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Re: Dead Stones. A community project.
Posted:
Oct 25, 2026, 12:41 PM
Love this idea for a project! Some more or less random ideas, none of which I've stress-tested:
1. Only p2 can place the first dead stone, and can do so at any point. After that, only p1 can place the second dead stone, but must wait some number of turns before doing so. Repeat.
2. Somehow make the right to place a dead stone contingent on how many of one's own pairs have been captured.
3. When you place a dead stone, you can also place a normal stone -- but if you do that (i.e., in addition to placing the dead stone), the other player immediately gets two (normal) turns in a row.
I think it would be a good idea for some of us to try this out with actual games.
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Re: Dead Stones. A community project.
Posted:
Oct 25, 2026, 12:48 PM
I'd be curious to hear from rainwolf how much time it would take to implement the ability to place a dead stone (so that we can all experiment). What sort of financial support from the community would make this viable?
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Re: Dead Stones. A community project.
Posted:
Oct 25, 2026, 2:10 PM
Here's my first pass at a dead stones ruleset, aiming for balancing and simplicity:
-First 3 moves for both players: pro-pente rules
-Starting with p2's 4th move and ending after their 6th, p2 has the option to place a dead stone at any open intersection in addition to their normal move. This stone is neither white nor black, and cannot be used to make captures or pente.
-This is a one-time occurrence: once p2 places a dead stone or after their 6th move, they lose the right to play a dead stone and the rest of the game they play normal pente.
-p1 gains the right to place a dead stone, with the same rules as p2, only after p2 places a dead stone. This option is available for only 3 moves after p2 plays their dead stone. If p2 never plays a dead stone, p1 never gets the option.
-After p2 and p1 both place their dead stones, the rest of the game is regular pente. Neither side can place a dead stone or alter any existing dead stones.
Obvious parameters to tweak are the windows for p1 and p2 to play the dead stones.
It's no use going back to yesterday, because I was a different person then.
Re: Dead Stones. A community project.
Posted:
Oct 25, 2026, 2:49 PM
1. Get buy in from Rainwolf 2. start simple, 1 dead stone per player, used at any time after first 2 rounds, p2 first 3. player must use his dead stone before placing his regular stone 4. collect a set number of played games then re-evaluate
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Re: Dead Stones. A community project.
Posted:
Oct 25, 2026, 3:03 PM
I like this constraint from Karl: "p1 gains the right to place a dead stone, with the same rules as p2, only after p2 places a dead stone".
One idea would be to only enable dead stones to be placed during captures. This idea is partly inspired by boku where "when a pair of stones is surrounded, only one of the two stones is captured, with the attacker choosing which one". So in this case, you have it such that when you make a capture, you take both pieces but then you have an option to place a "dead stone" (I vote red!) in one of the two spaces that has just been removed.
The toggle here could be deciding if this is just a one time thing for each player or potentially no limit given how captures aren't that frequent.
This is kind of an elegant way to figure out the restriction. Plus having a "dead stone" behind after a capture sounds kind of cool, like its the dead body of a capture.
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Re: Dead Stones. A community project.
Posted:
Oct 25, 2026, 3:04 PM
Not to speak for rainwolf, but considering he was willing to take on the rules of renju, I think given we have well defined rules for this, he might be open to it.
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Re: Dead Stones. A community project.
Posted:
Oct 25, 2026, 7:02 PM
Rainwolf said he can do it when he has a freed up week to work on it at some point. And he will need to rent a second server for more than one reason. He has been wanting a test server. And we would need to test run it before introducing it to the data base here. It will at first have its own data base. This will be one of the most complex coded games he has done yet. And he seems to have excitement and interest. But is waiting for us to get the concept at least 99% formulated and agreed upon. Which knowing our community could take a little time. So for now, we brain storm. With our differences of thought, and then somehow bring them together and narrow down on agreed consensus, to create the ultimate variant game. Then rainwolf will have is road map to work with. As to finances. I offered. He said would be for free so far. So. Yeah I dunno guess we will see how hes feeling when he goes server shopping. But coding sounds like for free.
Mike I'll re code the player to not be auto on in a bit. I can not code it to remember you and play once and not second time. So I'll just have to disable auto play.
Update* ok Mike i redid the code for the audio.
Noah, I do like red too. Its easy to identify, and its a masters color. And blood, looks intense. And vibrant. When I tests colors using AI imaging, gray was to hard to see mixed in with black and white. Gray makes sense, but visually didnt work in testing.
Checked out boku. Yes I see what you are saying. You select which of the 2 to cap. Interesting
Z
Scire hostis animum - Intelligere ludum - Nosce te ipsum - Prima moventur conciliat - Nolite errare
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Re: Dead Stones. A community project.
Posted:
Oct 25, 2026, 7:29 PM
So far interesting ideas from everyone. Ned your last one, of if P2 places dead stone, P1 gets to place 2 normal stones right after. Karl help me here to visualize this. Imagining game scenarios. Does this give P1 too heavy of advantage or is it balanced? Our goal should be to minimize advantages as much as possible, moving towards a balanced game. Im struggling to visualize what his idea would do to the balance. Karl or any body including Ned too, feel free to chime in on that.
Scire hostis animum - Intelligere ludum - Nosce te ipsum - Prima moventur conciliat - Nolite errare
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Re: Dead Stones. A community project.
Posted:
Oct 25, 2026, 9:20 PM
I'm really enjoying the ideas coming in so far. This is exactly what I was hoping for when I started this thread.
What I find particularly interesting is that everyone is approaching the concept from a different angle. Some ideas focus on balancing P1 and P2, others on placement timing, captures, simplicity, or entirely new tactical possibilities.
And I think that's a good thing.
I don't want this to become a competition over whose particular ruleset gets chosen. I'd rather we take the strongest elements from everyone's ideas and see what combinations produce the most interesting and balanced game.
Maybe the eventual version borrows something from several different proposals. Maybe testing reveals something none of us anticipated.
I think we should establish a few common goals:
- Preserve the fundamental character of Pente, particularly its positional opening play, tactical calculation, and forcing sequences. - Introduce a genuinely new strategic dimension, rather than simply an emergency defensive move. - Minimize any unfair advantage between P1 and P2. - Keep the rules understandable and reasonably practical to implement. - Above all, make something genuinely fun to play.
We also need to be mindful of Rainwolf's time. I don't think it's reasonable to expect him to program five different versions just so we can compare them. Ideally, we do as much thinking and experimenting as possible beforehand, then present him with one carefully developed initial ruleset.
And I want to emphasize *initial*. Whatever we eventually choose doesn't have to mean every other idea disappears forever. Those ideas may become future improvements, alternatives, or inspire something entirely new.
For now, I think the most productive next step is to explore actual board positions and determine how the different mechanics affect the game.
One question I'd especially like everyone to consider is whether placing a dead stone should replace your normal move or be an additional action. I suspect that single decision could have an enormous effect on balance and gameplay.
Keep the ideas coming. Nothing needs to be ruled out yet. We're building this together.
Scire hostis animum - Intelligere ludum - Nosce te ipsum - Prima moventur conciliat - Nolite errare
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Re: Dead Stones. A community project.
Posted:
Oct 25, 2026, 11:25 PM
Here's a question for rainwolf: Suppose you programmed a version that allowed either player to place a dead stone on their move, and then -- at their discretion –- place a regular stone. (So: no restrictions at all.) How difficult would it be to alter that program to conform to some specific rule set? If not difficult (i.e., small marginal cost), I'd suggest program that maximally permissive version first, because we can use it to test out every variant proposed so far (if I'm not mistaken).
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Re: Dead Stones. A community project.
Posted:
Oct 26, 2026, 12:28 AM
I messaged rainwolf to reply. I will say Ned. This is actually a genius idea. As it would allow us to test many different versions with one line of code.
So, code to: 1- Place a dead stone on an empty intersection on any move we want.
2-Choose whether to place a normal stone afterward or end the turn.
3-Let players agree beforehand on placement limits and timing rules.
And so we can choose by mutual agreement to play by almost any version rules we want as part of the test phase. Is this accurate?
Scire hostis animum - Intelligere ludum - Nosce te ipsum - Prima moventur conciliat - Nolite errare
Re: Dead Stones. A community project.
Posted:
Oct 26, 2026, 4:52 AM
Name suggestion: Tombstone Pente?
Logistically, more platforms = more complex = more time.
Only live website play is the easiest/fastest part to implement. I can add turn-based web-only pretty quickly too but then I'll have to think about isolation for testers only or not.
Mobile apps are easier to isolate, Apple/Google have infrastructure for me to release test versions to select users, but it still requires isolation on the server.
As for flow, I'm thinking a connect6 flow where the 2nd stone is either a pass or a dead stone, then you experiment at will, agreeing to rules in chat/message prior to playing. I can make them more restrictive as rules settle. Once settled, I can/will erase all games and can reset ratings too.
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