Viking Board Game Hnefatafl Rules Programs And Features
The Rules of Tablut Equipment, Preparation and Objective Tablut is played on a board consisting of an 9 x 9 grid of squares. Accompanying the board, there should be 16 dark pieces and 8 light pieces usually in the form of round counters plus an additional King piece. The King is usually taller, sometimes in the same colour as the light pieces and sometimes in a more regal hue such as gold. Tablut is a game of unequal sides and different objectives. The King is placed in the centre of the board and the light defending pieces surround him in the pattern shown.
The dark pieces are placed in 4 groups in a particular formation at the middle of each edge of the board. The aim for the defending light coloured side is to get the King to a corner square of the board.
The aim of the attacking side is to kill the King before he escapes to a corner. For this reason, it is usually best to play an even number of games so that both players get the same number of chances to defend. Basic Play The attacking side moves first. All pieces move like the rook in Chess – in a straight line for as many empty squares as the player chooses. Pieces cannot hop over other pieces and cannot move diagonally. Capturing only happens when a piece is moved so that a single opposing piece ends up trapped between two of the players pieces. A captured piece is immediately removed from the board.
- Free Download Viking Board Game Hnefatafl Rules Programs For Parents. This game features. Hnefatafl is a viking board game that is in a way similar.
- Very good and useful review! We are new to the Viking Game and Hnefatafl, and should be grateful if you could suggest some (fairly easy) variations that we could use.
It is possible to capture more than one piece at once. The King is unarmed and cannot capture.
Decorations
Hnefatafl, also known as The Viking Game, The King's Table or simply Tafl, is one of the rare breed of games with two unequal sides. The defending side comprises.
A piece that is next to the corner square can be captured by a single opposing piece. The piece is moved so that the opposing piece is trapped between the corner and the piece moved - the corner square acts as the second capturing piece. A piece can safely move to a square between two of the opponent's pieces without being captured. The King is harder to capture because opposing pieces must surround him on all four sides or, if the King is at the edge of the board, on the 3 sides available. Only the King is allowed into the corner squares – and, of course, such a move wins the game. Variations Variations of Tafl games abound. For instance some versions say the King only has to reach the edge of the board.
Some versions say that the King can be captured in the same way as any other piece. A good variation is that the King's player must say 'Check' if he can get the King to the edge of the board on his next turn. There are clues from the Nordic Sagas hinting that the King cannot take part in captures but many versions have an armed King who can capture.
While I will not presume to attempt objective criticism of a game over a thousand years older than I am, it would still be useful to review some versions of the game that are on the market now, and some versions that, being recently printed, are still available to those who know where to look for them. I intend, then, to post occasional reviews of the sets available, as and when I can obtain them. The first is a set that I have owned for a number of years, and from the pictures shown on this site, a lot of other people seem to have it also. I am talking about The Viking Game, made by History Craft Ltd. Of Cirencester, England.
History Craft are not primarily a maker of games, but are more involved in moulded plastics. I am unaware what series of happy coincidences might have induced them to become one of the foremost manufacturers of this particular game. Background Hnefatafl, for those who have not seen it before, is a game created somewhere in Scandinavia, some time in the first millennium. Being of that era, it is without a strong theme, though its mechanics are not so contrived as to prevent a theme being easily pasted on to it.
The most common theme, not unexpectedly, is a Viking theme, hence the name of the particular set I am looking at now. In hnefatafl a king sits at the centre of a square board, with a number of his men around him. Distributed around the edges of the board are twice their number of enemies. The king must escape from the field of battle, while his enemies try to capture him. Generally, pieces move in straight, orthogonal lines, like a rook in chess, and a piece is captured by surrounding it with two enemies. As those players over the last thousand years left us with incomplete information, the variations within this framework are many, much like the national variations in chess and draughts.
Gameplay The Viking Game adopts a board of eleven squares by eleven, like the 12th century board found at Trondheim, in Norway. It provides 37 pieces: a king, twelve defenders and twenty-four attackers. The defenders are positioned close around the king, in a diamond formation, while the attackers hug the four edges of the board, in four 'T' shaped formations. In this game the king escapes the field of battle through the marked corner squares, and to prevent the exits being easily blocked, his enemies may not land on these squares (nor may his friends, for that matter). They are also vulnerable when sat next to these squares, as we shall shortly see.
Movement of the pieces is as above described, like a chess rook. This includes the king, who can stride across the board as quickly as any other piece. The corner and central squares, however, may be occupied only by the king. Capture is also as described above, with a few variations.
The king himself must be surrounded on four sides by enemies. If he sits beside the central square, he would be invulnerable, so the rules allow him to be captured by surrounding him on three sides, if the fourth side is the central square. Attackers and defenders may be captured by surrounding them between an enemy and a marked corner square, so the corners cannot be easily blocked by eight attackers sitting beside them.
So much for the detail. How does it play? At first, it plays remarkably well. Beginners might say that the king has too easy a time, but this is not necessarily so. The king's side relies on short-term tactics, taking advantage of opportunities for escape, or for weakining the attackers' blockade. The attackers, however, need to look at long term strategy, carefully positioning themselves to gradually form the blockade and close in upon the king. When both players are aware of the longer term strategies, the game becomes more even.
There may be a flaw with these rules, however. Even though it takes twelve attackers to completely block the king's corner exits safely, these formations can easily be created, and the defenders have little opportunity to prevent them. The compact formation of the defenders at the start of the game exacerbates this problem, and I have yet to find a strategy for the king's men to prevent at least three corners being sealed off completely. Quality Let us start at the outside, and work our way inwards. The game I have was bought at the Jorvik museum in York, England, and fairly represents the set available in this country. I have seen from photographs that the box varies in different places.
The box is compact, about 14' by 6', and has a fake leather covering, bearing the name of the game in gold-effect print. Inside the box, one will find the rules, the thirty-seven pieces, and a linen 'board' rolled up and neatly stored. The rules are printed on a folded card, in four languages. They start with several paragraphs of history which is interesting, and largely accurate in the important points. After an explanation of the inspiration behind this particular set, the rules proper begin. They are reasonably clear and concise, being explained in eight numbered points. Illustrations show the various methods of capture, though they fail to mention whether multiple pieces may be captured at once.
The usual assumption is that they can, if all become individually surrounded at the same instant. The board is printed in black on cream-coloured linen. Interesting Viking-inspired designs have been used to mark the important centre and corner squares, as well as every other square on which a piece starts the game. I have heard people complain that it is difficult to make the board lie flat. I have no such difficulty, probably because I roll the board up with the pattern on the outside. I am not a fan of fabric boards, but this one has their common advantage of compact storage when not in use. The pieces are made from a substantial moulded plastic.
This is not cheap plastic, as one might expect from a children's game, but reasonably weighty, well-made resin. The king and his defenders are in an ivory colour, whereas the attackers are in a wood-like dark brown. While the defenders and attackers are all supposedly equal, interest has been added by varying the designs - at least two different designs have been used, in addition to the king. The good quality feel of the pieces makes them a pleasure to play with. Conclusion The Viking Game is a good quality product which is still, I believe, in production, and is widely available. Many museums sell it, and in the United Kingdom the Past Times chain of shops usually have it in stock at Christmas time.
It is not particularly expensive, being about £15 in the shops here. My reservations about the rules can be evaded simply by experimenting with variations, of which many have been published, and I can therefore recommend The Viking Game wholeheartedly to anyone who wants to try something a bit different. Edits in red. One simple solution is to lay out the defenders in a cross instead of a diamond. That allows defenders to harass the attackers' corner works more quickly. It works, but in my opinion all games might start to look the same once you've played a few times.
And it ignores the pretty markings on the board! The rest of the solutions involve allowing the king to win at the edge of the board, instead of the corners.
Doing this alone makes the game too easy for the king's side, so you need to do one of the following to bring the game back to balance again: 1. Disallow the king from capturing attackers. The king is weaponless, and though he's more difficult to capture than other pieces, it's now easier to trap him within a group of attackers without your attackers themselves being in danger. It has a documented but dubious historical precedent (a piece of poetry which, interpreted one way, refers to the king being 'weaponless'). Allow the king to be captured by surrounding him on two sides instead of four. With this the king has to be a lot more careful where he goes, and can't meander as freely around the board.
Though he's still as powerful as the other pieces, he's more vulnerable, like the king in chess, since his loss decides the game. This rule is exactly as described in a document of 1587, so it has historical precedent.
With a novice playing the attackers, you might want to apply both rules 1 and 2 with the edge victory, but between reasonably experienced players just one or the other should suffice.