> I looked into it, but think it'll be too confusing, especially for 1st time players.
I think the current weak stone is already very confusing, judging by my experience and some other comments, but I have not done any real playtesting.
But I would argue that first time players shouldn't play with the pie rule: they should just get the first-player advantage. It's a nice way to handicap the AI while the player learns the rules -- by the time someone knows the game well enough to play the balanced version, they have to learn a new rule. Just like new Go players start with extra stones on the board -- the game is the most fun when the two players are equally balanced, not necessarily on equal footing.
I think there's an implementation that makes it pretty intuitive: the first stone played doesn't get a border (or a more clear visual indicator that it's not capturable :). So the second player can choose to capture it, or to play elsewhere. If they play elsewhere, the first stone then becomes "locked." I think that's clearer than like switching colors or something.
The strategy for first-move play seems easier to grok than the strategy for a 55% weak stone, but I have to caveat that with: I play Hex, so it's familiar to me.
I've updated the UI of the game, so that it's more obvious that the 1st stone is weaker than the subsequent ones. Hopefully that will help with some of the confusion.
I agree that a 55% weak stone is not ideal, but it seems to be the easiest way to balance the game for now. Having the 1st stone become "locked" if it doesn't get captured, would also be surprising for new players.
I also did think about just letting players enjoy the 1st-player advantage, but on hard AI, green wins 43-7. That was what made me think of a way to balance the game in the 1st place.
I think the current weak stone is already very confusing, judging by my experience and some other comments, but I have not done any real playtesting.
But I would argue that first time players shouldn't play with the pie rule: they should just get the first-player advantage. It's a nice way to handicap the AI while the player learns the rules -- by the time someone knows the game well enough to play the balanced version, they have to learn a new rule. Just like new Go players start with extra stones on the board -- the game is the most fun when the two players are equally balanced, not necessarily on equal footing.
I think there's an implementation that makes it pretty intuitive: the first stone played doesn't get a border (or a more clear visual indicator that it's not capturable :). So the second player can choose to capture it, or to play elsewhere. If they play elsewhere, the first stone then becomes "locked." I think that's clearer than like switching colors or something.
The strategy for first-move play seems easier to grok than the strategy for a 55% weak stone, but I have to caveat that with: I play Hex, so it's familiar to me.