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Feb 11th, 2015 at 12:33:20 - Othello (Other) |
Othello is a two player game that is played on an 8x8 board. Each player has a set of round stones, one set colored black for player one and one set colored white for player 2. The board is initially set up so that the four center spots on the board are filled with a diagonal of 2 white pieces and 2 black pieces, making a square of white black on top then black white on bottom. Each player takes turns placing one piece, starting with black. The player must place their piece in a line (diagonally, horizontally, or vertically) starting from one of their pieces and ending in an empty spot on the board that is in line with the starting piece, and touching a game piece of either color also in that line. The line made must also contain a piece of the opposite color. All pieces of the opposite color located in the line made from the beginning point to end point are flipped over to be the color of the player making the move. This line goes from where the player places their piece to their next closest piece in that line, not necessarily to the beginning of the line. So if you have a line of white white black white black and placed a black piece at the beginning, it would only take the pieces in between the black that was placed and the first black it hits going through the row, making the new row black black black black white black. This is called taking a piece. If there is no place left for a player to place a piece in such a way that the line formed will take an opponents piece, then that player's turn is skipped. If neither player has any remaining moves, then the game is over. Whoever has the most pieces of their color on the board at this point is the victor.
Play #1:
For my first play-through, my strategy consisted entirely of attempting to gain control of one of the 4 corners of the board. By gaining control of one of the four corners, you gain a spot on the board that is impossible to take, and it allows you to set up a line from one side of the board to the other, which is also impossible to take, if it is on the edge of the board. The game started off poorly, as I accidentally allowed my opponent to get to the edge of the board first, but I knew all was not lost as long as I could secure a corner piece. By securing a corner piece, it is fairly easy to take over the two edges of the board near the corner piece, so long as the other corner piece is not taken. I tried to control the center of the board with the few pieces I had, so that if my opponent made a move that put him one space away from a corner I would be able to take it. At one point I only had four pieces left, but because I controlled the center I was eventually able to capture the top left corner of the board. The game immediately swung heavily in my favor, as my opponent had control of the top edge of the board and the left edge of the board and by taking the top left corner I wrested control of the edges from him. From there I methodically placed my pieces in straight lines, careful to never give him a chance to gain a corner or fill in a row, and managed to beat him 50-13.
Play #2:
For my second play-through, my initial strategy was roughly the same. I tried to set up the board in such a way that I controlled the diagonal spaces that were offset by 2 from the corner pieces. This way, if my opponent took this spot he would be one away from the corner, which would allow me to set up a diagonal to take the corner before he got to it. This game I was unable to maintain control of the center of the board, but I was able to take control of the bottom edge and the right edge, while my opponent had the top edge. Because of this, I focused on defending my edges and making sure my opponent was unable to take a corner or a spot on my edge. I continuously defended my right edge until he made the mistake of taking a diagonal that put one of his pieces on my edge, one spot away from the bottom right corner. I then took his piece and gained the bottom right corner, effectively taking control of the entire bottom right half of the board. My opponent had still not managed to get a corner, so now my number one goal was to keep him from getting a corner while slowly spreading from the bottom right corner in such a way that he could not gain a foothold anywhere else on the edge, slowly pushing him back to the top left corner, without letting him actually take the corner, where I could then take the top left corner from him, completely controlling the board. In my attempt of this, I managed to get a black piece in between one of his rows on the top edge that he had not filled in, which was in a spot that he could not take the piece, so I was able to take the top left corner from him. Unfortunately, he managed to get a piece in a similar situation on the bottom part of the board right beside my bottom right corner piece, and was able to take the bottom left corner, giving him control over the entire bottom row except for my corner piece. From here my strategy was to focus on the top and the right, as he had too much control of the bottom left, and attempt to take the top right corner to solidfy my control of the top side. Unfortunately I was not able to do this, and ended up taking control of the left edge in such a way that I was not in contact with his corner piece, so that he could not take the edge. I focused on taking as many pieces as I could with each move in such a way that he could not take them back, but it was much closer this time. The game ended with my opponent taking the top right diagonal, but I had managed to set the board up such that it was the last spot and he did not get to take too many pieces by moving there. I ended up barely winning, with a score of 38-26.
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