Awithlaknannai

How to play awithlaknannai

The rules

• Awithlaknannai is a game of the alquerque family, played by the Zuni of New Mexico.
• The board is a long row of eight diamonds, each cut in half by a centre line. That makes nine points on the centre line, eight above it and eight below. The diagonals run from a point below, through a point on the centre line, to a point above, so a jump over a centre point follows them. No line joins the outer tips to each other.
• Each player has twelve pieces. White takes the row below and the four centre-line points at one end; black takes the row above and the four at the other end. Every point is covered except the one in the middle.
• Take turns. On your turn, move one piece one step along a line to a neighbouring empty point.
• Capturing works as in alquerque. With an enemy piece next to yours on a line and an empty point straight beyond, jump over it and take it off the board. The same piece may go on jumping in the same move, as long as another capture is open.
• You don't have to capture, but if you could have and chose not to, your opponent may take that piece off the board.
• You win when you have taken all of your opponent's pieces.

In this version

• White moves first unless you choose otherwise.
• The penalty falls on a piece that could have captured. Your opponent takes it before making their own move, and may choose not to; if they move without taking it, the chance is gone. Stopping a chain of jumps early is not punished.
• Pieces you jump stay on the board until your move is finished, so you cannot jump the same piece twice or land on its point.
• If you cannot move on your turn, you lose.
• The game is drawn if the same position comes up three times, or after sixty moves without a capture.

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