Tara Board Game

History in a box

Classic games, like chess or the ancient Chinese game of Go, bear elements of the originating country's history. "Checkmate," as an example, is a reflection of a time when actually 'killing' or capturing a king was unthinkable. The game of Go, with its subtle notion of surrounding and capturing territory is reflective of thousands of years of Eastern history and thought.
Which brings us to Tara, Ireland's Royal Board Game. It bears a resemblance to Go, in that winning the game entails the capture of territory, and only incidentally, the occasional capture of opponents' pieces. It also has only two kinds of pieces to think about - red and blue ringforts. There are bridges which link these ringforts in game play, but they do not have independent movement rules. Tara even has an element of chess in it. Initial placement rules for ringforts require them to be placed a 'knight's move' away from each other, until such time as that can no longer be done (room to do so diminishes at each turn and then vanishes completely), at which point, players will begin to link their previously placed ringforts.
The reflection of Ireland's history is in a choice that players must make at some point during the game that is linked to the method of scoring.
In all three of the games that can be played using the same board and pieces, players will place ringforts and make connections until all 45 holes on the board have been filled. The difference in the three games - Sacred Hill, The High Kings of Tara, and Poisoned Chalice - is the initial placement rules, but the object is the same; to be the player with the LEAST amount of kingdoms (any series of connected ringforts) on the board. Unless, and this is critical, one decides to work at a tie in which the number of kingdoms is equal, in which case the game is decided by counting individual ringforts and determining who has the MOST.
In other words, does a player decide to go for the subtlety of consolidating the connection of his own ringforts and reducing an opponents' opportunity to connect his (or hers), or work at surrounding, capturing and winning by the 'brute force' of superior numbers of ringforts on the board?
This is just the sort of decision-making that was involved when medieval Irish landowners were competing for the title of Ard Ri na hEireann, or High King of Ireland, whose traditional 'seat' was the hill of Tara in what is now County Meath in Ireland. Some would pursue a negotiated settlement that would increase the amount of land in their possession, while others would just attack and take the land.
All this said, Tara, as a game, is not anywhere near as complex as its own history. It takes about five minutes to learn (and I've taught it in this amount of time to hundreds of people at the summer Irish festivals in Minnesota, Milwaukee and elsewhere), though like all classics, it can encompass a lifetime to master. The three games that can be played increase the complexity of the simplest game (Sacred Hill) to offer an almost limitless degree of challenge. And the application of different methods of scoring bears the potential of increasing that complexity if further challenge is sought.
If you enjoy the challenge of abstract strategy and tactics competition, Tara is not only a terrific game in that regard but fun, as well.
As an added bonus, the publisher's Web site (www.tailtengames.com) offers animated demos, which allow you to trace ringfort placement and connection throug