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

Play Hnefatafl Online. The Viking board game.

Play tafl against humans.
Тавлеи против людей.
Rasmus Holbroe vikings

Coming tournaments:
Simple Tafl 11x11 starting Jan. 7th 2021.
Tyr-w 11x11 starting Jan. 7th 2021.
Daldøs 3x12 starting Dec. 10th 2021.
Cuhkka 5x5 starting Jan. 14th 2021.
Welsh Tawlbwrdd 11x11 starting Jan. 14th 2021.
Saami Sáhkku 3x15 starting Jan. 17th 2021.
Copenhagen Hnefatafl 11x11 starting Jan. 21st 2021.

Brandubh 7x7 (Walker) test starting Jan. 21st 2021.
Forum note and rules: Brandubh 7x7
Next: Simple Tyr 15x15 and Hex 11x11.
Go to the Play Tafl Against Humans page to join; the invitation is open for 7 days.

Small forum.
Code of Conduct. You should not post any abusive, obscene, vulgar, slanderous, hateful or threatening material. Doing so may lead to you being immediately banned for a period of time.
(On the second, large structured forum registering is normally disabled to keep spam robots out. Please give a tip-off if you need it opened for registering of a new user.)


  01-26/08:34 Hagbard:  The Sea battle-204577-w 11x11 tournament finished with #1 Silversplitter and Beyn, #3 Docbullen
The Daldøs 3x14 tournament finished with #1 Rosk, #2 Draganov and Chaolaibhne

  01-25/12:10 Hagbard:  @Irish raven. Thank you! The bug and the move are removed.

  01-24/07:33 Hagbard:  Been most active week ever: 11400 board game moves.

  01-20/18:17 Hagbard:  http://aagenielsen.dk/wtfturneringer.php

  01-19/16:34 Draganov:  Does anybody know where I can find a good online tafl simulator for simulating the games from the world championships? The replay for World Championship 2011 is not working and I will need to replay the games on my own. I found some sites where we can play against ourselves but the board was missing the notations on its sides.

  01-19/14:21 Draganov:  Here is the topic for the members introductions:
http://aagenielsen.dk/hnefataflforum/phpBB3/viewtopic.php?f=8&t=53

  01-19/14:20 Draganov:  I would also like to encourage the new players such as Asther-Kane, Potapych, Beyn, Silversplitter, Dimetr to use the big forum to introduce themselves and help us to get to know each other better. It is completely fine if they want to stay silence but I think it would be better for the community to get to know each other better. So, feel free to give us some basic info about yourself, how did you come to the tafl game and what do you think about the game as a whole.

  01-19/14:13 Draganov:  Here is the link to the topic in the big forum. You can post your analyzes there.
http://aagenielsen.dk/hnefataflforum/phpBB3/viewtopic.php?f=4&t=141

  01-19/14:10 Draganov:  @all, I would like to write a small (or not so small) book about the history of the World Tafl Championship. I am planning to analyze all of the games of the world champions for the years in which they won the title. I am not going to analyze the other games except some really nice games, that I think are worth to be mentioned. I would like to start from the title of CRUST 2011 (Fetlar variant) and going further to my title in 2021. It will be useful for the new players to improve their understanding on the game and for everyone to see how the playing skills and tactics evolved during the years. It will be tremendous work, so don't expect the games analyzes to be delivered soon. I will deliver them in parts in the big forum but even that way, it will take a long time. When all of the tournaments winner's games are analyzed, I will packed them in a book in PDF file and upload it for free downloading. I would also like to give some historical background on the tournament format and some info about the champions, so I will need the help of Hagbard and some other experienced players, who I am going to ask some questions about the tournaments. I don't want to include only my analyzes of the games, so I would be glad if some other players analyze the games of the championship winners and publish their analyzes in the forum. It will be good to see diferent opinions on some complex positions and see how diferent players understand them. It is not a problem if players with low rating publish their analyzes, so feel free to discuss the games. I am going to start from the 2011 championship but you can start from any other championship. I hope that this work will be beneficial for the tafl community.

  01-18/06:19 Hagbard:  The Tyr-w 11x11 tournament finished with #1 Beyn, #2 Jrton80 and Masterluke

  01-17/14:35 Hagbard:  The Fetlar Hnefatafl 11x11 tournament finished with #1 Draganov, #2 Floki, #3 Docbullen

  01-17/14:21 Hagbard:  NB, The Single-Elimination test Round 2 starts Jan. 20th.
Move on: ChaolAibhne, Draganov, Dimetr, Potapych, Asther-Kane

  01-17/07:55 Hagbard:  The Daldøs 3x16 tournament finished with #1 Jilles, #2 Draganov, #3 L716 and Xerxes

  01-16/14:16 paul7:  I second Colophonius, a tournament would look fun.

  01-16/14:07 Colophonius:  Catching the king on his throne with just two attackers seems reasonable to me, since it probably would shift the balance a little further in black's favor. Perhaps a variant, where the king on the throne is caught by only two attackers, but where the throne is still hostile to all pieces could be tested, too - if that has not been suggested or done yet.

  01-16/11:07 Colophonius:  A Walker-Brandubh test tournament sounds good to me!

  01-14/20:08 Hagbard:  We have reasonably good experience with the "Irish Brandubh 2", balance +1.38.
The rules in the Walker leaflet are not far from this so they should be tried.

  01-14/18:53 Hagbard:  Brandubh 7x7 (Walker):
http://www.cyningstan.com/data-download/395/brandub-leaflet
Throne friendly to all. Corners hostile to all.
King captured by 2 everywhere, even on and next to the throne.

  01-14/14:32 Hagbard:  The number of board game moves registered in the database is now 1.6 million!

  01-10/09:19 Hagbard:  The Sea battle tafl 11x11 tournament finished with #1 Draganov, #2 Holidayinnes, #3 Paul7

  01-07/21:47 Hagbard:  I was asked about the titles FM, CM etc.:
http://aagenielsen.dk/hnefataflforum/phpBB3/viewtopic.php?f=4&p=1649#p1649

  01-02/10:11 Hagbard:  NB, The Single-Elimination test starts tomorrow evening.
Registered by now: Jrton80, Steiger, ChaolAibhne, wulfram, rosk, paul7, Hagbard, Draganov, Dimetr, Thou, Alex Hnefatafl, beyn, Potapych, nika, Silversplitter, Asther-Kane

  01-01/20:05 Hagbard:  The Historical Hnefatafl 13x13 tournament finished with #1 Jilles, #2 Holidayinnes, #3 L716 and Jrton80

  12-30/17:45 Hagbard:  Thanks! Was a bit worrying -

  12-30/17:38 ChaolAibhne:  I corresponded with Damian Walker and his tafl.cyningstan.com site is now back

  12-24/00:49 ChaolAibhne:  He posted to Twitter more recently on 18 December

  12-23/23:38 Hagbard:  Thank you. Walker used to post something from cyningstan.com daily on Facebook but the postings suddenly stop Dec. 6th.

  12-23/23:30 ChaolAibhne:  His personal site http://damian.cyningstan.org.uk/ is still up, with various means of contacting him

  12-23/23:27 ChaolAibhne:  @Hagbard Are you asking about the fact that the http://tafl.cyningstan.com/ site isn't being found?

  12-23/11:35 Hagbard:  Still nobody knows about Damian Walker "cyningstan" ?

  12-22/08:34 Hagbard:  Midwinter yesterday. Today the day is 3 seconds longer and the sun sets 15:45

  12-18/19:04 Hagbard:  A Championship Tournament evaluation:
http://aagenielsen.dk/hnefataflforum/phpBB3/viewtopic.php?f=4&p=1648#p1648

  12-16/18:12 OdinHimself:  OK, thank you.

  12-16/16:09 Hagbard:  @OdinHimself. That is a good question. It's a property of Elimination Tournament formats that they do not find a ranking of the players. They only find the winner, and the Double Elimination possibly also a number two.

  12-16/15:58 OdinHimself:  @Hagbard @ Umpires: Could you please show us the final results of the WTF tournament, I mean the ranking (maybe up to 10th place), so that I can post that to my FB tafl page?

  12-16/09:01 Hagbard:  Andersen tells more elaborately about it in the follow-up.
About minute 22:20 he tells that he has very many bows, usually 50 lb, and when it comes to trick shooting it's often half strength that would be 25 lb.
About minute 39 he demonstrates 3 fast arrows shot from a 53 lb bow.
About minute 31 he explains that an archer would meet a range of different situations, not only fixed placement in a large formation of heavy long bows, but also ambushes on the route to the battle field, accompanying others as guard etc. (Which would require different types of bows and different skills of the archer.)

  12-15/19:01 Bogd Khan:  About the video with Lars Andersen, he is very good archer but have in mind he is not shooting with a real bow. Actually in the past archers used very heavy bows (except mongols and hunters of course)... The medieval archers needed very powerful bows for penetration the armours of the enemies. Lars is pretty accurate and fast but it's all because of the bow. He uses bow with maybe 20lbs power. The foot archers in Medieval used 40lbs and sometimes 60+lbs like English longbowmen

  12-15/18:53 Bogd Khan:  Congratulations to Plamen for this brilliant tournament performance! We are proud of you! I can't believe how you lost only one game in this ruthless fighting system, against such powerful players! This is great.

  12-15/16:56 floki:  Congratulations Draganov, vive le Roi !

  12-15/13:38 Hagbard:  "Vechera na hutore bliz Dikan'ki" is removed by the uploader, but the whole movie is here:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YrsqKUD3Be8

  12-15/08:22 Hagbard:  Anybody knows anything about Damian Walker? His website is suddenly unreachable.

  12-15/07:00 Hagbard:  Congratulations to World Champion 2021 Draganov!
And a big thank you to the umpires Mike, Hamish, Mikkel and Adam!
And a big thank you, too, to the 30 players who took part in the tournament with enthusiasm and high quality games all across the board!

  12-14/20:04 Hagbard:  - and I thought that this one was advanced ... https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y5iNGo95OTs

  12-14/19:11 Hagbard:  Special

  12-14/18:39 OdinHimself:  @Hagbard: Please, hear this one: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZzI3CSqGB94&ab_channel=RobbieFowler This is a an extract from an old Bulgarian movie, where the main character actor performs the song without dubbing. This is the real Bulgarian music.

  12-14/18:35 OdinHimself:  Congratulations to Draganov, the first Bulgarian tafl world champion! He made my dream comes true! Skal!

  12-14/14:55 Hagbard:  I'm impressed by the Hristozova Koleda song, one of the best Christmas songs I've met. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-eYF79pPbkk

  12-14/14:02 Draganov:  @Hnefihunter, it is normal that you understand the Bulgarian song since Russian and Bulgarian languages are similar and from one language family. I also understand Russian without learning it.

  12-14/13:50 Hnefihunter:  Nice song! ^^)

  12-14/13:48 Hnefihunter:  It's down to the song, I found out I understand Bulgarian without a translator. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qeKNVPn640A

  12-14/10:13 Draganov:  Here is a video of the traditional Christmas celebration in Bulgaria:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mWnS7GTmNYw

  12-13/23:48 holidayinnes:  As the umpire of the 2021 Copenhagen World Championship Tournament I agree with the computers finding and declare Draganov as the champion! Congratulations to Draganov and everyone participating to make it a fun tournament. Also many thanks to Hagbard for setting up this tournament as well as all the other tournaments past, present and future! 
Cheers! Holidayinnes

  12-13/16:57 ChaolAibhne:  Thanks @Hagbard

  12-13/16:42 Hagbard:  @ChaolAibhne, not a bug.
The rule is that there are two dice, and you can use each dice to move one piece, but not move the same piece twice. OR you can use the SUM (third knob) to move one piece.

  12-13/16:33 ChaolAibhne:  @Hagbard I'm wondering if there is a bug in Daldøs 3x16 or if I just haven't understood something. In several of my games as black I've gotten 'x' and a couple of numbers on my first turn. I used the 'x' to undal (turn) the piece nearest to the stern and I assumed that I could then use the two numbers on the other dice to move this piece up the middle row. But instead after making the undalling move the two other dice were no longer presented and a "no x" message was displayed.

  12-11/23:33 Hagbard:  A follow-up to archery. Surprising points fx. that it's easier to hit a moving target like a coin in the air than a fixed target.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i4mqt69VZ28

  12-11/15:56 Draganov:  Here is an impressive video of what real archery looked like in the past.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BEG-ly9tQGk

  12-08/12:12 Hagbard:  Before the cases of nox series were simply unprobable, 18 nox in a row.
But the dice since Dec. 3 give natural results.
The 3rd move patch is a compensation to the players for not starting with three live men like in Sahkku.

  12-08/12:05 Draganov:  I don't know why it happens... probably there is a bug with the dice. Big series of nox happened too often. Probably, we need to test the no nox rule for 3 throws in a row in the middle of the game too. I think the patch for no 3 nox on the third move works fine and made the game more playable. So, what do you think about this rule to be implemented for the whole game and not only for the beginning?

  12-08/11:46 Hagbard:  Indeed. But it can be natural unluck, 6% can happen but seldom

  12-08/11:25 xerxes:  @Hagbard 8 out of 18 of my 'moves' in that game were nox, which put me at a disadvantage !

  12-08/10:27 Steiger:  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BphVtTKshiE

  12-08/07:17 Steiger:  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=osBPrU0k21s

  12-08/05:34 Steiger:  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-yHYc6dOM-o

  12-08/03:50 Steiger:  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jWiKX6wE9fY

  12-07/23:03 Hagbard:  5 nox in a row, the chance for that is 6%.
The patch ensures only that both players get at least an X in their 3rd move.

  12-07/22:41 xerxes:  @Hagbard: I'm Black vs Draganov in T260 - 3 nox in a row.

  12-07/19:39 Hagbard:  Perhaps it's a problem to some that links in the chat forum are not clickable.
The December links are placed clickable under the box, too.

  12-07/18:43 Steiger:  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lXQ15PyKM-M

  12-07/18:39 Steiger:  https://youtu.be/NXZhXkn0bmI

  12-04/11:44 Hagbard:  In December I put on the chat forum some songs of Christmas/winter which I happen to know.
Perhaps others know some songs of this time of year from your countries too?

  12-03/14:07 mihkkal:  Sounds like a good patch! When starting with 3 preactivated in Sáhkku they are placed as if they have all been activated by X, ie. activated and moved one ahead. I can see why that wouldn't work with Daldøs now you mention it: they'll crash because they move onto the middle row in the same direction...

Side note: Sáhkku can also be played like that. Sáhkku is usually played vuosttuk, i.e. pieces move onto the middle row from opposite directions, but it can also be played miedhuk, i.e. the pieces move onto the middle row from the same direction.

  12-03/12:07 Hagbard:  A simple patch is used now: In Daldøs each player will never get nox in his 3rd move. Rest of the game is unaffected.
The Sahkku solution starting with 3 live men is a good one. Daldøs cannot do the same, because live men have to move one step forward.

  12-03/11:53 mihkkal:  Re: the Daldos nox issue. In the related Sáhkku games, modern play has an optional rule that each player can start with the three foremost pieces pre-activated. Prevents people from being stuck for a prolonged time in the beginning of the game due to nox.

  12-03/11:47 Draganov:  Not accepting 3 nox in a row is a possible solution for Daldos. However, I think it would be good to use such a rule only for the beginning of the game until both players activate at least one of their pieces. If we have such a rule in the middle of the game it could cause some problems. For example, imagine a situation in which I have active pieces and my opponent doesn't and I know that he already had 2 nox dice. I will know that on his next throw he will have at least one X so I will not place one of my pieces on the square next to his first unactive piece because I will know that my opponent will kill my piece on his next move. 
This is just one of the problems that may occur, however, I do think that even with such cons, the implementation of not accepting 3 nox in a row will make the game better to play.

  12-03/09:00 xerxes:  @Hagbard: Draganov's suggestion of not accepting 3 nox n a row is a good one and would help.  At present, a run of nox at the start of a game puts that player at a huge dissadvantage.

  12-02/23:32 Hagbard:  Thanks. The dice are better, but your example shows that not enough.
(Technically, the function random_int is used and a pause of 1 second between each call. I'd want to make each dice an independent thread, but that's forbidden on a webserver.)
Draganov suggested to insert in the program that 3 nox in a row is not accepted. It seems that such a patch is necessary.

  12-02/23:01 xerxes:  @Hagbard.  I know I have mentioned this before, but I think there is still an issue with the dice in Daldos.  In my game against Jilles we have had 11 goes before the first 'X' to me as Black.  Jilles has had 7 throws and still no 'X'.  I realise that it is statistically possible, but it is much less probable than the frequency with which it happens.  This is not an isolated incident.

  12-02/11:17 Hagbard:  Ok. 
Two perhaps playable variants were found:
Unst Alea Evangelii 19x19, balance -1.09 from 75 games. But strong players alone, balance -1.60 from 27 games. According to Tim Millar (crust) this variant is played on the island Unst, 4 hirdmen are captured from 3 sides.
Alea Berserk 19x19 (Bartley), balance +1.50 from 130 spil. Invented by Adam Bartley who mixes in the rules the strong king with berserk.
The 19x19 board is a problem-child, it has been really difficult to find a good way to play on this board and with a setup similar to the illustration in an old English paper.
Last time we tried the Unst Alea one couldn't help but get a strong impression that black broadly speaking always wins.
To that, the internet players have little interest in large boards. They avoid boards even larger than 11x11, only 4% of the games played use boards larger than 11x11.

  12-02/10:04 Draganov:  @Hagbard, what happened to the Alea Evangelii variants? Why they are removed from the playing options? Could you share your experience on the balance of these variants?

  11-22/10:35 Hagbard:  - Similarly, World Champ. table for Sahkku, out of 10 players 5 are eliminated in Round 1 and 5 move on to Round 2.

  11-22/10:24 Hagbard:  - Similarly, when the World Champ. table for Copenhagen is examined the same way, then out of 21 players 12 are eliminated in Round1 and 9 move on to Round 2.

  11-22/10:04 Hagbard:  Good points.
If the World Champ. table for tawlbwrdd is seen from the point of Single Elim. (4 games against 2 opponents), then out of 13 players 8 are eliminated in Round 1 and 5 move on to Round 2.

  11-22/09:47 Draganov:  @Hagbard, how many games would be played in a single-elimination match. In my opinion if we play just 2 games, too many matches will be split and the winner will be determined by additional criteria. How are we going to resolve ties? My second considiration is about the match-length. For me playing just 2 games in a round is not enough to satisfy my desire to battle on the tafl field. Many players on the site are playing 10-15 games at once. Focusing on just 2 games would be boring for them. 
In my opinion, we need to play at least 4 games matches (2 games with the whites and 2 games with the blacks) against a single opponent.

  11-21/18:44 Hagbard:  The World Champ. Tourn. is not finished yet, 5 games or more are left, and time for evaluation is not until after the finis.

However, it would be interesting to try to downscale the "Double Elimination" scheme which was used, into a similar "Single Elimination" and see if it would work.
It could be tested from Nov. 29th with the variant Sea battle tafl 13x13 (Nielsen). The positive game balance helps the cargo ship a bit to escape.

  11-20/17:19 Hagbard:  May Odin give you knowledge on your path

  11-18/18:13 Hagbard:  fixed for now

  11-18/12:59 mihkkal:  Hi! There's a bug in the Daabloe game between Holidayinnes and me. He has immobilized my pieces but the game hasn't noticed that he's won.

  11-17/16:19 holidayinnes:  Speaking as umpire, I agree with the computer's list.

  11-17/09:10 Hagbard:  ATTENTION please! Copenhagen Round 3 starts Nov. 20th 18 o'clock Danish time.
Umpire Mike, do you agree with the computer's list of players who move on?
(sqAree, Draganov)

  11-13/16:26 OdinHimself:  Congratulations on the first Bulgarian champion! And respect to all opponents in this tournament!

  11-13/00:10 ChaolAibhne:  Speaking as umpire, I declare Draganov as the winner of the Tawlbwrdd tournament

  11-12/17:29 cacreal:  @plamen - validation and happiness come from within , look inside your gold medal 🥇 is waiting

  11-01/13:55 Hagbard:  Monday morning Nov. 8th.

  11-01/12:42 mihkkal:  When will the Daabloe tournament begin?

  10-31/02:10 Jrton80:  @Draganov yes, beserker is more complex, but that does not make it longer - stubborn refusal to resign while I still had my knight makes berserker longer

  10-29/12:58 Draganov:  Yes, I understand that while the Copenhagen World Championship is running, it will not be good to disturb the players with another tournaments. However, after the world championship is over, I think it would be good to have more than one tournament running in the same time.

  10-29/12:24 Hagbard:  I see your point. There's deliberately been a pause in the ordinary tafl tournaments until the Cop. World Champ. gets to Round 3, as to not disturb the players.
So we've practised the non-tafl games in the waiting time.

  10-29/11:37 Draganov:  @Hagbard, I can see that the next tournament will be Daldøs 3x14. These kind of games (Sahkku and Daldøs) are very easy-going and they are finished in less days than the tafl tournaments. In my opinion it would be better if you organize more than one tournament in the same time. These tournaments are not as serious and tough as the world championships and could be played more regularly. So, in this way, we could test a lot of variants. I mean we could play at the same time not only Sahkku and Daldøs but also some minor and inferior variants such as Tyr, Simple Tafl, Brandubh. I think an active player could easily play in two tournaments like Brandubh and Tablut simultaneously.

Full contents of the small forum.

Train your brain like a viking. Science Days in Norway Sep. 27th 2020. (Click on the image!)

Hnefatafl blog of Alessandro Arzani ("Abbas Agraphicus"), Italy!

Aleksandr Valerievich Tsyganok ("Steiger") created this ultimate guide to Historical Hnefatafl 9x9 (Saami Tablut), posted Feb. 12th 2021, history, rules and strategy!

To Copenhagen Hnefatafl, posted Feb. 25th 2021!

To Brandubh and Ard Ri Hnefatafl, posted April 17th 2021!

To Sea Battle Tafl, posted May 5th 2021!

And to Berserk Hnefatafl, posted May 31st 2021!

Dmitry Pashkov from Ethnic Board Games tells about tafl games, ludus latrunculorum, daldøs a.o., broadcasted by oper.ru Dec. 11th 2020.

In praise of HNEFATAFL. Frontlinetafl 2015 - 2021 (Aleksandr Valerievich Tsyganok, April 18th 2021).
See also Tsyganok's tafl game sets.

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.
Art on 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.
Tafl Shops.

Viking word of wisdom: The Hávamál.
(Havámál på dansk).

World Championship Tournament started September 15th 2021.
See the tournament page.

Здесь можно играть в тавлеи против людей. Можно использовать кириллицу.

Many thanks to Tim Millar ("crust"), Adam Bartley ("Adam"), John C. Ashton, Nicolas Cartier, Jonas Lööf ("conanlibrarian"), Olli Salmi, Damian Walker ("cyningstan"), Rasmus Holbroe, Thore Nissen, Lucho Panchev ("OdinHimself"), Corey Hart ("Brench"), Alexander Steiger Dis ("Steiger"), Dmitry Pashkov, Delray Curtis ("jrton80"), David Zolli ("branan"), Luk Martens ("Masterluke"), Marian Luck ("themightyglider"), Mikkel Berg-Nordlie ("mihkkal"), Alessandro Arzani ("Abbas Agraphicus") and all players who contributed to this site and to the photo gallery. And not least the more than 500 players the world over who played here 35000 real tafl games humans against humans and created a vast, practical experience with this intriguing, historical board game.

Updated 26.1.2022