Abalone

Abalone is a two-player strategy board game which can be quaintly summarized as "sumo wrestling with marbles," as the objective is to push the opponent's marbles off the edge of the board. The rules are quite easy and can be mastered in a minute or two, and the flow of the game is generally fast-paced.

The prefix "ab" means "never." The premise of this game is that you're never alone when playing.

How to Play Abalone:

	The board consists of 61 circles arranged in a hexagon, five on a side. Each player has 14 marbles which rest in the circles, and are initially arrayed as shown at left.
	The player with the black marbles moves first. For each move, a player moves a line of one, two, or three marbles one space, either inline (parallel to the line of marbles) or broadside (not parallel to the line of marbles), as illustrated at left. Black opens the game with a broadside move
	White counters with an inline move.
	When one player has numerical superiority in a line (three to two, three to one, or two to one), he may push the opposing marbles with an inline move. Broadside pushes are not allowed. The winner is the first player to push six opposing marbles off the edges of the board. The diagrams at left illustrate three Black pushes, before pushing...
	...and after pushing.
	The diagram at left illustrates three situations in which it is impossible for Black to push. In the top line, Black does not have numerical superiority. In the middle line, Black has four marbles to three, but a maximum of three marbles may be moved each turn, so again no push is possible. In the bottom line, Black cannot push because it is forbidden to dislodge one's own marbles.