optional for head-banging Sumo wrestlers). The big difference will be in the strategy of the lay-out phase. A player's main incentive would to keep his segments clustered to ensure the pieces can be combined into columns as soon as possible. Tubeology would hardly play a role. 'Protuberances' would be more likely, in areas that have a high density of like colored segments. Longer ones would ensure fast growth, as usual, but it would take time, too much time most likely, to assemble enough men in them to start the process. The opponent of course also tries to cluster his segments. Surrounding segments of an opponent is all but impossibe, so there's no alternative. The result of a lay-out will therefore usually be a fairly compact division in two areas, each occupied by a different player, with embryonic tubes along the edges to get growth started as soon and as efficiently as possible. In the initial movement stages, you'd run of course a risk of pieces being captured, so care should be taken to stay out of range of the opponent's pieces, or have pieces covered. It is not inconceivable however to sacrifice a piece for speed: once you get growth started, it may quickly be replaced by new ones. As Ed remarked: the proof of the pudding is in the eating, so shortly we'll serve the new recipe and see how it works out. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Oct 1st, 2012, 4:38am A night's sleep and and my thoughts have arranged themselves (as ever: more or less). In random order:
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Oct 5th, 2012, 6:08am Ed is working on the new opening protocol (while optionally retaining the current one). Meanwhile Benedikt and I have started a game (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/players-section/Serve.cgi?file=Mu_levis1348695462.html) displaying the now almost familiar 'position vs speed' strategy. Red's final removal was a choice for the former. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Oct 7th, 2012, 5:53am Barring bugs it's working. Our first game using the new opening protocol is a velox (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/players-section/Serve.cgi?file=Mu_velox1349603165.html) of course. A couple of things to observe are:
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Oct 7th, 2012, 9:27am In the fourth test round of the CodeCup 2013 Challenge (http://www.codecup.nl/intro.php) there appeared a new dutch competitor named Remco Bloemen, with a C++ program named "main32". It has an interesting list of results (http://www.codecup.nl/entrygames.php?ent=3281). Answering questions about strategy appears to be extremely difficult because Symple has a strategic dilemma embedded in its object. Watching this program play is fascinating, and will most likely provide the very tools that are needed to carve out the main strategic principles. Since I'm already struggling to keep up with its opposition, I have no doubt that I'd be on the losing end against main32 for the foreseeable future. I'm looking forward to playing against it. On another note, Luis has started a thread (at BGG (http://www.boardgamegeek.com/thread/864135/an-offbeat-alternative-to-the-pie-rule) and Lifein19x19 (http://www.lifein19x19.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=45&t=6872)) about what he describes as "an offbeat generalization of the Symple balancing mechanism", where I'd rather call it "a general balancing mechanism", inspired by the one of Symple. To remind viewers of the essence of this balancing mechanism I replied thus: Quote:
And looking at main32's results (http://www.codecup.nl/entrygames.php?ent=3281), there at least not much indication that Symple's balancing mechanism works other than intended ;) . |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Oct 9th, 2012, 4:17pm Given the development of this velox game (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/players-section/Serve.cgi?file=Mu_velox1349603165.html) I'm tempted to let levis keep the original opening protocol, while velox gets the new one. The new one is too slow for levis, the old one too fast for velox and I like things to be simple. Life is complicated enough as it is 8) . |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Oct 14th, 2012, 6:28am It's definitive, our latest velox game (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/players-section/Serve.cgi?file=Mu_velox1349603165.html) convinced me that the 'reduced' opening protocol serves the game perfectly. So Velox and Levis have drifted apart somewhat, despite having the same solid core:
P.S. We've started another one (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/players-section/Serve.cgi?file=Mu_velox1350211150.html). You guys may prefer to keep watching, but the aliens have landed, they're not going to crash anymore - you can actually play them ;D . |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Oct 17th, 2012, 12:53pm on 10/14/12 at 06:28:56, christianF wrote:
Yeah, right, players may crash though. Ed frankly admitted that this catastrophy (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/players-section/Serve.cgi?file=Mu_velox1350211150.html) was more due to his initial lay-out (no 'protube' like Red) and less than effective initial moves. So now (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/players-section/Serve.cgi?file=Mu_velox1350454296.html) we're warned that there's some 'opening theory' involved in the lay-out as well as the most effective starting moves in the 'progressive' early stages. P.S. Note that Ed plays second again, at his own request. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Oct 20th, 2012, 3:45pm on 10/17/12 at 12:53:12, christianF wrote:
So 'tubeology' is back. A boardshape doesn't have to be 'compact' to assure good cooperation of men in the progressive movement stage, as I had assumed for convenience. These insight will go into our next game (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/players-section/Serve.cgi?file=Mu_velox1350764075.html), and who knows what will happen next :) . |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Oct 24th, 2012, 7:26am on 10/20/12 at 15:45:25, christianF wrote:
I lost on a less than intelligent lay-out of my segments, leading to an arrears in development and initial growth. In Mu positive feedback is quite enough in such a case to trigger a tsunami (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/players-section/Serve.cgi?file=Mu_velox1350764075.html) by the opponent. A regular and usually achievable starting configuration to start growth with four-segments is shown top-left, the goal being the move combination top-right. Note that it involves moves from three different segments, two of which already saw a move in a previous turn. The rightmost segment is the 'tube' or spawning chamber, a segment with a low average capacity, making it the best starting area for chainreactions and the growth implied. http://i47.tinypic.com/2ymblzo.gif The bottom-left starting configuration is more effective, but maybe also less achievable against an opponent who is aware of it, as most would be, considering I'm pointing it out here. The number of moves is the same, but a short distance down the line, the chain reaction will spill over to the second segment, that has a lower average capacity than its counterpart above, and thus will speed up growth more effectively. These are only a few of a number of possible configurations that allow a quick start and that show that tubes keep playing a key role in both Levis and Velox, despite their differences in move protocol. P.S. Note that the bottom one has a disadvantage too. In the top configuration, once the second segment blows, it will easily spill over to two more segments. In the bottom one it only can reach one (albeit faster). That means that the bottom configuration will at a certain point, and for a short while, have less combinatory power. P.P.S. I'll have to catch up on some of those ever accumulating requirements in and around the house :P and do some work on mindsports too, so we've put Mu on hold for the moment. If you don't want to have some fun, don't try it ;) . |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Oct 25th, 2012, 6:12am I admire the best work of some of the more prominent inventors of abstract games, if that be the word to use in a realm that is largely neglected in the first place. One of them is Luis Bolaños Mures who among others invented an original and highly organic 'dynamic goal' connection game called Yodd (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/the-pit/yodd-623) and a beautiful and equally organic quintessential 'approach' game called Ayu (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/the-pit/ayu-636). When he's at his best, simplicity, originality and elegance are Luis' hallmarks. He's quite driven though and sometimes publishes prematurely. Well, who doesn't? He also leans towards the dogmata of the Church of Cylophobia and Hard Finitude. Games should be free of cycles, finite, drawless and perfectly balanced in terms of turn order advantage. Some members require, as an additional condition, that they should not be by me ;) . Don't argue that some of the worlds most prominent abstracts like Chess, Shogi, Xiangqi, Go and Draughts don't comply. The Church agrees and thinks these should be banned. Now it turns out that Ayu is not theoretically finite (https://groups.google.com/forum/?fromgroups=#!topic/rec.games.abstract/xOMUMRoeZDE). Luis starts with "Bad news". The choir sings "a stab in the liver!" and "dammit!" and "it was our favorite of your games!" and "what now lord, what now?". Because of what? The cycle discovered in Ayu requires cooperation between the players to emerge. That's called "soft finite". It means that you would need two church members cooperating to convince one another of something they agree upon in the first place. You cannot play to win and cooperate to prove the game isn't finite at the same time. The discovery of a 'cooperative' cycle takes nothing from the game in terms of simplicity of concept, elegance, quintessence or playability. Games are the essence, not dogmata about them. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Oct 27th, 2012, 9:14am We've modified the rules of Mu (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/arena/mu/) to reflect the differences between Levis and Velox as they crystallized in the past weeks. We've also widened the choice of the number of segments to 12 (which makes te maximum boardsize one less than a 13x13 Go board). Velox benefits from a somewhat larger board, if only to give the progressive start of the movement stage more combinatory scope. So we're engaged in a 12x12 Velox game (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/players-section/Serve.cgi?file=Mu_velox1351354839.html) now, enjoy :) . Edit: This appears to be the first Velox game that is not characterized by a gross lack of insight regarding possible lay-out strategies. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Oct 30th, 2012, 3:20pm So what did we learn of this one (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/players-section/Serve.cgi?file=Mu_velox1351354839.html)? For starters you need to build fast access routes to low capacity 'tubes'. You need the cooperation of at least 3 men to initiate growth, so with 12 segments you can choose four growth centra with 3 men each, or three with 4 men each, or two with 6 men each. In this game Red chose the latter against Purple's three starting areas. Purple's growth was faster, which is good, but fast growth isn't the whole story. In the inevitable encounter Red, for reasons not entirely clear, managed to occupy all sections of the wall, while keeping routes between his two sections open. This allowed him to pit his forces against the smallest of Purple's sections, while locking the rest of Purple's forces out. Invading and conquering this section turned the tables in terms of territory. So having more growth centra appears to bee advantageous in terms of growth, but leaves a vulnarability because each section in itself may be harder to hold on to. Let's see how it works out in the next one (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/players-section/Serve.cgi?file=Mu_velox1351622186.html). |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Oct 31st, 2012, 1:07pm A new category of abstract strategy games Let's, for argument's sake, pretend that abstract strategy games matter, then I unwittingly seem to have followed a trend that would appear logical in the interconnected virtuality we live in: boardgames without physical boards. All classic board games can nowadays conveniently be played online, so the emergence of strategy games that can conveniently be played online, but that have features that make them difficult or even impossible to play in the physical world, was an accident waiting to happen. This trend is much wider than my contribution, but the three games that have been the most exposed here lately show different degrees of the idea. Symple (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/arena/symple/) can be played fairly conveniently over-the-board, provided one has Go stones with a small dot on one side. Placing several stones and turning them around after placement is more complex than placing a stone, but on the other hand, Symple knows only placement, so there's no removal of captured stones - it kind of evens out. Edit: Or say it would even out if it were not for keeping the score: here an applet is convenient to the point of being indispensable. Sygo (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/arena/sygo/) is more problematic if one would consider over-the-board play, too problematic actually. Mu (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/arena/mu/) velox cannot be played over-the-board at all. The point being that a realm has been opened of strategy games that may be interesting or significant in some or all of their aspects, but that could never have been invented or discovered in a world where a strategy game is synonymous with a physical board game. |
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Title: th of improvements)to where I live Post by christianF on Nov 5th, 2012, 12:40pm For the record: I've adapted the cooperative cycle in Ayu (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/the-pit/ayu-636) to the 11x11 board and put it in an applet. It's a clever discovery by iGGC's "PCM", but not a game position. Whether such a cycle can be found in a legally played game remains unknown ??? . Our last Mu_velox game (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/players-section/Serve.cgi?file=Mu_velox1351622186.html) revealed the same as the one before that: two long starting combinations that build to a 5-column before the first explosion, beat three shorter ones that build to a 3 column. Crowded birth chambers pay off. Moreover, having three sections of territory always means one is the weakest. If the opponent manages to get on the wall of such a section, it is more than likely to fall. Keeping that in mind, here's the next game (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/players-section/Serve.cgi?file=Mu_velox1352139327.html). Remco Bloemen (http://remcobloemen.nl/), who's entry in the CodeCup was having the whole competition for lunch (http://www.codecup.nl/entrygames.php?ent=3281), happens to live close to where I live. Thus I learned that his program isn't MCTS based, but rather the heuristic intended to support a MCTS program he's working on. The next round (http://www.codecup.nl/entrygames.php?ent=3314) this clever little 'stand-alone support program' won 29 out of 32 against a presumably stronger opposition (one month of improvements). I'm curious how strong the indended program might eventually become, if at all stronger than the heuristic. I'll play against the current version shortly. It's a bit of an irony that, while looking for games that humans can play at a high level, but that pose difficulties for programmers, I stumble upon a game that I don't understand at all (despite winning regularly), but that programs can play at a high level :P . |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Nov 9th, 2012, 7:44am Game inventors like competitions and challenges and awards, so here's another one (http://www.boardgamegeek.com/geeklist/149283/best-combinatorial-2-player-game-of-20112012-award). The last one I entered was the "thousand year game design challenge". I wonder if anyone remembers the winner (http://danielsolisblog.blogspot.nl/2012/01/take-back-toe-wins-thousand-year-game.html) one year later - don't look! Judging by the choice of the winner, in a thousand years we'll be playing with pebbles ;) . Made me consider how someone in 1912 might have envisioned the year 1920. And how someone in 2012 may envision 2020. Our government, or lack thereof, envisions up to 2050 or so. Good luck! Anyway, may the best game win and all that, and please enjoy these two thirds of Kobus, who posed so nicely this morning that I couldn't resist :) : http://i49.tinypic.com/2h7j4lt.jpg |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Nov 11th, 2012, 6:33am Update on the CodeCup 2013 (http://www.codecup.nl/intro.php) The sixth test competition (http://www.codecup.nl/competition.php?comp=139) has been completed. There were 18 competitors. Abdessamad ELKASIMI (http://www.codecup.nl/entrygames.php?ent=3322) won 20 out of 22. Here are two games he lost, one against Remco Bloemen (http://www.codecup.nl/showgame.php?ga=69886) (2nd) and one against Bertrand Lunderer (http://www.codecup.nl/showgame.php?ga=69640) (3rd). Remco won by 1 point. Note that he has eight groups, and his opponent only two, indicative of the programs' priorities being growth and connectivity respectively (at least in this game). For some reason a winner gets 100+ points added to the score. This may be part of the competition protocol, I don't know. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Nov 12th, 2012, 11:29am Now, that was some fun (http://www.boardgamegeek.com/geeklist/149283/best-combinatorial-2-player-game-of-20112012-award). I won't comment here on people who are banned from this site, only thank Omar and Whatever Divine Authority may be involved, for the ban. A few thinkers about abstract games ... Others, who are perfectly free to reply, may be mentioned though, like Benedikt Rosenau (http://www.boardgamegeek.com/boardgamedesigner/15917/benedikt-rosenau), reluctant co-author of Symple, who thinks it wise to ignore persistent attacks on the game, because the attacker is like terminator, not to be be reasoned with and absolutely unstoppable. So he may well be right to keep silent while being pissed on. I won't because I'm too pissed off. Then there's Luis Bolaños Mures (http://www.boardgamegeek.com/boardgamedesigner/47001/luis-bolanos-mures), in my view the best game designer at the moment. Mark Steere has Oust, but basically (p)re-invented the game several times, and never better, in Tanbo, Flume, Redstone and Rive. Flume is a perfect little game, but it relates to Oust a bit as Othello does to Go: not quite that organic and not at all the same league. Luis' Ayu (http://www.boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/114484/ayu) however is no less quintessential than Oust, and neither are his innovative twin games Xodd (http://www.boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/112111/xodd) and Yodd (http://www.boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/105173/yodd). So I have high expectations of him. At the same time he values Mark's expertise to the point of accepting the inherent bullsh!t, especially if it is not directed at one of his games. But that might yet change. Actually I'm not sure about Nick Bentley (http://www.boardgamegeek.com/boardgamedesigner/7958/nick-bentley) who's best game, by his own admission, is Ketchup (http://www.boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/68199/ketchup), but whose other games seem to fail to compete with that game's quality and appeal. Why would someone praise Corey Clark's Slither (http://www.boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/75957/slither) to heaven? Among square connection games it is an outstanding game. But 'square connection' isn't exactly a grand theme, like checkmate or elimination or territory. And Slither uses a pie for balance, where it doesn't work, unless the board is so big that it doesn't matter in the first place. So it's a great game, but nothing to get carried away about. I had been wondering about that. And about the fact that Ketchup went from version 1.0 to 5.0 and then back to 4.0 because 5.0 in retrospect "wasn't an improvement". Now I'm starting to see a pattern. Nick questioned (https://groups.google.com/forum/?fromgroups=#!topic/rec.games.abstract/GbylTQBSGbQ) the balancing mechanism for Redstone (http://www.boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/120533/redstone), but later called the game a viciously good invention (https://groups.google.com/forum/?fromgroups=#!topic/rec.games.abstract/9YIy10Y7Mvw). Redstone is not a Go variant but an elimination game using Go mechanics, and I can reassure Nick: it doesn't need a balancing mechanism. The rules suggest a pie. A pie presumes that you can judge the value of an initial move. Jugging the value of an initial move presumes a general idea of the relation between strategy and tactics. In Redstone this relation is evasive to the point of being invisible. The strategic goal is way off and the global impact of the outcome of local fights is unpredictabe. Strategy is hard to find and tactics serve themselves. And despite Redstone's finitude a game can seem to take no end. I can see that almost at a glance, but Nick apparently is blinded by simplicity of concept - a necessary condition for a good game, but not a sufficient one. It surprises me because Nick's criteria for what makes a good game are are very well thought through. Barring other reasons for his praise of Redstone, I'd say he values the right concepts, but lacks the intuition to see how they might pan out in an actual game. Redstone sucks, but it may take determined supporters a while to find that out. Why do I mention these guys? Barring Benedikt they're the only contributors to (and account for 50% of the visitors of) rec.games.abstract (https://groups.google.com/forum/?fromgroups=#!forum/rec.games.abstract), a self declared 'nonsense-free forum' dedicated to cyclophobia and finitude. Read that again and see the irony ;) . ... and what they have in common But including Benedikt they're all concerned with abstract strategy for the sake of it. They're not the only ones of course, yet most inventors are in the business of game inventing to market particular games, and that's a perfectly respectable object, but not in the least interesting for those who want a game to be a mental sports weapon that would last, if not for centuries, then at least for the foreseeable future. Exhaustible tactical funnies, mostly based on peculiar mechanics rather than concept, don't fall into that category. Games have a spirit There was a suggestion that my evaluation of Redstone was influenced by my low opinion of its inventor. I have no low opinion of its inventor, not in that quality. I have a low opinion of Redstone and was just surprised that the inventor's claims were left unchallenged by knowledgeable people like Nick and Luis. So let me be more precise, for those who cannot immediately see this monkey's disease. A contagious disconnect I mentioned the disconnect between tactics and strategy. Redstone is an 'organic' game, no doubt. The basic idea is simple (no pun intended) and not new (the Glass Bead Game (http://www.mindsports.nl/index.php/arena/glass-bead-game/440-an-example-game) has neutral stones that 'capture but cannot be captured') and its implementation doesn't leave much room to deviate from the rules as they suggest themselves. A self-explanatory organism, and in that case you get what you get, for better or worse. And no doubt Redstone is 'playable'. But the author put forward a number of claims in the comments on the game's entry (http://www.boardgamegeek.com/geeklist/149283/item/2380242#item2380242) in BGG's 'best combinatorial game of 2011/2012' award, that made Benedikt raise an eyebrow. I'm not going into them here, but in it the inventor presented the preliminary evaluation of the game by a knowledgeable Go player, and here the game's spirit showed its subtle powers of infiltration: Quote:
That a game of annihilation would 'basically be Go', strategically, is questionable in the first place, but notice how Redstone's disconnect is translating into a similar disconnect in the argument: if the increased depth of complexity has an as yet unknown impact on strategy, then calling the strategy 'basically like Go' boils down to presenting fog as clarity. Cancer Here's another example of the game's spirit showing its subtle powers of infiltration. It's original name was 'Cancer'. I'm not a big fan of descriptive names for games, but I must make an exception here because the name totally fits. In itself the gradual disappearance of a given playing area, the Atlantis effect, is neither new nor undesirable. Amazons (http://www.boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/2125/amazons) is a well known example, as are the 'Atlantis Triplets', of which I mention Shakti (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/the-pit/shakti-550). But in these games the blocks that arise, either by placement or removal, result from one player's strategy. In Redstone they result from capturing fights and escape attempts that may go this way or that, resulting in differences in placements of red stones that may have huge impact further on, without a clue as to the nature of the impact. It starts with a capture and a single red stone here, and a capture and a single red stone there, and no clue as to how the board will even remotely look in the middle game. Like cancer they are opportunistically growing and seeding, and players are fighting not only against one another, but against the game. Show a Go master a middle game position and he'll know in seconds what it is about, because of his experience, and because the game has great clarity. Cancer has no clarity. It's time to shift the focus. I mentioned the inventors above for their concern with abstract strategy for the sake of it. In so far as they're all game philosophers, I'd like to address the question To this day, and for the foreseeable future, Go and Shogi seem all right, but what about Chess, Draughts, Checkers, to mention three stages of obvious decline? Do we need more 'modern' games, and if so, how might these involve more modern means. Is "playable on an actual bord with actual pieces" a significant criterion, only because two Chess players demonstrate this possibility at regular intervals at the center of an otherwise virtual worldwide display. Do we still start a car with a crank? Does the advance of Chess computers have an impact on the game? Are games between humans interesting if mistakes are immediately and continuously highlighted? Are games between humans and computers interesting if computers win? Are Go and Shogi sufficiently computerproof? Anyone for dead Checkers or terminal Draughts? If we want abstract games to play some kind of role in the future, do we have a problem? |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by NickBentley on Nov 14th, 2012, 4:21pm Interesting! Some quick thoughts in response: I'm not sure what I think about my intuition either. I'm sure that I can make good games though. However limited my intuition may be, the larger bottleneck for me, without question, is time. I have a full life and in making tradeoffs, game design often gets left to the side. I assert that the pie rule in Slither works better than you propose. The key is that there's an opportunity cost to moving a stone. So you can move the pie stone inward, but at the expense of not moving other stones elsewhere. The cost is big enough that I'd guess you can finely balance the game on a board 10x10 or larger. Not that it matters at this point, because the tactics are so insanely hairy that an initial imbalance is washed away for everybody for now and probably will be for some time into the future. Another thought about Slither: when I evaluate a game, conceptual unity is a prerequisite for high marks, but if that bar is passed, my evaluation depends strongly on what it feels like to play. No game sets patterns dancing in my head like Slither does, and that's why I praise it so highly. Of course there's nothing universally objective about this and it could reflect nothing more than the idiosyncratic wiring of my brain. My opinion on Redstone: I assume that a) it's balanced for most of us who play it now; b) at higher levels of play, it will be imbalanced (can't prove it, but that's my thought); but that's ok because c) some kind of swap protocol will fix it. My statement about "vicious goodness" depends especially on c) being true. I emphasize that my opinions are provisional - my intuition doesn't work well enough for me to be confident (to corroborate your point about my intuition). My experience with Redstone comes from a bunch of games I've played against myself, which also complicates evaluation. Finally, about r.g.a.: yep, it's a wasteland. I would kill for a widely read/active discussion forum where nobody gets personal and the focus stays on productive discussion of game mechanics. One thing I will say: personal experience demonstrates that it's not hard to have a perfectly cordial relationship with Mark: just be respectful of his opinions even when he says things you don't like. You can even tell him he's wrong and he won't bite your head off, if you do so respectfully. And when mark does go into attack mode, just don't respond and there will be no problem. The proof is in the pudding: Mark has been very critical of my games in the past just as he has of yours, but you'll notice that my relationship with Mark remains warm. I don't know if I'm out of place offering advice about to interact with Mark (you certainly didn't ask for it), but I feel that some small changes in your online behavior would staunch the craziness that poisons so many of our discussions. Now you might tell me that really Mark is the one who should change his behavior, and I don't disagree, but I've made the same appeal to Mark before, to no avail. In the absence of any hope of change in Mark's conduct, I now appeal to you. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by NickBentley on Nov 14th, 2012, 5:21pm One thing I forgot to mention about effectiveness of pie rule in Slither: because the board fills up a lot more in Slither than in Hex, for example, individual stones are less powerful, which means the pie rule doesn't have to do as much work. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Nov 15th, 2012, 4:30am on 11/14/12 at 16:21:07, NickBentley wrote:
on 11/14/12 at 16:21:07, NickBentley wrote:
on 11/14/12 at 16:21:07, NickBentley wrote:
on 11/14/12 at 16:21:07, NickBentley wrote:
In fact I've just suggested a subject matter that would be boring if I were to be the only contributer. Not to mention predictable ;) . P.S. Why do you think I published Mu only here? It's not finite, not drawless and, depending on the definition I might not even disagree with 'unbalanced' or even with the question whether it is a strategy game or a weird kind of pinball device. P.P.S. Why do you think Mark is so troubled by Symple? It's enough to know that in his view a game, ideally, should be finite, drawless and perfectly balanced. You kind of got away with it with Ketchup ;) . |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Nov 15th, 2012, 6:21am What is the future of abstract games? (part 1) For context: we're living in an interconnected world where computers can display intelligent game boards and play intelligent games. Yet the pinacle of abstract gaming is two players engaged in a centuries old game, pushing wood of a somewhat medieval disposition on a wooden board, while computers in the background are displaying large electronic boards and giving their evaluation. An evaluation that may soon be better than the one of either contestant. Unless you're a Chess player it's a somewhat anachronistic picture. The world is changing, and if Chess has always been meant for eternity, eternity appears to have come to an end. Other games fare even worse. Checkers There was a time when Checkers was fairly highly regarded by all but the Chess community. No more. Checkers has been solved (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chinook_(draughts_player)) and humans play in the shadow of perfect play. They do so with balloted openings and the like, and it has become a sorry affair altogether. Checkers has once more become a recreational game, not something people would care about in terms of who's the world's best player. It's common knowledge Chinook is. International Draughts So take Draughts, still standing after all these years. Much wider, far richer in terms of combinations, and not yet fully conquered by the bots. But it's only a matter of time before the bots will dominate it. Draughts has accumulated a massive literature and theory, and smart programs will dig their way in, to support an ever improving evaluation. Draughts is a determined draw. It's not proven, but neither is life beyond earth. Only an idiot would doubt it. Sixtyfive years ago, Piet Roozenburg (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Piet_Roozenburg) could score 17 wins and 3 draws in a tournament and become 'sportsman of the year' in the Netherlands. Nowadays matches and tournaments for the worldchampionship alternate but the top players are so evenly matched neither can win in a match. So there's tournaments, and draws are increasingly decided by tie-breaking blitz games. Did you know who the current world champion is? Here's the complete 100+ years list (http://nl.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wereldkampioenschap_dammen). Now let's take the last match (http://nl.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wereldkampioenschap_dammen_2009_(match)), between Schwarzman and Georgiev. For starters 12 draws. The games were played at four different locations near Enschede, where I live. Hardly the center of the world, and despite local media, I didn't even notice the event. Then three rapids (20 min. pp) and three blitz (10 min. pp), and both had won 1 game. Then came micro matches (don't ask) and Schwarzman won. Such is the state of affairs, and Draughts remains popular despite it, but the circus gets increasingly localized and marginalized for lack of sponsoring. To even get some attention by national media in the Netherlands (never mind international), Ton Sijbrands (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ton_Sijbrands) must be persuaded to break his blindfold record once more. But there's an end to that too, eventually. Chess Here's an opening quote from wiki's human–computer chess matches (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Human-computer_chess_matches): Quote:
If Chess becomes a knowledge based dead end street where the main issue is whether a human player can still reach a draw against the strongest programs, and where humans are tested on their knowledge of the latest discoveries rather than on insight and style, I fear something will go wrong, eventually. And the writing is on the wall. There's no easy way out either. Draughts players hang on to a sinking ship and yet refuse to question the game. Checkers has already sunk back to the grass roots level it once was raised from, yet the circus goes on and nobody is wet, apparently. Chess is even 'holier' than these games. Any problem regarding matches ending in knowledge based draws will be denied till it slaps them in the face, and even then, draws will never be a problem for the vast majority of the Chess community, so what. Everything counts in large amounts, and Chess has the numbers. 2b continued ... |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by clyring on Nov 15th, 2012, 7:27am I think your remarks on redstone are too harsh. Although the final goal of the game is elimination, this is achieved by gaining a territorial advantage. Since redstones can only be placed to capture a group and suicide via a regular stone is illegal, groups with two or more eyes are safe until the only legal moves are to fill these eyes. When this happens, the player who was able to create more extra eyes for his groups will be the last player compelled to sacrifice his own groups. Of course, the number of extra eyes is not the same as territory, but the two are nevertheless closely related. on 11/12/12 at 11:29:05, christianF wrote:
There is something more to this than what you have described- Playing the game in public is basically free advertising. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Nov 15th, 2012, 8:09am on 11/15/12 at 07:27:50, clyring wrote:
Quote:
on 11/15/12 at 07:27:50, clyring wrote:
Boards are convenient, but more convenient boards (http://www.dgtprojects.com/site/index.php/news/343-wireless-tournament-e-boards) are being invented on a regular basis. At some point tablets will probably be able to cover most games. This is bound to change the nature of playing board games, in ways we can't yet predict. For one, if I cheat, using a strong program instead of my brains, and I got an equally human opponent (in the sense that using a bot is very human), then what's happening if it becomes a trend? A continuous worldwide tournament of programs posing as players? Wouldn't we need games that at least temporarily were devoid of strong bots, to preserve the fun? |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Nov 15th, 2012, 4:10pm How about that. I got a question by Mark Steere: "Christian, what does it mean for a game to be perfectly balanced?" (https://groups.google.com/forum/?fromgroups=#!topic/rec.games.abstract/Vk3wk2ddkfI) Four posts up I said this: "Why do you think I published Mu only here? It's not finite, not drawless and, depending on the definition I might not even disagree with 'unbalanced' or even with the question whether it is a strategy game or a weird kind of pinball device." This is a question that can be answered from several points of view, and I won't rush into one answer because I think there is no one answer that would cover all viewpoints. It's no secret that a discussion over say the pie rule can be pretty extensive, given the basic simplicity of the rule. And the pie rule is only one aspect of Mark's question. But given a true interest in the subject I'll try to give whatever insights I have and hope that I get response in the same spirit. One point of order, I don't post at RGA and Mark doesn't post here. I don't expect that to be a problem if everyone has the same agenda: "what does it mean for a game to be perfectly balanced?" I'll sleep over it first because we're approaching midnight here. However, I can argue one valid point of view from which no finite drawless game is perfectly balanced. But that point of view is not concerned with the human condition and human players cannot profit from it. I also feel that the question "what do you mean when you say Symple or Ketchup are perfectly balanced" is easier to answer than the generalized question, so maybe we can approach the issue along specific lines. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Nov 16th, 2012, 6:04am The game theoretical perspective This is not new and it may be boring. Zermelo's theorem (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zermelo's_theorem_(game_theory)) is well known and empirically supported by a host of games that now are solved, including Checkers and Awari, both determined draws. Neither game is finite. Pit Chinook or the Awari Oracle against itself, and you get endless strings of draws. Perfectly balanced! By the same token, if applied to finite drawless games, you would get decisions without end, like Hex, in so far as it is solved for smaller boards. In finite drawless games any initial move is either winning or losing, so in that sense such a game cannot be 'perfectly balanced'. The AI perspective Solved games are no longer games from an AI perspective. In solved Hex the truth of any legal position can be quickly determined. Truth kills the meaning of concepts like strategy, tactics, style, attack, defense and fun. Truth is perfectly boring because it kills the game. And where it is not perfectly boring, like knowing that your first move in a game of 19x19 Hex is either winning or losing, it's perfectly useless. Even the knowledge that opening in the center is a win, may be perfectly useless against a significantly stronger player. The human perspective From a game theoretical perspective Hex cannot be called 'balanced' because Hex is decisive. From an AI perspective, solving the next boardsize is thrilling, but the result from then on is boring. Not yet from a human perspective, because knowing which opening placements are winning doesn't imply the knowledge how to do it. The basis for my idea of a 'perfectly balanced' game is
Hex-19 and the pie rule Going by example, imagine two seasoned Hex players playing a 19x19 game. Both are familiar with the division of winning and losing moves on smaller boards, even though they may not know the corresponding move sequences, that is: how to win such a 'won' position. They use the pie rule, extrapolating from their knowledge of the win/lose division on smaller boards.
1-2-2-2 ... This is a move protocol most everyone knows from games like Connect6 and Ketchup. It is a protocol that alternately puts players 'in the lead', instead of putting one in front and having the other catch up. Nick gave it a brilliant twist in Ketchup (http://nickbentley.posterous.com/pages/ketchup). It's a bit like a bicycle race where, if you overtake your opponent, he gets a burst of wind from behind (that is, he may move 3 instead of 2). If he uses it in turn to overtake you, then you get an extra burst. You don't have to 'overtake' (create a group, larger than any one that previously existed of either color), but in order to win, you cannot decline all the time either. It carries the feeling of balance all through the game, but this is not related to turn-order balance: that is provided by the 1-2-2 protocol as such. I would have no trouble calling Ketchup 'perfectly balanced' like I do Hex-19 with the pie rule, but not on the same grounds. The 1-2-2 protocol is not perfect in the same sense because there is no division of resposibility. But it works to most everyone's satisfaction, and I'm human and a player, not a game theorist. Many games don't even have a turn-order balancing protocol and yet don't show any problems, because any impact the advantage might have is dwarfed under the impact of human imperfection. Luis' Ayu (http://www.boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/114484/ayu) is not proven finite but it looks finite enough, and if anyone has a clue as to its turn-order advantage, please enlighten us. Intuition would put it at the first player's side but proving anything looks like a long shot. Many of thousands of games might empirically provide a statistical answer. For the moment the game does not seem to have any such problem. Draughts is not finite, but it has never had any such problem either. Not in the black/white division of decisions. These games may not be 'perfecly balanced', but they're perfectly playable. Ah, we still got Symple. We also got a nice evening with a couple of games and movies. Let's see ... movies it is :) Symple I woke up to an almost provocatively glorious day and decided to go to the weekly downtown market. By bike of course, it being an almost provocatively glorious day and all. I landed in the middle of the Entry of Sinterklaas (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sinterklaas), engulfed by hundreds of exited children and their parents, 'black Peters' all over the place, even on the roofs, and a very relaxed atmosphere despite all the excitement. I bought grapes and kiwis and bananas, and french fries with mayonnaise (Vincent in Pulp Fiction: "I've seen 'em do it, man. They fuggin' drown 'em in that sh!t."). On the way back I encountered the GoodHolyMan himself, riding a medium sized white horse. We even exchanged greetings. I must say the horse used to be bigger when I was a child. And all flat roads seemed downhill for excess energy. I had the same feeling on the way back, but it was backwind. Regarding Symple and why I feel it is totally correct to say that it is 'perfectly balanced', I must say that anyone who
The difference is that Symple's balancing rule is embedded in the move protocol. Luis' offbeat generalization (https://groups.google.com/forum/?fromgroups=#!topic/rec.games.abstract/6z4Dtfw-VWI) is not a generalization of it, as he tried to suggest. Symple's balancing mechanism is a unique trade-off between territory and growth potential and poses the same judgement call to both players over a trajectory of moves. Possible positions involving the call run into billions (no, not in one game). I had a very pragmatic girlfriend once, who defined "perfect" as "without any known imperfections". I've never heard a more practical definition. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Nov 17th, 2012, 9:36am Just saw Tom Ford (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tom_Ford_(snooker_player)) make a 147 break in the European Tour in Sofia. Great, I felt the tension as if I were there. Later it turned out it was a replay during the midsession interval. Never mind :) . We're still fully engaged (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/players-section/Serve.cgi?file=Mu_velox1352549837.html) in Mu-velox, and strategic thinking as well as the tactics employed - dirty tactics Ed! - are still developing. Only thing is, they seem to be developing faster in Ed's case. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Nov 18th, 2012, 10:14am What is the future of abstract games? (part 2) In terms of going under, Checkers has drowned, Draughts is splashing and fighting for air and calling that everything is all right, and Chess players will soon serve computerprograms rather than the other way around. Keep in mind that Chess is most likely a determined draw too, and a bleak perspective unfolds. Deniable of course, but not forever deniable. Unfortunately, and maybe surprisingly, Shogi doesn't seem to fare much better (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Computer_shogi) when it comes to the strength of programs. Nor does Xiangqi (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Xiangqi#Computers), a game more associated with the past of Chess than with its future. Othello (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Computer_Othello) has been solved up to 6x6 (win +4 by the second player) and is on the brink of being solved on 8x8. Not that it matters, 8x8 computers are beating humans consistently nonetheless, and for what it's worth: Othello cannot captivate the human mind like Chess or Go, or even Draughts. The one that keeps up something of a struggle is Go. You can read the state of affairs (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Computer_Go) in wiki. Combining knowledge-based evaluation based on pattern recognition with MCTS/UCT evaluation has led to "impressive results", and till now impressive results have usually led to programs that are stronger than the best human opponents. Yet it's noteworthy that the game keeping the castle for now, is a game of placement and capture. It would be hard to imagine that new games will fare much better. If Grand Chess were to develop a significant player base, computers would follow suit. Both humans and computers would initially be deprived of "knowledge" but in the end I can well imagine that the situation would not develop differently from the current one in Chess. So I think the future of abstract board games will not depend on the strongest players: they might invariably be bots. What it would depend on is fun, simplicity, availability on smart devices, speed and hype. Intelligent recreation maybe, but no longer interesting as a "sport", because in that capacity the players would end up serving the computers. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Nov 18th, 2012, 11:15am Benedikt Rosenau (http://www.boardgamegeek.com/user/Zickzack) has applied the Symple mechanism to Hex and Y. It's a simple fit, no pun intended. Quote:
I like that, though "as long as neither has grown so far" would be better, because this leaves open the possibility of black growth, a white placement, followed by black growth + placement. But the application is similar to column checkers: the principle can be applied to many checkers games, but there is only one game that is not the "columnification" of an existing game. You cannot unapply it from Emergo because Emergo is the quintessential implementation of column checkers. Take it out and there's nothing left. Likewise, Symple is the quintessential implementation of territory and dynamic goal connection. The latter stands to 'static goal connection' like a flock of birds to a spider's web. The quintessential hybrid requires the Symple move protocol. Take it out and there's no game left. Nevertheless the move protocol, and (essential!) the embedded balancing rule, can be applied to certain games. I considered Go, but decided Go's complexity would probably work against it. So I simplified the idea to Sygo. In Othello it doesn't work too well either, because of the obligation to capture and the ever changing configuration of groups. So I made Charybdis (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/the-pit/charyb-568) and never even played it yet. I left out the balancing rule because I don't feel it is necessary, given the tactical haywire. Now it seems to work fine in Hex and Y. Of course it's no longer Hex and Y. These are new games, using a different move protocol and a different balancing rule. I feel they may be very interesting, strategically, and in any case very modern because the Symple move protocol leads to significantly shorter and faster games, at least in terms of the number of turns. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by SpeedRazor on Nov 18th, 2012, 7:21pm Wow, really interesting stuff, Christian! (Especially starting from the 12th.) I'm kind of just an abstract game observer - (and leave this website for months at a time) - but I'm always interested in your essays and following your links. I dunno, but in my abstract game non-connoisseurial eye, I kinda think that Redstone and Ketchup (first iteration) were home-runs; as are many of the other games you mentioned: Symple comes to mind. Yeah, I could take Mark Steere posting here again, but he goes too far sometimes. Calling the founder of the Arimaa website a son-of-a-b*tch or c*cksucker; well, you just can't do that... Peace, Christian! Time to explore some of those links... |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarvinSpellbinder on Nov 18th, 2012, 7:27pm 11x11 Hex with pie is considered to be well balanced for most skill levels. Is 11x11 Symple Hex "perfectly balanced" as you claim for Symple? If not, why? |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarvinSpellbinder on Nov 18th, 2012, 8:34pm In your discussion of Hex, you claim that Hex-19 is perfectly balanced while smaller sizes of Hex are not. Can it be inferred that, in your view, lots of games are perfectly balanced given sufficient board size, and that there is, after all, nothing special about Symple? Game theory aside, and from the perspective of sheer playability, don't you think that Redstone is, over all, probably a better game than Symple? |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Nov 19th, 2012, 5:48am on 11/18/12 at 19:21:53, SpeedRazor wrote:
BEST COMBINATORIAL 2-PLAYER GAME OF 2011/2012 AWARD (http://www.boardgamegeek.com/geeklist/149283/best-combinatorial-2-player-game-of-20112012-award/page/2?) I can't direct you to a specific post, but there's a large comments section at the bottom that is off topic but worth reading. In it Benedikt suggests to ...Marvin to go to a better place for such a discussion and opened a thread in the Symple page called: Applying the mechanism to other games (http://www.boardgamegeek.com/thread/885926/applying-the-mechanism-to-other-games) In it he argues that the Symple mechanism is a "mutator" a term coined by João Pedro Neto (http://www.boardgamegeek.com/boardgamedesigner/3829/joao-pedro-neto). Not that I didn't know, but now that it's attracting some attention because it can be applied to a few other games or types of games, I'd like to point out that Symple is still unique in that it can't be unapplied from it. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarvinSpellbinder on Nov 19th, 2012, 10:03am [quote author=christianF link=board=other;num=1236541162;start=990#994 date=11/19/12 at 05:48:08] Benedikt suggests to ...Marvin to go to a better place for [a Symple] discussion and opened a thread in the [bgg] Symple page called....[/quote] What better place to discuss Symple than here in the primary Christian Freeling Games thread? Why must Benedikt speak for you in an obscure thread? on 11/19/12 at 05:48:08, christianF wrote:
The only people discussing Symple are you, Benedikt, and me. You and Benedikt are co-designers, and I'm a detractor because of your Symple-the-holy-grail nonsense. This is your idea of "attracting attention"? Redstone, unlike Symple, is attracting attention. Redstone, unlike Symple, is being discussed. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by SpeedRazor on Nov 19th, 2012, 5:16pm Thnx for the links, Christian :) I imagine Symple isn't in the running because it's too old? Darn, would've got my vote... Well, I noticed that vain, ego-maniac, MS was being his usual obnoxious self in a couple of the posts, but because this isn't a popularity contest, I voted for Redstone. Of the games I know in the contest, it's my favorite. But wow! What competition! Many more than I suspected abstract - (er, combinatorial) - games from 2011 / 2012 look very good! This bodes well for the industry, I hope... |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarvinSpellbinder on Nov 19th, 2012, 7:16pm SpeedRazor, I happen to know Mark Steere personally, and he extends his appreciation for your Redstone vote. Christian brazenly entered his obviously ineligible game, Symple, which was then summarily disqualified. I don't have a problem with Symple, the game. My issue is Christian's relentless, aggressive campaign to promote it year after year. Symple the "great game". Symple the "perfectly balanced" game. Symple the "quintessential" game. Then there's the brow beating, the berating of everyone for not embracing Symple. I am tired of that. The consensus seems to be that Symple is not a great game. I've never heard anyone other than Christian, in all the years he's been promoting it, call Symple a great game. In the sandbox at Game Site X, some unprogrammed games are played relatively frequently, like Slither and Ketchup. I've never seen Symple being played there. Christian, I hope you don't spend the rest of your days resenting a public who doesn't appreciate how "great" Symple is, but I fear you will. Don't be that guy. Don't be the grumpy old man. The public has the right to decide what it likes and what it doesn't. You can't force Symple on them. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by NickBentley on Nov 19th, 2012, 11:43pm Heh. "Marvin" |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Nov 20th, 2012, 7:05am on 11/19/12 at 19:16:02, MarvinSpellbinder wrote:
Actually, if one contemplates going mental over a game, etiquette suggests Chess. It's fascinating to have found a new game capable of doing the same. It adds to its uniqueness its significance. Only an idiot would go mental over an insignificant game. Please notify Mark that I've answered his question about "perfect balance". As to my other claims, they've always been just one: Quote:
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Nov 20th, 2012, 7:45am on 11/19/12 at 17:16:50, SpeedRazor wrote:
Quote:
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarvinSpellbinder on Nov 20th, 2012, 9:54am on 11/20/12 at 07:45:34, christianF wrote:
Not exactly, Christian. Mark Steere made an innocuous joke about Symple, and you freaked out and withdrew Symple from the contest. You said it yourself. "Only an idiot would go mental over an insignificant game." Mark Steere re-entered Symple, and then Markus Hagenauer wrote exactly this: > > I can´t understand this misplaced discussion about Symple. > > It does not fit the criterias of this contest (published 2011 or 2012) > and so I remove it again. Pretty explicit. Symple was published in 2010. Tweaking the pass rule, regardless of how it "dramatically changed the game" doesn't change that fact, Christian. You'd about have to be "mental", or at least extremely desperate, to think that Symple was eligible for this contest. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Nov 20th, 2012, 10:03am on 11/20/12 at 09:54:37, MarvinSpellbinder wrote:
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarvinSpellbinder on Nov 20th, 2012, 11:02am on 11/20/12 at 10:03:47, christianF wrote:
Hand waving in a foreign language. Just when I thought you couldn't get any more deceptive. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarvinSpellbinder on Nov 20th, 2012, 12:37pm Markus wrote: I would then explain the fact that the game is from 2010, and therefore too old to participate in the competition. Exactly. Knowing that fact, why would Markus allow Symple in the first place? The contest criterion is clear: - published in 2011 or 2012 A tweak doesn't constitute a new publish date. If Symple had won (lol), there would have been outrage at both Markus and you. Hand waving Europeans. You only fool yourselves. The integrity of the contest was restored, however reluctantly, with the disqualification of the offensive, ineligible game. It's still a stupid contest though since it includes late breaking editions of hugely popular Eurogames. I'd withdraw Redstone if I really gave a crap about a bgg contest. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Nov 20th, 2012, 1:00pm Markus wrote: Quote:
Quote:
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Nov 20th, 2012, 1:18pm Luis has posted (https://groups.google.com/forum/?fromgroups=#!topic/rec.games.abstract/2150YjPALBE) an interesting line of reasoning towards the best penalty value for a given boardsize in Symple, at RGA. We're not talking absolutes here, but it's a logical indicator, and deviation causes a difference in timing of the phase of maximum tension. In practice, increasing its value means a shift of tension towards the phase where connectivity of groups becomes more important than raw growth. That means that openings are usually somewhat higher. The bots at CodeCup all are base-15 and penalty 6, which according to Luis' criterion is optimal. The mindsports applet allows penalties to be set from 0-12, boardsizes from base-11 to base 19. That covers all bases :) |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarvinSpellbinder on Nov 20th, 2012, 1:24pm Markus wrote: "I would then explain the fact that the game is from 2010. Not "give as a reason", Christian. The translation is clear. It's a fact, as Markus plainly admits, that Symple was published in 2010. The only thing new here is that Markus is as integrity challenged as you are for even temporarily allowing the clearly ineligible Symple. Isn't it enough that you lie for yourself? Now you have to lie for Markus as well? |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Nov 20th, 2012, 1:30pm on 11/20/12 at 13:24:07, MarvinSpellbinder wrote:
I on the other hand do actually speak German. And mail in German unless otherwise agreed. But if it really is so important to you, yes, I tried to fool everybody :-* . |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarvinSpellbinder on Nov 20th, 2012, 1:34pm The literal translation is irrelevant. Everyone knows that Symple was published in 2010. Who do you think you're fooling, Christian? Get some integrity. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarvinSpellbinder on Nov 20th, 2012, 2:03pm The only explanation for Symple's disqualification that Markus gave in public and in English was "[Symple] does not fit the criterias of this contest." Period. Nothing about smarmy, backroom dealings. Basically Markus threw you under the bus, trying to disassociate himself from you and your ineligible game. But now that you revealed his email , you dragged him under the bus with you. Two bus squashings don't add up to integrity, Christian. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarvinSpellbinder on Nov 20th, 2012, 4:02pm on 11/20/12 at 13:30:57, christianF wrote:
You really did try to fool everybody. No kissy face required. You've never publicly admitted to Symple's 2010 publish date. Not when you entered it, nor even now after you were caught. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarvinSpellbinder on Nov 20th, 2012, 6:20pm Reminds me of the rec.games.abstract contest that you tried to manipulate to your own advantage. There's a pattern here... |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Nov 21st, 2012, 4:45am on 11/20/12 at 16:02:06, MarvinSpellbinder wrote:
Symple's invention (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/how-i-invented-games-and-why-not/late-arrivals-a-final-whispers#symple) Symple at BGG (http://www.boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/106341/symple) Symple at Sensei (http://senseis.xmp.net/?Symple) Symple at Arimaa (http://arimaa.com/arimaa/forum/cgi/YaBB.cgi?board=other;action=display;num=1236541162;start=240#244) :-* As it happens, there is still some wreckage left (in terms of a game that's no longer there) in the comments of the BEST COMBINATORIAL 2-PLAYER GAME OF 2011/2012 AWARD (http://www.boardgamegeek.com/geeklist/149283/best-combinatorial-2-player-game-of-20112012-award/page/1?). After game #25, Luis' game "Quentin", there's a section with 104 comments. In it you'll find one of "Russ" (Posted Wed Nov 7, 2012 2:28 pm), followed by one by me (Posted Wed Nov 7, 2012 3:00 pm) and one by Markus (Posted Wed Nov 7, 2012 3:22 pm). From these three it is clear that I put the matter of the invention date - invented in 2010 but a major change (in terms of gameplay) in december 2011 - before the jury. Further down you can see the reason why I detracted the game (Posted Sun Nov 11, 2012 11:14 am). Next MS entered it again against my wishes, so I mailed Markus to take it out. He suggested to give the invention date as a reason "um keinen Anlass für weitere Diskussionen zu bieten" (to give no cause for further discussions). Since this is an attempt at character smearing I will add Markus' initial remark: Quote:
Now this, obviously, will not end. We all know how "close" Marvin and Mark are. If I leave "they" will turn this thread into something like RGA. So I'll sit it out with some factual information now and then. Such as this post (https://groups.google.com/forum/?fromgroups=#!topic/rec.games.abstract/2150YjPALBE), Luis' reasoning towards the best value for the penalty, in which he had to enlighten a totally confused MS about the nature of the penalty: Quote:
It's a parameter that in the applet it can be set from 0-12. Changing it changes the balance between territory, the raw points, and connectivity. It does so, basically, by shifting the timing of the 'tension peak' of a game. It allows for the most interesting games if set within reasonable limits of Luis' calculated optimum, shifting the priorities within the game, without affecting balance. The point is so basic that anyone who doesn't understand it cannot even have a clue to Symple. Mark obviously thought it to be some arbitrary number on which the game's balance would depend. Quote:
Not even right on the facts, and clueless as to the meaning. Now I'm going to sit it out. I'll keep you posted on the CodeCup 2013 (http://www.codecup.nl/intro.php). |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarvinSpellbinder on Nov 21st, 2012, 9:46am on 11/21/12 at 04:45:13, christianF wrote:
When you entered Symple into the contest, Christian, there was no announcement of "Hey guys, I published Symple in 2010, but I made a tiny rule change in 2011." There was no remote reference to a discrepancy with Symple's publish date. It was only after Russ exposed Symple's criterion violation that you grudgingly admitted to it, making the case that Symple is so interesting that it warrants violation of the criteria. You couldn't very well deny Symple's 2010 publish date since it's plainly cited in bgg. You had clearly made Markus uncomfortable with your Symple entry. "Christian, in general I don´t think it is a good idea to make exceptions from the criteria." He recommended that if the 2011 change was significant enough, you should change Symple's cited bgg publish date from 2010 to 2011, which you then proceeded to not do. Then it fell through the cracks. This is your idea of integrity? |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Nov 21st, 2012, 10:35am on 11/21/12 at 09:46:15, MarvinSpellbinder wrote:
Factual information - I saved the original entry at BGG ('thing' and 'person' are links to Symple, Benedikt and Luis). Quote:
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarvinSpellbinder on Nov 21st, 2012, 10:57am Ok, Christian. You handled it better than I gave you credit for. But Symple, with its bgg cited 2010 publish year was clearly ineligible for a bgg contest requiring a minimum publish year of 2011. In any case, Symple is out and the contest is better for it. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Nov 21st, 2012, 2:00pm I lost my previous game of Mu_velox after a vicious tactical attack by Purple at move 18 (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/players-section/Serve.cgi?file=Mu_velox1352549837.html) that left me busy cleaning up the mess, losing tempo and, it being Mu, the game. Another thing to keep an eye on in the current game (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/players-section/Serve.cgi?file=Mu_velox1353272506.html). |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Nov 22nd, 2012, 5:14am I voted for Luis' Ayu (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/the-pit/ayu-636) in the Best combinatorial 2-player game award 2011-2012 (http://www.boardgamegeek.com/geeklist/149283/best-combinatorial-2-player-game-of-20112012-award/page/1?) at BGG. I must confess to a lack of knowledge about most other entries, merely having read the short summaries that come with them. But then, I haven't yet played a lot of Ayu either. Under the link above you'll also find an example of a cooperative cycle, under Ayu rules, but not in an Ayu position because Ayu starts with 30 stones each and there's no capture. Cooperative cycles are no problem. Forced cycles may constitute a problem if (and only if) draws are a problem. Which may not be the case. Chess has forced cycles, and the rules deal with them - where's the problem? So what do we have? A brilliant game that till now has shown that a cooperative cycle in an actual game position cannot be excluded yet. But neither has one been found. There may well be a proof that a forced cycle cannot occur in Ayu. But we haven't got it (I'm the most unlikely source for that matter). Till then I would say that the chance ranges from extremely unlikely to near impossible. To be ahead of any possible problem that could be arising from cycles, Luis made any cycle a draw. The chance ranges, as far as I can see, from smaller than in Havannah to zero. A draw in Havannah is significant enough news to have its own thread (http://www.littlegolem.net/jsp/forum/topic2.jsp?forum=50&topic=517). The system wasn't even prepared for it: a draw could not be offered and players were forced to fill the board, to alert the system to the end of the game. It was a bit of an event. A draw in Ayu would be an event too, something that might happen once in one's lifetime, unless someone proves a forced cycle it is impossible. In that case there would be no draws possible. I would find that almost regrettable. I'm in fact very pleased with the tiny margin of draws Havannah has. So if Nick Bentley says in the award thread: Quote:
Then I wonder how he envisions such a problem ??? . |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarvinSpellbinder on Nov 22nd, 2012, 9:33am Remember in Jurassic Park when Jeff Goldblum says "Life will find a way."? Same thing with draws. Draws will find a way. No one has to "envision" them. In Luis' case, he was far from "pleased" when he found out Ayu is draw susceptible. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by NickBentley on Nov 22nd, 2012, 4:35pm I don't envision them, but I figure if we're really designing games to last for the long haul, we're designing them to be played at a level of which we're mostly ignorant (or at least I am; I don't want to be presumptive). Anyway that's what I try to aim for. Once players start to see how draws are possible, players can increasingly "play for the draw" to avoid losses, and this can compound the draw problem way beyond what one might expect it to be. See Chess. So, it may be that a single drawn Havannah game creates new ways of looking and new opportunities for players who want to play competitively, and a few years down the road, draws are way more common than we ever expected. For this reason, it's important to me to find out whether forced draws are possible. Don't get me wrong though: I really like Ayu and Havannah. It's just that my admiration is conditional, as it is for my own games that carry the same risk. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by SpeedRazor on Nov 22nd, 2012, 10:30pm Very concise, elegant, and poignant - (shouldn't this be 3 of the x criterion for an abstract game?). Thnx Nick. Should games be bequeathed to the World before they are completely evolved / vetted? I say yes ... show us your [current] best stuff. Otherwise there never would have been a 'chess', for instance. Chess is a conglomerated consesus from myriad geniuses from around the world through the millennia, and it ain't even done.... Put the game out now, but continue to fine-tune - "envision" / troubleshoot - problems. I could be wrong, here, though... (I'm not a game designer.) |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Nov 23rd, 2012, 7:07am on 11/22/12 at 16:35:56, NickBentley wrote:
That's an inherent problem of game design. It is hard to look into the future behaviour of new games. Yet some are easier to predict than others because they've got "nowhere to go but deeper". I'd include Ketchup for that matter. on 11/22/12 at 16:35:56, NickBentley wrote:
I agree on Chess. It has the same problems as International Draughts, though as yet to a lighter degree. But Draughts , as a sport, is indeed terminal, where it was very alive just half a century ago. Chess may well go in the same direction. Actually it is hard to see how it could not. on 11/22/12 at 16:35:56, NickBentley wrote:
We're getting somewhere, I can almost see you now :) . I suspect that our different points of view may result from different points of departure. I don't know much about how you got involved in abstract game design, only that your criteria aren't all that different. The main difference seems to me that I never had an a priori generic framework. I did never care about specific criteria a game should answer to. I had certain general preferences. For instance, I like completeness and concistency, and dislike arbitraryness. I also dislike absolutism in the application. You cannot look on the outside if you cage yourself in. Be absolute in the dislike of arbitraryness, and you'll never invent a Chess game (I know some might see this as an argument for absolutism). Another example, Draughts was a great game but it grinded down to draws. Dameo has more or less the same structure. Let's for argument's sake assume it has at least the same to offer. Then it's fairly easy to argue that Dameo has a significantly smaller margin of draws. Sure, it can end in a draw, but it may well take another century before it does. That's disregarding the role of bots, but if bots become the strongest players in abstract games, then the games will become more recreational anyway, and any potential draw problem may never even become manifest. If one then looks at the stunning combinations these games allow, then I fear that excluding them because they can end in a draw, is throwing the baby away with the bathwater. About Havannah, I can't argue against it, but I feel it is absolutism to say that any form of draw will eventually 'spread' and kill the game. I don't think it is that simple. My point of departure has always been the game itself, not the box it should fit in. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Nov 23rd, 2012, 7:19am on 11/22/12 at 22:30:18, SpeedRazor wrote:
Actually you pinpoint a common source of misunderstanding, loosely linked to whether a game is designed or discovered, mechanic or organic. In retrospect my arguments with Fritzlein on precisely that point, suffered from it. It is also a fairly general notion that time shapes a game. Yet time had a hard time 'shaping' Hex or Othello, and I don't see Havannah being shaped any time soon. It's worth a discussion :) . |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Nov 23rd, 2012, 10:38am The program B_ot (http://www.codecup.nl/entrygames.php?ent=3316) by 'Bertrand Lunderer' ('blundrerer', a codecup nick) got to 3rd in the last test competition. Its programmer sent me a webstart version with these comments: Quote:
It also plays at mindsports.nl and I'm in sync with its engine author in that I'm 50/50 too now, with one game won (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/players-section/Serve.cgi?file=Symple1353517627.html) and one game lost (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/players-section/Serve.cgi?file=Symple1353517841.html), both pretty close. Edit: I'm 75/25 now, with one game won (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/players-section/Serve.cgi?file=Symple1353689970.html) and another game won (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/players-section/Serve.cgi?file=Symple1353689898.html), the last one very close. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by NickBentley on Nov 23rd, 2012, 10:57am Since I've forgotten again how to do the quotes properly here, I'll just have to use actual quotes: "We're getting somewhere, I can almost see you now. I suspect that our different points of view may result from different points of departure. I don't know much about how you got involved in abstract game design, only that your criteria aren't all that different. The main difference seems to me that I never had an a priori generic framework. I did never care about specific criteria a game should answer to. I had certain general preferences. For instance, I like completeness and concistency, and dislike arbitraryness. I also dislike absolutism in the application. You cannot look on the outside if you cage yourself in. Be absolute in the dislike of arbitraryness, and you'll never invent a Chess game (I know some might see this as an argument for absolutism)." I've voluntarily lowered myself into this box over the last few years. I confess that it is a box. From my point of view, there are both downsides and benefits to the "no draws" box. The benefits are chiefly that it allows me to avoid the risk described above in my game designs, and it has turned out to be a good constraint to force me to be creative. A good example of this: I just published a new version of Glorieta. In the old version, you will recall, draws were possible, and besides the use of neutral stones, the game's mechanics were unoriginal. But in an attempt to eliminate draws, I was forced to invent a new mechanic, and the result, I think, is both a better game and an exploration of a more interesting and unexplored part design space than the older version: http://nickbentleygames.wordpress.com/2012/11/23/revised-game-glorieta-3-0/ (You'll recall that the starting point for Glorieta was Havannah, which should indicate something about my admiration for Havannah) The main downside is the one you point out: I can completely miss out on a huge swath of design space where surely amazing games lie. At the moment, I feel that the benefits outweigh the downsides, and there's one reason for that: the space of drawless games seems so huge and unexplored that it doesn't much matter that there's this other huge unexplored space I never enter. "About Havannah, I can't argue against it, but I feel it is absolutism to say that any form of draw will eventually 'spread' and kill the game. I don't think it is that simple." I'm not saying I think it's inevitable. Just that it's a risk. My understanding of Havannah isn't nearly advanced as yours, so you're in a better position to say how much of a risk it is in this case. When I'm designing a new game however, I necessarily start from a position of great ignorance, so I'm in a bad position to make predictions about whether possible draws will become inevitable. In that context, there's a real benefit to staying away, imo. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarvinSpellbinder on Nov 23rd, 2012, 3:45pm on 11/23/12 at 10:57:19, NickBentley wrote:
Exactly what I've been saying all along. I'll be long dead by the time my Church of Cyclophobia becomes the dominant religion. Some things were meant to be feared. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Nov 23rd, 2012, 4:36pm on 11/23/12 at 15:45:30, MarvinSpellbinder wrote:
Are we to understand that you actually fear draws? |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MarvinSpellbinder on Nov 23rd, 2012, 6:13pm Cyclophobia - Morbid fear of getting caught in an endless game cycle. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Nov 24th, 2012, 5:15am on 11/23/12 at 10:57:19, NickBentley wrote:
Gimme some time on that one, I'm uncharacteristically and rather inexplicably involved in things requiring attention. I prefer the bicolored neutrals, by the way. on 11/23/12 at 10:57:19, NickBentley wrote:
One documented base-8 draw in thirty years, in a game that has base-10 for its regular board size ... I don't feel it will be a trend any time soon ;) . I agree that excluding draws is one problem gone. Whether that will make balance a more prominent problem may depend on the game. I wouldn't dare to generalize here. On the second issue, despite our criteria being in alignment for the most part, I sense a |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Nov 26th, 2012, 5:59am I've not yet digested Glorieta (http://nickbentleygames.wordpress.com/2012/11/23/revised-game-glorieta-3-0/) but I notice that it has "version n.0" (n= 1, 2, 3 ...) in common with several other games you designed. It not an unusual occurence in game inventing, but having Ketchup climb the ladder up to 5.0 before settling on 4.0 almost suggests indulgence. Here's how Glorieta 3.0 is introduced: Quote:
The trouble with platonic ideals is that they are based on 'inverse strategy'. That's a Christian's attitude towards God: to guarantee you can keep striving make the goal unattainable. You can never get it right: this could be the last version, but "the more I design games, the more I’m convinced they’re never actually done. Every ruleset is just a launchpad for another, better ruleset, always in pursuit of a platonic ideal". So I conclude that in your vision the last version can never be the final one. I might agree for certain kinds of games that implicitly have an arbitrary basis, like chess variants. But I don't agree that this would hold for abstract games in general. You can tinker with Hex till kingdom come, even come up with interesting new variants, but Hex is Hex and will still be Hex in 2112. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by NickBentley on Nov 26th, 2012, 8:40am on 11/26/12 at 05:59:45, christianF wrote:
When I design a game, I'm trying to create something which is a) elegant; b) fun and stimulating to play. These two aren't the same thing, and I want both. Let's say that I'm Piet Hein/ John Nash and I invent Hex, but then I keep going, and think to myself, "how can I make this connection game more stimulating?" So I keep looking around in adjacent design space and I come up with Slither. To me, Slither is superior to Hex - it's a little less elegant but it is a lot more engaging to play. The difference between Glorieta 2.0 and Glorieta 3.0, ruleswise, is greater than the difference between Slither and Hex, so maybe you argue that it's confusing to call them by the same name. But they both are attempts to achieve the same goal, and I'm using the same name for all my attempts to achieve that goal. One reason this may seem like indulgence, I think, is that it's hard to see, just by looking at the rules, that there are (usually) real, and to me important, differences in how engaging the different versions are. And when that's not the case, there's a difference in the degree two which the different versions satisfy the goals I'd set for myself in designing the game. In Glorieta's case, it's both: the game is both more engaging than the last version, and it satisfies two constraints that the last version did not (drawlessness, and having the players decide where the neutrals go) But about engagement: unless one actually plays the different versions, it's hard to see that there's a real progression, and so the different versions can end up looking like indulgence. But from my point of view, they're not. They're just a history of my progress in becoming a game designer. Not that I expect anyone to play my games. I'm just obsessed with trying to make the best games I possibly can, and that means constantly trying to do better than I did the last time. If I were publishing games commercially, then there would have to be "final" versions for expedience, but I'm not. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Nov 26th, 2012, 9:56am on 11/26/12 at 08:40:38, NickBentley wrote:
Now that you explain it, it makes more sense. on 11/26/12 at 08:40:38, NickBentley wrote:
It wasn't meant negatively, but if you label different games under the same name, version such&such, people might naturally assume it to be versions of the same game, rather than provisional implementations of the same idea. on 11/26/12 at 08:40:38, NickBentley wrote:
Isn't there a subjective element? Different people like different games. You're not too fond of multiple moves per turn, I usually don't like to play chess type games. That's something else than "I don't like chess type games", because I do. I just suck at them. Likes and dislikes, like your preference for Slither, these things may be in the wiring. A game isn't bad just because you or I don't like it. on 11/26/12 at 08:40:38, NickBentley wrote:
There's no need to avoid it either, unless the thought of a "final" version actually bothers you. But designing the best games you possibly can and not expecting anyone to play them, that's a bit weird, although it does align with you being the sole judge of your own games. But games implicitly need players to judge them, and if you need their feedback, you must throw it for the lions at some point. Of course that's exactly what you do, so what am I trying to get to ... :) . How about this. You called Redstone "viciously good". I'm not going to argue that because different people like different games. My point is that Redstone has conceptual simplicity and that, barring an initial hiccup pointed out by Luis, it 'froze' into its suggested implementation without effort. It 'became what it was', just following the idea. Now there's general agreement about the rules. So if anyone wanted to 'explore' it further, say because you'd like more 'engagement', it must mean finding a new game, doesn't it? Redstone seems quite 'final' to me. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by NickBentley on Nov 26th, 2012, 2:15pm Quote:
Perhaps there's a better way to name my games. My choice is the result of looking to the future: a decade or two hence, I'll try to cultivate communities of play around my best games (with tournaments, bots, strategy articles, etc), and I know that I'm not going to pick two different attempts to achieve the same goal in the group; there's only going to be one Glorieta-like game in the lot, if there is one at all. This naming convention works in the light of this purpose. Quote:
Very subjective. The vast majority of people don't even like this whole genre of games. But I follow my lights and create the things that satisfy me. Quote:
To be clear, I *want* people to play my games, I just don't expect them to, based on experience. Few people end up playing the games that I design, or any other non-commercial abstract games for that matter. So I need and want their feedback, but sometimes I just don't get it, or at least much of it. Examples: I'm pretty sure my second best design is a game of mine called Odd, but I don't know anyone who has played it lately. The only reason anyone knows about Ketchup is that I spent more time talking about it than I do most of my games. The only reason anyone knows about Slither is that I'm constantly telling people how good it is. Games are generally only known in proportion to how much they're promoted and I'm not promoting my games, so most people don't know about them, don't talk about them, and don't play them. That's fine, for now. Quote:
Sure, but again, this is a terminology thing. If had invented Go and Redstone both, they might be called Go 1.0 and Go 2.0, and if I later found an implemention of "surround capture" that I liked even more, I might call it Go 3.0. I would use those names looking forward to the fact that I'd eventually settle on one that I wanted to explore deeply and to promote. I guess for me, the thing that makes a game final isn't the rules themselves, but when a play community springs up around those rules. That's why Go deserves it's own specific name, separate from Redstone. Someday I'll try to foster play communities around my own games, and then they'll have to have their own unique names, and then they will. But for this development stage of my game design career, the iterative names work better for me. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Nov 26th, 2012, 2:57pm on 11/26/12 at 14:15:35, NickBentley wrote:
So here's the divide. I start from a game being an 'organism' that exists even before someone dreams it up. If I get the smell I follow and try to find out how it behaves and what it 'wants'. Kind of a dialogue. If the game is self-explanatory and one keeps an eye on Occam's Razor (not intoducing what isn't necessary), then the result may end up quintessential. Emergo, for instance, is quintessential, and whether people play it or not isn't my business. We found it and published it and made an applet. What more can you do :) . I know a game is no organism and doesn't want anything, but thinking that way is pleasant and patient and quite without effort, and it has paid off. Also, only 'organic' games emerge that way. I can assemble a Chess variant in minutes. Organic games are usually 'uniform'. Games with different pieces are more a matter of a good choices and good 'assembly', finding your way through a wood of arbitraryness. Not that interesting. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by NickBentley on Nov 26th, 2012, 4:18pm Quote:
Ok, I think this is clarifying the difference of approach for me, although I emphasize that I too feel that certain games are discovered rather than designed. The ideal that I'm always pursuing is a game that is both completely organic and also wildly addictive/engaging (for me), and I believe that these two don't always correlate (though they often do). So, for example, Hex is more organic than Slither, but Slither is more addictive/engaging than Hex. In practice, it means that I sometimes compromise one or the other virtue in order to find the "best" overall ruleset. I also sometimes feel that one way to find organic rulesets is to start from some non-organic ruleset in nearby design space, and to understand it well enough that you can find the more organic stuff nearby. Ketchup was designed this way, for example. The rules for the first version of Ketchup were three times as long as they are now. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Nov 28th, 2012, 6:07am on 11/26/12 at 16:18:40, NickBentley wrote:
Well, you said it, "for me". That would include your view of Hex and Slither. Others might feel otherwise, or indeed have a completely opposite view. For me Hex and Y are diamonds, simple, organic, self-explanatory and awfully deep. But I don't play them all that much. However, I can easily imagine how someone could be totally fascinated by them. As for Slither, I wouldn't argue that it is less organic, and you're the living testimony to the fact that it is capable of casting a spell on someone ;) . I suck at it (25 won out of 75 at LG), but that doesn't affect my high opinion of the game. Taste is inherently subjective, but simplicity and structural elegance are not. on 11/26/12 at 16:18:40, NickBentley wrote:
As long as one gets there, the route isn't all that important, and I do understand self-chosen restrictions (and even see the advantages). I fail to understand however why games outside the realm to which the Church restricts itself, should be left unconsidered altogether. Glorieta (http://nickbentleygames.wordpress.com/2012/11/23/revised-game-glorieta-3-0/) You posted it at rga (https://groups.google.com/forum/?fromgroups=#!topic/rec.games.abstract/UCW0HR2rMVE), got 20 views and no replies yet in 5 days, and are currently being overrun by Rampart, Shuffle & Squinch of Cyclophobia Incorporated. Shuffle seems the most interesting, a kind of "Mad Queens" in slomo. Squinch has already been disqualified by its inventor, and Rampart shows that CC is still a dedicated follower of the Church. It's the kind of game you might design if you contemplate Tanbo long enough. Like two years. I found your evaluation of Glorieta at rga: Quote:
The use of neutral stone isn't all that new, even in this particular way. In your own game Shello (http://nickbentleygames.wordpress.com/2012/06/23/new-game-shello/) they're fixed, but I've seen Othello based games using 'active' neutral stones too. So you're right about application in other games, but it isn't a novelty. The "stack" is interesting as a means to movetype distribution, and the implementation in Glorieta is particularly interesting because if its flexible 'timing' of compulsory reversals. I see a slight cause for possible confusion in the wording:
I'm curious how you proved that "the game will always end with a loop and there will never be a draw". Not that I doubt it, and the proof may be quite simple, but I suck at deductive thinking :P . Edit: Sorry, don't bother, flipping to neutral, you can't escape ring formation. Imagine, that took me half a day :) . |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by NickBentley on Nov 28th, 2012, 10:55am Quote:
To be clear, I don't think they should be left unconsidered, just that I'm not the one to consider them. Trying to explore just a tiny part of drawless game space is more than I can handle. The most exciting thing about being a game designer is just how vast the design spaces are compared to my minds puny ability to contemplate them. Quote:
I haven't tried Mark's new game yet, but I've played Rampart and my first impression of it could hardly have been better. Corey put a ton of thought into it and it seems to have paid off. (for the record I don't like Tanbo all that much to play, even though I think the core idea is interesting and Corey seems to have proved that with Rampart- the devil is in the details). Quote:
I *didn't* mean to say that the use of neutral stones generally is new. Rather what's new is the use of neutral stones to make *any stone pattern goal* inevitable in a game. I mention this because I thought it might be useful for game designers to contemplate. This goes back to why loop-formation is inevitable in Glorieta, so I'll tackle that question while answering this one. In Glorieta, on a turn you either drop stones or flip a stone. When the board is full, you can no longer drop stones, which means you must proceed by flipping. If you kept flipping for as many turns as possible, you'd end up with a board full of neutrals and nothing else. At some point prior, a loop would have formed, containing neutrals and at least one stone owned by just one player. That player wins. In practice, you want the game to end long before that, because the game is rather too cold at that point, but that's a simple matter of forcing players to create neutrals in the proper proportion to their own stones throughout the game. But back to the inevitability of a loop: just as a loop is inevitable, so is any other pattern of stones you can think of. I found this worth noting because their are hoards of games that choose some pattern of stones as the winning condition (every n-in-a-row game, and every connection game, just to name two large genres), and the choice of pattern goal is always constrained by the fact that the goal can't be too hard. If it's too hard to achieve, then neither player will and the game will always end in a draw. This is why there are no games with a goal of "10-in-a-row" or "connect to all six sides of a hex board with one group". This mechanism allows you set *any* stone pattern as a goal (as long as you don't define empty spaces as part of the pattern) and to create a game where one player will inevitably create that pattern and win. There are millions to try, and the vast majority won't be good, but maybe there are some in there worth trying. I think Glorieta is one. The reason I've been fascinated by the idea of making a game where the winning condition is a loop on a hex board, is that loops on hex boards have the potential to act as both tactical and strategic goals. A six stone loop is a very tactical goal, but loops can also be these huge winding things that can only be established over the course of a whole game. There aren't very many win conditions that work on both levels: connection goals are typically mostly strategic, n-in-a-row are typically highly tactical, etc. One thing I love about Havannah is that it addresses the issue in this beautifully simple way: just have multiple goals that sit at different points along the tactics/strategy spectrum. Voila! A great game. But pondering Havannah, many years ago, it occurred to me that if loops were easier to form, loops would actually be all you need, because different sized loops sit all over the tactics/strategy spectrum. And that's when I began trying to figure out how to make it happen. That's lead to this very long exploration that has resulted in Glorieta. Not to say that Glorieta is better than Havannah or anything: the cost of imposing the unified win condition is a more complicated turn structure. I just think it's cool that it turned out to be possible at all. It probably seems rather more cool to me than to anyone else, simply because I've spent an embarrassing amount of time working on it. I've known the general solution with neutrals for something like three years now, but creating a fun (for me) game out of it turned out to be hard. Quote:
Yeah, I need to refine the wording One more thing: still strying to characterize the differences our approach. It seems like it comes down to simple differences in tastes: for you, the most "organic" game is always (or an any case almost always) the most interesting to play (eg for you, Hex is more interesting to play than Slither), so it makes sense for you to pursue the most organic mechanisms, and you'll end up with games you like. Whereas the correlation isn't as strong to me, so I'm more willing to veer away from organic games. Does this sound accurate? |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by NickBentley on Nov 28th, 2012, 11:05am One more thing: although indeed, nobody seems to care about Glorieta at R.G.A. it's gotten more traffic than my other game design posts overall. Most posts get 300-500 visitors on the day of the post, but Glorieta got 800, so someone seems interested (even if I'm not exactly sure who!), and that is some small consolation. It's always hard being interested in things that other people aren't. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MillyOatfish on Nov 28th, 2012, 12:24pm on 11/26/12 at 05:59:45, christianF wrote:
You can't be serious. The only difference between Nick's perpetual tweakfest and yours is that Nick is honest about his. When you regret your most recent update, you give it a unique name and let it fade into obscurity. One has to note the sheer volume of tweaks. Nothing could rival the perfect tweakstorm culminating in Hanniball 15.0. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Nov 28th, 2012, 1:18pm on 11/28/12 at 10:55:52, NickBentley wrote:
I mean not only as a design goal but in general. If a game has cycles it's usually hammered down. Thus introducing some nuance in the realm of cycles is difficult. For some "to be caught in an endless game cycle" is to horrific to even contemplate. Others say "ok, a draw, have some coffee?", and start the next game. on 11/28/12 at 10:55:52, NickBentley wrote:
Mark's game could hardly be more blunt. Strategically it will probably remain opaque in the opening but there's room for emerging clarity of tactics toward the endgame. Corey certainly had enough time to put into it so maybe I should have a more careful look at it. on 11/28/12 at 10:55:52, NickBentley wrote:
Yes, I figured that out way too slow :) on 11/28/12 at 10:55:52, NickBentley wrote:
That's an interesting aspect of it, and there are quite a few game principles that might be considered in that light. One for the toolbox. on 11/28/12 at 10:55:52, NickBentley wrote:
I think its a good game indeed. And Havannah was just a lucky merger, nothing 'innovative' about it. on 11/28/12 at 10:55:52, NickBentley wrote:
I like to think in terms of what an organism would 'want' and I like it to pursue its object with means that are both necessary and sufficient. You cannot always avoid arbitrary decisions, but that's what I strive for: to eliminate the inventor from the process! That's the deepest motivation I have, and that's also the reason that I don't care too much about 'taste': if a game is self explanatory, then that is what you get, like it or not. In practice, if you've got the mechanics and the object aligned, half the job is done. If you have one without the other, you're nowhere yet. Mu behaves very complicated yet I could 'discover' it on a nightly bikeride because I had both the mechanics (and very simple ones at that) and the object. There's very little arbitrary in Mu. There are slightly different move protocols for levis and velox, and the capacity of cells of the wall differs from the rest of the cells. That's about as much choices as I had to make, and even these suggested themselves naturally. Mu_velox turned out as Pinball meeting Risk in an abstract no-luck perfect-information environment. I find that fascinating (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/players-section/Serve.cgi?file=Mu_velox1353863041.html). And despite expectations to the contrary (come on guys, be honest :) ) it is rock solid in it's behaviour. But it is what it is. I found it, it explained itself and I respect that. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Nov 28th, 2012, 1:22pm on 11/28/12 at 12:24:28, MillyOatfish wrote:
No, but I can recommend one who is. You might even know him, or rather 'them', fairly intimately. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by hyperpape on Nov 28th, 2012, 3:26pm on 11/24/12 at 05:15:25, christianF wrote:
Not that I expect Havannah to be overcome by draws, but it's going out on a limb to judge what will happen. I'm not particularly worried. If it happens, it happens, and we all find new games to play. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MillyOatfish on Nov 28th, 2012, 3:55pm on 11/28/12 at 15:26:12, hyperpape wrote:
Exactly. For me it's about pride of craftsmanship. If my finite game were to grow to the extent that Chess has, academic since that'll never happen to any modern game, there wouldn't be a cycling issue. It's also more challenging to design with the imperative of finitude. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Nov 28th, 2012, 3:58pm on 11/28/12 at 15:26:12, hyperpape wrote:
By that time I guess I won't be thinking outside my box, and neither will you ;D . |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by MillyOatfish on Nov 28th, 2012, 4:30pm on 11/28/12 at 15:58:27, christianF wrote:
You'll be thinking inside a box. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Nov 29th, 2012, 2:36am on 11/28/12 at 16:30:44, MillyOatfish wrote:
Yes, Milly (http://graph-art.matc.edu/davidt/vicom_145/unit_1/web_sites/iron/wwwroot/irm3.html), that was my point, didn't you notice? |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Nov 29th, 2012, 4:30am Some thirteen billion years ago the universe was still in dipers. Actually it didn't 'exist' because there was no smartass who thought "hey, I think, therefore I am, therefore that funny stuff surrounding me must also 'be'. Some thirty or forty billion years from now the universe will have expanded till the point of evaporating black holes and ripping atoms apart. Actually it won't 'exist' because there won't be a smartass to think "hey, I think, therefore I am, therefore that funny stuff surrounding me must also 'be'. In between there was a sudden pop and light and sound and smell and taste and touch poured in and they told me that I was a boy named Chris and this was Enschede, the Netherlands, and World War 2 was just over. A nanosecond later, against that timescale, I'll pop back into that unproblematic state of non-existence that got me through World War 2 without even noticing. Is there a clue? Not really I'm afraid. "Life is fundamentally futile, and great games are a tribute to precisely that" it says on the mindsports homepage. My quest for excellence is rooted in dealing with futility. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by GeraldApplecore on Nov 29th, 2012, 9:45am on 11/29/12 at 02:36:34, christianF wrote:
Oops, didn't realize we'd entered the Mt. Doom zone again. The shadow of Mt.Doom is long You'll miss me when I'm gone I'll sing this song from dusk till dawn You'll miss me when I'm gone |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Nov 30th, 2012, 2:18pm Our latest game of Mu_velox (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/players-section/Serve.cgi?file=Mu_velox1353863041.html) shows an interesting strategical twist. Ed starts growing in two places, a tube at the top, which was till now considered the obvious strategy, and a 'reverse tube' in the center (around move_17). You usually pick a concave shape to start, but this game shows that starting around a convex shape works just as well, IF you position it well. In this case Ed succeeded in cutting me off in only a few turns. Mu_velox is like riding the bull: it takes a while to adapt to its wild behaviour. But once you can keep your balance, strategy and tactics open up. Small misjudgements are amplified quickly and the sumo syndrome is invariably present, but there's a lot to learn. However, something has come up that'll keep Ed busy for one or two weeks, so we'll take a break. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by hyperpape on Nov 30th, 2012, 10:51pm on 11/28/12 at 15:58:27, christianF wrote:
A strange possibility: bots could surpass humans, and their game could turn out drawish, while we still played decisive games. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by GeraldApplecore on Dec 1st, 2012, 2:16am on 11/30/12 at 22:51:38, hyperpape wrote:
What a bizarre, outlandish claim :) Havannah is a better game than Arimaa. It's also scalable, less draw prone than Arimaa, and played with generic equipment. Statistically, Havannah is played at more than twice the rate of Arimaa at iggc. While you've been dancing on Havannah's grave, Havannah has been out kicking butt and taking names. Havannah has been thoroughly analyzed longer than Arimaa has been in existence. Havannah is a far cry from far eclipsed by the likes of Arimaa. Check your far fetched facts, Pape. Havannah has a much brighter future than Arimaa could ever hope for. Incidentally, Cephalopod (http://www.marksteeregames.com/Cephalopod_rules.pdf) is played at more than twice the rate of Havannah at Spanish megasite, Ludoteka. So by extension, Cephalopod doodies on Arimaa. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Dec 1st, 2012, 6:15am on 11/30/12 at 22:51:38, hyperpape wrote:
Omar and I are different people. I basically try to bring a new game to the community's attention and leave it at that. Sometimes you can't leave it at that, but most of the time you can. Then I wait for the next game. Omar has basically Arimaa to concentrate on, and has other interests and talents that allowed him to spark a blooming community and an effective marketing strategy. Mind you, he never could have done that if Arimaa had been a bad game. But it is also an arbitrary game. This it has in common with chess variants. As a designer I tend to shy away from the arbitrary. The chess variants I made all revolve around a new idea or concept within the general idea of checkmate. Like, how much does one actually need to create a chess variant. That led to Chad (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/the-pit/chad-520). But such a result in itself is arbitrary, because later I accidentally (and ironically) stumbled over Shakti (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/the-pit/shakti-550). It's a troublesome design area and Omar was lucky to have it all come together so well. But how well Arimaa will hold up in the future is anybody's guess. Success always lends a hand to digging its own grave. on 11/30/12 at 22:51:38, hyperpape wrote:
That's actually the most likely scenario for most games that can end in a draw. But there's always the matter of margins. Havannah has a smaller margin of draws than most other such games. And when Havannah dies, eventually, it will be no different than its inventor (long ago by then), or any inventor, or indeed any game. So it's a bit of an effort to really care ;) . |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Dec 1st, 2012, 6:44am Today, december 1, the seventh test round (http://www.codecup.nl/competition.php?comp=138) of the CodeCup Challenge 2013 will be played. As I write, it is running, and already new contenders can be found at the top. I've played some 70 Symple games now, against various human and AI opponents, and I can sort of keep up with the front of the pack. I'll comment on the final ranking later. Edit: Eventually the strongest known programs came out on top. B_ot (aka 'Engine') by Bertrand Lunderer (http://www.codecup.nl/entrygames.php?ent=3350) (blunderer, a nick) lost 2 of 4 against Remco Bloemen (http://www.codecup.nl/entrygames.php?ent=3348) and 4 of 4 against Abdessamad ELKASIMI (http://www.codecup.nl/entrygames.php?ent=3340). The latter two made 2-2 too. These are the top dogs. I won once and lost twice against Abdessamad in the CodeCup settings, that is: base-15, penalty-6. Here are my current two games against the winner B_ot (game 1 (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/players-section/Serve.cgi?file=Symple1354132503.html) - game 2 (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/players-section/Serve.cgi?file=Symple1354132548.html)) and I'm winning both, but these are base-19 penalty-10 games with bigger trees and more emphasis on connectivity (because of the higher penalty). |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by hyperpape on Dec 1st, 2012, 10:21am Mark, it may be confusing to hear this, but I'm not interested in pissing matches about which game is more popular (which y'all claim not to care about, but constantly argue about), or better. My claim was about the amount of _analysis_ that a game has been subjected to. And on that front, Arimaa is ahead. I'm not sure how the number of games of Arimaa compare to Havannah (there are some 250000 games of Arimaa played on the arimaa website, but I don't know a good count for all the places Havannah is played). But the point is that there are two books on Arimaa, there are problem compendiums, there is collaborative analysis that occurs on the boards, or in game commentaries. Meanwhile, in Havannah, there are some cursory strategic notices from Christian Freeling, but there is almost no public discussion of strategy, opening sequences, problem sets, any of the things we associate with analysis in Chess, Checkers, Go, or other games like that. People study (or don't) in isolation. And of course none of these games compares to Checkers/Draughters--we know more about perfect play in those games than in any of Arimaa, Havannah, Slither, Cephalopod. That's not because Checkers is best, but just because of its history. In fact, knowing so much about play in Draughts is almost a bad thing--it's why we know it's so drawish. So my point is this: there is more analysis of Arimaa than Havannah, but still nothing for Arimaa comparable to what exists for Chess, Checkers or Go. And that collaborative analysis opens up new ways of play. So it could turn out that if Havannah was subjected to the same level of scrutiny as other games, it could become drawish (though there is no positive reason to believe that will happen). |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by hyperpape on Dec 1st, 2012, 10:32am on 12/01/12 at 06:15:53, christianF wrote:
That's fine for you. It seems like an interesting idea to try and create non-arbitrary structures subject to the constraints that you adopt, or Mark adopts, or Nick adopts, though it's not a pursuit I care to engage in, or feel that it has much bearing on me as a game player. My positive evaluation of Havannah, Slither, Oust*, Redstone* and Arimaa is based entirely on how they play. (*) Conjectured. I've watched games, but never played them. They seem appealing. Quote:
I agree. I am not worried by the thought that Havannah may be drawish. I just hope you can admit we know a lot less about this than you sometimes suggest. What we know is that right now, Havannah is amazingly resistant to draws, given that they are possible. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by GeraldApplecore on Dec 1st, 2012, 11:09am on 12/01/12 at 10:21:38, hyperpape wrote:
Oh get real. The vast majority of those are barely started test games against a bot. The number of completed, person to person games is obviously a teensy weensy fraction of that. Stop trying to mislead everyone with Arimaa's phony popularity. on 12/01/12 at 10:21:38, hyperpape wrote:
Boy that's a lot of piss for someone who doesn't like pissing contests. Arimaa is a good game by all accounts. But it's also commercially produced and heavily promoted by Omar. Arimaa's untold "success" is mainly a product of Omar's money, charisma, and dedication. Arimaa uses proprietary equipment, and will only be produced for a limited time. Online, there are simply better games to choose from than Arimaa. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Dec 1st, 2012, 11:47am on 12/01/12 at 10:32:12, hyperpape wrote:
I'm perfectly willing to admit that. If I suggest otherwise, sometimes, that's because Havannah's margin of draws is very small compared to other games, and because Havannah will probably never be big enough to get the global pack of top programmers out for the hunt, or to sprout top players for that matter. I hope we don't forget that most games are played recreationally, even if they make it to the occasional club or association. Chess, Go and Shogi are big game because they're big games. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by hyperpape on Dec 1st, 2012, 12:08pm Mark, you are welcome to reread my posts to confirm that I am neither making claims about popularity, nor pissing on anything. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by GeraldApplecore on Dec 1st, 2012, 12:26pm CHRISTIAN, LICK YOUR DIARRHEA CRUST OFF ED'S SAGGING BALLS |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Dec 1st, 2012, 12:51pm Quote:
Mark Steere had been bashing around on Symple for almost two years, and for a long time in this very thread, when he posted this. It shows that he had no clue about the penalty parameter. Luis had to put him straight: Quote:
Being clueless regarding the parameter means being clueless regarding the move protocol, the balancing rule, the object, the 'oneness' of the game. So all this bashing that one can find in this very thread, till the moment he was banned, was given in complete 'cluelessness'. Imagine that. Omar gave me the means to keep this thread on track. That means that discussions should be content centered, not ego centered. Not that I'm fully armored against ego, but I'm an old hippie. "Its nice to be important, but its more important to be nice" isn't that bad a motto to live by. P.S. I'll copy the preceding one to justify the removal of some posts: on 12/01/12 at 12:26:36, GeraldApplecore wrote:
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Dec 2nd, 2012, 1:15pm I'm an old fox and I wasn't hunting or anything, but while discussing Symple Hex (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/arena/symple-hex/) (no applet yet) with Benedikt, I picked up a faint presence of a game. Ignoring it would have been harder than following the trail, so I followed a trail that led to a new move protocol which in turn pointed to 'territory' as the most likely object, and on thursday night, in the magic span between going to bed and falling asleep, it came together without a wrinkle. It's called Triccs (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/the-pit/triccs-627) and there's also a square version (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/the-pit/572-square-triccs) that I'm not quite sure about because of the usual straight/diagonal issues. I'm sticking my neck out here, because I've not played it yet, but I have a fairly good feeling about it. An applet is high on the priority list. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by browni3141 on Dec 2nd, 2012, 9:00pm on 12/01/12 at 02:16:50, GeraldApplecore wrote:
Interesting that a game without possibility for draws is more draw prone than a game with possibility for draws. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by jackspritz on Dec 3rd, 2012, 4:03am Corey Clark here. I guess I had to join the fray sooner or later. on 11/28/12 at 06:07:14, christianF wrote:
First off, I want to say that personally I do not envision a future where only draw-free abstracts exist. My belief is simply that abstract game design is a recreational science, not an art. I believe there are rules to designing abstract games and I believe what constitutes a good game is fundamentally objective. What I would like to see an end to is the unsophisticated "guess and check" approach and creative freewheeling that currently reigns. I say enough designs based on the fact you saw some birds flying around (I'm looking at you Dieter). This is mathematics. As a designer I seek the approval of the universe before any prospective audience. Recently I was having a conversation with an iggamecenter user and there I came up with a perfect term to describe the current abstract game design climate. That term is "draw apologetics". What do I mean by this? Well a common criticism of my perspective on draws is that some people like them. Obviously I can't argue with this other than to say I don't care (I really don't). However I'll admit Nick Bentley made a very good point when he said something to the effect of "the most balanced game would have 1 perfect draw". Though to my mind, this does not justify the existence of any and all draws. far from it. And yet these are just the sort of draws being justified. What I term "Draw apologetics" is the process by which a designer builds a game, discovers draws during playtests or otherwise conceives of a draw position and evaluates its likelihood based on a gut feeling or a limited sample. None of this inspires me with confidence. If it isn't demonstrable that your game is at least practically draw free then by what method are you determining the likelihood of a draw? And of course as the designer you are already biased when making this assessment. Personally I would abandon "cyclophobia" altogether if it didn't seem to be such an intuitive and sensible approach. But indeed as I agree with Nick that draws have the potential to be a signifier of balance in a game, I dream of the day when we will have sophisticated enough of an understanding of how perfect information games work that we begin to design the right kind of draws into our games to enhance them. Most draws however simply attract the branches of the game tree into a convergence and bind them at once. If both players are ultimately pursuing their own ends then once the method for creating a draw has been discovered draws will only become more frequent. A good draw would be one that is so rare and inconsistent with intuitive play that the theory would already be highly counter-intuitive for it to ever be relevant. Such a position may exist in Ayu for instance. So no, I have no problem with draws and cycles on principle so long as their exact nature can be determined. Christian I will also say its telling that you remain by far the most vociferous critic of the "church" and yet you continually praise the games that filter out. Namely Ketchup, Slither, Hex Oust and Ayu. You also called Luis the best designer working today like a week ago. This apparent contradiction doesn't make a lot of sense to me. You seem to imply the methods of the church are wrong and yet the games produced by this method are brilliant. I have bandied about a few theories in casual chats as to why you do this but I'll reserve them for the time being as I'll admit they're fairly far-fetched. At any rate I'm calling you out here. on 11/28/12 at 06:07:14, christianF wrote:
Actually Rampart was the product of contemplating Tanbo for about 20 minutes. I consider use of the Tanbo mechanic to be a compromise at best. My design grail over these past two years had been a game which would conserve as much board space as possible. This was something I became deeply interested in after falling in love with Hex Oust. Originally I had hoped to find my own finitude mechanism but Oust and Tanbo were always lurking on the periphery. Unfortunately the ones I did come up with had various problems, either not being able to produce a filled board or were too high maintenance or too difficult to build a game around. However Ki did filter out of earlier experiments. So back in August I was fiddling around with the Tanbo concept in the sandbox and eventually Rampart just started coming together and there was obviously no turning back. First off I needed to create some sort of conflict so I decided "what if you could occupy your own liberties" and this created a very tense environment for the game. To me this is really what makes Rampart an essential game. Its obviously very cold because every move is a possible liability. Yet one would have to wonder what passive play looks like in Rampart, clinging to the edge will get you nowhere and failure to defend your groups from an aggressive opponent will result in some serious losses. Rampart has another novel mechanic which enhances its potential for drama, the "ghost capture". By having the removal of enemy stones constitute a whole move the tempo is always shifting. Really Christian I don't know how this eluded you so thoroughly that you just wrote the game off as a Tanbo variant. I guess that intuition isn't what it used to be... Rampart really wasn't 2 years in the making, it came together in less than an hour but the process was all the failed designs that preceded it and how I developed a better sense for negative feedback mechanisms and gaining a better understanding of the design process along the way. That's really how it is with abstract game design I think. You're not going to be working on one game for years or even months but the previous failures are all part of the process leading up to the conception of that one exceptional game. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by hyperpape on Dec 3rd, 2012, 7:55am Browni two things worth knowing: 1) the draw prevention mechanisms of Arimaa were added relatively late in the design process, and that makes folks like Christian and Mark dislike them. 2) For some people, explicitly preventing cycles (superko, the threefold repetition rule) is inelegant or a cheat. Any game can be made cycle free using those methods, so it doesn't count to them (I'm not sure if I'm speaking for Christian here, but I know that Mark thinks this way). |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Dec 3rd, 2012, 7:58am on 12/02/12 at 21:00:48, browni3141 wrote:
There are games that cannot end in a draw, games that can but that have unproblematic margins, and games that have problematic margins. There may not be a concensus about what makes a margin 'problematic'. One criterion might be whether the game amounts to anything. Draughts is big, therefore the margin of draws is 'problematic'. Few care about Abalone, none about Noughts & Crosses. Go had two problems, turn-order balance and a margin of draws that some considered 'problematic'. The first one has been addressed by komi. Balance is ruled in. The second one has been solved by introducing a half point in the komi value. Draws are ruled out. So comparing a game with a small margin of draws with games in which draws have been ruled out isn't quite fair. Draws can only be ruled out if they are there in the first place and if they are felt to be problematic. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by hyperpape on Dec 3rd, 2012, 8:02am on 12/03/12 at 04:03:45, jackspritz wrote:
That a game has properties X,Y and Z is an objective fact. That these properties make it a good game is (barring major additional arguments that you're not ever going to give), your subjective opinion. That is all. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by jackspritz on Dec 3rd, 2012, 8:49am on 12/03/12 at 08:02:58, hyperpape wrote:
Well its like I say, there's not enough at stake for me to be "right". If someone wants to argue against my perspective they can pretty much invalidate it by claiming others like draws or that cycles enhance the experience. No one is dropping dead because of a draw or cycle so people who want to debate me can basically just move the goal posts around all over the d**n place and even misrepresent themselves if they want to be right. Its pretty sensible though to think that a game should be as competitive (and therefore decisive) as possible. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Dec 3rd, 2012, 8:52am on 12/03/12 at 08:02:58, hyperpape wrote:
Usually arguments that end with "that's all" tell more about the person giving them than about the subject matter. It's often founded in craving for simplicity in complex matters. However, sometimes I feel it is justified, and this happens to be the case here. The distinction you make should be kept in mind in all discussions regarding abstract games. It's not always easy though. Some find Chess a good game, some find Go a good game. I like both as a sport, because the enormous player base of both games makes for unattainable strategic refinement at the top. Unattainable for mere mortals like me. In that respect it's no different for me than Snooker or Golf. I like both in a conceptual way too, but the concept of checkmate can be implemented in more ways than I care to reflect upon. The concept of Go is far less arbitrary. Conceptual simplicity, elegance, 'organic' behaviour and a minimum amount of arbitrariness seem things worthy to strive for, quite apart of the question whether these render a good game. That's for the players to decide (and the playing field there is inherently uneven, and lobbying is inherently present). But these much sought after properties are neither necessary nor sufficient to make 'a good game' because that's for others to decide. |
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Title: rse cares. Post by christianF on Dec 3rd, 2012, 10:38am on 12/03/12 at 04:03:45, jackspritz wrote:
First off, I agree with Hyperpape: what makes a good game is subjective, no matter how long you repeat that it is fundamentally objective. Secondly, nature and mathematics are closely related. I use a flock of birds versus a cobweb as an illustration of 'dynamic connection' versus 'static connection'. There are simple mathematical algorithms that mimic a flock of birds or the creation of a cobweb. There are no rules for inventing abstract games. There may be guidelines. Talent may play a role, dedication may play a role and sheer luck may play a role. The objective may play a role. You "seek the approval of the universe", I doubt if the universe cares. Dieter made a nice and elegant game but he also runs a company selling nice and elegant games so marketability will have been one of the design criteria. I see that as a perfectly justifiable reason. And if people like Volo, then I'm glad for him. Also, there's nothing against an "unsophisticated guess and check approach and creative freewheeling". If there's anything that that "currently reigns", it's the idea that there are rules for inventing games. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Dec 3rd, 2012, 11:27am on 12/03/12 at 04:03:45, jackspritz wrote:
Let's take this a step further. Just yesterday I published Triccs (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/the-pit/triccs-627). First of all, it was unintentionally. I picked up a scent in the middle of a reply to Benedikt. Where did it come from? I can't tell, I just noticed its precence. Now note, Triccs is:
So I invent games that satisfy the criteria of the church. And as you already noted, at mindsports we feature Mark's Oust (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/arena/oust/) and HexOust (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/the-pit/hexoust-614), your Slither (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/the-pit/slither-625), Nick's Ketchup (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/the-pit/ketchup-620) and Luis' Xodd (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/the-pit/xodd-624), Yodd (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/the-pit/yodd-623) and Ayu (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/the-pit/ayu-636). These, in my opinion, are good games, so I'm not sure where I did ever criticize them. Nor do I see any contradiction because I happen to find, say, Dameo (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/arena/dameo/) a good game. There's a lot to find in such a game, but here you find the church members on your way, ridiculing draws, ridiculing cycles, and bashing everything game that has them, and generally making discussions impossible. Even a discussion of Symple (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/arena/symple/) was made impossible. Symple is finite and decisive, so how did that happen, I wonder. You know what I find ridiculous? Eliminating draws by introducing a half komi point. It means that the idea of two great Go-minds climbing a mountain and arriving simultaneously, in mutual respect, is considered unbearable. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by jackspritz on Dec 3rd, 2012, 10:54pm on 12/03/12 at 10:38:05, christianF wrote:
So what am I just supposed to take your word for it Christian? Why would you even make a statement without fortifying it with evidence and counter-arguments. I guess you think your reputation will just carry you through the remainder of this debate, huh? The overall quality of a game is fundamentally objective. Now unlike you I am going to explain my position even though this proved to be pointless the first time I did it because you were unable to provide a level of discourse beyond that of Monty Python's argument clinic. But here goes nothing. The depth of a game is measurable. We know this because games have game trees. The level of balance in a game is measurable by extension of this. The decisiveness of a game is quite clearly a measurable quality. Even the clarity is measurable to some degree because we know for instance that the ability to maintain an advantage in a game is crucial to this. So besides this what's left? Oh right "fun". I've already made your counter-argument for you as I'm quite familiar with the course of this kind of conversation. While nobody will bother to explain what the hell "fun" is in any concise terms, I have to ask three things. Are the factors which contribute to the competitiveness of a game such as depth, level of balance, length of move-wasting phases, degree of clarity and decisiveness entirely outside the domain of "fun"? And if so can this one factor "fun" really be more essential than all the others? First off isn't the point of any game to be a competitive experience to at least some degree? Secondly how are we to define fun outside these terms anyway? I suppose there is "novelty" which is really an epidemic, there's a bit to much emphasis on novelty and gimmicks. In fact some designers seem to be more interested in games as vehicles for new gimmicks than making them deep and competitive. Indeed it seems a lot of designers are willing to accept the bare minimum in terms of quality of play in order to showcase a gimmick. And as I'm familiar with the course of this debate I'm aware of the level of depravity it can reach. An incidence of this comes to mind when Benedikt Rosenau suggested tic-tac-toe was a worthwhile game because a lot of people played it and found it to be fun. Since Ben obviously knows tic-tac-toe is trivial he was clearly just misrepresenting himself to win the debate by claiming he could envision Einstein enjoying a game of tic-tac-toe at some ethereal level. But this really strikes to the heart of the "fun" issue. As far as I can tell the draw apologists believe sheer popularity is how we should measure "fun". If fun is simply the level of popularity a game has then I'm going to have to follow my contemporary Mark Steere and say I don't care about fun. I'm never going to design a game to pander to an audience and if that is a primary objective for designers these days then the whole field is in poor shape to say the least. I couldn't seriously consider popularity to be a significant factor in determining the quality of anything, least of all an abstract game. The reason being that popularity is just such a universally unreliable measurement of quality its almost arguable there is a trend towards higher degrees of sophistication inversely related to popularity. Its obvious why this is, the most popular examples of something are likely to be the least controversial, least revolutionary, least intellectually challenging and most accessible. Look at top 40s music, its all prefabricated beats and auto-tune now. Look at summer blockbuster comedies. "Adam Sandler is a zebra in..." So if "fun" is just popularity then it simply isn't worth the hassle. Quote:
What is this? I don't even... I only suggested that abstract games should be based on abstract principles specifically integrated to enhance the experience of playing a new game or offer an essentially different playing experience. At any rate the mathematics of nature or the golden mean or Fibonacci numbers are irrelevant here. Nothing about Dieter Stein's arbitrary interpretation of birds flying around is explicitly conducive to a robust game. Maybe it is a good game but as you said luck and talent play a role. But is Volo a game for the ages? While you publicly expressed approval of it, apparently it wasn't quite exceptional enough to make it into "The Pit". Don't get me wrong here as I haven't played it I don't believe Volo is necessarily not a good game but I believe that would more or less be a product of luck as its design process wasn't one rooted in the pursuit of improving upon previous games. It was just another in a multitude of cases of navel gazing. on 12/03/12 at 10:38:05, christianF wrote:
That sure is a lot of "mays" Christian. You certainly don't seem very confident that these "guidelines" even exist. How is it you even invent games and why not? Surely you believe there is some method to it that can be applied in a general sense. Quote:
Christian where did you learn to be this edgy? With your nihilistic game design perspective and gems like this you're like a young Nietzsche. Its called a figure of speech bro. I'm saying I would rather pursue objective variables related to the competitive qualities of my game than seek the approval of the community. Quote:
That's real swell Christian. However on the matter of elegance I'm going to have to disagree. It seems like a lot of people find simplicity and elegance synonymous. I don't quantify elegance in such a way. In fact I could call a game with 20 thoroughly integrated rules more elegant and organic than one featuring 5 arbitrary ones. Such is the case with Volo. While the rules are fairly simple, the board, the rules and indeed everything about it seems to not be working towards any tangible goal besides Dieter's bird-watching. I also want to say I bear no ill will towards him. I only use Volo as an example because he openly said the purpose of the game was to simulate the flight patterns of birds. This to me is the antithesis of a solid design approach. Quote:
Christian I have every confidence we eventually will reign. Just like any set of pioneers, we'll have to take the masses kicking a screaming only to bring them to the light. But right now the community at large seems intent on keeping us in a permanent abstract games dark age where the savage dictum of "do what thou wilt" is the whole of the law. "Abstract games are art!" they declare, willfully ignoring the pervasive mathematical structures within even the most arbitrary games. "There are no rules for inventing games." when even academics in various artistic disciplines already suggest there are rules for music composition, writing and directing. Apparently it is a popular belief that the arbitrariness of people's aesthetic sensibilities should invalidate a whole science which exists whether or not we choose to pursue it. It becomes apparent that the real religion is being perpetuated by those who hold onto these sort of absurd beliefs. I cannot even for the life of me understand the level of push-back I get in expressing these ideas. I'm just trying to get people thinking about abstract games in a more productive way so we have better games. I would like to see more designers thinking about game design in more scientific terms (in all genres for that matter) and a scientific community dedicated to sharing knowledge and establishing a foundational theory that can be applied to future game designs leading to a steady improvement of game designs overall. How this could sound like a bad idea to the ears of any game designer is beyond me. Though its like anything else I suppose, as soon as someone challenges the status quo everyone is up in arms about it, "but I like chess!". Go ahead and like Chess, you don't have to stand in the way of progress over it. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by browni3141 on Dec 3rd, 2012, 11:18pm on 12/03/12 at 07:55:49, hyperpape wrote:
I was going to say this before, but must of deleted it for some reason. Even before the new rules natural draws were very uncommon. I will present here the entire list of drawn games in the database. Of course it's difficult to find out if games under the new rules would have been drawn under the old rules, so we can only look at the old ones. Arimaa's lack of draws isn't much of a good thing to me. I view it as a flaw. Of course, the biggest flaw in my view is certainly the scoring function. Here are the games: http://arimaa.com/arimaa/gameroom/comments.cgi?gid=2818 Suicide http://arimaa.com/arimaa/gameroom/comments.cgi?gid=8166 Lose Arimaa http://arimaa.com/arimaa/gameroom/comments.cgi?gid=11123 Natural draw http://arimaa.com/arimaa/gameroom/comments.cgi?gid=12085 Natural draw http://arimaa.com/arimaa/gameroom/comments.cgi?gid=25057 Bot game http://arimaa.com/arimaa/gameroom/comments.cgi?gid=25169 Bot game http://arimaa.com/arimaa/gameroom/comments.cgi?gid=25959 Bot game http://arimaa.com/arimaa/gameroom/comments.cgi?gid=26752 Bot game http://arimaa.com/arimaa/gameroom/comments.cgi?gid=28483 Suicide http://arimaa.com/arimaa/gameroom/comments.cgi?gid=33268 Bot game http://arimaa.com/arimaa/gameroom/comments.cgi?gid=34285 Idiot bot http://arimaa.com/arimaa/gameroom/comments.cgi?gid=34293 Iffy, bot is playing according to different rules http://arimaa.com/arimaa/gameroom/comments.cgi?gid=36210 Idiot bot http://arimaa.com/arimaa/gameroom/comments.cgi?gid=39945 Idiot bot http://arimaa.com/arimaa/gameroom/comments.cgi?gid=40733 Idiot bot http://arimaa.com/arimaa/gameroom/comments.cgi?gid=43918 Suicide http://arimaa.com/arimaa/gameroom/comments.cgi?gid=44819 Idiot bot http://arimaa.com/arimaa/gameroom/comments.cgi?gid=48224 Suicide http://arimaa.com/arimaa/gameroom/comments.cgi?gid=49404 Natural draw http://arimaa.com/arimaa/gameroom/comments.cgi?gid=51406 Natural draw http://arimaa.com/arimaa/gameroom/comments.cgi?gid=54785 Suicide http://arimaa.com/arimaa/gameroom/comments.cgi?gid=56329 Not a serious game http://arimaa.com/arimaa/gameroom/comments.cgi?gid=72628 Natural draw? http://arimaa.com/arimaa/gameroom/comments.cgi?gid=74070 Probably Natural That's 4-7 games that I would consider natural draws. That's more than I expected. It seems that draws are more a tendency stemming from blunders and weak play by the winning side rather than two Arimaa giants simultaneously reaching the top of the mountain. Perhaps Arimaa is more draw prone than Havannah overall, but which game is more draw prone only considering high quality games? |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by jackspritz on Dec 3rd, 2012, 11:26pm on 12/03/12 at 11:27:44, christianF wrote:
It might be finite and decisive but so far it has puzzled Luis, myself and Mark as to why you created it. What were you hunting Christian? What's the big secret here? Quote:
You criticize the process by which these games were ultimately derived. Quote:
Mark =/= the church. Catholics around the world cannot be held responsible for the transgressions of the Pope and likewise I cannot be held accountable for Mark's persistent heckling. I've already said I think draws are acceptable if integrated skillfully and my only criticism is of the general approach most designers take. I'll admit my position on draws has softened but the church isn't nearly as dogmatic as you make it out to be. I'll mention that I have no personal interest in designing games with draws and cycles but that's just because I like a challenge and it fits my aesthetic agenda. My philosophy on game design shouldn't be conflated with my personal approach. Quote:
This is a very good point which I've only recently started thinking about. Even if a game is theoretically devoid of draws, if the only factor ensuring there are no draws is, for instance, an odd sized board your game might still gravitate towards pseudo-draws. Its not really much of an improvement on a draw-prone game for it to have score differentials of 1 point most of the time. In fact I'll have to confess that Ki is an example of a game with pseudo-draws but Ki was never that big of a deal to me and it still fits in with my aesthetic agenda and I still think its a fairly interesting game. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Dec 4th, 2012, 2:41am on 12/03/12 at 23:26:32, jackspritz wrote:
I don't know why I am not believed, obviously. I'm not hunting. Why would I? I invented games, and we put them on the internet for free. A lot of people appreciate that, but some obviously feel I must have some hidden agenda. I don't, and why would I lie about how I accidentally assembled a little game. Is it suspect to offer players something they might enjoy, or might not, what's the big point here? Am I earning anything? Hurting anybody? on 12/03/12 at 23:26:32, jackspritz wrote:
No I don't. But the chuch criticizes what I do. on 12/03/12 at 23:26:32, jackspritz wrote:
Maybe you need a new pope then ;) . on 12/03/12 at 23:26:32, jackspritz wrote:
I'm glad we agree on something. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Dec 4th, 2012, 4:17am on 12/03/12 at 22:54:09, jackspritz wrote:
I'm not sure what you mean by 'measurable depth'. If it comes to the plydepth of a tree, then it is trivial. It's 60 for Othello, and quite a bit more for say Tanbo, to take two finite games, but I'm fairly sure that this isn't what you mean. But if you refer to the 'depth' that humans can reach in reading a position, then were on subjective ground. Same question as to how you would read 'balance' from a tree. And 'decisiveness' cannot be measured because a game either is or is not decisive, and that's usually easy to establish. on 12/03/12 at 22:54:09, jackspritz wrote:
Yes, I know, that's called reality. It doesn't bother me. Eventually gimmicks fade, and hopefully quality survives. I strive for quality, but even so there's a lot of 'collateral damage' that most certainly isn't made for eternity, nor meant for it. on 12/03/12 at 22:54:09, jackspritz wrote:
There are so many abstract games that lack of popularity doesn't say anything. Since you rightly point out that popularity doesn't say anything either, we might as well close the book on that one. on 12/03/12 at 22:54:09, jackspritz wrote:
Volo isn't a game for the ages, no, but my question is "why should it be?" I certainly have Volo on the list, but there's only so much time, and there are a couple of games higher up. on 12/03/12 at 22:54:09, jackspritz wrote:
No, actually I don't think so. I can only say how I did it, and if people doubt that, they probably have their reasons. on 12/03/12 at 22:54:09, jackspritz wrote:
That's your method and of course I understand it as a methaphor. I don't object to it and I recognize the good things that came out of the approach. But your criteria still differ from mine and Mark's Shuffle Queens may satisfy yours, but not mine. I didn't invent for the ages either, but for my contemparies and, if and when I'm lucky and dead, a couple of generations onwards. on 12/03/12 at 22:54:09, jackspritz wrote:
So what if people like the game? Isn't it appealing to children? Doesn't it stimulate interest in games? Does it pretend to be more than it is? on 12/03/12 at 22:54:09, jackspritz wrote:
That's a telling metaphor. I'm not sure who "we" are, but obviously not "we, the people". |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by hyperpape on Dec 4th, 2012, 10:55am First, no matter how objective balance, decisiveness, draw-freeness, depth of game tree and such are, one must choose a weighting, and that will not be so objective. After all, I can sit here and insist that the decisive criterion is how many levels of skill there are (interpreted as gaps such that player x can beat player y n% of the time...) and therefore insist that Go is the greatest game that has ever been invented. No objective considerations will disprove me. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Dec 4th, 2012, 11:21am on 12/03/12 at 23:26:32, jackspritz wrote:
If you, like Luis, misread the rules (he just told me in our Ayu game - the 'if, and only if (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/the-pit/triccs-627) ' part), I can imagine you were all puzzled. It means that there is no 'normal' Othello capture, only a 'one line' capture between the placed and the moved stone. It means for a line (or piece) to be captured, it must be open ended at both sides. You can at the same time capture and create a new threat if the vacated cell becomes the second open end of an opponent's line. It also explains why I wasn't after an Othello variant. The capturing mechanism emerged because I wanted to continue the two-step protocol, hence I had a 'placement' and a 'movement' ... what to do? That's when 'capture a line between them' presented itself. The final piece of the puzzle, not the starting point. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Dec 5th, 2012, 11:21am After Benedikt's promising experiences with the Symple move protocol in Hex, leading to Symple Hex (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/arena/symple-hex/), it occured to me that implementation on a square board might be interesting, so here is Scware (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/the-pit/scware-646). P.S. This one's for te Universe! ;D |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by NickBentley on Dec 5th, 2012, 12:22pm Re subjectivity vs objectivity: throwing in my two cents because I need a work break. This is mostly addressed to Corey: I'm in the camp that game-quality is ultimately subjective. Rampart vs Tanbo - I love Rampart, don't care much for Tanbo. And yet there's no difference in the degree to which the two games satisfy the kind of objective structural requirements that you're talking about Corey. If objective structural requirements were all that mattered, I wouldn't like one game much more than the other. Same goes for Slither vs Hex. In fact Hex is a way more "organic" game, since Slither needs an extra "unnatural" rule to shoehorn the game onto a square board. But still I like Slither much more, because that "unnatural" rule happens to create tactical situations that send my brain careening off into a vortex of ecstasy (if you ever publish the game you can quote me here on the back of the box). So, your own creations have, for me anyway, a special X factor that goes beyond objective structural requirements, and that's why I prefer them to most other games. You seem to be attending to the subjective side of things while denying that you're doing it! Which isn't to poo-poo the appeal of drawlessness, cyclelessness, simplicity, etc. I do think that those things are useful constraints in the search for great games (and I rely on them as such constantly in my own attempts to design games). But by themselves, they aren't what makes a game great. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by NickBentley on Dec 5th, 2012, 12:44pm I should also mention that it's my belief in the fundamentally subjective nature of quality that I think most of us who participate in these discussions are waaaaaay too quick to judge games that we haven't played. The "feel" of a game just can't be easily inferred from the rules. It seems like every one of us in this little world are guilty. There are plenty of examples in this very thread (dismissals of Rampart, dismissal of Christian's Othellish game). I remember before I played Slither I did the exact same thing. For a few years prior, I'd been playing Hex (and the game of Y) with the same move protocol (minus the diagonal restriction, since there are no diagonals on Hex boards). Since Slither is almost identical to these games, my first reaction to Slither (which was then called "Particle Bond") was "So what? It already exists". Of course, since I try to be a polite person, I didn't say it out loud, and it's good I didn't, because it would have been a stupid thing to say. That reinforced for me an important lesson: when it comes to abstract games, even tiny little changes can fundamentally transform the feel of a game, and it's impossible to feel the force of these effects by merely perusing the rules. If it weren't so, we all would have noticed how good Slither was right away. But we didn't. Someone had to play it, be blown away, and tell everyone else about the experience. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by NickBentley on Dec 5th, 2012, 1:58pm PS can one of you guys give me a christmas present? On BGG, Ketchup needs just one more rating to achieve an official BGG ranking, which would be my first game and only game to achieve it. Anybody wanna help a brother out? (feel free to rate negatively. No offense will be taken) |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Dec 5th, 2012, 2:18pm on 12/05/12 at 13:58:09, NickBentley wrote:
I'd gladly help you out there with an 8, but I seem to have this weird disconnect with BGG. What I expect is that you click ratings (http://www.boardgamegeek.com/collection/items/boardgame/68199?rated=1) and then you come to ratings, so far so good, and then I expect something like "Rate this game". But I can't find it. My stupidity, I'm sure, but help me out here, or I can't help you out :) P.S. The "Othellish game" is called Triccs (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/the-pit/triccs-627) and I wonder, when you discussed it with Luis, who had misread the rules, whether anyone else had missed the "... and only if, " ? Because judging from the rules is difficult, as you say, but judging from misreading the rules (need I recall Symple?) is even more difficult. P.P.S. That's why I made the rules of Scware (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/the-pit/scware-646) especially symple ;D . |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by NickBentley on Dec 5th, 2012, 2:31pm I didn't ever discuss the game with Luis, so I'm not the one you're looking for. In any case, I didn't make that the mistake you mention when I read them. I haven't played it yet though, so don't have any opinion about it yet. As for famously unintuitive BGG functions: go down to the bottom of the Ketchup page on BGG, and you'll see a section called "user information". In that section, there's an option called "record information". Click on the plus sign for that option and the option to rate will appear. Thanks kindly Christian! |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Dec 5th, 2012, 2:54pm on 12/05/12 at 14:31:11, NickBentley wrote:
Ah, ok, hope you like it. The rating mission has succeeded by the way, thanks. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by NickBentley on Dec 5th, 2012, 4:58pm I'm definitely going to play, since, as you may recall, turning the Othello mechanism into a good game is one of my interests. Don't know when it will happen though. Maybe not until new year. Thanks for the rating! |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Dec 6th, 2012, 3:34am on 12/05/12 at 16:58:47, NickBentley wrote:
That's the irony of inventing. I wanted, one time, far far away in the 20th century, to invent a minimal chess variant. The question was: "what does one actually need to implement checkmate". A king, obviously, and this and that and such and so, and I came up with an elegant and deep variant (if in doubt, try) that I named Chad (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/the-pit/chad-520). Later I was fooling around with Ravensburger's attempt at over the top simplicity (http://www.spiele-check.de/2013-Isola.html) (in German) and suddenly realized I had accidentally found a minimal chess variant (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/the-pit/shakti-550) that decidedly beat my previous deliberate attempt. In this case I wasn't trying to make an 'othello variant' at all. I was addressing an unruly kind of organism and in the process found a move protocol that would bring the game through a 'first phase' that would stop with the board far from filled, because the placement conditions would gradually disappear. At that point I stopped looking at the protocol in terms of the 'unruly organism' because it seemed to point at a "minimum # of groups" object, and that implied having to rule out draws, because that minimum is too easily the same for both. So I switched to "territory". The question was how to proceed after phase 1. Since the first phase had a two-step protocol, I wanted to continue that. So I thought, "well, free placement and a small move", and there othelloanian capture presented itself as a fairly modest way to grab territory. Not the big flipflaps of Othello, but a single line captured between the placed and the moved stone. So "Othello" entered the equation at the very end. You can "plan" to Kingdom Come, but without a bit of luck and things coming together by chance, game inventing can be a frustrating endeavour. And I wasn't planning anything in the first place. But every other Fall or so I seem to switch to automatic ??? . |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Dec 6th, 2012, 5:06am Where would I be without Luis? Probably still in Enschede, but with a bug in the rules of Scware: http://i49.tinypic.com/optemx.gif Luis sent me this position where neither can connect by "growing any or all groups" without leaving a bare diagonal connection. So he suggested to add "... unless they are part of the same group" to the restriction rule. It appears to solve the problem but we can't be quite sure - this is a very small board with an unlikely position (both have left groups 'ungrown' or have made a single placement where growth would have been logical). If anyone can refute Luis solution we would appreciate the attempt. Edit: In fact, I've rephrased the rule to:
Edit 2: Quote:
The 'same group' condition isn't only generic, but works as intended because you cannot actually cut a diagonal connection if the two pieces concerned are in the same group: one end of the cutting chain would end up inside that group (even disregarding the fact that the cutting chain itself implicitly has a diagonal connection and thus would have to satisfy the 'same group' condition, making a cut not only useless, but impossible). That's why the generic phrasing is better if preventing a cut is what the rule intends to do. Edit 3: Now that the Symple move protocol gets some exposure as a mutator, as I believe João Pedro Neto coined a mechanism that is applicable to a range of games, we've decided to bump
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Dec 9th, 2012, 7:05am on 12/06/12 at 05:06:15, christianF wrote:
Both games can now be played (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/players-section) at mindsports. Since Scware (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/arena/scware/) has no compulsory placement, the applet can only determine the end of a move by its being submitted, and only then can it effectively test the "same group" condition. We'll try to work around that, but as it is, if a move that violates the condition is submitted, the applet will instead perform a "pass" and the player will have to undo and make a legal move instead. Not the first prize for user friendlyness, but at least effective. Of course Symple Hex (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/arena/symple-hex/) needs no such test. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Dec 12th, 2012, 8:24am Phalanx (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/the-pit/phalanx-632) Being a multi-player game has its drawbacks. It's difficult to avoid a festival of collusion over the board, not to mention online and turnbased. It also prevents any serious consideration as a two-player game. So I decided to shift the emphasis and give the two player version a regular board and, for those who know the game, an obvious initial position. http://mindsports.nl/images/stories/sidedishes/moregamesbycf/phalanx_inpos.gif (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/the-pit/phalanx-632) Phalanx is a friendly game in which you may do a lot and have to do nothing. It allows for coopetrative cycles to give troubled minds the opportunity to demonstrate the obvious. It can end in a draw to allow less troubled minds to enjoy an even game without the game itself pushing one through the grinder, and worst of all, it's fun. Need I say more? Yes, I might as well: it also has neutral stones arising from captures. Sounds familiar? Well, it has had them for more than a quarter of a century in case anyone wonders. Because despite the facts - Phalanx was invented (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/how-i-invented-games-and-why-not/organic-mechanisms#phalanx) in or around 1984 and was mentioned sideways here exactly three years ago (http://arimaa.com/arimaa/forum/cgi/YaBB.cgi?board=other;action=display;num=1236541162;start=120#120) - reality can be elusive (https://groups.google.com/forum/?fromgroups=#!topic/rec.games.abstract/W9tzoPhLbQM). ;) |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Dec 14th, 2012, 7:01am mindsports bot section There are at least two Symple bots registered at mindsports, that are on standby 24/7 via the normal email protocol. They are the numbers 1 and 3 of the last played test round (http://www.codecup.nl/competition.php?comp=138) in the CodeCup. "Engine" goes by the name of "B_ot". I've played against both of them for weeks, because they're fast to reply (barring occasional modifications of the programs) and I get a lot of 'feel' for the game that way. I was only vaguely aware that connecting that way required some delicate programming skills, till I told Ed, who hadn't been aware of their presence. He was rather amazed at how well it worked. Since we had just been discussing how to get Marcin Ciura's Havannah bot "Lajkonik" permanently available at mindsports, the protocol used by the Symple bot programmers would seem to be the obvious way. Lajkonik is one of the three bots that participated in the Havannah challenge (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/arena/havannah/641). So, all else remaining equal, we're considering a separate bot section in the Player Section, to give them some exposure rather than having them blend in between the human players. This will have to wait till after the CodeCup however, of which the final testround (http://www.codecup.nl/competition.php?comp=137) will be played on Dec. 22 and the final competition (http://www.codecup.nl/competition.php?comp=136) on Jan. 12. The section would also make a good place for analyzers like this one (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/arena/havannah/643). |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Dec 15th, 2012, 5:39am I've started two games against B_ot in the CodeCup format: Base-15, Penalty-6.
So there you have it, human superiority, if only for the day :) . |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Dec 16th, 2012, 6:21am Here are two more games against B_ot, this time not in the CodeCup format but in my favorite one: Base-19, Penalty-10.
Edit: Humanity wins again :) All humanity? Well, maybe you should try. I've played some 100 games now and the game begins to feel as natural as riding a bike. Now it's more about learning new strategies and tricks. Elkasimi Abdessamad's bot was out today, probably because he's working on the program, so it might not react immediately. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Dec 18th, 2012, 6:21am Bots are one thing, but humans are still another cup of tea, fortunately. Here's a base-19, penalty-10 game between yours truly and Jos Dekker, a dutch Go player working in Germany who has some 25 games under his belt.
Edit: What did I tell you? Humans have long term planning and Jos aimed for the center. I wanted to see how far he could take it. That plan at least was successful: I saw clearly how far. Here's another one for good measure:
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Dec 22nd, 2012, 7:41am Not so much a 'wave' this Fall, more of a ripple. Triccs (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/the-pit/triccs-627) is recreational stuff, Pit (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/the-pit/) material, collateral damage, whatever, but it still had a puzzle. Quote:
The puzzle was: is a position possible where a player can meet the conditions of the first placement, but not of the second? If not, then it would not be necessary to mention the possibility in the rules. And the answer is ... I still don't know, but on a base-3 hexboard, the position in question can be arrived at. http://i47.tinypic.com/333fhqg.gif can lead to http://i46.tinypic.com/dylhyb.gif http://i49.tinypic.com/1pj9fl.gif http://i48.tinypic.com/2w565na.gif On the left it's blacks turn and he has 3 options for the first placement: From left to right, black places the first (4) stone so that white cannot meet the first condition on his next move, then he places the first stone so that white can meet the first condition on his next move, but not the second, and finally he places it so that white can meet the conditions of both placements. It suggests that the rule dealing with it should not be omitted on the base-6 board for the time being. Recreational games should not be treated any less conscientious than games that have more unity and are less of an assembly than say Triccs. I care about my collateral damage. Without it how would greater games be recognized? Edit: Guess what? Ed has made a Triccs applet and we're running a test game (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/players-section/Serve.cgi?file=Triccs1356185759.html). We're also playing a game (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/players-section/Serve.cgi?file=Scware1356025440.html) of Scware (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/arena/scware/) for that matter, a game I suspect of being more than collateral damage. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Dec 22nd, 2012, 12:51pm The final CodeCup Challenge 2013 test competition has been completed (http://www.codecup.nl/competition.php?comp=137#roundindex). Congrats Abdessamad Elkasimi! :) Of the 432 games that were played, 419 came to a legal conclusion. 217 (51.8%%) were won by white, 202 (48.2%) were won by black. The top dogs are still the same, but Sergey Nefedov's program skifi_025 is catching up. * Note that winners always get a 100-points bonus, obviously for some reason, but I'm still in the dark about it. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Dec 23rd, 2012, 7:54am on 12/02/12 at 13:15:06, christianF wrote:
So we have an applet now, and we're playing our first game (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/players-section/Serve.cgi?file=Triccs1356185759.html). No Sandboxes involved. As already shown in a previous post (http://arimaa.com/arimaa/forum/cgi/YaBB.cgi?board=other;action=display;num=1236541162;start=1080#1094), there's no parity of any kind. http://i47.tinypic.com/333fhqg.gif can lead to http://i46.tinypic.com/dylhyb.gif http://i49.tinypic.com/1pj9fl.gif http://i48.tinypic.com/2w565na.gif In fact there are two more puzzles: what is the minimum number of stones needed to get to the second stage, and what is the maximum. That's quite a difference and it lends strategical and tactical flexibility to the game. Not bad for a recreational funny :) http://i50.tinypic.com/rb0cg1.png (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/players-section/Serve.cgi?file=Triccs1356185759.html) Here Black's last move is indicated (as well as White's subsequent first placement). Black could have prevented White from playing A1 by playing at B1 or A2 with his second placement. But that would have given White the start of Phase 2. Black would rather have that himself. Edit: I overlooked C8 :( - now I'll have to take the 'last first placement' myself. Note that a white placement at A1 gives White 11 options for his second placement. Therefore the 'safety mechanism' - i.e. "if the player to move cannot make the second placement ... - is probably not even necessary on a regular board, despite the base-3 example where it is necessary. A base-3 board has 12 edge-cells and an inner area of 7, one more than half the edge. A base-6 board has 30 edge-cells and an inner area of 61, more than twice the edge. So (though not proven) a base-6 example seems highly unlikely because there's so much more 'room' in the inner area, relatively speaking. Note also that the move protocol does what it was supposed to do: give a practical intermixed position to start the second phase. As such it has, again, significance as a mutator, a generic principle or mechanism that is applicable to more than one game. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Dec 23rd, 2012, 11:16am http://i49.tinypic.com/2po5xdg.png (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/players-section/Serve.cgi?file=Scware1356025440.html) Something must be seriously wrong with Scware (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/arena/scware/) because the regular help of my critics, in particular those who acknowledge their own restrictions by admiring them, as yet fails to materialize ??? . |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Dec 24th, 2012, 12:56pm For the last few months I've been playing a Symple game against Cly Ring in which he gives elaborate comments on the moves, in full recognition of the fact that we're all beginners. My comments are limited because I find commenting on the reasons much harder than considering them. I try to find my way by playing a lot, Cly Ring by analyzing a lot, and since he's winning, it's 1-0 for analysis :) . Cly Ring - CF (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/players-section/Serve.cgi?file=Symple1340044785.html) (running) |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by clyring on Dec 24th, 2012, 5:42pm It's really more like 3-1 for analysis taking into account the other games we've played: clyring - CF 0-1 B+79 (http://www.mindsports.nl/index.php/players-section/Serve.cgi?file=Symple1326261104.html) (Freeling showing a beginner no mercy... :P) clyring - CF 1-0 W+9 (http://www.mindsports.nl/index.php/players-section/Serve.cgi?file=Symple1328222367.html) (A thematic and closely contested clash: connections vs territory.) CF - clyring 0-1 B+9 (http://www.mindsports.nl/index.php/players-section/Serve.cgi?file=Symple1333289532.html) (I seriously misplay the opening and blunder away a key connection in the middlegame, but manage to stage a dramatic comeback when Freeling plays too passively in the endgame.) clyring - CF in progress (EDIT: Now 1-0 W+Res.) (http://www.mindsports.nl/index.php/players-section/Serve.cgi?file=Symple1340044785.html) Unfortunately there is not so much commentary included with the other games. There is, however, a discussion (http://arimaa.com/arimaa/forum/cgi/YaBB.cgi?action=display;board=other;num=1236541162;start=900#911) on page 61 of this thread about the second game's final stages. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by hyperpape on Dec 24th, 2012, 6:34pm Does this forum have hide tags? I have just now challenged you to a game, clyring. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by clyring on Dec 26th, 2012, 12:33am This forum does not have hide or spoiler tags implemented, so if you are trying to ask me to play a Malkovich game, I guess you will have to start a thread at L192 for it. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Dec 26th, 2012, 5:43am The CodeCup format is base-15 penalty-6 and Abdessamad won the final test round (http://www.codecup.nl/competition.php?comp=137) so in terms of bots you can't expect any better opponent. I've just been challenged and I'll try to give it my best shot. Cly Ring is putting dents in my confidence :)
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by hyperpape on Dec 28th, 2012, 3:05pm You're free to comment or not clyring, I'd just had the thought to share some of my thoughts as the game progressed. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Dec 29th, 2012, 10:11am Sometimes solutions are implemented before they are found :o . In multi move games like Symple and Yodd, the mindsports applet since fairly recently dims the 'submit' button as long as the position allows no legal submitting of a move. In Triccs however it allowed submitting a move in the first stage after a player's first placement, although the rules for no apparant reason (except maybe the inventor's slow grasp) required the second placement to be made too. That 'fault' is the solution to the problem posed by a position in which the player to move can make the first, but not the second placement. Here's one such position on a base-4 board, and it wasn't all that difficult to find either: http://i46.tinypic.com/2qn43h1.gif The second (9) placement is not possible. The whole problem disappears if the second placement is optional, and there's no reason why it shouldn't be. Triccs is a hot game where every stone counts and where a player can always find a good place for it, especially in the opening phase. So the second placement has been made optional (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/the-pit/triccs-627). As a bonus this brings the first phase of the game in line with the second phase, where placement is compusory and movement optional. The generic angle The main interest of Triccs may be its opening protocol, a generic protocol that leads to an opening lay-out for a second stage of a game in which say a third to half of the board is filled in an evenly divided way. What the game should be depends on what you (or I) would have in mind. For now Triccs is a good way to preserve the protocol, but it's more than likely that better games that would employ it, are hidden out there in the foggy realm of the as yet uninvented. As for Triccs itself, the first game (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/players-section/Serve.cgi?file=Triccs1356185759.html) shows some curious and interesting tactics, but it is clearly a game for which the phrase "coming with the territory" should have been invented, if it hadn't been already. There's room for big mistakes, but with intelligent play the advantages to gain are small, and easily lost. It feels negotiating modest margins without any large scale drama, yet it's tricky so the name seems appropriate enough :) . |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by hyperpape on Dec 29th, 2012, 3:00pm As Christian already knows, there's a small ambiguity in the Symple rules. Suppose you have exactly two groups, one of which has a single empty adjoining point, which is next to the second group, which has many empty adjoining points. The question is, must you play the connecting move? http://mindsports.nl/cgi-bin/Arena/Serve.cgi?file=Symple1356191511.html: my game with Jos Dekker features that situation at move 24. Christian has said that you don't, which should probably be reflected in the rules. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Dec 29th, 2012, 3:11pm on 12/29/12 at 15:00:41, hyperpape wrote:
The rules say: Quote:
This note is included to clarify of what "all possible groups" means. This isn't something that can be determined a priori: it depends on the group configuration and order of placements. It includes the particular case in which a group cannot grow at all because all its liberties are shared with a group or groups that have already grown (as in your game with Jos). |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by hyperpape on Dec 29th, 2012, 7:42pm Was that there the whole time? I looked at the rules when the situation arose in my game--if I missed that, my apologies. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Dec 30th, 2012, 4:34am on 12/29/12 at 19:42:37, hyperpape wrote:
Yes it was :) . The procedure emerged when Symple switched to compulsory placement. Growing 'every group' had to merge with the rule that no group may grow more than one stone in a turn. The former had to be subject to the latter, so growing at group 'A' made that the vacancies it shared with group 'B' would be off limits, and vice versa. Hence the order of placement would determine whether or not a particular group would be subject to growth. The implication is that the order of moves is subject to tactical considerations. P.S. Since any straw of a prospect of an ambiguity in the Symple rules is predictably being jumped at by the troubled high-priest of the church of cyclophobia & hard finitude, who is determined to not understand anything about Symple (and getting better at it all the time), here are the rules at Sensei (http://senseis.xmp.net/?Symple). In the example diagram you see the situation illustrated bottom-right. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Jan 1st, 2013, 6:41am May I wish all of you a very happy, prosperous, creative and less than problematic 2013 :D . When I started playing Symple after the introduction of compulsory placement, Marcel Vlastuin's bot (http://www.codecup.nl/entrygames.php?ent=3369) gave me a hard time. In the last CodeCup test round it ended at place 8 with a ranking that is slightly higher than half the ranking of Abdessamad's bot (http://www.codecup.nl/entrygames.php?ent=3364). Now I usually win against the latter, but Abdessamad recently upgraded his program, and there's a shift in priorities in it's evaluation. It suddenly started playing closer to the edges in the opening, while starting two groups in the center. That wasn't so bad a plan and it took me by surprise: CF - Abdessamad (game 1): 0 - 1 http://i48.tinypic.com/2ywii44.png (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/players-section/Serve.cgi?file=Symple1356705739.html) Here's the position after Black_10. I'm White. I took the turn order bait at move 4 and started growing at move 9, which leaves me with a group less. That was wrong because Black seeds another single, more or less forcing me to do likewise to not get even further behind in growing options. But I got squeezed between Black's strong center and his low-running edge groups. I was keenly aware that something had changed in the program's approach, so my next game with white I was ready to adapt. Again I took the turn order bait no sooner than at move 5. That's rather late (I think) but Abdessamad's program is fairly 'seed happy'. But different from the previous game, I decided not to accept a group less in the growing stage. That means that Black would have to grow first. CF - Abdessamad (game 2): 1 - 0 http://i45.tinypic.com/dyoora.png (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/players-section/Serve.cgi?file=Symple1356877951.html) Here's the position after Black_10. Both have 9 groups. Black dominates the bottom side, White has secured the left side and has put an important wedge in the center, where Black again has followed its 'two-groups' strategy. I decided to not dispute Black's bottom area connectivity, but to split him elsewhere as much as possible. It worked. Humans versus Bots The bots started out better than humans, but by now the tables seem turned. I'm not particularly intimidated by the best of them and fairly confident I can win most games. Meanwhile I'm in danger of being overtaken left and right by the likes of Jos Dekker, Hyperpape and ClyRing. So the game develops in an interesting matter. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Jan 2nd, 2013, 1:54pm I'm a sucker for first sentences
Now I came over this one (http://nickbentleygames.wordpress.com/2013/01/02/how-can-abstract-games-find-commercial-success/)
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by SpeedRazor on Jan 4th, 2013, 6:17am • Man was evolved from an ape-like creature. • God created Man in his own image. Where am I going with this? The Universe is Great :) Are abstract games somehow not as 'good' as the sometimes more fun, but often a little (or a lot), more arbitrary 'popular' games which may use dice, rolling bones, etc? I say no Christian! Spend your next Century coming up with more abstracts, perfecting your myriad masterpieces!, or just ... critiquing, the entire genre. You are an Icon, Mr Freeling! Never stop! Happy New Year, Christian! |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Jan 4th, 2013, 7:27am on 01/04/13 at 06:17:36, SpeedRazor wrote:
Thank you and the same to you. However, my next century will for the larger part be subject to the motto "I don't think, therefore I am not", so I might not be able to oblige there :) . Regarding your observations, popularity is an issue that many consider important. There's a lively discussion (http://nickbentleygames.wordpress.com/2013/01/02/how-can-abstract-games-find-commercial-success/) going on at Nick's Blog in response of his addressing the subject once again. If I were a cynic, I'd have no difficulty noticing that what it is, isn't nearly as interesting as how well it would sell. But I'm not a cynic . |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by NickBentley on Jan 4th, 2013, 1:00pm on 01/02/13 at 13:54:28, christianF wrote:
!!! Unfortunately, nice sentences for me only happen in moments of rare dumb luck, so there will be no novel. And yes it does lead to deplorable interference. It's also sad that I'm not a better game designer, given this problem. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by NickBentley on Jan 4th, 2013, 1:04pm Also note: even more discussion in response to the piece happened here: http://www.boardgamegeek.com/thread/906952/how-can-abstract-games-achieve-commercial-success |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Jan 4th, 2013, 1:49pm on 01/04/13 at 13:04:57, NickBentley wrote:
I glanced through it, and I'm glad that it's not a subject I'm very interested in, because chasing commercial success seems like a recipe for frustration. Nor does it mean much, if games like Abalone can have it. I believe good games at first need a long time to emerge and then a much longer time to submerge, but without envisioning any 'centuries' or 'universe' crap. Even Chess in its current form will come to an end sometime, as did its predecessors. Commercial success has little to do with it, as far as I can see. The public at large will usually go for the tactical game. Strategy games imo. reveal their secrets to slowly to have any immediate appeal. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by NickBentley on Jan 4th, 2013, 2:16pm My interest comes mainly from a desire to make stuff swirling around in my head better match the way I spend my days. It's uncomfortable having to fight off these impossibly persistent thoughts so that I can focus on doing something entirely different for pay each day. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Jan 4th, 2013, 2:39pm on 01/04/13 at 14:16:28, NickBentley wrote:
My way to handle thoughts is to consider them like clouds, not important, transitory, only worth following if there's something interesting about them (which usually isn't the case). Admittedly this is only possible because I don't have to work for a living :) . |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Jan 6th, 2013, 5:42am http://desmond.yfrog.com/Himg875/scaled.php?tn=0&server=875&filename=jbmsri.jpg&xsize=480&ysize=480 This was the cause of a power outage at some 22.000 households, mine among them, that started on Saturday Jan. 5th at 3.20 pm local time and lasted for some ten hours. With no electricity, no heating and the mobile network down, we were literally in the dark about what was going on. Fortunately we still had gas so after a couple of hours, when the temperature in Kobus' room became somewhat critical, I could put some buckets of warm water around his favorite spot. Not that I felt completely comfortable doing so, in the dark, knowing that his infrared sensors could follow my movements far better than I could follow his. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by browni3141 on Jan 6th, 2013, 4:54pm on 01/06/13 at 05:42:02, christianF wrote:
We had a nasty power outage here in Michigan recently also. It lasted over two days and affected around 50,000 people served by Great Lakes Energy. I don't know about other companies. It was caused by a bad winter storm that caused a lot of damage. Luckily I don't have any cold blooded friends to take care of, but my grandmother lives downstairs. We stayed warm by running our gas stove. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Jan 8th, 2013, 3:18pm A ripple of creativity followed by a ripple of lethargy. I'm so bored that I even picked up posting at rga. Tickle me :( . ... ... ... (A couple of days later) Ok, that was fun, my lethargy is waning, tomorrow the final round of the CodeCup (http://www.codecup.nl/competition.php?comp=136) takes place. Results will pour in during the evening, local time (GMT +1). Stand by. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Jan 11th, 2013, 6:48am We've put Luis Bolaños Mures' game Ayu (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/arena/ayu) in the ArenA. Why? I've played Ayu several times now, deplorably losing to the inventor. My initial impression of the game has only been strengthened. Ayu is quintessential (in that all rules are necessary and sufficient) and highly original. Tactics and strategy are intertwined in a way that makes you feel clarity can only come with experience, but also that it will come with experience. Ayu suffers from the strategy game syndrome: it requires an investment on the player's side before any reward (in terms of growing insight and improved play) can be harvested. It's not a game you can play 'on the side', at least not at any significant level. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by hyperpape on Jan 11th, 2013, 6:41pm A few thoughts on symple, based on recent play. My game against Christian illustrates them well, I think (http://www.mindsports.nl/cgi-bin/Arena/Serve.cgi?file=Symple1357161278.html). First, I think that Luis's estimate of the proper number of groups to start in the beginning is not accurate. Luis's estimate would work if the only way that you could control space on the board was by filling it, and if all groups filled space at the same rate throughout the game. Neither assumption is reasonable. First, groups can control space by making it in to territory (as a go player would see it) as well as by filling it. My own player, as befits a go player, focuses heavily on territory, so this game shows that well. A corollary of this point is that you can effectively force your opponent to grow by threatening the split of territory. A major part of maintaining the balance of territory is to keep access to the sides. Thus, in the corner, it's a huge threat to threaten to play under another stone on both sides. . . . . . O X . . X X . . . . . (great for Black). The second point is that particular groups may be forced to connect, and once they connect, they lose half their growing potential. This is an argument for a higher group penalty (>= 8 ). Indeed, I think Symple with penalty 4 is just a bad idea. In any case, those theoretical points aside, there's a lot related to the endgame in this game. I'm not confident either of us played correctly, but there's a lot going on. ** Move 20 After white plays 21, it will be time for a detailed count and endgame. Now that I know that he isn't connected at O9, it will be substantially easier. J16 is a really appealing point, but placing at G11 or H11 is also quite a nice idea. ** Move 21 Decided to defer the analysis, and just take J16 and A13. I had a hunch this would be optimal regardless of the analysis (which gets simpler with every move taken towards the endgame), so might as well wait and see. Next move should almost certainly be J17 or G11/H11. ** Move 22 *** Analysis The score is 66-38 at the moment. White should make three connections, and Black should make two, turning that into 96-58. Black territory 20 + 14 + 16 + 9 + 12 = 71 White territory 20 + 6 = 26 Score of 122-129 counting the territories, but not contested central areas. That's clearly close enough that we have to consider both how those territories will divide, who will be forced to make placements. Both sides have largest groups with 20 internal spaces. In White's favor, his group has 9 dame, but in its disfavor, it is currently three disconnected groups, so it will consume those dame faster. Furthermore, Black has several internal points that can be played to slow filling. White has S10, M19, G11 and perhaps M10. Combinatorially, it's too difficult for me to calculate exactly how things go, but given the closeness of the endgame, I believe playing at G11 will pay off by helping force White to play in my territory later. The cost is 10 points, plus up to 4 dame, minus 6 (3*2) points I'll take from White's territory. ** Move 23 I am rather confident that White's R10 is dominated by R11. It may not matter on this board, because White may want to fill more than two more times now, but better to preserve the internal placement at S10--it would probably not be good for Black to take that point with penalty of 10, the G11 group on the board, etc. ** Move 26 Currently, each turn I spend expanding existing groups gives me two dame and deprives Christian of one. With penalty 10, that means it could be up to a 7 point gain to play within my own territory if it later forces him to make a placement in mine. So it probably would have been better to play within my own territory than grab a few dame this turn. ** Move 27 It's hard to decide the best location for this move. The lower left is shapeless, so a white move at B3 would take a lot of my interior space. ** Move 33 Now, the largest interior area for Black is in the lower-middle, with 11 spaces. White has 10 spaces on the top, and Black has at least two opportunities to make placements in his own territory. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Jan 12th, 2013, 8:43am on 01/11/13 at 18:41:28, hyperpape wrote:
I'll add some comments later Hyper, at the moment (2.30 pm GMT) more than half of the games at the CodeCup Challenge have been played. It's not that lonely at the top anymore it seems. 4.30 pm GMT: Final results after 28 rounds (614 games) (http://www.codecup.nl/competition.php?comp=136) 1 Abdessamad ELKASIMI (31,MA) --- dyfficult9 --- C --- 7276 2 Dan Banica (25,RO) --- Easi1 --- Java --- 7054 3 Shadeel Han (23,TW) --- newcomer --- C++ --- 6936 4 Remco Bloemen (25,NL) --- 5m --- C++ --- 6873 5 Bertrand Lunderer (30,FR) --- Engine --- Java --- 6703 You can play (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/players-section) against the #s 1 and 5 at mindsports.nl. Bertrand Lunderer's 'Engine' plays under the name B_ot. Here are the games between these five: Abdessamad ELKASIMI - Dan Banica (89-70 white win) (http://www.codecup.nl/showgame.php?ga=72297) Dan Banica - Abdessamad ELKASIMI (75-78 black win) (http://www.codecup.nl/showgame.php?ga=72298) Abdessamad ELKASIMI - Shadeel Han (85-80 white win) (http://www.codecup.nl/showgame.php?ga=72217) Shadeel Han - Abdessamad ELKASIMI (76-77 black win) (http://www.codecup.nl/showgame.php?ga=72218) Abdessamad ELKASIMI - Remco Bloemen (56-91 black win) (http://www.codecup.nl/showgame.php?ga=72269) Remco Bloemen - Abdessamad ELKASIMI (91-44 white win) (http://www.codecup.nl/showgame.php?ga=72270) Abdessamad ELKASIMI - Bertrand Lunderer (76-89 black win) (http://www.codecup.nl/showgame.php?ga=72400) Bertrand Lunderer - Abdessamad ELKASIMI (50-67 black win) (http://www.codecup.nl/showgame.php?ga=72403) Dan Banica - Shadeel Han (64-80 black win) (http://www.codecup.nl/showgame.php?ga=72376) Shadeel Han - Dan Banica (91-62 white win) (http://www.codecup.nl/showgame.php?ga=72377) Dan Banica - Remco Bloemen (66-81 black win) (http://www.codecup.nl/showgame.php?ga=72246) Remco Bloemen - Dan Banica (88-71 white win) (http://www.codecup.nl/showgame.php?ga=72245) Dan Banica - Bertrand Lunderer (87-48 white win) (http://www.codecup.nl/showgame.php?ga=72274) Bertrand Lunderer - Dan Banica (63-84 black win) (http://www.codecup.nl/showgame.php?ga=72273) Shadeel Han - Remco Bloemen (92-73 white win) (http://www.codecup.nl/showgame.php?ga=72324) Remco Bloemen - Shadeel Han (67-86 black win) (http://www.codecup.nl/showgame.php?ga=72321) Shadeel Han - Bertrand Lunderer (67-86 black win) (http://www.codecup.nl/showgame.php?ga=72347) Bertrand Lunderer - Shadeel Han (73-62 white win) (http://www.codecup.nl/showgame.php?ga=72351) Remco Bloemen - Bertrand Lunderer (87-72 white win) (http://www.codecup.nl/showgame.php?ga=72373) Bertrand Lunderer - Remco Bloemen (80-91 black win) (http://www.codecup.nl/showgame.php?ga=72375) |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Jan 14th, 2013, 8:06am on 01/11/13 at 18:41:28, hyperpape wrote:
Quote:
Regarding the value of "p" I must say that "base-15 p-6" worked very well in the CodeCup, that "base-19 p-10" is my personal favorite and that "p-4" is included in the applet to serve maybe a base-11 game. Penalties "2" and "0" are included because Ed hasn't removed them yet :) . on 01/11/13 at 18:41:28, hyperpape wrote:
on 01/11/13 at 18:41:28, hyperpape wrote:
on 01/11/13 at 18:41:28, hyperpape wrote:
The vacant cells in one's own territory where an isolated stone can be placed for slow filling have fairly recently emerged as a useful tactics. As in everything in Symple, there are two sides to it: in different conditions these very points may provide the best invasion points for an opponent. on 01/11/13 at 18:41:28, hyperpape wrote:
on 01/11/13 at 18:41:28, hyperpape wrote:
on 01/11/13 at 18:41:28, hyperpape wrote:
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Jan 15th, 2013, 7:03am Abdessamad Elkasimi (http://www.codecup.nl/entrygames.php?ent=3449), who's bot Dyfficult9 won the CodeCup 2013 (http://www.codecup.nl/competition.php?comp=136), has made some modifications to the program and challenged me to a double game base-15, penalty-6:
Since there are at least three players probably better than I am, we can say that Symple does well in terms of a certain resistance to being programmed. I started out last summer, losing against a bot that now, based on its ranking, must be considered mediocre. Programs also may evolve slower than humans. Then again, maybe they're not. And in any case they're nice sparring partners. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Jan 18th, 2013, 5:56am Early this week we hit minus 18 C here, during the night, minus 8 during the day. The raccoondogs don't mind, they've been sleeping 22/7 for weeks already. I don't mind either, the shoppingmal is a 5 minutes walk. I'll survive :) Miraculously the northern part of the Netherlands remained snowfree, in particular the province of Friesland. When the frost came, they immediately shut down the pumping stations to protect the ice, resulting in a nice dark icefloor, not nearly thick enough at places, but the predictions are that the frost will stay for another ten days. That might just be enough to start a uniquely dutch event called For some reason this event unites the Dutch in a warmhearted crazyness like no other event can. Even non skaters like yours truly can't escape: it's totally captivating and all things unrelated seem to come to a complete standstill. It makes great television too. I hope it will happen. For me its the only excuse for having freezing temperatures in the first place :P . Edit Jan. 21: Snow, and a lot of it over Friesland. Higher temperatures as of next weekend. Thaw will turn the snow on the lakes and canals to "fondant ice". End of story (for the time being). |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Jan 19th, 2013, 11:16am http://i46.tinypic.com/bf49r9.png Jos Dekker - Christian Freeling (0-1) (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/players-section/Serve.cgi?file=Symple1358191560.html) This is the final position of a game between Jos Dekker, a dutch Go player living in Germany, who has 33 games under his belt, and me. It was also the first game in which I employed a tactics that Hyperpape had used against me: free internal placements. Reasoning starts from the premiss that having more internal vacancies in one's largest group than the opponent has in his largest group, is good. If both must fill in in the endgame, the opponent will be full first, and so be the first who must invade, creating new groups and accumulating penalty points for it. Then, still very generally speaking, and always within the context of a 'fairly close' game, it became apparent that not only the size of a vacant internal area matters, but also its shape. http://i48.tinypic.com/2jhgk.png (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/players-section/Serve.cgi?file=Symple1358191560.html) This is a couple of moves earlier. The 3x5 area bottom left is easier to invade (white just did it) than the 16-points white area top left. Apart from this 16-points area, white has a 9-point area, a 3-point area and a 1-point one. There are 6 dame points on the G- and N-line. Black has 14, 12, 12, 8, so each filling his own territory results in a black win. White must invade and the largest area is most fit. In fact it was left that open to invite the invasion (black had been taking the dame-points on the outside instead). After C2 black was counting on his two 12-vacancies groups and on his free internal placements. There are two in the top group: O19 and Q19. Then there's A10 and A12, and either S1 or S2. Why are they crucial here? Because there are almost no dame points left, so if a player must grow, this growth will be internal. At some point White must either grow internally or accept penalty, because he has only A19 and I19 as free placements. Black does not want to grow internally, so he decides to grab two points by cutting at S14, and leave the invasion for what it is, for the moment. In the final position white has an 11-vacancies group against two 9-vacancies groups, and he managed a solid invasion bottom left, but he has no free internal placements left, while black still has 3 and so black can slow down his internal growth and avoid having to invade, despite white's higher number of vacancies. The tentative conclusion is that the groups with the largest number of internal vacancies should shape these areas so as to make invasions difficult, that is a bit 'tentacled', because large groups are targets for invasions. Groups with less internal vacancies however, should shape themselves so as to leave a maximum (or at least 'enough') of possible free internal placements. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by clyring on Jan 24th, 2013, 1:13am on 01/19/13 at 11:16:10, christianF wrote:
(I made a reference to this idea in March during the analysis of our second game- this lack of understanding that because you had the more numerous groups you had the obligation to invade me cost you four very clear points in the final stages of that endgame, and probably several more in the earlier phases as well. In my opinion you had winning positions in both our second and third endgames but failed to press your advantage correctly using this principle. Not that I can fault you for not understanding the principles of the game before you have been made aware of them. :)) With all of the above said, I now make a bold claim that you may not agree with: The group penalty parameter is no more than another bug posing as a feature and not an essential component of the game. Occam's razor begs to be applied to Symple once more. Having played a handful of games with already medium to high penalties, I now feel confident in saying that deciding games entirely by the number of groups each player has would not break the balance between connection and territory, but it would simplify the rules and remove the need for counting so many stones at the end of the game if it is ever played on a physical board, though that is admittedly not the biggest of concerns nowadays. A bigger concern in my mind is what to do about the possibility for a draw under these rules, but if it must remain drawless, giving the win to the player who moved last when the two players have an equal number of groups seems natural. That player can be thought of as having an extra spare half tempo in the endgame where one's primary goal is to have as many extra tempi relative to one's opponent as possible when the position inevitably leads to zugzwang. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Jan 24th, 2013, 5:27am on 01/24/13 at 01:13:04, clyring wrote:
Agreed, but I feel acquited by the fact that I'm a beginner, and not different from anyone else in this respect. Insights regarding strategy necessarily start out in a very low resolution, so refinements are only to be expected and I thank you for them. on 01/24/13 at 01:13:04, clyring wrote:
My point exactly, and I'm improving, but not to the point of being the leading strategist or anything. Actually, as a player I lack some of the properties to excell at any game, including my own. My max rating in Havannah at LG was 2000+, but not that much "+", and there are several players with significantly higher rankings. Inventing abstracts and playing them are two very different diciplines. on 01/24/13 at 01:13:04, clyring wrote:
Regarding this claim I admittedly do see the draw problem. As for its context, you're right that I may not agree, but I tend to disagree more cautiously nowadays ;) . The thematic angle I've always used an arbitrary and incomplete division of object themes (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/how-i-invented-games-and-why-not/key-concepts). Two of them, checkmate and elimination, are existential in that the object is to kill/annihilate/eliminate head&heart and body&limb respectively. I'm no longer sure why these object should be considered 'higher' than those of coexistential games. It may simply have to do with Chess being considered 'the royal game' as opposed to anything not Chess, like the proletarian 'Draughts'. A cultural thing, most likely. I'm not sure if Go- and Shogi players in the East have cultivated a similar hierarchy in which one is considered 'superior' to the other. A game's object has little to do with its depth, its clarity, or its appeal, so from a purely abstract point of view, stripped from any reference to a 'metaphor for life', the object is irrelevant. But humans are not purely abstract in their abstract thinking, and I for one have preferences. I've done my share of chess variants, but seldom play one. If one sucks at Chess, as I do, then trying Grand Chess is silly. In the last decade I've played an occasional game of Shakti. I do love Draughts, but I'm not even mediocre, and knowing how much I don't see in games like Dameo and Bushka is annoying. So I've been drifting away from the killing fields. In the Arena we feature both Mark's Oust (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/arena/oust), an elimination game, and Luis' Ayu (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/arena/ayu), an approach game. In terms of simplicity, clarity and depth I consider these two of the highest category. Yet I prefer the latter, precisely because there's no capture and the object is constructive rather than destructive. It's friendlier and age has made me milder. Territory versus connection As a 'metaphor for life' one conquers territory and uses connections in the process, not vice versa. That's why I've always considered the relationship similar to the one between primary and secondaty colors. It makes 'territory' the slightly higher theme. From a purely abstract point of view it is a dual relationship between equals. Despite this equality I'm more territory inclined, while Luis leans more towards connection. I don't think anyone has done more (or is doing more) in the 'square connection' department than he. I once added an ad hoc list (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/the-pit/query-548) in the Query rules and it keeps growing. Six by Luis so far. His insights have also been very helpful in that he initiated Symple's switch to compulsory placement, and the generic restriction rule in Scware. Dynamic and static goal connection This is an important distinction and rather than trying my hand at a definition, I'll give examples:
In LOA (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/the-pit/loa-536) and Ayu (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/arena/ayu) 'dynamic connection' is the sole object, but it also loves thematic company:
As to your suggestion to alter Symple's goal, to make it 'simple Symple', I have no objections. Everyone is invited to alter my games (and I don't exclude the possibility of improvements) as long as due reference is made to the original game. But I consider the merger of 'dynamic goal connection' with 'territory' in its simplest form (the number of stones) to be preferred above a merger with a 'minimum number of groups' object. The latter lowers the resolution of the game and introduces a less than rare possibility of a draw. It might end 10-10 and something would have to be done about it. Your suggestion seems too much of a means to an end, and I also have some doubts regarding the "I now feel confident in saying that deciding games entirely by the number of groups each player has would not break the balance between connection and territory ...". Where's the 'territory' if only the existence of a group counts, regardless of size? What would keep a player from growing only one group? What am I missing here? In Symple the equivalent of 10-10 would more likely be in the 100-100 region, the tenfold resolution, The closest one can get to a draw is something like this, an annoyingly funny and slightly ironic ending to a recent game against Abdessamad Elkasimi's bot: http://i47.tinypic.com/4tt2py.png (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/players-section/Serve.cgi?file=Symple1358953618.html) The last move would bring my score to 100. Hurray! ;) Changing the object the way you suggest still isn't entirely clear to me, but you've obviously put some serious thought into it so I hope you will elaborate. In any case it would take the penalty out of the equation, and therewith the, for lack of a better word, 'tension parameter'. Luis has argued towards an ideal value with less than ideal reasoning. Hyperpape has shown that things were slightly more complicated and came to a slightly higher value. In any case there's a concensus that shifting the value alters the character of the game. That is a rare property for a game, and off the top of my head I know only one other, Nick Bentley's Odd (http://nickbentley.posterous.com/one-of-my-better-games-odd). So you're right, I don't agree where Symple is concerned. At the same time I'd be interested in more precise rules regarding your alternative. Occam's Razor on 01/24/13 at 01:13:04, clyring wrote:
I'll try to explain why I think the last suggestion is wrong. I've argued that Symple is "quintessential" and there's no precise definition of what that is. Precise definitions are required in mathematics, but in everyday life we couldn't do without fuzzy concepts. Try defining a "chair". We use fuzzyness to communicate without making a fuzz over everything. But I can say plausible things about any particular chair, and I can try to explain why I consider Symple quintessential (like say Ayu, Oust, Hex and Emergo). There have been four attempts that I know of, to quantify static goal connection using penalty points, Star (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Star_(board_game)), *Star (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/*Star), Superstar (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/the-pit/superstar-552) and YvY (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/the-pit/yvy-555). I know of no game besides Symple that quantifies dynamic goal connection. In the static goal games, a group amounts to the number of 'special cells' it touches or occupies. The first thought that led to Symple was to take the groups size as its value, instead of how much cells it would touch. The immediacy of it seemed far more logical than the roundabout way of counting in the other games. Unhooked from the 'special cells' it implied both a simple territorial object and a shift to dynamic goal connection. So the territorial object was there, right from the start. The merger with dynamic goal connection sparked the move protocol, ensuring the dilemma between the speed of growth and the accumulation of penalty points. So regarding Occam's Razor, it depends on what you aim for. You can design a giraffe, aiming at a high food source. Of course you can then use Occam's Razor to cut out the neck and argue that there's enough grass around to do without it. And you'd be right, but at the same time it's no longer a giraffe, is it? ;) |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Jan 25th, 2013, 7:15am on 01/24/13 at 01:13:04, clyring wrote:
It seems not too far fetched to suggest that abstract board games will become abstract tablet games in the not too distant future. You can have animated tutorials and you can play anywhere with anybody, chat, store games, include a bot, play 3D (generally speaking, it would imply the possibility to go 3D with a whole load of concepts and mechanics) and, barring the tablet, never lose stuff. I think it opens a huge new realm for inventors. Symple is just one example. You don't play the game by counting all the time. As in Go, there are moments to consider the total count, but usually you go for the best move in local situations without counting. Unless you like things to be difficult, it's convenient to be able to check the score at a glance. Not just in Symple. It doesn't stop there. Bashni (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/the-pit/608-bashni) is still manageable if you use Backgammon type pieces, but Stapeldammen (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/the-pit/stapeldammen-588) isn't, unless you're a fanatic. Now imagine you'd want to make a game of towers that would raise far higher, for instance with the object to have the tallest tower at the end of the game. Imagine there some natural feature in the mechanism that, given a certain boardsize, would eventually terminate growth at some point, say between 40 and 60 pieces high. That could be an interesting game, and nothing would prevent it from being played on a tablet, while in the 'real world' it would be impossible. Come to think of it, any argument that requires abstract games to be playable in the real world is a bit strange, since abstract games aren't the real world in the first place. They're virtual, and the only handicap till now has been that this virtuality had to be implemented in wood. To make an even more compelling argument: you could play Symple-3D in say a base-5 or base-7 cube. Same rules. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Jan 27th, 2013, 11:25am As a domestic point, we've upgraded Chad (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/arena/chad/) to the ArenA (the applet will be updated soon *) and downgraded Symple Hex (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/the-pit/649-symple-hex) and Mu_levis (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/the-pit/650-mu-levis) to the Pit. Mu_velox (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/arena/mu/) is now completely separated from its tamed relative. Rotary (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/arena/rotary) has also appeared in the ArenA, but Ed is still working on the applet. The rotational pieces have sort of kept it in the pipeline for a long time, but it had to be done sometime and this seems as good a moment as any. Also a base-13 and a base-15 board will be added to the Ayu (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/arena/ayu/) applet shortly. * * Done |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Feb 4th, 2013, 10:14am http://i46.tinypic.com/x7t3s.gif For what it's worth, here's an idea for an initial position for HexAyu. Here's Ayu (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/arena/ayu) itself. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by Luis Bolaños on Feb 4th, 2013, 12:20pm on 02/04/13 at 10:14:38, christianF wrote:
Interesting. I had suggested (http://www.boardgamegeek.com/thread/738801/hex-ayu) this one instead: http://cf.geekdo-images.com/images/pic1181066_md.jpg Quite conveniently, both of them have (roughly) as many stones as empty points, just like the square version. Your suggestion is more symmetrical and maybe just better. I considered it as well, but I was worried that occupying the central point would be too powerful. Now I'm not so sure. EDIT: Yours has the slight disadvantage that boards with an odd number of cells per side can't be used (the set-up is not symmetrical for both players on those boards), but that's not a problem. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Feb 4th, 2013, 12:58pm on 02/04/13 at 12:20:02, Luis Bolaños wrote:
Neither am I, it's difficult enough to understand tactics and strategy on a square board. I can't say anything about the hexboard, other than that it is a similar game and that it will raise similar problems. On the face of it, considering object and mechanism, the centercell would not appear to have any special significance. on 02/04/13 at 12:20:02, Luis Bolaños wrote:
Going from the premiss that 13x13 will become the 'main variant' I figured that a 169 cells hexboard would be completely in line. But yes, the adjacent alternatives are farther away on a hexboard: base-6 much smaller, base-10 much larger. On the other hand, you need odd-based boards for the square game, in the suggested setup it's
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Feb 8th, 2013, 6:17am Multiplicity (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/the-pit/651-multiplicity) is a concept of a game, or maybe a game already. It follows a discussion at rga around "multiplication of sizes of groups" as an object. Nick Bentley's Produto (http://www.boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/136995/produto) and Luis Bolaños Mures' Alpha (https://groups.google.com/forum/?fromgroups=#!topic/rec.games.abstract/PCYjeUkh8uE) were the main actors, but I also include Néstor Romeral Andrés' Omega (http://www.boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/81588/omega), because it has the same scoring criterion as Multiplicity: The product of the sizes of all of a player's groups. These three games all have move protocols that allow placing stones of the opposing color. I can see the implications of that in this particular theme, as well as in Luis' Yodd and Xodd, but I don't feel much affinity. So I thought, why not introduce the Symple move protocol? Moreover, the product theme itself profits tremendously from having the score tracked and displayed by the applet. Nestor reassures us at BGG, regarding Omega: Quote:
But to be fair, I know what he's getting at. You don't count all that much in Symple either, or in Go for that matter. You often have a fair idea of the priorities in any given position. But believe me, it helps having the score displayed at all times. And in the evolution of board games to tablet games, it's a logical step. A concept It may be a game already, because it should work ... but is it fun? In some circles this criterion has fallen into disrepute, but I still embrace it. It also doen't have a tie-breaker, because I cannot as yet evaluate whether it needs one. There are large enough scores in the pipeline here, to make equal scores a less than frequent occurence, possibly, and for the record: I'm not a member of the Church, so I don't object to draws on principle ;) . The provisional board is a base-5 hexhex: http://mindsports.nl/images/stories/sidedishes/moregamesbycf/multiplicity_d1.gif (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/the-pit/651-multiplicity) Say you conquer half the board, some 30 cells, how large a score is possible? To get an idea, lets divide 30 evenly, or as evenly as possible:
Turn order balance Without the balancing rule, white could take the growth initiative at any moment, while black can not afford to start growing because he then would have a group less than white, so white could immidiately double the score. The balancing rule makes that either can trade the growth initiative for one or more "2-groups" already present, as a compensation for going second into the actual growing phase. Timing is important, but as to the moment to actually trade it. I'm not sure yet. Timing of growth Nor am I sure about the timing of growth after the trade: when do I start the actual growing phase? It's nice to have ten groups and grow them all twice, but say your opponent starts growing at eight groups while you have also eight. Can you afford to place another single? Compare eight groups of 3 [6561] to nine groups of 2 [512], two moves later. Taking a compensation into account, say two 2-groups for the second player, it would be seven groups of 2 and two groups of 3 [768]. So I'd say you can't, and a mutual obligation to keep growing may start early, like at five, six or seven groups each. As I said, it's a concept, maybe a game. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Feb 9th, 2013, 12:03pm The graphics of the Ayu (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/arena/ayu) applet have been updated to match those of the diagrams, and there have been minor updates in the Yodd and Xodd applets (larger stones). |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Feb 10th, 2013, 6:11am http://i45.tinypic.com/1hqux3.jpg Kobus had caught a severe cold after the power outage, breathing like a dentist drill, while shedding at the same time. He had not eaten for about two months, all in all, but now he seems fully recovered. It's a big rabbit too, because I had it for about the same period, and during that time it could eat as much fresh lettuce and carrots as it wanted. Kobus needs those vitamins, especially in winter. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Feb 10th, 2013, 9:00am "One sticking, one free" - a generic opening protocol with an exceptional property I assembled Triccs (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/the-pit/triccs-627) mainly to park the opening protocol somewhere, lest I should forget. Not that I forget easily. Smoking marihuana on a daily basis not only improves one's memory, but also ... ??? no, wait, it'll come to me ... Anyway, the opening protocol was a near miss. Here's a very similar one called "one sticking, one free", which is shorter and has a very exceptional property. We've already adapted Triccs to it. Here it is: White starts by placing one stone on the empty board. From that point on players take turns to:
Here's how the board might look at that point. http://mindsports.nl/images/stories/sidedishes/moregamesbycf/square_triccs_d1.gif Note that the number of stones on the board will be equal, but note also that whoever started the first phase, has no bearing on whose turn it will be at the start of the second phase. Depending on the 'compactness' of the players' placements, either may end up being the one to start the second phase. That's quite an unusual property and it is also the reason that games using this protocol won't have much use for a pie. The opening protocol is generic in that it results in an evenly spreaded position with an equal number of black and white stones covering about a third (hex) to half a board. Any game could start from here, including games using a normal move protocol (1-1-1 ...), and Triccs is certainly not the best game to serve it. Looking at the board I imagine you could start Ayu this way, but unfortunately for me that's not an option. So it's stuck with Triccs for the time being. Eventually something may turn up to that is more deserving of it. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by Luis Bolaños on Feb 10th, 2013, 12:49pm It's a very interesting protocol and definitely an improvement on the one you had originally used in Triccs. I agree that it would make for a nice Ayu variant as well. The protocol even works as a combinatorial game all by itself, but obviously an opaque and boring one. :) |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Feb 10th, 2013, 2:38pm on 02/10/13 at 12:49:40, Luis Bolaños wrote:
Yes, who gets the first 'second phase' move. Its only interest lies in the game that follows. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Feb 12th, 2013, 2:20pm on 02/10/13 at 09:00:00, christianF wrote:
This one for instance: Argon (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/the-pit/argon-653) Note that the game doesn't prevent cooperative cycles. If two players want to aimlessly move to and fro, that's fine with me. But are there forced cycles possible? I'm not sure. Coincidentally the game not only ends its first phase with an initial position wherein the number of stones of both players is equal, something like this, ... http://mindsports.nl/images/stories/sidedishes/moregamesbycf/argon_d1.gif (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/the-pit/argon-653) ... but it retains this property throughout the rest of the game. I'm fairly curious about this one, and an applet doesn't seem to be the most difficult thing in the world, considering what Ed has implemented so far, so I got good hopes that we'll soon be able to give it a shot. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Feb 13th, 2013, 10:59am After smoothing out the Triccs opening protocol to "one sticking, one free" it occured to me that this modification probably pushes the square version to the front, so now we have Triccs (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/the-pit/572-square-triccs) and Hextriccs (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/the-pit/hextriccs-627) rather than Triccs and square Triccs, with only the hexversion having an applet. Appletwise, Rotary was in the pipeline, but I've listed both Multiplicity (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/the-pit/multiplicity-651) and Argon (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/the-pit/argon-653) in the Pit and I hope to see applets for them soon. Together with Scware (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/arena/scware/) they make up this season's harvest. I might skip a season or I might not, who knows, but for now I'll call it quits. Spring is in the air, albeit not abundantly yet. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Feb 15th, 2013, 11:35am on 02/13/13 at 10:59:27, christianF wrote:
Actually it doesn't. The protocol allows very compact placement on a square board till the "free placement" requirement kicks in. This is because only orthogonal adjacencies count - it allows players, if they would choose so, to each stay on their 'own' diagonal grid for a long time. The hexgrid has three diagonal subgrids and doesn't allow a similar compact placement. Argon (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/the-pit/argon-653) has mechanics that are not susceptible to variations in compactness and should be playable on the square as well as the hexgrid. But but using the same opening protocol in a square version of Triccs (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/the-pit/triccs-627) could lead to a too densely packed board at the start of the second phase to be interesting in the short number of moves that would remain. So I've abandoned the idea. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Feb 15th, 2013, 3:13pm The reasoning that led to the conclusion that the square grid wasn't very well suited for Triccs showed up in reflections about another game. Ever heard the Shogi proverb "If you find a good move look for a better one"? That's good advice and far from limited to Shogi. Argon, for instance, still has to show its worth as a dynamic connection game. A hexversion clearly would need a specification as to what a move does if it meets the edge. Reflecting off it isn't in line with the square game, and an acute angle seems unnatural, so proceeding along the edge at an obtuse angle is the most obvious rule, but it is an extra specification as well as an extra limitation (if compared to the square game), so I don't yet know if it is worth it. Surely there must be a hexversion of LOA, but I've never seen it. But it didn't prevent looking at a hexposition such as would result from the "one sticking, one free" opening protocol ... http://mindsports.nl/images/stories/sidedishes/moregamesbycf/inertia_d1.gif (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/the-pit/654-inertia) ... and then I saw the contours of a new game, obviously inspired by Ayu, but regulated not by the "nearest neighbor" requirement, but by the requirement not to increase the number of one's groups. Since in Ayu this is an inherent property it obviously has a different mechanism of movement, not based on the groups themselves, but on individual stones. The possible "density" of the positions resulting from the protocol on a square board interacts unfavorably with this mechanism. That's why I ruled out a square board fairly quickly. That in turn made me reconsider the square version of Triccs, only to find the same drawback. But Inertia (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/the-pit/654-inertia) may be interesting enough, although I can see problems arising from forced cycles. So let's call it provisional in the sure knowledge that time will tell (not to mention the Church ;D ). |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Feb 16th, 2013, 7:12am A good night's sleep removed a few wrinkles in the phrasing of the rules. Actually I had been overregulating what was already being regulated by the rule that forbids a player to increase the number his groups, as a result of his move. So it comes down to:
So I can see cooperative cycles, but they don't bother me (for one, you don't need a game to aimlessly move stuff to and fro, anything will do, use your imagination!). But I haven't yet found an example of a forced cycle. I'm not ruling out stupidity on my part and I'd appreciate it if someone could find an example. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by Luis Bolaños on Feb 16th, 2013, 9:07am on 02/16/13 at 07:12:41, christianF wrote:
Barring a misunderstanding of the rules, this position should result in a forced cycle: o o . x x . o o . x x . I think this kind of draw patterns will be very common, and possibly more so than they would be in Ayu without the distance rule. For example, this particular position isn't a draw in the latter. EDIT: This is only a proof of concept. It's a square board, but it shouldn't be difficult to find similar examples on a hex board. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Feb 16th, 2013, 9:13am on 02/16/13 at 09:07:27, Luis Bolaños wrote:
If I understand correctly you draw two goups each, and the players can only move to and fro (leapfrogging). That's a forced cycle all right, but it is drawn on a 3x4 square board. I had already reached the conclusion that the game mechanics are on unfavorable terms with a square board. Can you provide coordinates for an example on the above board? |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by Luis Bolaños on Feb 16th, 2013, 9:29am on 02/16/13 at 09:13:31, christianF wrote:
That would be (at least a little) more difficult indeed. I'm not especially interested in the problem, though. I'm sorry. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Feb 16th, 2013, 9:53am on 02/16/13 at 09:29:40, Luis Bolaños wrote:
My hope would be that it is more than a little more difficult and it's a pity it fails to capture your interest. I'll try to figure it out myself of course, but puzzling isn't my favorite way to spend a day. An example is still welcome :) . |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Feb 16th, 2013, 12:20pm http://i47.tinypic.com/2i20500.gif If the two red stones at the top were connected, this would be a forced cycle. So they are possible. Here I deviate from dogma and wonder how problematic they would be. Three-fold in Chess doesn't seem to have had too much an impact on its worldwide popularity. As it is, red can move K8-K6 and K10-K11, and with black leapfrogging the J-line this leaves a hole at either J5 or J11 that Red can occupy. So imagine the above position, but with Red on K6 and K11 and moving K11-J11. The threat is to hook up K6-K11 and escape over the 11-line. Note that Black cannot follow "Ayu-fashion" because all moves are straight only. Nor may he split up his group. If he moves J10-K10, he creates an inert red stone, while the other red stone has an open view of the large red group, and can connect in one move (J11-C4). So Red can win (or can he? Black could 'uninert' the stone of course ...) . The example has the benefit of being artificial, but situations like this are clearly possible, including all the little details that would lead to one or another outcome. So I'm as yet undecided whether Inertia's forced cycles do constitute a problem and I certainly would need some actual games to get a feel of their scope. Very undogmatic, I admit, and worse, I don't care. Heresy! But really, the worst thing that could happen is that the game is flawed. Edit: Get this, the position is a red win :D . I just found out why but it's Sunday Morning (beautiful song (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3qK82JvRY5s) by the Velvet underground, by the way) posing as Saturday night, so I'll save the solution for later today. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Feb 17th, 2013, 5:20am http://i47.tinypic.com/2i20500.gif Since there's no doubt that the above position would be a draw if both the top red stones were connected, the rules now state that, indeed, 3-fold is a draw. But the position as it is (with either to move) is a win for Red.
If Black now moves 4. ... J9-K9, Red can connect with 5. J10-C3. This makes both Red groups inert, so Black must open a path between the Red groups. Unfortunately his last move prevents him from doing this at the right side, so he must move 5. ... J5-J9 or 5. ... J5-I5. In either case Red moves 6. K6-I4 (ad lib) and 7. I4-C4 and wins. So that's a no go. Black must proceed with his small group.
http://i45.tinypic.com/5n6jwi.gif Black's small group is stuck in the corner, so there was no alternative! Now Red can connect with the indicated move, and Black must open a path because both red groups are inert. So it's either 9. ... J5-J9 or 9. ... J5-I5. In either case Red moves 10. K6-I4 (ad lib) and 11. I4-C4 and wins. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Feb 17th, 2013, 6:38am This little problem was hidden in an example diagram that was chosen on the fly to illustrate both a draw and a 'doubtful case'. One that is no longer doubtful. It's the delicate inevitability of the solution that suggests that Inertia harbors a hidden wealth of delicate intricacies so I'm inclined to trust the game, despite the possibility that it may end in a draw. Of the 20+ games in the ArenA (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/arena/) only a handful cannot end in a draw, and only one has a problematic margin. Draws, if they're not a problem, have their own charm. I've added an acknowedgement in the rules (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/the-pit/inertia-654) to the effect that Inertia was inspired by Ayu. For which I thank Luis :) . Thanks to its unexpected delivery this season's 'harvest' has now grown to
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Feb 18th, 2013, 5:42am A few loose ends. The April 2013 issue of Games Magazine (http://www.gamesmagazine-online.com/) features Bushka (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/arena/bushka/). To our surprise I must add because we weren't notified. Trying to solve the mystery led me to the conclusion that they must have published it before, with an admission that included a possible republication. But that's deduction, I don't actually remember. I just hope they published the 10x10 version (because Bushka started out 9x11). Also, in the near future a couple of our games will be "app'd" under Windows-8. More games and other platforms will eventually follow I guess, because I see the whole world of abstract games inevitably making that transition. As for inventing, Triccs was 'mechanics induced', mainly to 'store' the opening protocol that a few weeks later found its present form that I coined "one sticking, one free" for short. Not to put too fine a point on it, but both the "Symple" move protocol and the "one sticking, one free" opening protocol are generic. Although they cannot be used for just any game, certain sub-classes can be adapted to it. In that respect they constitute useful tools for other inventors. That being said, Triccs is fairly average, as games that start from the mechanical angle tend to be. The other four were "object induced", which is an approach that I prefer. Multiplicity, Argon and Inertia have never been tested. Don't blame me if they turn out right, it's just a coincidence ;) . |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Feb 20th, 2013, 12:41pm I got some wrinkles in the site to iron out but in the meantime I'm most curious about Inertia. Multiplicity is predictably solid and balanced, with a good measure of coldness in the endgame. I can't see Argon go wrong either, but it will be a game tending to tactical opportunism within a fairly obvious strategy. The thing about Inertia, apart from the intruiging subtlety that was emerging in a simple example position, is the precence of forced cycles. These have been stigmatized into insurmountable problems by the Church of Cyclophobia, and deemed unacceptable in 'modern game design'. The advantage of that point of view is that you don't have to think about them, nor engage in those shades of grey they bring, that are so difficult to grasp if you've got black & white written all over you. Like for instance that "eventually, given an ever higher standard of play", they will lead to ever more draws. I know that's possible. It's in fact happening at this very moment before our very eyes with International Draughts. Draughts is dying as an international sport and will likely live on some time as a recreational sport. However, it has given us a century of breathtaking games and problems despite eventually becoming drawish, and now we need better Draughts. Not a big deal. But people arguing that the same will happen to Ayu or Havannah don't understand games, at least not these games. Luis and I agree that forced cycles in Inertia may pose a problem. But we come to that common ground from a different direction. We've got an Ayu game (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/players-section/Serve.cgi?file=Ayu1361194758.html) going, with comments on the subject, and since it is a public game I'll cite an excerpt here. Quote:
But I'm curious enough to have asked Ed to bump the Inertia applet to the front of the pipeline. Rotary is nice and looks good, but there's also not much about the game that I don't know. That's different with Inertia. Let's see if we can stop considering 'draws' a dirty word. My feeling about Inertia is that it may be a true strategy game, as opposed to a tactical one, and if what it has to offer comes with (I won't even say "at the price of") a small margin of draws, that's fine with me. Players with another point of view don't have to play it. That's fine with me too :) . |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Feb 24th, 2013, 6:43am Inertia (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/the-pit/inertia-654) testrun The Inertia applet is ready, thanks Ed :) . The thing has been kicking inside my head like a baby in its mother's womb. I hope we get at least some clues regarding the scope of the problem that may arise due to the presence of forced cycles, because I cannot make any well founded guess, and my optimism may be no more than misinterpreted wishful thinking. So here's a testrun:
To be ahead of any confusion, we've had a first hiccup in the emergence of an illegal move in game 1 due to a bug in the applet and a lack of paying attention on my part. This has been corrected (or at least the bug). |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Feb 26th, 2013, 3:27pm Here's the good news, Inertia may end in a decision (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/players-section/Serve.cgi?file=Inertia1361706831.html) ;D . The bad news is: I won. As a faithful supporter of the myth that good inventors make bad players I'm inclined to consider that a bad omen :( . Of course superstition brings bad luck, so I might reconsider ;) . Edit: Reassuring news, I lost this one (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/players-section/Serve.cgi?file=Inertia1361708026.html) :) . |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Feb 26th, 2013, 4:05pm on 02/26/13 at 06:58:07, Mageant wrote:
How about a pie? After the first player's first move, have the second player decide to either play with that initial setup or against it? |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Mar 1st, 2013, 8:36am So here's a game that may involve a forced cycle (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/players-section/Serve.cgi?file=Inertia1361981926.html). We're at Red-23 and Jos has a won position, but I got a last straw because I can block the single red stone by moving C2 to either D3 or C3, and then oscillate between those 2 cells, depending on where the Red stone goes. http://i46.tinypic.com/dli59v.png (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/players-section/Serve.cgi?file=Inertia1361981926.html) Or can I? If Jos moves D87 he has one group and a single, and they're both inert, so I will have to open the enclosure. Can Red mess up the 'forced cycle' plan and win? Edit: well ... I think he can by moving to C2 with the red stone. I'm not so fast as a player :P . But this is not a forced cycle, only a first reminder that they may lurk deep in the gametree, ready for the kill ;) . |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Mar 1st, 2013, 10:17am
But if I may rephrase the above considerations metaphorically: it's like winning with checkmate in Chess, but actually losing by giving stalemate. So the pass will be implemented: Inertia is won by being inert, not by being totally hampered. That being said, I may add that the situation thus described would seem to be a theoretical possibility rather than frequent occurence. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Mar 2nd, 2013, 3:26am on 03/01/13 at 10:17:28, christianF wrote:
Which doesn't mean we're out of the woods here, but my main concern is the possibility of forced cycles rather than the occurence of the above situation. Luis took it a step further and created a position that doesn't seem to be possible as a result of the opening protocol, but that can be legally arrived at if players cooperate in the second phase of the game. In this positions only one group is inert but neither player has a legal move (http://www.iggamecenter.com/gm.php?aid=20913&sid=333602&code=BOXEVE457). Under Luis suggestion the player to move has won. Under the passing rule it is a draw. Under the sun it is unlikely :D . |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Mar 2nd, 2013, 7:16am So I was at the presentation of CodeCup (http://www.codecup.nl/intro.php) winners at the University of Twente to deliver a small speech. The point of it was that when game programming began, we were looking for games that were easy for computers, whereas now we're looking for games that are easy for humans. Take a game like Explocus (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/the-pit/explocus-527). In the late eighties a student at that same university wrote a program that ate itself through three ply in twenty minutes, using alpha-bèta pruning and a very simple evaluation function. It was unbeatable because no human player could manage more than a partial two-ply evaluation. Imagine a CodeCup contest now. The worst program would beat the best human ten out of ten. Whatever would happen in games between programs, would be beyond any human comprehension. It would prove that programs are better than humans at Explocus - and little more. It would be utterly uninteresting. That's why we should be looking for games that are easy for humans. Humans need games that allow strategic understanding, the making of plans and the achieving of calculable sub-goals. I still beat the best Havannah bot seven out of ten. My score against the winner of the Symple contest is 24 wins out of 35. These games may not be more difficult to program, but they give humans a firm handle and, for the time being, a fair chance. That's more interesting for humans, and certainly not less interesting for programmers. I've made a suggestion, therefore, to include this aspect in the procedure to select games, and to hold a yearly match between the winning program of the previous year, and the best human player (to be determined in some form of competition, possibly at mindsports, in the year following the win of the program). The game for 2014 has been selected, but remains a secret for now, so I've got no clue. For 2015 I've suggested Luis' Ayu (http://mindsports.nl/index.php/arena/ayu), because contrary to some people's perception I'm not after a one-man-show and Ayu is easily the best game I've seen in the past year. It also fits the requirements of a game wherein humans have a chance against digital opposition. I hope the idea of a yearly follow up match between man and machine finds some fertile ground. In that case, there may be an additional Symple match next to the new CodeCup Challenge, in about a year. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by omar on Mar 2nd, 2013, 9:13am Thanks for sharing this Christian. If there's a video of the lecture, I would love to watch it; but maybe it's not in English. It's always interesting for me to see your perspectives on game design, since you've been at this for many years. I like your idea of having a yearly man vs machine match for the AI resistant games. I hope it fuels more interest in this area of AI. I really think there is a lot to be discovered in this area. But it's also a bit scary to think that eventually we may get to a point where there is no overlap between the games that are interesting to humans and games that are difficult for computers. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by omar on Mar 2nd, 2013, 9:21am > I have discovered a new race/breakthrough type game and Christian suggested I might publish it here. Yes, you are most welcome to post it here. However, I would suggest starting a new thread for any new game announcements rather than appending it to this thread. I don't know what the limit is on how long a thread can be, but it's not good that anytime someone posts a reply to this thread the "post reply" page contains the whole thread. I might eventually have to lock this thread if it starts causing problems. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by Forum Admin on Mar 2nd, 2013, 9:30am I just updated the posting guidelines to mention that a new thread should be started for new game announcements. Feel free to do it retroactively as well. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Mar 2nd, 2013, 9:44am on 03/02/13 at 09:21:15, omar wrote:
That might not be such a bad idea, regardless. Personally I'm not referring all that much to it, but I'm rather fond of the 'blog' function it more or less grew into. Judging from the number of views there are at least a few dozen regular readers and having invented 4 new games and a new generic opening protocol in the past few months, it seems I'm not quite dead yet ;D . So as far as I'm concerned you're welcome to lock it, and I'd be happy to start a fresh follow-up thread. |
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Title: Re: Essay by Christian Freeling on inventing games Post by christianF on Mar 3rd, 2013, 2:55pm See
See
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