GAMES WITH PENCIL AND PAPER Eric SolomonGAMES WITH PENCIL AND PAPER Eric Solomon Dover Publications, Inc.Copyright Copyright © 1973, 1993 by Eric Solomon. All rights reserved under Pan American and International Copyright Conventions. Published in Canada by General Publishing Company, Ltd., 30 Lesmill Road, Don Mills, Toronto, Ontario. Published in the United Kingdom by Constable and Company, Ltd., 3 The Lanchesters, 162-164 Fulham Palace Road, London Wo SER. Bibliographical Note This Dover edition, first published in 1993, is an unabridged republication of the work first published by Thomas Nelson and Sons Ltd, London, in 1973. A new Preface has been written by the author specially for this edition. Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Solomon, Eric, 1935— Games with pencil and paper / Eric Solomon. P. cm. ISBN 0-486-27872-7 1, Pencil games. 1. Title. GV1493.S66 1993 793.73—de20 93-21327 CIP Manufactured in the United States of America Dover Publications, Inc., 31 East 2nd Street, Mineola, N.Y. 11501Contents 10 ret 12 13 14 15 16 Preface to the Dover Edition 5 Introduction 7 Sprouts, a “topological” game 9 Three-Dimensional Noughts and Crosses, a spatial pattern game 12 Eleusis, an “induction” game 16 Think of a Letter, a “crossword” game 20 Crystals, a pattern-visualising game 22 Hex, a curious race game 27 Middleman, a trading game 29 Boxes, an “enclosing” game 37 Coincidences, a word game 40 Aggression, a war game 44 Battleships, a popular war game 48 Hangman, a word game for children 56 Go Moku, an ancient positional game 58 Subterfuge, a spy game with secret bidding 61 Letter-Strings, a simple word game 67 Buried Treasure, a game of bluff 69Preface to the Dover Edition ince Games with Pencil and Paper was first published there has been steadily growing interest in board and table games ofall sorts. Erno Rubik’s Magic Cube probably attracted more scientific and mathematical attention than any earlier intellec- tual recreation, and many of those whose enthusiasm was kin- dled by this puzzle continue to apply their minds to the many unsolved problems of games theory. Of course, Games with Pencil and Paper is not intended to contribute to the advance- ment of scientific knowledge—it aims merely to present the tules for pencil and paper games in a simple and direct way. However, several recent discoveries will be of interest to all players and these are briefly described here. In addition, the omission of several credits is rectified. Sprouts: This game was introduced by John Horton Conway and M. S. Paterson of Cambridge University. Conway is co- author (with Elwyn R. Berlekamp and Richard K. Guy) of the definitive work on recreational games theory Winning Ways (Academic Press, 1982). This lively book contains a section devoted to Sprouts and similar topological games and provides outline proofs confirming my conjecture about the length of the game. Three-Dimensional Noughts and Crosses: Oren Patashnik has proved (Mathematics Magazine, September 1980) that the first player can, in theory, always win this game. His proof required. some 750 hours of PDP-10 computer time, but does not affect the enjoyment-value of the game because it is unlikely that any human could be guaranteed to play optimally without very extensive reference tables, in which case he would be unlikely to find an opponent willing to play! Eleusis: This game is based on the card game invented by Robert Abbott and introduced in Martin Gardner’s “Mathe- matical Games” column in Scientific American (June 1959).Robert has since extended Eleusis in interesting ways, as re- ported in Scientific American (October 1977). Think of a Letter: This is an old game of unknown origin. In England some players know it as Wordsworth, which is a snap- pier title for what I consider to be the best of all word games. The game is improved if five-letter words carry a bonus of five points rather than one point as described in this book. Crystals: I have received many enquiries about the origin of Crystals and must now admit to having devised the game spe- cially for this book. Hex: Hex is the invention of the Danish poet and polymath Piet Hein, who also invented the Soma Cube puzzle. The game was first shown in 1942 under the name Polygon and about ten years later was marketed by Parker under the name Hex. Middleman: This is an adaptation of a variety of trading games based on the behavior of free markets. Boxes: No one seems to know how this game originated. It is well described and analysed in Winning Ways (see Sprouts, above). Coincidences: This game is based on a vague memory of a similar game that I played as a child—and for which I can find no references. Players of the later code-breaking game Master- mind (Vic-Toy, 1972) may notice some similarities. Aggression: Aggression was inspired by the unabashedly bel- licose board game of world conquest marketed under the name of Risk (Parker, 1953), though the mechanics are quite different. Battleships: Hubert Phillips, the inventor of the version pre- sented here, was a popular broadcaster, puzzle compiler, and writer on games in the 1940s. Subterfuge: This is a pencil and paper adaptation of my board game War Office Papers marketed as Sigma File (Seven Towns, 1970) and subsequently under different names by various manufacturers. Other Games: Games not listed above are traditional games of unknown origin. Eric SolomonIntroduction Ts games described here require no more equipment than pencils and paper. Some are old favourites, some are well-established games which deserve to be better known and some are brand-new games. Each chapter describes one game ina roughly uniform fashion. A short background to the game is followed by a specification of the rules. Next comes an illustrative game if appropriate and feasible within the limita- tions of space. Finally, the strategy of the game is briefly discussed. Any method of deciding which player makes the first move will suffice provided it gives everyone an equal chance: if there are two players a coin may be tossed; if there are more than two people involved write the numbers 1, 2, 3, etc. on separate pieces of paper and draw them out of a hat or cup. The player drawing 1 will move first, 2 moves second, and so on. The facts that word-game players increase their vocabular- ies, that positional-game players improve their visuo-spatial predictive capabilities, or whatever psychology buzz-words are currently in fashion for pattern-spotting ability, are beneficial side effects of what should be enjoyable pastimes. Not all games bestow these blessings on their participants, however, and there’s no telling what traits a game such as Subterfuge will develop! So do remember that games should be played for fun. I should like to acknowledge the assistance afforded by Neil Peppé, and other friends, including the long-suffering games section of the London Inter Varsity Club, on whom many experimental games have been inflicted. ES.Sprouts A “topological” game "Topcleey is the branch of mathematics which deals with relationships between parts of an object not affected by the size or distortions of the object. Sprouts was devised quite recently at Cambridge University specifically as a purely “topological” game. The name derives from the appearance of the completed game, which resembles nothing so much as the plan of an over-cooked and disintegrating sprout. The game is suitable for two or three players but is not recom- mended for more unless a rubber is played in which every player is given a first move. Before play starts some points are drawn at random on a sheet of paper. Five or six points make for a game lasting about five minutes. More points give a longer game. The players take turns to draw a smooth line starting and ending on a point, then draw one new point somewhere on the line. There are two rules: 1 No line may cross any other line. 2 No point may have more than three lines leaving it. Note that the new points added after the game is under way always begin life with two lines leaving them. That is, the new line drawn by a player is effectively divided into two lines when he adds his point. From Rule 2 we can see that only one new line may be started or ended at one of the points drawn after the game has begun. Also note that it’s perfectly permissible for a line to start and end on the same point provided the rules above are satisfied. The winner is the player who takes the final move and leaves no opportunity for another player to complete a valid turn. The three figures show positions in the middle of a 5-point game. Fig. 1 illustrates two valid moves with the new lines10 sPROUTS dotted and the starting points shaded. The figures 2 and 3 show invalid moves, also dotted. ‘When you have played several short games and become familiar with the rules you can try a larger number of starting points, say ten. Although the original points are placed ran- domly it’s advisable to space them out well to avoid conges- tion towards the end of a game. Figure 2_An Invalid Move _— Lines crossSPROUTS 11 Strategy: Very little is known about winning strategy in Sprouts. If you have aspirations to crack this problem the following facts might be useful: a Every new line (pair of lines really as the new point divides it in two) either produces one new region, or it joins two hitherto separate parts of the game. The term “region”’ is used for a closed area of the paper bounded by lines. b There is a relationship linking the number of points, lines, regions and separate parts of a game. This equa- tion is true at all times during a game: POINTS + REGIONS = LINES + PARTS This is known as Euler’s formula and was discovered about two hundred years before Sprouts was invented! c It is conjectured that a game of Sprouts always has a number of moves equal to or greater than twice the num- ber of starting points, and less than three times the num- ber of starting points. Figure 3 An Invalid Move —Too many Ines on a pointT hree-Dimensional Noughts and Crosses A spatial pattern game Novetts and crosses, or Tic-Tac-Toe, is a game of limited scope. For instance, it has the property that the second player can always force a draw however the first player moves. As such, it is at best a test of endurance. The ordinary game is played on a single three by three framework of squares in two dimensions. A logical step in finding an im- proved game was to try playing it in three dimensions on a board with depth as well as height and width. The “3D” game described here has been popular at universities and among computer programmers for over ten years. It is a first-class game and deserves to be better known. In recent years some “hardware” versions have appeared on the market, but the game can be played perfectly adequately on paper. Indeed this is how it was originally played. Imagine a cube made up of 64 smaller cubes stacked so that there are four layers of sixteen cubes. Each layer has four rows of four cubes as shown in Fig. 1. In order to play the game on paper the layers are separated and drawn as illu- strated. The two players alternately write their symbols into the boxes in the usual way with the “cross” player starting. The first person to obtain four of his symbols in a straight line is the winner. A straight line, that is, in the properly stacked cube. Fig. 2 shows some completed games with the winning lines shaded. Note that the boundary line round each layer is not normally drawn. Strategy : There’s a rich field for investigation here. The im- portant squares are those which have most lines passingTHREE-DIMENSIONAL NOUGHTS AND CROSSES 13 Top or first fayer FE Second sayer FE Third Jayer Bottom or fourth /ayer FEE EEE Figure L Derivation of the Game Sheet for 3D _Noughts and Crosses through them. It’s obviously good tactics to occupy some of these squares early in the game. Fig. 3 shows a game sheet with the number of lines passing through each square indi- cated in the square itself. A useful exercise for the serious student of this game is to take one layer of the cube and to try to establish what majority of symbols will guarantee him a win inside the layer chosen.14 THREE-DIMENSIONAL NOUGHTS AND CROSSES Main alagonal = Minor dlagonal = Simple straight across the cube. across a layer. vertically through the cube. Chere is a deliberate mistake in one of these games. The losing player has not noticed that he has a completed line. Can you tind 16?) Fiqure2 Some Completed Games of 3D Noughts and CrossesTHREE-DIMENSIONAL NOUGHTS AND CROSSES 15 Figure 3 Kelative Importance of Squares tn 3D Noughts and Crosses.Eleusis An “induction” game Bievsis started life as a card game of a novel sort. Practically ‘all games are deductive in that the players learn a set of rules and deduce their best moves within these rules. In Eleusis one player secretly invents a rule and the others make trial moves in order to discover what the rule is, That is, they try to induce the general rule from their particular moves. The inventor of the rule, called the “Umpire”, tells each player whether his trial move is successful or not, but he may impart no further information. One attraction of the game is its analogy with the process of scientific research: the scientist observes particular facts then postulates general laws of nature which could explain the facts. The player of Eleusis observes the success or failure of his trial moves, and those of the other players, and postulates a law to explain them. There are several inductive games based on Eleusis. The version described here can be played by two, three or four players. A game consists of a number of rounds, as many as there are players. In each round one player takes the part of the Umpire. At the end of a round the players, including the Umpire, assess their penalty points. When every player has been Umpire once the game finishes and the person with the lowest total of penalty points is the winner. Equipment : Each player requires a sheet of paper having a 10-by-10 matrix of squares as shown in Fig. 1. A player’s paper is used for the round in which he is Umpire. The player on the Umpire’s left is the “A” player, the player opposite is the “B” player and the player to his right the “C” player. If there are only three players the “C” position is not used. Similarly, if there are only two players one is the Um- pire and the other the “A” player. The “lettered” players each have appropriate letters as shown in Fig. 1. TheELEUSIS 17 Umpire has twenty symbols and numbers as shown and at the start of each cycle of play, immediately before the “A” player takes his turn, he must circle the next symbol or num- ber starting on the left of the top row and finishing at the right of the bottom row. BBBBBBBBBB dbdRRRBBRBBRBEDR - 4 f Ht AHAAHHAARHKHHAG See ta tetetorees TALLY 85 2 o12 5 8 15 figarel Playing Sheet for Eleusrs A Move : The “A” player takes a turn by placing the point of his pencil on a square of his choosing and asking if he may place a letter A in it. The square must be empty at this stage. If the Umpire replies “Yes” the player writes a letter A in the square and crosses out one of the A letters on his side of the sheet. If the Umpire replies “No” the turn passes to the “B”’ player, and the “A” player is not entitled to cross out one of his letters. The “‘B” and “‘C” players play in the same way by asking if they may place, respectively, a B or C in some square,18 ELEUSIS Penalty points : A round ends immediately one of the players “goes out” by using his last letter. If no player has gone out by the end of cycle 20 the round is terminated. This is easily detected as the Umpire will find that he has no more numbers to circle. At the end of the round the letter players count their unused letters which are reckoned as penalty points. A player who has gone out will have no penalty points for that round. The Umpire’s penalty is the number he last circled. A alps First letter anywhere - Spiral of the letters next letter must be a ABCABC, etc. The letters chess-knights move from can be placed in any order previous letter. $0 long as their position "3 correct. Figure 2 Typical Umpires Rules ia Eleusis It will be seen from Fig. 1 that the Umpire receives no penalty points if the round lasts exactly fifteen cycles. He is heavily penalised if he thinks of a rule so easy to discover that someone goes out at cycle 10, or soon after. Similarly he is penalised for thinking out a rule which no one can discover before the full twenty cycles are played.ELEUSIS 19 The Umpire’s rule ; There’s absolutely no restriction on this. To minimise his penalty points the Umpire should devise a rule which at least one player will discover after five trial move failures. Typically the letter players will have a certain amount of luck before they find the rule, so it’s unlikely that these failures will all occur in the first five cycles. The Umpire should write his rule down in some way, if only to avoid disputes. The best way is probably to complete a spare sheet with the letters placed in the appropriate squares, Obviously he should avoid “‘silly’’ rules such as “A may be placed anywhere, B and C on the edge only’’! It is important that a rule should not favour one letter player more than any other. Some versions of Eleusis try to avoid this possibility by augmenting the Umpire’s penalty points by the difference between the round-winners’ penalty points and those of the runner-up. Fig. 2 shows some specimen rules which may inspire further ideas,Think of a Letter A “crossword” game Ths is one of the very best word games and has been popular in England for many years. Some people call it Crosswords. It can be played by from two to five people. Each player is issued with a pencil and a sheet of paper having.a five-by-five framework of squares. After it has been decided who starts, the first player calls out one letter which he writes into some chosen square of his framework. Each of the other players writes the same letter into some square on his own paper. The second player then calls out a letter of his choice which every- one again places in his framework. When all the players have taken a turn in this way the first player calls out another letter, and so it goes until all 25 squares have been filled. The object of the game is to spell out words reading either across or down the sheet. No player should permit any other player to see his framework until the game is finished. Each player accumulates a score as follows: 1 For every word, either across or down, as many points are scored as there are letters in the word. One-letter words, however, score nothing. 2 Five-letter words score a bonus point. No two words in the same row, or column, may share let- ters. For example, suppose a row contained the letters IT WIT. The IT scores two points, the word WIT scores three points, and the total for the row is five points. It would not be permitted to score the two points for IT as well as the four points for the word TWIT. It is important that all players should record a letter clearly in its square before the next letter is called. Every player adds his row totals and his column totalsTHINK OF A LETTER 21 together to obtain his final score. The player with the highest final score is the winner. Fig. 1 shows two completed sheets from the same game with the row, column and total scores recorded along the right-hand edge, the lower edge, and the bottom right-hand corner respectively for each sheet. c]s|s|zlol2 vlolsla|s|4 vielwialzle TlalPlelole6 TIxlalwieé|3 slR|elRiz| 2 wleleiels|4 zlAlwlely! 3 AlolelPlr| 6 E|x|Alc|7| 6 2663468 0 3 4 4 0@2) Figure 1 Two Completed Sheets trom a Game of Think of a Letter Permissible words : As in the majority of word games there is the possibility of dispute over the matter of which words are permissible. These are easily resolved if the players agree beforehand to use a particular dictionary. As a rule, proper nouns requiring a capital letter, hyphenated words and words including an apostrophe, such as DON’T, should be avoided. Needless to say, reference to the dictionary before the playing sheets are completed is strictly forbidden. Variations : Think of a Letter is capable of much variation: the reader should feel free to try a larger playing area, say 8 by 8 squares, if he wants a longer game. You may decide to reward longer words more generously. For example, an eight-letter word could merit two bonus points.Crystals A pattern-visualising game H= is a game played on squared paper in which each con- testant tries to“‘grow” crystals. The winner is the person who covers most squares with his crystals. The game can be played by any number of people, but the greater the number of players the harder it is to form crystals, and those that are produced tend to be less spectacular. The playing area may be any size and shape but a piece of paper having 21 rows of 21 squares each is recommended as a standard. Symmetry: All perfect crystals display symmetry in some form or other. Many are manifestly three-dimensional. Under certain conditions, however, some substances form plate- like two-dimensional crystals, the sort we shall be growing in this game. Before proceeding it is important to understand the concept of a “mirror axis of symmetry”. This sounds frighteningly esoteric but it’s simply an imaginary line drawn across the crystal and along which it could be folded so that the two halves exactly overlay each other. A tidy housewife would fold a tablecloth along its mirror axis. The symmetry of our crystals is dictated to a degree by the nature of squared paper. The “natural” axes to use are those parallel to the lines on the paper. If we used only these two axes it would be simple to construct crystals according to the rules of the game. Too simple, in fact, to offer any challenge. The best axes are the two natural axes plus the two diagonal axes. Thus, it must be possible to fold each crystal horizont- ally, vertically and diagonally across its centre-point without obtaining any protruding or uncovered sections. The H- shaped crystal shown in Fig. 2 would be permissible if only the natural axes were used, but it does not have sufficient symmetry when the diagonal axes are introduced. The crystals shown in Fig. 1 have symmetry about all four axes.CRYSTALS 23 Atoms :; Crystals are grown from atoms. Each player has one type of atom and at the start of play decides on a suitable symbol to represent it. With two players one could use noughts and the other crosses, while a third player might use small triangles. Having decided who is to have first move the players take turns to draw one of their atoms in any square not already occupied. This is called “‘seeding”. A crystal may be grown as soon as it contains four seed-atoms. You might be excused for asking “Which crystal? Where?” The answer is any crystal you can visualise on the paper, and which satisfies the crystal-growing rules below. The crystal is “marked” by drawing a heavy pencil line around the boundary and roughly shading the interior. The number of squares within the crystal is counted and added to its owner’s score. The game then continues with the next player placing a seed- atom, Crystal rules: To be legitimate a crystal must satisfy the following rules: 1 The crystal must contain four or more atoms of one type and none of any other type. 2 The crystal must be symmetric with respect to the vertical, horizontal and two diagonal axes passing through its centre point. 3 The crystal must be properly connected. Atoms cannot be connected by their corners only. 4 The crystal must contain no empty holes. 5 The crystal must have no “interlock” boundaries. The last condition merely means that crystals must never lock like jigsaw pieces. Figs 1 and 2 show permissible and impermissible crystals. Study of these will soon clarify the notion of interlock boundaries. ‘The game ends when everyone agrees that no more crystals can be grown. The player with the largest score is the winner. If the crystal shading is done distinctively the scores may readily be checked at the end of the game.24 CRYSTALS To develop your skill rapidly the points in the next section should be noted. Fig. 3 exhibits a specimen game between two players who have kindly numbered their seed-atoms to show the order in which they were placed. Points of strategy : The formation of a crystal leaves you less strongly represented by seed-atoms than your opponents. This effect becomes proportionally less noticeable as the number of un-crystallised seed-atoms increases. Therefore it may not necessarily be advantageous to make crystals as soon as they are possible. The non-starting player or players should place their atoms defensively at first because the starter’s potential for really large paper-filling crystals is high after four or five rounds of play. If there are only two players it’s highly probable that the starter will form the first crystal. In this case the non- starter should concentrate on restricting the size of his opponent’s first crystal. Long spiky crystals do not score heavily but are effective in preventing the opponent from forming large crystals. In any legally formed crystal every atom has a special property which it may be useful to note: suppose the atoms of a crystal, whether seed-atoms or ones “implied” after the crystal boundary has been drawn, could migrate from one square to any other within the crystal. It must be possible for any atom to “walk” in a straight line to one of the symmetry axes without leaving the crystal at any point or touching a boundary. Having reached the axis the wandering atom must be able to turn through an angle of not more than 45 degrees to face the centre of the crystal along the axis it has reached. If it decided to walk to the centre along this axis it could do so without leaving the crystal on its way and without touching a boundary. The facing illustrations and that on the following page give examples of permissible and impermissible crystals.CRYSTALS 25 Insutticient Lmproperly Contains Having interlock symmetry. connected. a hole. Boundaries. Figure 2 Some _Impermissible Crystals26 CRYSTALS SCORE 2 3 12 Player © 43 29 conceded the game 8 after jor 62. move 61 Figure 3 A game of Crystals with the atoms numbered to show the order of playHex A curious race game H= is a race game for two players. It is played on a tri- gular grid, as illustrated. Paper marked in this way is obtainable from good stationers and is sometimes known as “isometric graph paper”. To play Hex, the participants take turns to mark one previously unmarked point of their choice. These points are located at the intersections of the lines. One player marks his points with a circle, the other with a heavy dot, the object of the game being to connect two opposite sides of the playing area with a line of adjacent symbols. Two symbols are adjacent if there is just one short line connecting them. The first player to construct a complete line with his symbols wins the game. Note, however, that his line must connect the correct pair of opposing sides. One player aims to connect one pair of sides and the other tries to connect the other pair of sides, Which pair of sides is allocated to which VY VY DOL RRR oy Figure 1 Hex Sheet showing a Win for the ‘Dot ‘Player28 HEX player is decided at the start of the game. Each corner point is regarded as belonging to both of the sides meeting it. Two lines of marked points cannot cross because this would imply that at least one point was marked with both symbols. It follows that there cannot be a draw in Hex. The playing area : The sheet may be of any size, a larger play- ing area makes for a longer game. It is vital to ensure that each side of the sheet has the same number of points. If you are unable to obtain pre-printed isometric graph paper a sheet may be constructed quite easily from ordinary lined writing paper. It is possible to do this free-hand but a ruler should be used for one set of parallel lines at least. These should be drawn at sixty degrees to the printed lines on the sheet. The angle can be measured with a protractor or by using a pair of compasses to construct a large equilateral tri- angle with its base along one of the printed lines. It’s quite feasible to guess the sixty-degree angle with some practice. Small inaccuracies in registering the lines are not important. A sheet can be used several times if drawn in ink and if play is conducted with pencils applied without undue pressure. The marks can then be erased at the end of each game. Strategy : It’s best to start the game with fairly well separated marks and gradually to fill in the intervening spaces as the game progresses. It is known that the opening player can, in theory, always win the game. This fact, while reassuring, doesn’t indicate how he is to do it in practice. Certain “‘con- stellations” of symbols can always be safely connected how- ever the opponent plays. A simple example is afforded by a pair of symbols at either end of a lozenge made up of two small triangles. Provided the remaining points of the lozenge are free from enemy symbols they can always be connected. Any aspiring “Hex maniac” would be well advised to discover these safe constellations by experimentation.Middleman A trading game Boze: games are becoming very popular. There are now ‘national competitions and many corporations use them in the training of young executives. Middleman bears little re- semblance to the complex games used for these purposes, but it does incorporate such basic decisions as how much to buy, how much to sell and at what prices. Starting : The players, of which there may be any number, take the part of traders dealing in tins of some worthy com- modity, say sardines. Each starts with a fixed sum of money and then buys and sells tins of the product with the object of ending the game with more money than his competitors. The supply and demand of tins must obviously be limited, and limited in a variable way. Since dice are not acceptable in true pencil-and-paper games the market figures are decided by adding together numbers privately chosen by the players at the start of the game. Let’s call these A and D numbers. A stands for “‘available tins” and D for “demand for tins”. On his game sheet, see Fig. 7, each player writes the numbers 0 to 9 into the boxes on the row marked A, but he may write them in any order he chooses. Next he writes the same numbers in a different order into the boxes on the row marked D. The amount of money allocated to each player is ten times the number of persons involved. The units are pounds, dol- lars or any other unit of currency but are not quoted here as they are irrelevant to the playing of the game. Thus, if there are two players each starts with twenty units, if there are three each starts with thirty, and so on. This figure is written into the first CASH box in the first column of the game sheet. Zero is written into the TINS box beneath and then you’re ready to start.30 MIDDLEMAN Jane Fred Mary we TINS WANTED | 6 5 2 OFFER/TIN | 5 4 2 A| 8 oO 2 AVAILABLE 7INS | 10 10 10 TINS BOUGHT 6 4 oO bw nw figure _L The Auction stage of Middleman ~ First Example Game-turns : All the players first visit an auction to buy tins. Each privately writes the number of tins he wants to buy into the TINS WANTED box of the current column on his sheet. (All players start in the first column, and when this is com- plete move to the second column, and so on.) Next he writes the amount of money he is prepared to pay per tin into the OFFER/TIN box. These two numbers constitute the player’s order. After each player has written his order the auctioneer— not one of the players but purely conceptual— reveals how many tins are for sale, which is obtained by each player call- ing out his A number. These are added together to give the total number available. Now our notional auctioneer is like anyone else in that he wants to maximise his profit. He there- fore favours the player who has offered the most money per tin, and the player has his order fulfilled as far as possible. If his order is completely satisfied and there are tins still avail- able the player with the next highest offer per tin has his order dealt with. The procedure goes like this until either all orders are met or there are no tins left to be sold. Each player next writes the number of tins he has succeeded in buying in the next box marked TINS BOUGHT. Here is an example of the auction stage of the game: we have three players— Jane, Fred and Mary. The relevant parts of their game sheets are shown in Fig. 1. Jane has offered most per tin, Fred is next and Mary has tried to get her tins too cheap with the re- sult that she gets none at all.MIDDLEMAN 31 ‘When two or more players have made identical offers per tin, and no other player with a higher offer is still waiting for his order to be met, the tie is resolved by satisfying their orders equally until one of the following situations occurs. a One or more of the players has his order completely satisfied, in which case the auction continues in the normal way. That is, tins are sold to the player with the highest offer price who still has an unfulfilled order. Again, if there is more than one player due to buy tins, and if several players have identical “best” offers, they share tins equally until one of the situations listed occurs. b More than one of the “‘best-offer” players still want tins but the remaining tins cannot be shared equally be- tween them. That’s to say there are fewer tins than “best-offer” players so that they can’t receive even one tin each. In this case these players drop out of the auc- tion and the tins remaining are then offered to the next highest bidder. c There are no tins left to be sold, at which point the auc- tion stage is ended. Here are two more examples showing what happens when there are players offering the same amount for tins: Jane Fred Mary TINS WANTED | 6 5 9 OFFER/TIN | 5| 3 3 A |_7| 3 1 AVAILABLE TINS | 11 11 11 TINS BOUGHT | 6 2 2 Wa man (One tin remains unsold because 1t cannot be shared equally by Fred and Mary and there 18 no other buyer remaining.) figure 2 The Auction Stage of Middleman = Second Example32 MIDDLEMAN Jane Fred Mary. TINS WANTED | 3 g 2 OFFER/TIN | 4. 4. 3 A\| 7 3 1 AVALABLE TINS | 11 i1 11 TINS BOUGHT | 3 8 °o bow Ll Ffigare 3 The Auction Stage of Middleman — Third Example When all the players have filled in their TINS BOUGHT boxes they proceed to fill the CASH and TINS boxes at the head of the selling stage of the game sheets. In the CASH box a player will write a sum equal to the cash in hand minus the money he has just spent in acquiring new tins. The latter amount is, of course, the product of the number of tins bought and the offer price per tin. If he finds that he does not have enough money to pay for his new tins he is bankrupt and eliminated from the game. This situation can occur only through error in placing an order. In the TINS box each player writes a number equal to the sum of his original tins and the number of new tins. All is now ready for the selling stage. Selling : Everyone privately decides how many tins to put on the market and the asking price per tin. These numbers are written in the FOR SALE and the PRICE/TIN boxes. Notice that the market will never pay more than 10 per tin. If any player has asked for 11 or more per tin it counts as if he had written 10 in the PRICE/TIN box. The D numbers are then added together to give the number of tins that the market demands. This is written in every player’s DEMAND box. How do we discover how many tins each player manages to sell? The method is identical to that used in the auctionMIDDLEMAN 33 stage, except that whereas the Auctioneer favoured players offering the “highest” price per tin, the market favours those asking the “lowest” price per tin. The player asking the lowest price sells all his marketed tins unless the market wants less. If two or more players have asked identical prices for their tins, and there is no other player with a lower asking price who still has unsold tins, the tie is resolved by allowing them to sell tins equally until one of the following situations occurs: a One or more of the players has sold all his tins, in which case the sale continues in the normal way, tins being sold by the player with the lowest asking price who still has tins on the market. Again, if there are several players with the same asking price they sell tins equally until one of the situations listed here occurs. b More than one of the “cheapest price” players still have tins to sell but the market wants less tins, so they cannot sell an equal number of tins each. In this case these players withdraw their unsold tins from the market and the next cheapest tins are sold. c¢ The market requires no more tins, in which case the sale is closed. ane Fred Mary FOR SALE | 3 § 4 LRGELLIN, | 5 9 |40 D6 1) 3 DEMAND |10 10 | Z0| 7INS SOLD | 3 5 2 wa Vw Wr Mary 18 left with 2 unsold tins.) Figure 4 The Selling Stage of Middleman = First Example34 MIDDLEMAN Three examples of the selling stage of the game are given in Figures 4, 5 and 6. The last two examples illustrate cases where different players have specified the same asking price. Jane Fred Mary FOR SALE | 6 6 9 (wor BCE, (7 z 10 D|6 L 4 DEMAND | 11 il il TINS SOLD | 5 5 1 bad Yrs (The remaining tin demanded by the. market atter Jane and fred have sola 5 tihng each cannot be provided equally by both Jane and fred, so Mary “$s allowed to provide st.) Figure _5 The Seling Stage of Middleman - Second Example Jane Fred Mary. we FOR SALE | 3 22 (nor BIEL, | 9 | 6 4] DEMAND |1T | [22 | TINS SOLD \ 3 4 (The market demand has been satistied and Mary 13 lef with 18 unsold tins) Figure 6 The Setting Stage of Middleman — Third ExampleCASH HELD TINS HELD TINS WANTED OFFER PER TIN A AVAILABLE TINS TINS BOUGHT CASH HELD TINS HELD FOR SALE PRICE PER TIN D DEMAND TINS SOLD BEE MIDDLEMAN 35 12345 6789 HU [+ L | Figure The_Game Sheet for Middleman When everyone has recorded the number of tins sold in the TINS SOLD box the round is finished and the CASH and TINS boxes at the head of the next column can be filled in. In the CASH box goes the amount in the previous CASH box plus the revenue from sales. The latter quantity is the pro- duct of the number of tins sold and the asking price per tin. The TINS box contains the number of tins held at the start of the selling stage minus the number of tins actually sold.36 MIDDLEMAN Winning : The winner is the person with the most money in the CASH box at the head of column 11. That is, the final column of the game sheet which is not completed beyond the CASH and TINS boxes. The number of tins still held does not enter the reckoning. The final selling stage of the game is obviously important as everyone will be trying hard to sell their remaining tins. Game-sheet : Fig. 7 presents a full game sheet which can be prepared easily on ordinary lined writing paper. A de-luxe version can be produced by writing or typing the text in the left-hand margin on a narrow strip of cardboard clipped into place on a sheet of lined paper. Strategy : The art of playing Middleman well is to recognise which rounds provide buyer’s markets and which provide seller’s markets, and to buy and sell accordingly. One of the interesting features is that a certain amount of prediction is possible on the basis of your A and D numbers and the, so far revealed, A and D numbers of your opponents. It’s rare to get a good buyer’s and a good seller’s market in the same round so it’s often necessary to buy a lot of tins in one round and to hold on to them until a seller’s market comes up. How- ever, it is easy to delay too long, with the result that when an even better buyer’s market occurs you have no spare cash with which to bid for tins.Boxes An “enclosing”’ game Ts game for two players has always been very popular. It’s commonly found, however, that Rule 2, below, is ig- nored, which is a pity because it greatly enhances the game. The players use one sheet of plain paper previously marked with a rectangular framework of dots, as shown in Fig. 1. The dots are destined to be connected together to forma grid, such as that shown in Fig. 2. The size of the playing area is im- material though it’s preferable to have an odd number of squares, or “‘boxes”, in the completed grid. To obtain this result there should be an even number of dots along each side of the initial playing area. The object of the game is to win the greater number of boxes. A game turn: The players take turns to draw one horizontal or vertical line connecting two adjacent and previously un- connected dots. A box is won by that player who draws the fourth and last side of the box. After a player has won a box he writes his initial into the box and immediately takes a further turn. This next turn may also win a box, in which case he would be entitled to take yet another turn. In this way it is possible for a player to win a considerable number of boxes before his opponent may take his turn. The following condi- tions must be observed: 1 After winning a box a player must draw one more line immediately. It’s possible for one line to win two boxes at once but the player takes only one further turn. 2 It is not compulsory to win a box even though there may be a square with three of its sides completed. The figures: Fig. 1 shows a game in progress on a 63-box sheet. Fig. 2 shows the same game completed. Player “A” has38 BOXES won 33 boxes and player ‘‘B” has won 30, so “A” wins by three. Strategy : Towards the end of a game there occur configura- tions of lines called “corridors”. These are of two types, “open”, and “‘closed”. An open corridor is illustrated at the bottom right-hand corner of Fig. 1. It contains four squares (uncompleted boxes). If a player connects two dots in the corridor it becomes a closed corridor and the other player can, if he wishes, win all the boxes in the corridor on his next turn. A closed corridor is shown at the top left-hand corner of Fig. 1. The strategy of the game involves yielding small closed corridors to your opponent and winning large ones yourself. Rule 2 is important here, for suppose that a game Here oad Figure 1 Game Sheet for Boxes with Game in Progress was finished except for a small closed corridor and a larger open one: if you decided to win the whole of the closed corri- dor your final line would have to close the larger open corridor and your opponent would then win it all. If, on the other hand, you were to leave two squares of the original closed corridorFigure 2 Completed Game of Boxes uncompleted your opponent would be forced to close the open corridor at the end of his next turn, and you could then win it all for yourself. Note that corridors do not necessarily have to have two “ends”. The square formation at the top right-hand corner of Fig. 1 is an open corridor as the addition of one more line will produce a set of four squares which could be won by the next player.Coincidences A word game A game does not necessarily have to be fair to be enjoyable. ‘Coincidences is one of these “unfair” games and so long as this is recognised by the players from the outset it will pro- vide much fun and lively argument. Any number can play the game, which is divided into a number of rounds. In each round one of the players acts as “Accountant”. The first thing the accountant does is to think of a word of about six letters. He secretly records the word on a piece of paper and announces the number of letters it contains. The other players attempt to discover his word by calling out sequences of letters of equal length to the accountant’s word. All the accountant has to do is to count up the number of coincident letters in the last sequence called and state the result. He must not say where in his word the coincidences occur. For ex- ample, suppose the accountant’s word is YELLOW and that the sequence called out by one of the players is EEEOOO. The second and fifth letters coincide so the accountant simply replies “two”. The players take turns to call out a sequence with the player on the accountant’s left starting the proceedings. When some player calls out a sequence which exactly matches the accountant’s word the round ends and a score is recorded as follows. Scoring : The player spelling out the accountant’s word re- ceives two points, the other players receiving one point each. The accountant also scores as follows: if his word is discovered in fewer trial sequences than there are letters in his word he scores nothing. After this he is entitled to a score of one point until the number of sequences called is equal to twice the number of letters, at which point his score rises to two, When the number of sequences equals three times the number of words the accountant scores three and so on.COINCIDENCES 41 As an example, suppose the accountant’s word was CEN- TURY and that it was found on the fifteenth trial sequence. The player calling CENTURY receives two points, the other players one point each, while the accountant receives two points. When all rounds have been played everyone totals their round-scores and the person with the highest re- sult is the winner. Word restrictions: As in the majority of word games the ac- countant should not choose proper nouns normally spelt with a capital letter, technical terms unlikely to be known to the other players or hyphenated words. There is no restriction whatsoever on the sequences called out by the other players. Recording sequences : Each player should record his own trial sequences, and those of the other players in some sort of table. The sample game below shows tables in which the number of coincidences is written against each sequence. Circled letters are those which the player firmly believes to be in the Accountant’s word. Sample game: In this game there were two participants, A and B. Thus there were two rounds with A acting as account- ant in the first round and B as accountant in the second round. Strategy : It can be seen that there is considerable scope for skill in the game of Coincidences. On one hand there is the mathematical problem of efficiently permuting the letters to obtain matchings as quickly as possible. On the other hand the game calls for the “literary” ability of recognising words from a skeleton of their letters. Notice that in the sample game both players endeavour to find vowels as early as possible. In round 1 player B had a lucky inspiration at trial 9. In round 2 player A had to work hard to discover the first letter once he had deduced that UDDLE were the last five letters. An elementary knowledge of letter frequency in English words is necessary to play well. It’s also useful to know the42 COINCIDENCES Round 1 Round 2 AS8 word is BS word is WHISKY PUDDLE Score in round 1: Accountant A scores = 1 point Player B scores 2 Score in round 2: Accountant B scores 4 = 3 pots Player A scores 2 B wins the game with a total of 5 points. A has scored a total of 3 points. Figure 1 Sample Game of CotncidencesCOINCIDENCES 43 most common digrams (pairs of letters) and trigrams (trip- lets). The table in Fig. 2 shows these and has the most fre- quently occurring group at the head of each column. The second entry in each column gives the next most common group and so on. Single letters Digrams Trigrams E TH THE T IN ING A ER AND O° RE ION N AN ENT L AE FOR Ss AR 710 R EN ERE 4H 7 HER Zz TE ATE D AT VER c ON TER Uv HA THA Figure 2 The Most Common Letter Groups in LnglishAggression A war game Aseression is a war-game for two players. Each has 100 armies to be distributed in certain countries on a map which is drawn at the start of the game. A series of battles are then fought with the object of neutralising enemy armies. The player retaining control of the most countries is the winner. There are three phases, in each of which the same player moves first. Phase 1: The players take turns to delineate one country on the map. This is done by drawing the boundary lines of a single enclosed area on a piece of plain paper. There are no restrictions on the size, shape or location of the countries, though it is recommended that they be drawn reasonably large. Twenty countries are to be drawn in the standard size game. Fig. 1 shows a typical map at the end of phase 1. The countries have been given letter-names to aid play in phase 3 but they are not essential to the game and may be omitted. Phase 2: The players take turns to allocate some of their armies to one unoccupied country. The number of armies allocated is written into the country concerned and that country is then regarded as occupied. The player taking first turn should identify his own allocations by boldly under- lining his figures. Phase 2 continues until all countries are occupied or until both players have allocated all of their 100 armies. Fig. 2 shows the map at the end of phase 2 in a typical game to be played by Napoleon and Wellington. Note that Napoleon has favoured a small number of strong coun- tries while Wellington has distributed his armies to a larger number of countries with relatively fewer armies in each. Countries B and N have been left unoccupied. Phase 3: The players now take turns to conquer one or otherAGGRESSION 45 of the opponent’s countries. A country may be conquered if there are more of your armies in adjacent countries than your opponent has in the country under attack. Similarly your opponent may conquer one of your countries, at his turn, ifhe has a superiority of armies in adjacent countries. To qualify as “adjacent”, countries must have a visible length of com- mon boundary. Thus, in the figures, countries M, B, and D are adjacent to A, while countries A, M, K, F, C and D are all adjacent to B, and so on. The number of armies in the conquered country is crossed out and they take no further part. The armies carrying out the attack are in no way de- pleted and may be used for other attacks later in the game. The object of the game is to retain more of your own occu- pied countries than the opponent retains of his. Note that countries you conquer don’t contribute to your score but merely reduce your opponent’s score by one as he will have retained one less country at the end of the game. Fig. 3 shows the course of phase 3 of the Napoleon-v- Wellington campaign. The table is added to illustrate the sequence of moves. Napoleon took first turn and his armies are therefore underlined. The game finished with Napoleon holding four of his original countries and Wellington holding six of his original countries. Wellington’s strategy of starting with more occupied countries than his opponent paid off although Napoleon did the most conquering. Wellington was the winner by two countries. Strategy : A considerable amount of mathematical analysis of Aggression is possible but is not included here. The best strategy depends, in complex ways, upon the original map. It is possible to enjoy the game, and play well, without going into higher mathematics. Several tips are: a Create “buffer” countries to protect weak countries dur- ing phase 2. b Avoid crowding enemy-held countries at the start of phase 3. c The first countries to attack in phase 3 are not neces- sarily the strongest of the enemy-held countries, but those which, by teamwork, can most damage your posi- ton.