Leeward
An original two-player board game on a seven-by-seven chart. Every piece moves by the wind, and whoever moves sets the wind for the other side.
| Ink | Paper |
|---|
Leeward
A board game written for this page, not adapted from an existing one. Two sides, Ink and Paper, share a single wind. Every piece except the Lamp moves by it — the Sail runs before it, the Oar pulls against it, the Kite slips across it — so the same piece can be a threat on one move and harmless on the next. The twist is who controls it: after you move, you must turn the wind, and the wind you leave is the one your opponent has to move in. Each move is therefore two decisions: what to do, and what to let the other side do.
The pieces are drawn in the frame of the wind, so their shapes turn with it and point the way they can go. Pick a piece to see its squares, pick a square, then choose one of the three new winds. While you hover over a wind, the board marks which of your pieces it would leave open to capture.
| Piece | Each side | Moves |
|---|---|---|
| Lamp (ringed disc) | 1 | One square in any of the eight directions, onto an empty square only. The Lamp never captures. |
| Sail (triangle) | 2 | Any distance downwind, in a straight line, stopping at the first piece; takes it if it is an enemy. |
| Kite (lozenge) | 2 | Crosswind, to either side: one square, or a leap of exactly two squares over whatever is between. |
| Oar (chevron) | 3 | One square into the wind, straight or slanting to either side. |
| Rule | |
|---|---|
| Turn | Move one piece, then turn the wind: veer left, veer right, or reverse it. It may never stay where it was. |
| Capture | Land on an enemy piece to take it. Pieces taken are out of the game. |
| Win | Take the enemy Lamp, or make landfall by walking your Lamp onto the ringed square the enemy Lamp started on. |
| Calm | Sixty moves in a row without a capture end the game in a draw. A side with no legal move loses. |
| Start | The wind blows east, and Ink moves first. |
The computer reads ahead with an alpha–beta search under a time limit: a quarter of a second with some deliberate carelessness at Easy, under a second at Fair, and nearly two at Strong. Settings are remembered in the browser; the game in progress is not. Arrow keys turn the wind once a move is picked (left and right veer, up or down reverses), and Escape takes the pick back.