Buga Shadara

Opening Position

Alternate Names

Bouge Shodre

No. of Players

Two

Equipment

A Buga Shadara board; two black counters called buga, representing boar (or sometimes deer); and twenty-four white counters representing dogs are required for play. There are two different boards which may be used for this game, but the initial setup and rules are the same. Some accounts of this game refer to the buga as “Kings” or "Deer”.

History

Buga-shadara is a traditional folk game from Tuva, an autonomous republic in south-central Siberia, Russia. Ancient boards that date to the 7th or 8th Century CE have been discovered and indicate that this game is probably very ancient.

Objective

The objective of the dogs is to immobilize the bugas so that they can't make any legal move. The bugas try to reduce the number of dogs enough so that they are unable to do so. Typically, the dog player will give up when they have ten dog counters or less left as it takes several goats to successfully immobilize a buga.

Play

The counters are positioned on the board as shown above. In addition to the eight dog counters white commences with on the board, there are also another sixteen white counters that begin off of the board. With alternating turns, these remaining sixteen white counters must be entered onto any vacant position on the board in white's first sixteen moves. White counters cannot move until all of them have been placed on the board. The black buga player, however, has the first move and will likely capture one of the white dogs on the first turn. Buga have the power of the short jump and may jump and capture an adjacent dog counter by landing in a necessarily vacant position just beyond along one of the lines on the board. Only one dog counter may be captured per turn and captured dogs are removed from the board for the rest of the game. Capture is not compulsory for the buga. All counters move along the lines to any adjacent and vacant intersection one intersection at a time, but white may only move after all counters have been entered into the game and black may only move on a turn when not also making a jump and capture move.

Strategy

The white dogs should try to drive the bugas toward the edge of the board where they will have better chances of immobilizing them. The extensions on the sides of the board are strategic strongholds for both players and an attempt should be made to control them early in the game. It is very essential for the white dogs to control the center square if they want to immobilize the buga.

Variations

One variant allows the white dogs to move immediately after dropping the first counter. This makes the task much easier for white.

Alternate board with identical opening position for the counters

A plethora of boards have spawned for the play of this game and it seems to be more widespread than initially realized by myself and others. Variations are known from Mongolia, China (especially Tibet) and Kazakhstan and Kyrgyzstan.