Here's me explaining Dots & Boxes on a promo maths lesson in Yakutia - that's in Russia, to the East of even Siberia. :)

And have you guys told anyone else about the game?

Nice photo Polydarya! What is written on the blackboard?

I used to play on my booklet without the teacher knowing…

Yes I taught my kids, and they are not at all interested!

I have discussed the game with some of my friends - they have been surprised that it is actually as serious and deep as it is! Many remember playing it in their youth, but few knew anything beyond the basics.

My biggest problem in introducing Dots & Boxes has been that it's difficult to demonstrate its depth through a simple enough example for a beginner to understand. Any ideas? :)

I think if you start by explaining domino moves, then you can show on basic positions with two or three long chains the parity rule, first player being odd and second even on 5x5. (But even explaining this clearly needs some advanced math as the Euler characteristic)…

After that, the battle for parity quickly enters a world of big complexity with the short chain battle and how to trade keeping control against part of chains or quads…

Yeah… but I don't like parity games, when I win I am not really happy, when I lose I am not really concerned, these games are for computers (-;

Hi Caroll, thanks! On the board it says simply “Mathematical games, Dots and Boxes” - it's in Russian. It's funny to be the teacher who tells about the game… will see if I'll have to catch my students playing secretly from me, haha :)

I've discussed the game with some friends in Maths to whom it's not problematic to explain the theory (though none of them started playing). I've also explained the game to school students who don't know any advanced Math, but then, if you have 45 minutes of talking time and your listeners can't run away… ;)

(I've never gone any further than parity for chains and a bit of facts on sacrifices, though.)