jayhawklov: Sounds like an even match to me. 8 of yours vs. 5 of ours.

In all seriousness, though, hawk: say what you need to say to get the Snut-man back where he belongs--on our team!

Richard III: Doesn't D-pente involve the option for position-swapping at some point? That does eliminate the P1 advantage, but to me, it changes the essence of the game. If there is one (or more than one) option to swap colors, then the game becomes psychological, a kind of poker-like game where the object is to trick your opponent into taking the weaker positoin. I can understand why Gary might like a game like that (he plays more than a bit of poker, I believe, as well as pente), but that doesn't look like pente anymore to me.

Thad: Ok, that makes sense, although once you introduce the possibility of a draw, it seems that the proposition hinges on a certain definition of "optimal." For instance, in chess, would it be optimal to play a move that assures you of a draw, or would it be optimal to play a move that risks losing for a chance at winning, depending on what your opponent does? Obviously, if we assume both sides are playing optimally, then you take the draw because an optimal play against your move will make you lose, if there is a chance you can. But people don't play optimally.

But you're talking theory, and I'm talking practice. Point taken.

But wouldn't a drawable version of pente be harder to master (to memorize optimal play) than a non-drawable version? I imagine (but am only guessing, having not done the analysis myself) that this slight rule change would cause most of the major lines to be re-analyzed, as the optimal play of even the most basic openings (wedge, for example) leads to very close games, if both sides play them optimally.

Thad: No. Any skill game that has the possibility of a draw does not have this problem because there are ways for P2 to play for the draw as a last resort, which causes P1 to have to take chances, which makes the game winnable for either side. Every time this comes up, I tell whoever will listen that all that needs to be done to fix the P1 advantage at the highest levels of pente is to give both sides the same number of moves. If P2 can pente or take the 5th pair on the move immediately following P1 doing so, then the game would be a draw.

There are other ways of fixing the problem too (different ways of swapping colors early in the game, etc.), but these modifications have always seemed to me to change the essence of the game more than is necessary. As long as there is no way to draw in Pente, the game will be busted, inherently flawed in favor of P1. And that's a shame.

Thad: Most pente boards are played with multi-colored glass beads called stones. Of the stones I've seen, the closest that would approximate opaque white is actually clear. But the first player is referred to as "white" by definition, so that if we are going to have white and black pieces on this site, it makes more sense for P1 to play the white pieces.