[HN Gopher] How to Play Renju
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       How to Play Renju
        
       Author : fsnowdin
       Score  : 29 points
       Date   : 2024-03-15 12:20 UTC (1 days ago)
        
 (HTM) web link (www.renju.net)
 (TXT) w3m dump (www.renju.net)
        
       | tromp wrote:
       | The page doesn't describe the rules that make Renju a more
       | complicated game than plain 5-in-a-row, a.k.a. Gomoku.
       | 
       | First, Renju has the rule of forbidden moves to limit Black's
       | advantage, something gomoku does not have. Second, Renju utilizes
       | special opening rules to balance the starting positions of games
       | [1].
       | 
       | Gomoku was solved in 1992 by Victor Allis as a 1st player win. A
       | version called Free Renju was solved in 2001 as 1st player win.
       | The standard Renju with modern opening rules such as Yamaguchi
       | and Soosorv-N has not been solved.
       | 
       | [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Renju
        
         | sltkr wrote:
         | It does include those rules, just towards the end of the page.
         | I do think it would have been clearer to mention that Renju is
         | based on Gomoku upfront.
        
         | elijaht wrote:
         | The page does cover forbidden moves, and in a later tutorial
         | mentions the starting position
         | 
         | """ What you learned so far actually is not quite renju yet.
         | The basic 5 in a row game is called gomoku. All the beginners
         | start with learning gomoku at first, and after some time, they
         | move on to renju. Renju is a bit more complex game, and there
         | are more rules. While gomoku is just an easy family game, renju
         | is a serious sport and there are even world championships in
         | that game. Renju game was developed from from gomoku game by
         | Japanese masters about 100 years ago. The reason why gomoku was
         | not satisfying for players any more was the fact that the
         | skillful first player (black) could always win the game.
         | Additional rules had to be made to balance the game and give
         | the white player more chance for resistance. The game with
         | those balance rules is called RENJU. So, here are the three
         | rules that make renju different from gomoku:
         | 
         | Black player is not allowed to make the 3x3 fork. Black player
         | is not allowed to make the 4x4 fork. Black player is not
         | allowed to make an overline (6 or more stones in a row). """
         | 
         | """ With the years of serious games and analyses by strong
         | masters, it became evident that the forbidden moves alone are
         | not sufficient enough to provide the balance in the game, black
         | was still having the advantage. In order to give the best
         | balance, there were developed some opening procedures that both
         | players need to follow. Below is the list of those procedures.
         | 
         | The first player sets the opening pattern, consisting of two
         | blacks and one white stone. The second player choose either
         | black or white side. The player with white stones plays the 4th
         | move. The player with black stone puts two choices of the 5th
         | move on the board. The player with white stones removes one of
         | the 5th moves, and plays the white stone - the 6th move """
        
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       (page generated 2024-03-16 23:00 UTC)