Introduction
HexQuint is a new game and the goal is to achieve five-in-a-row; a quint (the word 'quint', or 'quintuplet,' means "a combination of five of a kind"). The game is played on an hexagonal board with a 5 square side. Counters are dropped on the board, one by one. Between drops, and also after all counters have been dropped, they can move one step in all directions. An enemy counter is captured by sandwiching it between two of one's own (so called interception-capture). Capture is not mandatory. Note that it's admissible to make captures before all counters have been dropped. Similar to Go-Moku, 'overlines' don't count (i.e., 6-in-a-row, or more). Stalemating or reducing enemy stones to zero also count as win, but this occurs rarely. Three-times repetition of a position, with the same player to move, results in a draw. In the dropping phase, if one decides to capture an enemy counter, one should keep in mind that one risks losing the initiative to the opponent. Remember to keep count of how many pieces there remains to drop.
Discussion
This game is quite difficult because interception-capture (custodian capture) can be used even before all counters have been dropped. It can be played with differing amounts of counters. I have implemented versions with 15, 17, 20, and 22 counters. Possibly, it could occur that both opponents' counters are reduced to less than four, but the game doesn't stop there because one could still win by way of stalemate or by removing all the opponent's counters. Note that the closely related games Quint and Quad (on the chessboard) are different in that they do not allow piece movement during the dropping phase. I suppose it is the hexagonal board in HexQuint which makes possible the more complex solution of combined dropping and movement.
I have also implemented four additional variants where all counters must be dropped before they are allowed to move.
You can download my free HexQuint program here (updated 2006-08-01), but you must own the software Zillions of Games to be able to run it.
© M. Winther (December 2005).
