PahTum is one of the oldest known games in the history. The ancient boards of this game had been found at dig sites of Old Mezopotamia and Asyria. The game is played on 7x7 board with an odd number of "black holes" which are randomly generated for each game. An example of a start position is shown on the following picture:
The game is played by placing white and black stones on the board, each player places one stone per turn. A stone can be placed only on squares which do not contain another stone or a black hole.
The goal of the game is to create more connected lines of stones than an opponent. A connected line must be either vertical or horizontal and may contain only stones of the same colours, no opponent stones or black holes. A player is awarded by a certain amount of points for each connected line of his colour:
1 stone = 0 points
2 stones = 0 points
3 stones = 3 points
4 stones = 10 points
5 stones = 25 points
6 stones = 56 points
7 stones = 119 points
The next picture displays a sample position after several moves:
The white has 1 line of 3 stones and 1 line of 4 stones, it makes 3 + 10 = 13 points. The black has 2 lines of 2 stones and 1 line of 3 stones, which is 0 + 0 + 3 = 3 points.
The game is finished when the board is full of stones and black holes. The player with higher amount of points is the winner. If both players have the same points, the game is a draw. Play this game
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