Controls

You play in phases: placing, then moving. First you place your nine men one at a time onto the board's points. Then you slide men along the lines to adjacent empty points.

The mill is the heart of the game:

• Forming a mill means getting three of your men in a row along one of the board's marked lines. Each time you complete a mill, you remove one of your opponent's men from the board.
• Flying kicks in when you're reduced to three men. At that point you can move a man to any empty point on the board, not just an adjacent one, giving the losing side a fighting chance.

When removing an enemy man for a mill, you normally can't take one that's part of a mill unless no other men are available.

You win by reducing your opponent to two men or trapping them so they can't move. The computer sharpens across eight levels.

Tips

• Build toward multiple mills at once. Placing your men so they threaten two mills together forces your opponent to defend, and setting up a position where you can swing between two mills lets you remove a man every turn.
• Take the crossing points. Points where several lines meet belong to more mills and give your men more places to move, so controlling these hubs gives you flexibility and more mill threats.
• Block your opponent's mills. Every mill costs you a man, so occupying the empty spot in a line where your opponent has two men denies them the mill and the removal that comes with it.
• Don't let your men get stuck. You can lose by having no legal move, so avoid clustering your men where they block each other, and keep open points nearby to move into.
• Remove men that hurt most. When a mill lets you take an enemy man, pick the one that most disrupts their plans, such as a man about to form their own mill or one guarding a key point.
• Set up the swinging door. Two mills sharing a man let you break one and re-form the other each turn, removing an enemy man every move, so building this position often wins the game.

Frequently asked questions