Page 6 of 11
My second game, after the first one ended up like Frankenstein's monster, was a quest for simplicity. Hex was chosen as a starting point because it didn't come much simpler than that, in terms of rules. A hexagonal board was chosen to get away from Hex.
There was this half hour in which several winning conditions were reviewed, before three of them merged into Havannah. I immediately knew I had my game.
This is a game between Mirko Rahn (white) and Pascal Huybers (black). I'll leave it without comments, except to say that both are excellent players.
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Mirko Rahn (white) - Pascal Huybers (1-0)
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It should be noted that Havannah didn't emerge from any a priori concept. It was just a lucky merger of three winning conditions. Typically, the game is not invariant to board size because the relationships of these conditions change with it. At base-10 the game is deep and wide, while the pie rule provides a good balance.