Havannah

Game deconstructed by Clayton Chod

The Hexagonal Abstract Strategy game Havannah was created by Dutch game designer Christian Freeling. The game belongs to the Connection Game family and has been compared the the games Hex and TwixT. The game is played with two players with different colored stones or markers.

The Goal: The object of the game is to create one of three winning conditions by placing your mark on the hexagonal cells. The winning conditions are the way in which you make marks. To win the game you can create a ring which is a complete loop around at least one cell, it can even belong to the other player.

You can also make a bridge which connects two corner pieces.

and finally you can make a fork which connects three non-corner edge pieces.

Core Mechanic: The core mechanic is the player's ability to claim a hexagonal cell for his or her self with the intention of creating a path of shapes that match the winning conditions.

Space of the Game: The space of the game is a hexagon comprised of hexagonal cells. The edges of the large hexagon must be equidistant. an 8 x 8 hexagon is considered to be a standard size for beginners to the game.

Objects, Attributes, States: The main, in fact, only objects in the game are hexagons. They can be either unclaimed, claimed by player 1, or claimed by player two with the objective of making a path which falls within the constraints of the winning conditions This makes it a connection game like Go Moku, Tic Tac Toe, and many others.

Actions: A player may place his or her marker on an unclaimed hexagonal cell.

Rules:

The player may only claim one hexagonal cell per turn.

The player can not relinquish his or her ownership of a cell.

The ring formation must be formed around either an empty cell or a cell owned by the other player.

The bridge formation must be between two corner cells

The fork formation must contain three edge cells, this excludes corner cells.

Skills Players Learn: The player must decide if they wish to fill in hexagonal cells to fulfill their own winning condition or obstruct the other player's attempt to fulfill a winning condition. A great skill for the player to pick up is to see how many turns it will take for the opponent to complete a winning condition. A good player should be able to tell if they can complete their condition before the other player can complete his. A good player must also be able to detect the multiple plausible winning conditions his opponent can make from a hexagonal cell. Your opponent may not always be stopped from completing a winning condition but he can be slowed by being force to mark cells around your own. It depends on how much sooner you can win before your opponant.

The opponent's ignorance can be a powerful weapon. Take this particular game for example:

Near the beginning of the game Red was attempting to create a fork while Blue was trying to make a ring. Generally a ring is quicker to complete than a fork so Red used some of his turns to obstruct its creation with his own marks. In doing so he was able to place a mark on two different edge pieces. With just the right amount of defense and the opponent's ignorance, Red was able to make it nearly all the way to the next edge piece needed to make a fork. Blue was busy trying to create another ring and didn't realize until it was too late to slow Red down before he could complete said ring.

The main skill player's must have when it all boils down to it is the ability to see if your opponent can inevitably win before you can and slowing him down so you can win.