GenCon Post Mortem

Hello everyone!

GenCon was amazing! I would like to thank all those people that came out to the Tak events - we had an excellent turnout:  all slots that were signed up for were filled and we even had multiple passersby walk up and get involved.

We put on 4 events total:  2-hour casual events were held Thursday, Friday, and Sunday with a 4 1/2 hour tournament on Saturday. It was great to see some high level games between experienced Tak players. It was also very morale-boosting to see all the new people interested in Tak. The events left me feeling charged and reaffirmed in my belief that Tak is here to stay and grow.

These events simply couldn't have happened without Ben working hard to organize them. Among other things, he secured entry badges, gathered prizes, and helped make sure no one was left out. Thanks, Ben!!

Also, I would like to thank Queso and FloatingSkull for helping set up, tear down, and talk Tak!

Congrats are in order for M_Ainsel! She walked away with a white oak Wyrmwood Tak set and a copy of my book signed by James Ernest.

Second place was Tarontos, winning an Arcanist board and my book signed by the team at Worldbuilders.

3rd-8th place all received some combination of Tak sets from Cheapass Games along with a copy of Mastering Tak.

In addition to having a great experience, all participants walked away with the new Tak coin from Cheapass Games.

So, all in all, I think we gave away over $700 in prizes! Not bad for a $20 entry fee...


A video of the final games will be posted by Ben when he gets the time to do post-production on it. After that, I plan on doing an in-depth analysis of the most interesting one.

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I wanted to share my GenCon haul with you guys, too. The first day I managed to only spend $4 in the exhibition hall, and that was on a tray of nachos :)  But, as anyone that has been around that much awesome stuff can tell you, there's always something that draws you in.

Space is at a premium in my house, so only premium things get that space. I searched through the convention center and these items fit the bill:

Tak University Edition with cloth board

A nicely embroidered bag to put it in

And a place to put my Tak coins

Also inside this Bag o' Tak, I can fit my Tak-themed Pairs deck and wooden deck box with Name of the Wind dealer coin:

If you've never played Pairs, it's a great game to rest your mind after a long day of Tak!

The fit is a little snug, as the deck box is made for 52 cards, but the craftsmanship is superb and I couldn't pass it up

If you weren't able to make it to GenCon this year, there's always next year!

Until then, let's go spread the good word of Tak :)


P.S. I will try to post a puzzle this weekend. I also have a non-puzzle blog to post, hopefully late this week or early next.

Commentated Game against Takticianbot

Good morning, everyone!

I am going a little different route this week. I haven't done one of these types of game breakdowns in about a year, so I thought it would be a nice change.

Speaking of changes in routines, I'm not sure that I will be posting a puzzle next weekend as I will be at GenCon. I hope to play and see some great games with some great people while there, and will probably come back with some blog ammunition, but I won't have my computer with me and I've packed my schedule quite full.



This is a game I played last week against Takticianbot (Tako, for short). If you are really looking to test your skills and there isn't a human around to play, Tako can be your trainer. This bot isn't for the faint of heart, though; it routinely beats almost all humans. So, you have to go into the game with the mindset of learning something and not with the mindset that you are going to boost your ego :)

In my opinion, Tako is great at teaching players efficient and safe moves. It is not a flashy bot, it wins by slowly building threats without much risk involved. This can lead to some interesting moves during games. For instance, in this game, there are a few times where it would seem that Tako should make a 'tak' threat (most humans would), but Tako instead chooses a safer option of placing a flat in another area to build up to a slower and more powerful threat with less chance of its opponent's defense of that threat endangering its flat count.

Let me know what you think of this game and this format. I won't be doing it every week, as it's very time consuming, but I think that one of these commentated games could find its place in my blog every couple months.

Putting the commentary inside of a frame embedded in the blog makes the comments take up too much of the playing area, so, here's a link.


Enjoy!!

Puzzle #75: White to Play; White to Tinue

Hello, all!

This week's puzzle is from a game between AaaarghBot and myself. I missed this Tinue during the game and ended up forcing AaaarghBot into placing wall after wall, ending in a Gaelet game. On review, I found this board state and thought it was a really neat one.

There are slightly different ways this could go, but Tinue board state should be reached in 3-5 turns with the win for White in 5-7 turns. If you find other ways to get there, I'd love to hear them!

Please form your answer with PTN or a link to your solution via ptn.ninja. Also, be sure to use the spoiler tag so as not to ruin it for later puzzle solvers.

UPDATE:  The Reddit site has updated and the newer version does not recognize the older spoiler tag - " [spoiler text](/spoiler) ". The new version has it's own spoiler tag " >! spoiler text !< ". Unfortunately, the new spoiler tag does not work on the old Reddit. So, for the time being, since we have community members using both new and old Reddit, both tags need to be used. I found a way to nest these spoiler tags:

>! [spoiler text](/spoiler) !<

Ex:  >!<

I know it's a bit of a pain, but eventually, we should be able to switch over to the new tag only.

I hope you enjoy this one!

P.S. If you have suggestions for puzzle board states or how they are presented, please let me know.