Tafl, Hnefatafl, Tablut, all strange names.

Hello once again

Today I play even more ancient games, this time in the form of Tafl, Hnefatafl and Tablut.

All of these game is are pretty much the same, in which the idea of each game is to get the king from the middle of the board to one of the corners or edges of the board, depending on what rules you decide to play. However as the king's army, you are heavily out numbered by your opponent and must make tactical moves in order to the get to the goal. You can take each other pieces within the game by having one piece on opposite side of the piece you are wanting to take. Once this has been met, the piece is completely removed from the game. However in order to capture a king, you must trap him from all four sides to fully win the game. Movement is a set value, in that you can move any piece single piece you want each turn, and the movement is exactly the same as moving a castle/rook in the game of chess. You can move in a line however many spaces you want.

I really enjoyed playing this game, since there was an extremely good tactical approach. You had to think about cutting off the king's exits, or making it so that your men create a clear path to make your king escape, there was an endless number of ways to tactically win the game, which was the highlight of the game.