Oware

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Oware
Ranks Two
Sowing Single lap
Region Ghana, Benin and other West African countries; Surinam and the Caribbean
Owari game from Cameroon. On this board players would sit left and right.
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Owari game from Cameroon. On this board players would sit left and right.

Oware is an abstract strategy game and the mancala game most widely considered suitable for serious adult competition. Oware is the national game of Ghana, and the particular name "Oware" is that given by the Akan speaking people there. It is played throughout West Africa and the Caribbean. Among its many names are Ncholokoto (Igbo), Ayo (Yoruba), Awalé (Côte d'Ivoire), Wari (Mali), Ouri, Ouril or Uril (Cape Verde), Warri (Caribbean), Gebeta (Ethiopia/Eritrea), Adji (Ewe), and Awélé (Ga). A common name in English is Awari. Two different but very similar games are Kalah and Pallankuzhi.

Contents

[edit] Rules

These are the rules for the abapa variation, considered to be the most appropriate for serious, adult play.

[edit] Equipment

f e d c b a
4 4 4 4 4 4
4 4 4 4 4 4
A B C D E F

A typical Oware board has two straight rows of six pits or cavities, called "houses", as in the diagram to the right, and optionally one house at either end to store captured stones. Each player controls the six houses on their side of the board, and the score house on their right.

The only pieces are 48 undifferentiated seeds. In the Caribbean, these are typically nickernuts, which are smooth and shiny seeds of sprawling coastal shrubs. Beads and pebbles are also sometimes used. In the West, marbles are sometimes used in cheap sets, but these do not have the feel or ease of play of traditional seeds. In tourist sets cowrie shells are sometimes seen, but they are not comfortable to play.

Boards may be elaborately carved or simple and functional; they may include a pedestal, or be hinged to fold lengthwise or crosswise and latch for portability and storage with the seeds inside. While most commonly at either end, scoring houses may be placed elsewhere, and the rows need not be straight, as in the photo above. When a board has a hinged cover like a triptych, the scoring houses may be carved into the two halves of the cover, and so be in front of the players during play.

When there is no board present, people may simply scoop two rows of pits out of the earth, and so use the ground as a board.

[edit] Object

The object of the game is to capture more seeds than one's opponent. Since the game has only 48 seeds, capturing 25 is sufficient to accomplish this. Since there are an even number of seeds, it is possible for the game to end in a draw, where each player has captured 24.

[edit] Sowing

Example turn:

2 2 1 2 3 1
3 1 4 Empty 6 (highlighted) 2

The lower player prepares to sow from E.

2 3 (highlighted) 2 (highlighted) 3 (highlighted) 4 2
3 1 4 Empty Empty 3

After sowing, c, d, and e are captured.

Players take turns moving the seeds. On a turn, a player chooses one of the six houses under his or her control. The player removes all seeds from that house, and distributes them, dropping one in each house counter-clockwise from this house, in a process called sowing. Seeds are not distributed into the end scoring houses, nor into the house drawn from. That is, the starting house is left empty; if it contained 12 seeds, it is skipped, and the twelfth seed is placed in the next house. The diagram shows the result of sowing from house E.

Knowing the number of seeds in each house is, of course, important to gameplay. When there are many seeds in a house, sometimes enough to make a full lap of the board or more, they cannot easily be counted by eye, and their number is often guarded by the player who controls that house. This may be done by repeatedly moving the seeds in the house. A player may count the seeds when contemplating a move; in such cases the last few are usually counted in the hand to avoid revealing their number.

[edit] Capturing

After a turn, if the last seed was placed into an opponent's house that brought its total to two or three, all the seeds in that house are captured and placed in the player's scoring house (or set aside if the board has no scoring houses). If the previous-to-last seed also brought an opponent's house to two or three, these are captured as well, and so on. However, if a move would capture all an opponent's seeds, the capture is forfeited, and the seeds are instead left on the board, since this would prevent the opponent from continuing the game. In the above diagram, the lower player would capture all the seeds in houses c, d, and e.

[edit] Let the opponent play

The proscription against capturing all an opponent's seeds is related to a more general idea, that one ought to make a move that allows the opponent to continue playing. If an opponent's houses are all empty, the current player must make a move that gives the opponent seeds. If no such move is possible, the current player captures all seeds in his/her own territory, ending the game.

[edit] Winning

The game is over when one player has captured 25 or more seeds, or both players have taken 24 seeds each (draw). If both players agree that the game has been reduced to an endless cycle, each player captures the seeds on their side of the board.

[edit] Variations

[edit] "Grand Slam" Variations

The move before leaving your opponent with no seeds is called the Grand Slam. It is usually the last move, and there are variations to the (necessarily) special rule that applies. The rule may be one of the following:

  1. Grand Slam captures are not legal moves.
  2. Such a move is legal, but no capture results. International competitions often follow this rule.
  3. Grand Slam captures are allowed, however, all remaining stones on the board are awarded to the opponent.
  4. Such a move is legal, but the last (or first) house is not captured.

Various other rules also exist.

[edit] History and Society

A Time magazine article from June 14, 1963 demonstrates the age of mancala thus:

"Carved on a vast block of rock in the ancient Syrian city of Aleppo are two facing ranks of six shallow pits with larger hollows scooped out at each end. The same design is carved on columns of the temple at Karnak in Egypt, and it appears in the early tomb paintings in the valley of the Nile. It is carved in the Theseum in Athens, and in rock ledges along caravan routes of the ancient world. Today the same pits and hollows are to be found all over Asia and Africa, scratched in the bare earth, carved in rare woods or ivory inlaid with gold."

Although not all of these examples are still credited today, the mancala family of games has existed for at least 1000 years. Oware is perhaps the most widespread game in that family.

Reflecting traditional African values, players of Oware encourage participation by onlookers, making it perhaps the most social two-player abstract. Games may provide a focus for entertainment and meeting others. The game, or variations of it, also had an important role in teaching arithmetic to African children.

In May 2002, two scientists from the Free University in Amsterdam, Netherlands reported that they had used computers to solve the game of "Awari" using a brute force approach. Over 889 billion positions were considered, with their solution demonstrating that perfect play leads to a draw. However, some oware players have noted that this experiment was not done using the abape ruleset used in international competition, but rather with the Grand Slam variation.

In Nokia 3310 cell phone, Oware is included in the games but is called Beans. Also, it features more seeds or beans than the original game.

[edit] External links

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