模倣子 How to Play Faspeel

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Introduction

This is a simple game which is quick to play and only requires the coins in one's pocket. It can be played just as a game of chance, or as an exercise in trying to read one's opponent.

The name comes from French (1). The idea came from boiling chess down to the simplest possible board, i.e., two by two and two pieces (2).

Stuff Needed to Play

1. Each player needs three coins of the same type, i.e., size and shape, and each player's coins need to be distinct from the other players, e.g., one larger or a different color or nationality. For example, three pennies and three nickels, for you Americans.

2. You need a cross on a piece of paper or table. This is "the board."

fig 1.1 "the board"

3. A piece of paper and pen or pencil to keep score.

The Set-up

1. Each player places a coin, face up or down, on the board at diagonals. This is called "The Show" or what is showing--more on this later.

fig. 2.1. Coins on the board "The Show"

2. Each player stacks their remaining coins, one on top of the other, so the bottom coin is hidden. The top coin is "The Cover," the bottom one "The Secret" and together they are "The Message."

fig 2.2. Stacked player coins "The Message"

How to Play

At the start of every turn, a player has the choice of:

1. Moving their "Show" coin (including "Bumping" the other's Show coin--see below)

2. Flipping their "Show" coin

3. Shuffling their "Message"

First, some terminology. The players' coins are either "Near" one another, or "Away" from one another on the board. At the start, they are at diagonals, which is "Away." When "Away," the only move is to move "Near" (3). When "Near," one can either move "Away" or choose to "Bump" the other player's "Show" coin. This is when scoring is determined--more on this later.

fig 3.1. "Near"

fig. 3.2. "Away"

When shuffling their "Message" the player holds their coins so the other player may not see them. The player may flip either the "Cover" coin, the "Secret" coin, both, or neither, before replacing them with the "Cover" up. It does not matter if the two coins themselves are exchanged, so long as one covers the other.

Scoring

When a player "Bumps" the other player's coin on the board, the player being bumped reveals their "Secret" coin. If it's the same as the "Bumping" player's coin, each player gets two points. 

If the Bumper's "Show" and the Bumpee's "Secret" are different, then both players flip their "Show" coins and if both come up tails the Bumpee gets three points, otherwise the Bumper (the player whose turn it is) gets one point.

The players put their coins back in the diagonal position and it's the next player (Bumpee's) turn.

Keep a tally of the scores until one player (or both) reaches ten, and that's the end of a round. The game may be played competitively or cooperatively for as many rounds as desired.

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(1) The French name is “Face-pile” (Faspeel or “heads or tails”) the German is Münzspiel (“coin game”) and the Japanese is 表裏 (“hyô-ri” or “heads or tails”). Still working on Spanish—could be something like “cara mentirosa” (“lying face/coin face”).

(2) The idea is to step back from chess and make a system that may be more easily modeled as a memetic system, and then work back up to chess as a model of conflict or cooperation between two "societies."

(3) For the purposes of the game, when moving from "Away" to "Near," the direction, left or right, doesn't make a difference.

(4) More Links: Early Memetic Analysis, Early Take on Rules