Havannah

Two of my brothers came out to visit me from Colorado last week. While we were here we played several dozen different board games.

The game we ended up playing, and enjoying, the most turned out to be Havannah! I had been familiar with Havannah for quite some time, but this was the first time I had ever played it! It's a marvelous game and I would love to see it here on this server someday!

There are several websites that mention and describe this game. One of them can be found here:

http://www.mindsports.net/Arena/Havannah/AboutHavannah.html

From what I've read about the game, we won't see any draws, and we won't have to worry about computers beating us anytime soon... they play Havannah very poorly.

Yes, I have played a few games of Havannah at mind sports.

I noticed that as novice players we could still get quite involved in making complicated and satisfying plans.

Havannah plays like what I call a top down game as does Go. Hex and Twixt play like bottem up games. The tactics will act as a school teacher and drive you to build up your strategies and more tactics.

Havannah and Go play top down which means that the rules of the game have the role of a "referee". They give a ruling on which of the proponents plans prevale in a particular situation. But they do not directly guide you as a school teacher might.

In Go the rules give you no guidence and you really need contact with stronger players who can impart the spirit of Go.

In contrast, with Havannah, even though it plays as a top down game, new players have the feeling of playing in an "intelligent fashion".

I would like to see Havannah on LG. I really would :-)

Reading about how the Twente University students played thousands of games the first year, without even beginning to understand the game's strategic concepts, fascinates me. And all this from a game where the rules can be explained in less than a minute.

What do you mean by "top down" game vs "bottom up" game?

I've never played GO nor Havannah so perhaps if you could

explain in terms of some other game, I could then understand

it. I do play Hex so what makes it "bottom up?"

Some other games I've played include Chess, Checkers, Backgammon, Reversi, and Connect 4 (4 in a row).

i went and read about the game and it sound interesting.

didnt understand clearly how one wins (something about a ring, fork and bridge) but it looks the game is full of strategy.

i like how they try to compare it with GO...but understanding the superiority of GO.

it will be good if LG consider it.

bump