Help For the Game Of Unlur

Introduction

Welcome to the network Unlur server. The rules of Unlur are given below. The Unlur challenge command is described here. Other commands are the same for all pbmserv games.

unlur challenge [ -radius=N ] userid1 userid2

Start a new game between userid1 and userid2
N specifies the size of one side of the playing field. The default size is 6.   Legal values range from 4-13.

Note that Unlur only supports games with two players.

Rules

1.    The player using the black pieces is attempting to form a Y (a continuous path joining sides 1, 3, 5 or sides 2,4,6).  The player using the white pieces is attempting to form a line (a continuous path joining opposite sides 1,4 or 2,5 or 3,6).  The corner is considered part of both adjacent sides.

                Side 1
              1 2 3 4 5 6 
             / / / / / / 7
         A- . . X . . . / 8 
        B- . . X . . . . / 9 
Side 6 C- . . X . . . . . / 10  Side 2
      D- . . . X . . . . . / 11
     E- . . . . X X . . . . / 
    F- . . . X X . X . . . . 
     G- . . X . . . X X . . 
      H- . X . . . . . X X 
Side 5 I- X . . . . . . .  Side 3
        J- . . . . . . . 
         K- . . . . . . 
              Side 4

Diagram 1: A Win for Black

                Side 1
              1 2 3 4 5 6 
             / / / / / / 7
         A- . . O . . . / 8 
        B- . . O . . . . / 9 
Side 6 C- . . O . . . . . / 10  Side 2
      D- . . . O . . . . . / 11
     E- . . . . O . . . . . / 
    F- . . . . O . . . . . . 
     G- . . . . O O . . . . 
      H- . . . . . O . . . 
Side 5 I- . . . . . O . .  Side 3
        J- . . . . O . . 
         K- . . . O . . 
              Side 4

Diagram 2: A Win for White

2.        To eliminate the possibility of a tie, if the black player forms a line without also forming a Y in the same turn, or if the white player forms a Y without also forming a line in the same turn, he loses.  I.e., you cannot achieve your opponent’s victory condition unless you simultaneously achieve your own.

3.        Because the conditions for winning are different for the white and black player (the white player has a much easier time joining two sides instead of three), at the beginning of the game it is not decided which player plays with which color.  Instead a variation of the pie rule (you cut, I choose) is used.  During the first part of the game the players are in the contract phase.  During this phase both players place black pieces.  At any point instead of placing a piece, either player may pass his turn by issuing the move “black”.  At that point it is his opponent’s turn with the white pieces (and this ends the contract phase).

4.        During the contract phase neither player may place a piece on the edge of the board.  This is because some moves on the edge can actually be disadvantageous.  It also eliminates the possibility of the victory conditions being met before the contract phase has ended.

Notation

Moves are indicated by specifying the coordinates of the piece to be placed (the color is implied by which phase of the game you are in and which player has been determined to play white):

i.e., a move is of the form:

unlur move name password c4

Additionally the special move “black” is used to end the contract phase (and indicate you want to play the black pieces):

unlur move name password black

The coordinate system is indicated in the diagrams above (note that in the lower half of the board the columns are numbered starting with a number higher than one).

References and History

Unlur was invented in 2001 by Jorge Gomez Arrausi and was the winner of Abstract Games Magazine’s Unequal Forces Game Design Competition.  There is an Unlur homepage containing rules and strategy information, and realtime play is available at Ludoteka.  There is a mailing list for Unlur at Yahoo Groups.

The extension to the PBeM-server for playing Unlur was written by Lyman Hurd. If you find a problem or a bug, let him know.

 

Helpfile courtesy of Lyman Hurd <lhurd@yahoo.com>