Talk:Tic-tac-toe
The opening move with the least number of drawing replies is in one of the corners. After this move has been made, the opener can force a win if the opponent takes any square other than the centre one, as shown in the above game.
I have removed this description just after the first example since it did not make much sense as to how it is "The opening move with the least number of drawing replies" and why is the next example not equivalent in that sense.
Four draw positions
When I was doodling one day I established to myself that there are only four possible draw positions in tictactoe, including inversions and rotations of the four.
They are:
OXO OXO XOX XOO XOX OXX OXX OXX XOX XOO OXO XXO
Two questions. Is this relevent enough to include in the article, and more importantly, am I right?
- No, there are only 3 - your third and fourth positions are the same except for a reflection - or is that not allowed? Incidentally your second game has more 0s than Xs, unlike the others. Ignoring symmetry but assuming X goes first, there are 16 possible draw positions (4 of first type 1, 4 of second type 2 and 8 of third/fourth type). --Henrygb 15:38, 11 Oct 2004 (UTC)
Alternative names
I have removed most of the section Alternative names, as this is an encyclopedia, not a dictionary. Here's the enitre paragraph as it looked before my edit:
Alternative names
- Jǐngzìhyóusìh (井字遊戲, "the game in the character 井") (Chinese - Taiwan)
- Tic-tac-toe, tick-tat-toe, or tit-tat-toe (English - USA)
- Noughts and crosses or naughts and crosses (English - United Kingdom, Ireland, Australia)
- X's and O's (English - Ireland)
- Ta-te-ti, Tres en raya, Gato, Michi, La vieja, Equis cero (Spanish)
- Tris or Filetto (Italian)
- Morpion (French)
- Boter, kaas en eieren ("butter, cheese and eggs") (Dutch)
- Kruisje, Nulletje ("Little Cross, Little Zero") (Dutch)
- Kryds og bolle (Danish)
- Luffarschack, (literally "tramp chess"), Tripp trapp trull (Swedish)
- Ristinolla ("cross-zero") (Finnish)
- Jätkänshakki ("workman's chess") (Finnish)
- Trips-traps-trull (Estonian)
- X şi zero (Romanian)
- Jogo do galo - Cock´s game (Portuguese - Portugal)
- Jogo da velha - Old lady´s game (Portuguese - Brazil)
- Τρίλιζα (Greek)
- Zero kata (Hindi)
- Phool aur chaukadi (Hindi)
- Maru batsu (円伐, "circle strike") (Japanese)
- Sanmoku narabe (三目並べ, "three in a row") (Japanese)
- Морски шах ("sea chess") (Bulgarian)
- Kółko i krzyżyk ("circle and cross") (Polish)
- Крестики-нолики ("crosses and zeroes") (Russian)
- Tripp trapp tresko, or Tre på rad (“Three in a row”) (Norwegian)
- /iks-miks-driks/ (Yiddish and Modern Hebrew)
- /iks-igul/ ("Ax(letter)-Circle") (Modern Hebrew language)
- أكس أو ("X O") (Arabic)
- Mylla ("Mill") (Icelandic)
- Piškvorky (Czech, Slovak)
Sometimes, the names of the games Tic-tac-toe (where players keep adding "pieces") and Three Men's Morris (where pieces start to move when the first four have been placed) are confused.
Niels Ø 13:35, 30 September 2005 (UTC)
Strategy
The strategy as described in the article does not guarantee a draw when used by player two, and fails to win against sub-optimal play in lines that result from an opening move in the corner of the board. Mikebell 04:09, 15 November 2005 (UTC)
mnk games
The mnk class of games and the fact that tic tac toe is an instance of that class should probably get a more substantial mention than in the intro paragraph to tic tac toe variations. (meta) As a Wikinoob, I don't know if this is the right forum to discuss opinions about content / direction of the article changes like this. Someone will have to correct me if this isn't how it's done. Mikebell 04:15, 15 November 2005 (UTC)
Chickens
The article says that Las Vagas casinos have tic-tac-toe-playing chickens. Is that true? I didn't see any last time I was in Vegas. I have played tic-tac-toe agaisnt a chicken, but taht was 30 years ago at a county fair.
- I have seen chickens that are presented as playing Tic Tac Toe at carnivals. There is a common cheat which is used. The chicken is trained to peck at a light, and has a Tic Tac Toe board in its pen which is mediated through a computer. It is actually the computer which is playing the game, and the chicken is just pecking at the Tic Tac Toe square which has a light illumninated by the computer. The chicken sees the light (you don't) and pecks at the square selected by the computer. Kmorford 03:16, 1 March 2006 (UTC)
Chaos and order
A great variant of Tic Tac Toe is a game called "chaos and order" (or is it "order and chaos"?) It is played on a six by six board with players alternating placing either a single X or a single O on the board at a time. The first player plays the part of order, and wants to get five in a row of either Xs or Os. The second player plays the part of chaos, and wants to completely fill the board with out having any instances of five in a row of either Xs or Os. Either player can play either an X or an O in any unfilled space on the board when it is his or her turn. With perfect play, I suspect that order can always win, but I do not know that with certainty. The game is complex enough that there are good opportunities to win for both sides. Kmorford 03:25, 1 March 2006 (UTC)