Slimetrail

Slimetrail

Inventor: Bill Taylor, 1992

Ranks: N by M

Sowing: Fractured

Region: New Zealand

Slimetrail was invented by Bill Taylor (New Zealand) in 1992. It was the first game with "shared" sowing that leaves a common track.

The game-theoretical values of many Slimetrail boards were analyzed by Dave Boll (USA) in 1993.

On January 12, 2008, the game was implemented by Arty Sandler on igGameCenter.

Rules

Possible Position on a 5x9 Board after Move 1

The game is played on a NxM rectangle of squares. Each player has a goal square in one corner of the board, diagonally opposite to his opponent's goal square.

The first player places a piece on any square except the goal squares (or "targets").

Then the pie rule is used to determine who plays next.

After that a player moves the piece to an orthogonally adjacent square, leaving a token (e.g. a Go stone) on the square he vacates.

It is not permitted to visit a square twice.

The player whose goal square is reached first (it doesn't matter by whom) wins. If no player can reach his target, the game is a draw.

Variants

Chess King Slimetrail

The piece may move like the king in the game of Chess.

Hex Slimetrail

Slime Trail can also be played on a rhombus board instead of a rectangular one. According to Dave Boll the targets are best in the obtuse corners, since having them in the acute corners easily result in draws.

Slime-Moku

A variant with a different winning condition is Slime-Moku.

No Draws

João Neto claims that "it is illegal to go to a cell from which it becomes impossible to reach any home cell". This is contrary to the oldest description of the game (published in 1993), which permitted draws.

External Links

• Slimetrail at Game Cabinet
• Slimetrail on World of Abstract Games
• Czech Rules
• Slimetrail at igGameCenter
• [1] by Jorge Nuno Silva

Copyright

© Ralf Gering
Under the CC by-sa 2.5 license.