Play the Viking board game Hnefatafl online | Viking Chess | Tablut | Nefatavl

Play Hnefatafl Online.

The Viking board game.
Tafl against humans.

Тавлеи против людей.
(Button in top panel.)
Rasmus Holbroe vikings
Artist: Copyright © Rasmus Holbroe (Jan. 2016).
Search! Who is Nicolas Cartier, who wrote this paper?
LE TABLUT DE LINNAEUS / Nicolas Cartier (November 2011).
Steve Lonsdale ("Xerxes") visited Erik the Red's settlement in Brattahlid, Greenland, last year and writes about it here:
Brattahlid
The January 2018 issue of Tabletop Gaming Magazine has an article on hnefatafal, including input from David Lonsdale ("Animals") and Damian Walker ("Cyningstan"), and mention of this website. The magazine is available in PDF form from here (article starts on page 48):
Tabletop Gaming Magazine
(Xerxes)
Small forum.


  06-18/02:11 mccluskeyp:  @Hagbard, I think you are doing a great job too.  Regarding re-running the past tournaments, Scottish Ard Ri 7x7 cross throneless needs more experimentation to determine if it is truly solved or not.  At this point it appears White will always win with best play, but my hope springs eternal!

  06-17/23:30 Hagbard:  Thanks for the good words.
@Casshern: That's a good idea!
Perhaps Sea battle tafl 13x13, Scottish Ard Ri, Fetlar or Sea battle 9x9 should be repeated?

  06-17/10:58 Trygve:  I agree with «animals», Hagbart's doing a great job as I can see!

  06-17/10:10 animals:  Most of us appreciate the hard work you're putting in Hagbard, and I personally think the site is well run.

  06-17/09:38 edmond-dantes:  with the bad management of this site you will drive out and the few players left to play here. WARNING

  06-17/05:06 casshern:  I think the 4 player limit has been good. Personally, I don’t mind playing large tournaments with many players. But larger tournaments tend to take more time to finish. Resulting in few tournaments throught the year. Now there is a new tournament every week. And we have been able to play many different variants in a short amount of time. The one thing I will ask Hagbard is can we have multiple tournaments if more than 4 players are interested. Since, as Jrton80 said, some tournaments full up right away. Leaving who knows how many players locked out. Hagbard, if a tournament fulls up (4 players) within the first 3 days, could you open up another group? And if more than 8 players are interested another group? And so on. Then perhaps the winners of the groups could play a final round? This is essentially what we currently have planned for the WTC this year.

  06-17/00:31 mccluskeyp:  I think you can make a case for both sides there @Hagbard.  @edmond-dantes may not mind playing many simultaneous games.  I personally like the 4 player limit.  If there is no cap on the number of players then I probably will just not join tournaments.

  06-16/14:47 Hagbard:  Other opinions on this? A different limit?

  06-16/12:47 edmond-dantes:  please remove this foolishness from having a limit on the number of players

  06-15/21:27 Hagbard:  It's to limit the size of normal tournaments, so that the player knows he'll have no more than six games. In return a new tournament starts every week.

  06-15/21:03 Trygve:  Why is it «Max 4 pers.»-limit for the tournaments?

  06-15/20:41 Hagbard:  Bogd Khan won the Fetlar tourn.
Casshern shared with Ded fomich the win of the Sea battle 9x9 tourn.
and Casshern won the Simple Tafl 11x11 tourn.

  06-15/11:37 Hagbard:  New proposed scheme for World Championship:
http://aagenielsen.dk/hnefataflforum/phpBB3/viewtopic.php?f=4&p=1046#p1046
Registering could begin in 14 days and Round 1 start Sep. 15th.

  06-14/01:46 Hagbard:  Indeed. Since there's a wish, it can be the next in two days!

  06-13/23:42 Trygve:  Good idea! I will attend a Magpie comp!

  06-13/23:35 mccluskeyp:  @Hagbard, would it be possible to schedule a Magpie tournament for sometime in the next few months?

  06-13/19:05 Hagbard:  That is, a normal Old Hnefatafl 13x13 tourn. starts in two days.
Which strong king variant we'd want for Sep. 15th is up to suggestions. Just not Copenhagen, which is used for the world champ. tourn.
And which variant the Eastern vikings would want for a tourn. Sep. 15th is totally up to suggestions, again just not Copenhagen.

  06-13/17:32 Trygve:  Sorry, not 37, but 51 generations back!

  06-13/17:30 Trygve:  Scandi-tourn with Old 13x13 sounds perfect! Looking forward to Sept 15! I've never played against Odin Himself, my forefather 37 generations back, he's high ranked, maybe I could give him a hard time with black, but with white he would be a big favourite.

  06-12/22:10 Hagbard:  New in gallery: Steiger sent photos from the Moscow historical festival June 10th

  06-12/20:58 Hagbard:  - And at the same time an Eastern tournament among the 8 Eastern vikings?

  06-12/20:37 Hagbard:  It's difficult to gather all in the summer time, therefore the American tournament was in April.
Perhaps we could have the Scandinavian one at Sep. 15th (same as World tournament round 1)?

  06-12/16:25 OdinHimself:  @Hagbard: Correction! You're 8 Scandinavians. Don't forget I'm a viking at heart. My second name is Olve Eikemo and I'm from Bergen, Norway. So, you can count me in! ;)

  06-11/23:45 Hagbard:  Could be possible, we are 7 Scandinavians.
Planned for next tournament is Old Hnefatafl 13x13, but I suppose that a Scandinavian tournament must be with a longer notice.

  06-11/23:40 Trygve:  What about a Scandinavian tournament in a strong king game?

  06-11/19:01 casshern:  I think circular would be worst for white with the 1-step rule. Honestly, I am opposed to 7x7 variants. Brandubh is the closest to a balanced game we have. I think 7x7 is just too small. I prefer 9x9 and 11x11 boards.

  06-11/16:32 Hagbard:  Maybe Ard Ri-1 friendly-throne circular. Because the friendly-throne balance was -1.86, not too bad, and circular can perhaps help white.
But that is two deviations from standard rules: the one step limit and the friendly throne.

  06-11/15:19 mccluskeyp:  @Hagbard @casshern, what are your thoughts about Ard Ri-1 7x7 with the circular Black layout instead of cross?  Circular layout scored higher for White than the cross during the test tournament, perhaps the circular layout is a way to improve the balance of Ard Ri-1.

  06-09/19:52 jrton80:  thanks

  06-09/08:46 Hagbard:  A bug. The software should've detected that white cannot move. White must resign manually to end the game.

  06-09/04:41 jrton80:  @hagbard I got a berserker game with commentjouer which should be a win for me, but it did not kill

  06-09/02:40 casshern:  No more testing. Thank you Hagbard.

  06-08/21:20 Hagbard:  The Ard Ri-1 7x7 balance is now -2.50
More testing?

  06-08/09:23 Hagbard:  Proposed scheme for World Championship:
The great majority of participants will have only six games, and it is six games against matches.
http://aagenielsen.dk/hnefataflforum/phpBB3/viewtopic.php?f=4&t=4&p=1043#p1043

  06-07/14:34 Hagbard:  When black is aware that white can go for a draw fort, much can be done to spoil it

  06-07/14:05 Bogd Khan:  About the game with Epm180 in Fetlar tournament: Hagbard i like the rule with the repetition(draw) but in Fetlar games it looks quite easy to make a draw in every single game with white...it is not balanced.

  06-07/12:52 Hagbard:  - The capture-two-blacks requirement was introduced to prevent the building of a center fort in two moves, which was discovered to be theoretically possible.

  06-07/12:49 Hagbard:  Fetlar tournament about the Epm180 / Bogd khan game:
Interesting game. White had to retreat to a center fort but unfortunately before there'd been time to catch two blacks.
Therefore there's not a Draw Button on the screen, and white should lose by repetition.
If two blacks had been captured, this would have been a draw.
Unfortunately the software is not implemented to look for this situation, so white has to give up manually to end the game.

  06-06/12:04 Hagbard:  Revised scheme for the world championship:
http://aagenielsen.dk/hnefataflforum/phpBB3/viewtopic.php?f=4&p=1039&sid=9ad05078df39cf09b9a00cf0de0c9aa4#p1039

  06-03/08:49 Hagbard:  Well, there's room in the current tourn., and the next is planned about June 9th and to be Simple Tafl 11x11.

  06-02/22:21 jrton80:  But Harbard, you should know, I was Blonde before I lost my hair, I forget things. I can easily space out for a week

  06-02/08:17 Hagbard:  It's easy to know long time before, when a new tournament will start. In the invitations list it says about the current tourn. "Running x days". When it has run 7 days, a new will start. And then the first couple of days there's usually room for more players.

  06-02/02:49 jrton80:  I cannot say I like that, fewer games is good, but that is more on the player, is it not? i.e. you play one side at a time - waiting for one game to be over before starting the next. A habit I find a bit annoying, but I have gotten use to it (and we always like what we are use to) and if that is what you want, all is good - I'm not going to argue - it is how you choose to play your game after all. Not getting into a tournament (which I kind of suck at) just because I do not go to the home page that often? I really do not like that

  06-02/00:10 Hagbard:  It's to make it easier for the tournament players, fewer games in the tournament. In return a new tournament can start each week, next one tomorrow.

  06-01/23:26 jrton80:  @Hagbard why the limit of 4? I really do not check there as often as I should, but really ONLY 4 in a tournament? I's confused

  06-01/18:59 Hagbard:  @mccluskeyp: A wonderful feature. Like you, I have to use board and pieces to try out moves for important games. Sometimes in tournaments there are more difficult games running at the same time, and sometimes the tournament board is larger than 11x11.
Not quite simple to implement, though. I could take a try at it after summer.

  06-01/16:48 Hagbard:  Proposition for world tournament rules 2018. Sign in from July 1st, start Sep. 15th:
http://aagenielsen.dk/hnefataflforum/phpBB3/viewtopic.php?f=4&p=1028#p1027

  06-01/10:06 Hagbard:  Ard Ri-1 7x7 is on the list.
In the test tournament 76 Casshern won all games both as white and black, which of course is a good sign about the balance.
However, it could be the "Crust-effect". In the first years of testing a lot of variants from 2010 forward, Crust was the stable opponent for the testing. And strangely, nearly any variant came out balanced. The reason was that whatever the rules, Crust would win all games whether white or black. When other players tried the same rules, the result was much different...
So we could likewise have a "Casshern-effect" with the Ard Ri-1...

  06-01/00:36 Hagbard:  Yes, I can open it from tomorrow. But the measured balance so far is -2.18

  05-31/22:31 casshern:  @Hagbard: I think mccluskeyp is referring to something like the Ard Ri 1-step that we tested. Tournament 76 I think. Would you be able to add that one to the list as well?

  05-31/14:25 Hagbard:  Interesting. Magpie 7x7 is back on the list.

  05-31/14:11 mccluskeyp:  Casshern proved to me over the course of yesterday afternoon that the Scottish Ardi Ri 7x7 cross throneless variant is solved.  With best play, White always wins.  Can we bring back the one step variant to see if that fixes things?

  05-31/11:34 Hagbard:  I wonder if Kalabalik comes to Tønsberg the next three days:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rcnVTKkDd-8

  05-30/14:16 mccluskeyp:  Thank you for the information Agmundr.  That website doesn’t have the ability to play the variant I’m interested in.  It appears to support only 9x9 Tablut and 11x11 Hnefatafl.

  05-30/11:55 Agmundr:  @mccluskeyp, here is a site where you can test out your future moves. You can also play against the computer. 🍻 http://www.lutanho.net/play/hnefatafl.html

  05-30/08:03 Hagbard:  Planned next tournament: Sea battle tafl 9x9 (Imperial Contest)

  05-30/06:49 Hagbard:  If you happen to some day get a photo of a tafl board there, or other photos of the activities, I'd like them for the gallery.

  05-30/06:14 Fairland:  By there, I mean the Muskogee Castle. .

  05-30/01:00 Fairland:  Yes! I saw your comment about tønsberg. I live just an hour and twenty minutes from there. It is largely post viking age, but I have seen the occasional tafl board for sale.

  05-29/21:08 Hagbard:  I for one didn't hear about the Muskogee festival before. It's in Oklahoma and has a homepage:
https://www.okcastle.com/renaissance.html

Regarding the mccluskeyp suggestion, I'll wait for others to comment first -

  05-29/15:55 mccluskeyp:  Has there been any discussion in the past about the possibility of adding a feature to the site that would allow players to test out future moves in their games?  For example, let's say I'm 10 moves into a game and I'm trying to decide whether to move a particular piece.  If there were a way to move that piece in the game interface and then move my opponent's pieces to see how the board would look (and so on and so on, X moves into the future and not just a single move into the future) I would find that useful in deciding how to play.  The method I use now is to set up the board position using a board and pieces I have at home and then test out different variations.  Appreciate your thoughts and comments, mccluskeyp.

  05-28/21:37 Fairland:  Hagbard, have you heard of the Castle of Muskogee and the Rennaissance faire they have there?

  05-27/09:54 Hagbard:  Tønsberg Middelaldersfestival, Norway, June 1st-3rd!

  05-24/08:54 Hagbard:  Casshern won the Sea Battle 13 tournament, all points.
And we have a new expert in Scottish Ard Ri: mccluskeyp

  05-23/19:10 Hagbard:  New in gallery: photos from Zmijovich, Ukraine.

  05-23/00:31 Hagbard:  Planned next tournament: there's a wish for Fetlar.

  05-21/18:41 mccluskeyp:  Nevermind, I figured it out.

  05-21/16:32 mccluskeyp:  Question about the Long forum.  Is there any way for me to upload an image stored on my computer desktop?  I see that the insert image tool allows me to insert a link to an image, but I can't figure out if it's possible to upload an image from my computer as opposed to linking to an image on the internet.  Or perhaps just a way to link to a particular game in the archives, since that is what I'm trying to show in this case.

  05-20/14:40 Hagbard:  Though you probably have the essentials of board games from a long chess career - as I suspect that all the top players here have...
The measures against draw here are general for any variant other than Fetlar:
- Total surrounding of white is a black victory (except Berserk where pieces can jump).
- Repeated side stepping is a loss (the side stepping is easily recognized by human players, and also by the computer)
- Repeated white moving in the constraint of a draw fort or similar position is a white loss.
(Actually practically all repetition is a white loss.)

  05-20/13:22 Ded Fomich:  But I’m not one of them, as you may have guessed =)

  05-20/13:19 Ded Fomich:  By the way, in comparison with chess, where the absolute majority of the games are played to a draw, one can say that Copenhagen Tafl has no draws, their number can be neglected. For example, Harry Kasparov wrote in his book that at the level of grandmasters white wins in 29% of cases, black wins in 18% of cases, draws comprise 53% of cases. But huge amount of people enjoy chess in spite of draws. According to the most conservative estimates, 200–300 millions of people play chess, according to FIDE estimates, 600–650 millions.

  05-20/13:13 Ded Fomich:  @Hagbard I assume the same thing, that’s one of the reasons why I don’t play variants with the corner exits. Also I had doubts regarding Sea Battle Tafl because of my misunderstanding of the repetitions rule, but you have just eleminated them. I remember that I followed a game from the WTF Championship 2016, Crust played with Herjan, 167 moves (!) and it ended in a draw, I was very disappointed. But that’s just my personal opinion (Steiger always calls me a «cornerphobe»), international practice shows that corner tafl variants are the most popular variants, a lot of players really enjoy them, and Copenhagen Tafl is an unrivalled leader among all the variants. And I have no doubts that that all the variants have to be represented and saved—Fetlar, Old Hnefatafl and so on. The players should be able to choose and play those variants which rules they really like. All those variants are, after all, parts of the modern history of the game.

  05-20/09:43 Hagbard:  The American Championship tournament is finished after 13 days, and IM Mario Aluizo won with max. points.

  05-20/09:03 Hagbard:  One could wonder if the draw perhaps is a foreign element in the tafl game. The details of the Fetlar game were decided on by the Fetlar Hnefatafl Panel. In consultation with Tim Millar, who knows the Panel personally and went to the island Fetlar for the World Championship twice and won, it was decided to keep the Fetlar rules as they are anyway.

  05-19/22:51 Hagbard:  Draw is a speciality of the Fetlar game (draw forts and draw by repetition). For all other variants I assume that it is only possible for king-win-in-corner games (Copenhagen, Old Hnefatafl and Berserk) and only in the case where both parties are prevented from winning because of too few pieces.

  05-19/21:07 Ded Fomich:  The possibility of a draw in such exciting game as Sea Battle would have broken my heart, I’m implacably opposed to draws. Actually there is nothing more depressing than a draw!

  05-19/21:04 Ded Fomich:  @Hagbard Oh, I see. I thought that the position should be repeated for three times immediately and only in this case it can be recognised as a threefold repetition. Now I see that this is just about any three positions not necessarily in a row. So, the king is lost. Nice to hear that, thanks!

  05-19/20:44 Hagbard:  It is however tedious if you have to wait 49 moves for this obvious thing to happen.
In the software of this site the rule is interpreted such that a repetition like this is detected only after 6 moves:
The king side steps back and forth - 2 moves
The king again side steps back and forth, possibly using two other squares, but still it really is the same side step on the same line. 2 moves.
The king side steps again back and forth on the same line, again possibly using two new squares but still the same line and the same situation. 2 moves.
The king lost!

  05-19/20:44 Hagbard:  Interesting case! But also here there are a limited number of pieces involved in the repetitive patterns and a limited number of squares, so inevitably sooner or later a board position will occur three times. In this case the king can be on one of 4 squares, and the 2 black opponents can be in 2 of 4 squares. That is 4 x 6 = 24 possible board positions, one of which will be repeated for the third time after 49 moves at the latest. So if the king goes on like this, he'll lose in the end.

  05-19/20:15 Ded Fomich:  Today I played with Steiger in chess club «White Rook». We paid special attention to See Battle Tablut 9×9 (not Imperial Contest—we came to the conclution that the king’s move limitation is not required). We played many games and in one of them we faced with an interesting problem, it relates to the perpetual repetitions rule. Here is the position in our game: https://bit.ly/2rSuDME

The matter is that the king (cargo ship—the aggressive player) and the attackers’ ships can make moves indefinitely without repeating of the board position for three times, for example the simplest variations with only one attacker:

h6-h7	i6-i7
h7-h6	i7-i6

h6-h8	i6-i8
h8-h6	i8-i6

h6-h7	i6-i7
h7-h6	i7-i6

h6-h8	i6-i8
h8-h6	i8-i6
h6-h8	i6-i8
h8-h6	i8-i6

h6-h7	i6-i7
h7-h6	i7-i6
h6-h7	i6-i7
h7-h6	i7-i6

And so on ad infinitum, there are several possible combinations. Two attackers can be involved in moving, but it doesn’t matter—one or two—the result will be the same: both sides will move endlessly without threefold repetition. How this situation should be judged if nobody wants to surrender in keeping with the Vikings’ spirit? Is there any rule in Sea Battle Tafl for such situation?

  05-18/20:40 Hagbard:  The balance numbers are regularly updated as more games give more experience with the variants.

  05-18/19:49 mccluskeyp:  Do the balance numbers for the different variants update on the fly as games are completed, or are they fixed at the value determined when the balances were first calculated?

  05-18/19:49 mccluskeyp:  Do the balance numbers for the different variants update on the fly as games are completed, or are they fixed at the value determined when the balances were first calculated?

  05-18/16:13 OdinHimself:  Skal to Mario and all the vikings who participated!

  05-18/08:39 Hagbard:  The winners of the American Championship tournament are found:
Gold to California, silver to Fairland Schools Hnefatafl Club and bronze to Canada!
Congratulations to IM Mario Aluizo ("casshern")!
And thank you to the players; it was nail-biting to follow this tournament!

  05-17/21:13 Hagbard:  The 15x15 test tournaments are finished, and Casshern cleared the table and won max points in both.
A big thank you to the players for doing these tests. All archaeologically found board sizes are now thoroughly tested (7, 9, 11, 13 and 15), and well working setups are now known for them all.
It has taken 8 years to come to this point!

  05-16/23:05 Hagbard:  @Teondrae: that happens for long games ( > 10 days ).

  05-16/18:21 Teondrae:  My time buffer keeps going down even though I’m making 2 to 3 moves aday. I thought it would reset

  05-15/19:42 Hagbard:  Yes

  05-15/19:31 mccluskeyp:  Scottish Ard Ri sounds great to me, but I'm partial to it.  Assuming you mean the 7x7 cross throneless?

  05-15/09:05 Hagbard:  General tournaments: with the 4 player limit, the time limit for joining could be reduced also to fx. 7 days.
In return for smaller tournaments, they can be more frequent. Planned next is: Scottish Ard Ri. Or perhaps there are other wishes?

  05-15/07:47 Hagbard:  @Casshern: No. The strong king type is covered in the Copenhagen tournament autumn, the world championship.

  05-15/02:23 will:  Deregisters from the American Championship Tournament 2018.

  05-15/01:29 casshern:  @Hagbard: Is there a title for Old Hnefatafl Champion?

  05-15/01:19 casshern:  Congrats Bogd Khan on the victory! The Bulgarian invasion continues to grow stronger.

  05-14/20:14 Hagbard:  That's what I thought - it's very efficient in number of games, for the price of a long tournament time.

  05-14/20:07 mccluskeyp:  A tournament with 100 players may include three to five rounds as the previous round's winners are matched against each other.  Such a tournament, depending on the game time control, may last six months between the beginning of the first game and the end of the final game.

  05-14/20:05 Hagbard:  I reckon that the chess way is a knockout tournament, taking many rounds.

  05-14/19:47 Hagbard:  :)
And then, on the chess sites, large numbers of players, several smaller groups, one game at a time, how long time will the whole tournament then normally take?
Here a tournament is normally finished in about 30 days.

  05-14/19:43 OdinHimself:  Bulgarian warriors of Tengri taking over the northern lands by storm! Great Khans gather their tribes! Bowstrings will prevail!

  05-14/19:41 mccluskeyp:  Hagbard, limiting the number of participants is the only way I can think of for this site.  I know that commercial board game sites such as chess dot com have ways to allow large numbers of players to participate in a tournament, yet limit the number of simultaneous games to just a handful.  They do this by making several smaller groups of players and then only having opponents play one game at a time.  For example, if you and I were playing, we would have to finish our first game before the second game began.  Not sure on the mechanics of all that from a website function/coding perspective.  Limiting the number of players seems like a decent way to create this effect so thanks for doing that.

  05-14/08:09 Hagbard:  Bogd Khan won the Old Hnefatafl tournament!

  05-12/08:57 Hagbard:  General tournaments limited to 4 players; thank you for pointing out the problem.

  05-11/23:11 Hagbard:  No, any suggestions how to do that?
As for the Historical 15 tournament, it's also a measurement of game balance, which was not well known. So in this case it was very valuable with many games.

  05-11/22:35 mccluskeyp:  Have you given any consideration to changing how the tournaments work so that players do not play so many games simultaneously?  I'm in the Historical 15x15 tournament and it has turned me off to other tournaments due to the volume of simultaneous games.  I don't have enough time in my daily life to spend on 10+ games of that complexity.

  05-07/08:04 Hagbard:  The American Championship Tournament 2018 has started.
The Fairland Schools Hnefatafl Club is strongly represented with 2 out of 5 players, and Canada is represented, too.
Enjoy the tournament!

  05-05/08:26 Hagbard:  Registered for the American Championship tourn. 2018:
jrton80, casshern, Fairland, kAAgEE and Teondrae.
2 days the registering is still open, and these names are missing on the list:
altti, Brench, mccluskeyp, tuireann, vonraider, Torc, Aluric, Patterson, Waegn

  05-04/18:22 Mungo:  Deregisters from the American Championship Tournament 2018.

  05-03/20:22 Teondrae:  Registers for the American Championship Tournament 2018.

  05-03/17:53 kAAgEE:  Registers for the American Championship Tournament 2018.

  05-03/07:21 Hagbard:  Thanks for the info, Bigwurm91 and Fairland!
3 days registering still open for the American Championship 2018, and these names are missing on the list:
altti, Brench, mccluskeyp, tuireann, vonraider, kAAgEE, Torc, Aluric, Patterson, Waegn

  05-03/01:52 simplemath:  Deregisters from the American Championship Tournament 2018.

  05-02/20:49 Fairland:  Registers for the American Championship Tournament 2018.

  05-02/20:48 Fairland:  Registers for the American Championship Tournament 2018.

  05-02/20:48 Fairland:  I haven't been on in a long while. Bit of a crazy year at work. I will go ahead and participate although I am from from "at my best" so to speak.

  05-02/03:19 Bigwurm91:  Hey sorry to my fellow North, South and Central Americans I will not be participating in the American tourney.  I am a bit busy working and studying Chinese here in Beijing. I hope to be back from my hiatus in the next month or 2. Also, if my ip looks funny my vpn is probably turned on. Good luck to everyone and may the battles be bloody and well faught!

  05-01/10:15 Hagbard:  6 days registering still open for the American Championship 2018. These names are missing on the list, among others:
altti, Bigwurm91, Brench, mccluskeyp, tuireann, Fairland, vonraider, kAAgEE, Torc, Aluric, Patterson, Waegn

  04-30/20:55 asd:  Registers for the American Championship Tournament 2018.

  04-30/20:55 asd:  Registers for the American Championship Tournament 2018.

  04-30/20:55 asd:  Deregisters from the American Championship Tournament 2018.

  04-30/20:55 asd:  Registers for the American Championship Tournament 2018.

  04-30/20:55 asd:  Registers for the American Championship Tournament 2018.

  04-28/11:53 Bogd Khan:  Deregisters from the American Championship Tournament 2018.

  04-28/03:53 casshern:  Registers for the American Championship Tournament 2018.

  04-27/20:56 edmond-dantes:  yes, I was understood now

  04-27/20:09 casshern:  @edmond-dantes: I’m sorry, I think I was confused earlier since you mentioned a Champions tournament. But, you are talking about a new tournament here, different from current format, that is open to all players. And we will first have a test tournament, no fee, to see how it works and gage players interest? This is sounding very promising. I am very interested in this idea. It would be a nice change from current format.

  04-27/19:30 edmond-dantes:  just ask can a tournament be made on this site to be administered by me or not?

  04-27/19:27 edmond-dantes:  I'm worried that you do not understand my idea. I suggest a runner administered by me and judged by me that has nothing to do with the other tournaments on the site. The tournament will be made according to different rules and format than before, anyone who wants to play will be open for all grandmasters in this site are not at a higher level than other players. I just want to make a modern tournament that will be nicer and different from the ones until now ...

  04-27/19:03 casshern:  I had the same thought as Hagbard regarding the Champions League Tournament. The Valholl group of the WTC is basically the same as what we are discussing. Last year, I believe, was the first year that we did not have a previous Grand Master join the tournament. I am not sure why that is or why many of them are inactive now. Perhaps it is the format or the time commitment. I don’t know their reasons. If this new idea would bring them back from their hiatus, then that would be great. Also, there maybe many more rounds here leading to a longer tournament. Ideally, we should use the “play live” feature. If we can all agree to that, then players matched up against one another could designate a time to play their games that work best. This would make the tournament go much faster than say making one move per day.

  04-27/07:59 Hagbard:  Perhaps in practise the World Championship final is the same as a grandmasters' tournament:
2017 the final players were Plantagenet, Casshern, OdinHimself, Edmond-dantes, Animals and Sqaree, which is about the same collection of players which a grandmasters' would have.
Meaning that another form of a grandmasters' tourn. is superfluous. (Speaking of regular tournaments, not the fee idea).

  04-27/06:45 Bogd Khan:  Deregisters from the American Championship Tournament 2018.

  04-27/06:44 Bogd Khan:  Registers for the American Championship Tournament 2018.

  04-26/20:19 jrton80:  Registers for the American Championship Tournament 2018.

  04-26/18:53 edmond-dantes:  if there are mistakes in my lyrics I'm sorry my English is not very good

  04-26/18:52 edmond-dantes:  actually I think it is better to play a test tournament before tax and prizes are introduced. My idea is that the time control will change a bit, the tournament will be a knockout, the players will be ranked on a rake, with more than one draw will be played in the match between the players, the series of qualifiers will be discussed. 2 games will be played in each round. one with white and one with black. the draw will go to another hand of Hnefaftal again in 2 games with white and black and so on. The games will be closed for viewing. will not be able to play from 1 ip address

  04-26/18:29 edmond-dantes:  If society thinks that the fee is inappropriate, I have a desire to administer Champions League tournament for which he will announce the regulation and rules of course if Agge can make them technically on the site

  04-26/18:24 edmond-dantes:  I do not really think the fee will be a huge cost to the players because it will be of 3-5 $. But when we have 30 players and fees collected from sponsors, people with more opportunities and friends will increase the interest in the game of the strong players and will there is a good rider. I personally will donate 50$ for such an initiative to the prize pool.

  04-26/12:30 simplemath:  Registers for the American Championship Tournament 2018.

  04-26/09:26 Hagbard:  Old Hnefatafl 11x11 tournament: Like Fetlar (king armed, captured from 4 sides, wins in corner), but no draw forts allowed and no repetitions, and the king can be captured on the edge, that is normally by 3 blacks and next to a corner by 2 blacks.

Registering for Amercian hemisphere champ. tourn. opened, starting May 7th. I've contacted Altti and Bigwurm91 about it.

  04-26/09:23 test1:  Registers for the American Championship Tournament 2018.

  04-25/20:30 Hagbard:  - Since presumably a good many of the titled masters would not attend, there could perhaps be room for a wildcard. Fx. edmond-dantes has a very fine Copenhagen rating.

  04-25/19:52 Hagbard:  We did have a Grand Masters' tournament once in January 2015 (hat tip Crust). An idea to repeat at a suitable time? In 2015 we had only 3 grandmasters for a tournament. Now we would have 6 (Crust, Nath, Schachus, Adam, Herjan, Plantagenet), plus I'd say International and Quadrathlon Masters (OdinHimself, Altti, Casshern). I'm aware that only some would come.

  04-25/19:27 Hagbard:  Sorry, message size increased now

  04-25/18:54 Ded Fomich:  Too much letters for one post, it’s splitted now, sorry for that.

  04-25/18:52 Ded Fomich:  the grandmasters. I don’t like that idea too. Quite the contrary, the best way to motivate players to take part in the tournament is the sponsor’s prize like in the last WTF Championship Tournament. The mentioned by Casshern participation of Plantagenet is a good case in point. If things work in our favour we shall find an opportunity to get another sponsor’s board as a prize towards the end of the year. We are taking steps for that.

  04-25/18:51 Ded Fomich:  @edmond-dantes Actually I'm not the best person to be asked about that, I don’t play Copenhagen Tafl, accordingly, I don’t participate in WTF Championship Tournament, I don’t have any ambitions to get any titles, don’t care about rating. I just like to play Saami Tablut and my brainwork while playing it. Sometimes, occasionally, willingly and to try new gameplay I play some other games (mostly other HH variants) and sometimes I take part in HH tournaments—to support HH rules. There are no other rules but HH rules and Saami Tablut is their Prophet.

I’m not a sportsman, I’m, so to say, a recreational athlete. But you asked all of the players, so here is my opinion. I agree with Casshern and think that the other tournament can make sense in the form of the competition between those players who have the title of grandmaster, for example. Something like World Boxing Super Series in the sport of boxing (https://worldboxingsuperseries.com)—a tournament for the best boxers in one weight category to find the undisputed champion of the world in that category and to unify the belts of the numerous boxing organisations. Every single fight of that Series is the feast for the eyes because of mastery of the best boxers, a very spectacular tournament. So I think tafl tournament among grandmasters can be as wonderful as boxing tournament among the best boxers and champions in different boxing versions.

But even in this case I don’t think that the fee payment would have success among

  04-25/09:34 casshern:  @edmond-dantes: I think it would be hard to get players to pitch in for a prize pool. Especially, when most players know they don’t stand a chance to win. Just look at the WTC last year. Plantagenet decided to play because there was a prize offered and he ended up winning. I am speaking from experience as I, for many years now, have been playing a recreational sport called dodgeball. It is not a big sport, but it does get competitive. And there are many cash prize tournament. However, the sport is dominated by 2 teams who usually finish 1st and 2nd in each tournament. Sure many teams pay to play and have fun, but that is what worries me about this idea. If everyone was at the same skill level, ie grand master, then I think it is fine. But, it just doesn’t seem fair to me to ask players to pay who know they don’t have a chance of winning. I play tafl to have fun and challenge my opponent and myself. I don’t mind either way. I would pay for a champions league tournament if that’s what it takes. And if it would draw more people to the game and grow our community then all the better.

  04-25/09:11 casshern:  I would love to play another American tournament. Hopefully Altti  and Bigwurm will join. It has been a while since I have played them. I would vote for Copenhagen. I think Copenhagen is our preferred variant. At least, it is the first game that I learned to play.

  04-25/08:47 Hagbard:  About Champ. League tourn. - personally my chance of winning such a tourn. is zero, so for me a fee would be pure expense.

  04-25/07:51 Hagbard:  If the American hemisphere champ. tourn. is an idea, it must be soon so as not to hit the summer vacations. Fx. starting May 7th. The games usually last less than 30 days, ie. May 7th - June 7th.
Would the games be Copenhagen Hnefatafl 11x11, or perhaps some other variant?

  04-24/23:15 casshern:  @edmond-dantes: I like this idea. At first, I was tentative because I don’t think our community is large enough to charge a fee for such a tournament. Personally, I would rather not pay a fee to play. But, if we could get former and current champions to play, I would hope this would spark more interest in the game to help it grow.

  04-24/19:12 mccluskeyp:  Why do you want to make a fee part of that tournament?  My gut reaction is to say Sodium Bromide.

  04-24/14:28 Hagbard:  After the Historical 15 test tournament:
There's a wish for an Old Hnefatafl 11 tournament.
After that, would it be an idea with an American Championship tournament (American hemisphere)? Last one was February 2017.

  04-24/06:42 OdinHimself:  I agree.

  04-23/20:22 edmond-dantes:  Please all of you comment?

  04-23/20:19 edmond-dantes:  Currently, with Age, we are discussing a Champions League tournament project where the idea is to raise a small fee for players' participation and sponsorships that we can attract. With the collected fees distributed 100 percent as a prize pool. So players will be motivated for victory. The format and rules will be clarified as everything will be transparent. Would any of you express an opinion?

  04-21/09:54 Hagbard:  Nice game piece! Looks like a slice of a bone. They liked decorations in those days, but perhaps the circle decorations could also be used to distinguish types of pieces?

  04-20/10:08 Agmundr:  Picture of a tafl piece found in Oslo. https://smp.vgc.no/v2/images/e23c6dbd-b45a-4043-96a9-d3298d46e99e?fit=crop&h=1000&w=1000&s=4688a65908f042a668ffb4f0133ea64a005cedb4

The article: https://www.vg.no/nyheter/innenriks/i/XPV2n/nytt-middelalderfunn-i-oslo-vekker-oppsikt

  04-18/20:17 Hagbard:  ;)

  04-18/19:50 OdinHimself:  Ek hlewagastir holtijar horna tawido is what I got from the runes too, but it just didn't have a translation from Danish to English. Now I see why, it's an Old Norse, my native language when I was a viking in one of my past lifes...

  04-18/08:27 Hagbard:  400's, the same time as the first tafl board found.

  04-18/08:01 Hagbard:  Famous inscription, Old Norse, on the golden horn from 400's, ek hlewagastir holtijar horna tawido, I Lægæst son of Holt made the horn.

  04-18/06:35 OdinHimself:  This is hard! I can't understand what you say Hagbard.

  04-17/22:19 Hagbard:  ᛖᚲ ᚺᛚᛖᚹᚨᚷᚨᛊᛏᛁᛉ ᚺᛟᛚᛏᛁᛃᚨᛉ ᚺᛟᚱᚾᚨ ᛏᚨᚹᛁᛞᛟ

  04-17/12:58 Hagbard:  New in gallery: new tafl boards from Lucho Panchev.

  04-16/22:17 Hagbard:  Spot on!

  04-16/20:00 OdinHimself:  So, Agmundr aka Asbjorn Riis said Hail Hnefatafl! and Hagbard answered in Danish - Exactly! Am I right warriors? :)

  04-16/14:37 Hagbard:  ᛀᛂᛗᛚᛁᚷ!

  04-16/14:31 Hagbard:  "C0;"

  04-16/14:29 Hagbard:  C0;

  04-16/10:52 Agmundr:  ᚼᛂᛚᛚ ᚼᚾᛂᚠᛅᛏᛅᚠᛚ!

  04-16/10:04 OdinHimself:  @Hagbard: Hail! This means we are growing in number and knowledge! Viking steel will prevail!

  04-16/00:33 Hagbard:  This week the players did 6672 game moves, highest number ever for this site.

  04-15/22:21 Teondrae:  Hagbard that is in an awesome feature. I beat Crust only twice in my days... I miss playing him even though I lost all the time. Haha

  04-15/01:24 Hagbard:  With this function you can look more than two years back and find them again:
http://aagenielsen.dk/visallespil_soeg_nath.php

  04-14/23:59 Teondrae:  Well I noticed that my games against crust in games archive are not there anymore. Makes me sad I used those as review of how to play by losing all them lol

  04-14/13:41 Hagbard:  @Adam: NB, the two games against casshern time out in 6 days.

  04-12/20:16 Hagbard:  NB. The large forum is opened for new registerings for three days.

  04-12/15:53 Hagbard:  Welcome mccluskeyp. The next tournament is Historical Hnefatafl 15x15, it's a test tournament and starts in about a week. At that time you just click a button and join.

  04-12/14:31 mccluskeyp:  Hello, new player and forum user here.  I'm wondering if it is possible for new players like me to join your next tournament, and if so how can I do that?

  04-10/03:56 steiger:  Oh gosh, all kinds of stuff!

  04-09/18:09 SimpleMath:  What’s up?

  04-06/10:50 Agmundr:  https://www.met-hammer.ch/wp-content/uploads/2016/09/Valhalla-Mjod-Met.jpg.jpg

  04-06/09:39 Agmundr:  Skál! 🍻

  04-05/23:23 Ded Fomich:  And as judged by results a viking from Vinland runs on mead as Agmundr likes to say.

  04-05/23:13 Ded Fomich:  And a powerful player from Copenhagen is strongly represented in that overview too!
Nice going, gentlemen!

  04-05/18:18 Hagbard:  The Historical 13x13 tournament finished yesterday, and the tournament doubled the experience with this variant!

At bottom of the Wall of Fame page is calculated the quadrathlon results for the 8 players who participated in at least two of the four tournaments Copenhagen + Berserk + Sea Battle 11x11 + Hist. 13x13.
At top of the same page is an overview of the three top winners of various tournaments.
In the winners' overview is strongly represented players from the clubs in Kyustendil, Formby, Tønsberg and Moscow!

  03-31/10:45 Hagbard:  Interesting videos about Old Norse language!

  03-30/14:18 Ded Fomich:  Here’s a short video from Dr. Jackson Crawford, an Old Norse specialist and instructor of Nordic Studies at the University of Colorado, about knattleikr and hnefatafl: https://youtu.be/lVKmNxWiqy4

Dr. Crawford runs a really wonderful YouTube channel—it’s about Old Norse, its grammar, pronunciation, about sagas, myths and other related topics.

  03-30/14:11 Ded Fomich:  Very reasonable decision, there should be limitations even for no timing games.

  03-29/19:00 Hagbard:  So if there are no objections, the games where there has not been a move since autumn last year, will time out.

  03-29/17:51 casshern:  @Hagbard: I agree with allowing “no timing” games to time out after a month. It is unfortunate, since I have the most games to lose. But, the point of “no timing” is to allow players more time to play games. I understand some players don’t have enough time to play games with the regular timing restrictions. But, I think 1 move per month is a very reasonable expectation for a player to keep a game active.

  03-29/15:06 Hagbard:  About "No Timing & No Rating": At the moment these games can be deserted for ten years and nothing will happen, they'll be on the list forever.
Would it be an idea to let "No Timing" games time out after all, if no move was made in the game for a month?

  03-26/11:52 Hagbard:  The historical rules are scalable and work on all the archaeological boards (7, 9, 11, 13 and 15). And the game length does not increase much even when the board is larger.
(In comparison to king captured from 4 sides in Fetlar etc., we've experienced that this works only on board 11x11).

As for capture of corner pieces: this has turned out to be more a philosophical problem ("dead squares"). In reality there've now been played 150 games with this rule in function and no corner piece was ever captured at all. Capture of a corner piece turned out to be something which could happen only very very rarely.
So ok, after the Hist. 13x13 tourn. it could be dropped for the Hist. Hnef., and as an experiment kept for the Sea Tafl.

  03-25/18:18 Ded Fomich:  It’s very nice that HH rules work so beautiful on this board and using this starting setup. But I think that there is no need to use that new rule about the corner capture because of its rarity as far as there was no need in “Linneaus capture” because of the same reason. I’d prefer to leave HH rules as they are—simple, historical and well working. Maybe this rule can make sense in Sea Battle Tafl.

  03-25/18:13 Ded Fomich:  I had no doubt that Casshern will prove his title of the heavy tafl shark according to classification of Tim Millar, I wish to pay him well-deserved tribute, congratulations! Many thanks to Hagbard for the organisation of this HH tournament and to all the players for the very nice and tough battles. I wasn’t expecting that I’d like the games on such big board, but the reality has shown to be different. Skál!

  03-22/13:52 Hagbard:  A great thank you to casshern and to all the players for your effort in this series of tafl games, and congratulations to casshern on the good results!

The quadrathlon of games has given new information about the four variants, especially the Sea Battle 11x11 and Hist. Hnef. 13x13 which were not as thoroughly tested as other variants. Before this tournament, the best estimate of the game balance of Hist. Hnef. 13x13 was +1.30, and an alternative setup was prepared to help black a bit. Now the estimate is -1.09 and the alternative setup is discarded.

  03-21/20:08 casshern:  Thanks Xerxes and Agmundr! And thanks Hagbard for putting these tournaments together. They were all very challenging. I really enjoyed it. Now, I am exhausted. I need a little break.

  03-21/08:39 Hagbard:  While we're at it, the triathlon might as well be made into a quadrathlon and the scores calculated for:
Copenhagen (the world champ. tourn.) + berserk + sea battle + hist. hnef.
Casshern won this one too.

After this hist. hnef. 13x13 tournament, the 13x13 board is well known, as are already the 7x7, 9x9 and 11x11 boards.
But there's little experience with the 15x15 board, so planned for research the next weeks is:
Sea Battle 15x15
Hist. Hnef. 15x15
Full contents of the small forum.
International tafl master Lucho Panchev ("OdinHimself"), Bulgaria, tells about Hnefatafl in the scientific TV magazine Epohata na Vodoleya, Bulgarian TV September 2017.
Darius Trimegiste tells about Hnefatafl on Lofoten, Norway, August 2017.
SC Odin club, Bulgaria; Hnefatafl promo, November 2017.
Lucho Panchev's book about Hnefatafl in Bulgarian, January 2018.
Lucho Panchev's book about Hnefatafl in Bulgarian, March 2018.
A review of hnefatafl made by Dmitriy Pashkov for the Russian YouTube channel "THE STATION" Feb. 2018.
Logo: Adam Bartley.
World Tafl Federation on facebook.

Notice the collection of photos on the Facebook site! Large photo series of handmade tafl sets!
World Tafl Federation Hnefatafl Championship tournament 2017.

10 years anniversary since the first Hnefatafl World Championship on Fetlar 2008!
Hnefatafl is also known by the names Nefatavl, The King's Table, The Viking Game, Viking Chess, Tablut or simply Tafl.
History of this site.
Comments on Hnefatafl.
The origin of the Viking board game Hnefatafl and the Berserk rules.
Links to more information on the Viking board game Hnefatafl.
Viking word of wisdom: The Hávamál.
(Havámál på dansk).
Здесь можно играть в тавлеи и против компьютера, и против людей. Можно использовать кириллицу.
Many thanks to Adam Bartley ("Adam"), Tim Millar ("crust"), Gregory Binns ("Torc"), John C. Ashton, Nicolas Cartier, Jonas Lööf ("conanlibrarian"), Olli Salmi, Damian Walker ("cyningstan"), Sten Helmfrid, Rene Gralla, Olga Mudrichenko, Gary and Christa (Germany), Ludovic Antoine, Nikolas Lloyd, Jeffrey Westcoat ("Sigurd"), Rasmus Holbroe and Thore Nissen for their contribution to this site. And not least the more than 400 players the world over who played here more than 15000 real tafl games humans against humans and thus created a vast, practical experience with this intriguing, historical board game.
Updated 30.3.2018