Have you ever heard of Dejarik? If you’re a Star Wars fan, you know just the game I’m talking about. For the rest of you, it’s the freaky hologram game Chewbacca and R2-D2 play in Star Wars: A New Hope. For a while, fan-made rules for the game were available on the Internet. The rules are now down, but I was able to dig them up on Wayback.
Setting aside for a moment the interesting game of Courtier, look at Dejarik. If you’re like me, you’ll find it’s missing something. There’s too much luck. If a player winds up with bad pieces, there’s nothing he can really do to overcome that. Additionally, attacks from the back are known from The Joiner King to be stronger, yet these rules do not take that into account.
Therefore, I took it upon myself, as I often do with games, to fix the rules. I created a modified version, probably closer to the “real” version, and called it “Starrett’s Dejarik”. The differences from Ris’sa’s Dejarik are these additional rules:
1. Combined Attack. Two or more pieces adjacent to a single enemy piece may combine their attack values in a single attack roll. To do this, the primary attacker is determined, then half of each secondary attacker’s attack is added to his. For determining direction, the primary attacker is used.
2. Combined Defense. A piece may add half the defense values of all adjacent friendly pieces to its defense value for a defense roll.
3. The “Hold.” In the event of a push or counter-push, the victorious piece may choose to freeze the losing piece in position until either the losing piece pushes or counter-pushes the holding piece, the holding piece is killed, or the holding piece leaves the space.
4. The “Flip”. In the event of a push or counter-push, the victorious piece may move the losing piece to any square adjacent to the victorious piece.
5. Each piece is defined as “facing” in the direction it last moved or attacked.
6. An attack not from the front or the back is always interpreted as one result level better for the attacker than otherwise.
7. An attack from the back is interpreted as two result levels better than otherwise.
8. A player may expend a step to change a piece’s facing without moving it.
9. On the outer orbit and middle orbits, if you know the facing, front, back, and sides should be easy to determine. In the center, the five spaces in front are the front, the five in back the back, and the other two the side.
Feedback and variants welcome!
That seems a little complicated, not that complicated is bad. I think it presents some neat alternatives so you can mix it up when you’re playing dejarik with a friend. One idea I had, though, to incorporate the attacks from the back is to simply add a flanking type scenario. In other words, if you attack an enemy who is caught between your attacker and another of your pieces, the attacker gets to add the attack dice of the attacker AND the defense dice of the other allied piece. This represents the enemy focusing on the other allied piece so the attacker is attacking “from the back” in a figurative way. This eliminates the need to keep track of facing and adds benefits for strategically placing your pieces. It also increases the tactics available for the defensive pieces (Kintan Strider and N’Gok).
However, I must say I really like the ideas of the “hold” and the “flip.” Those are neat twists.
I had a question though: what do you mean by attacks from the sides or back being one or two “result levels” better? Does that mean that a counter-push becomes a push and a push becomes a kill?
“I had a question though: what do you mean by attacks from the sides or back being one or two “result levels” better? Does that mean that a counter-push becomes a push and a push becomes a kill?”
Yes, for one result level. Add another for two, obviously.
As far as your flanking ideas go, they’re interesting, but I doubt I’ll use them much. The problem is that attacks from the back are attested as an(almost overwhelming) advantage in(I think) The Joiner King, without reference to anything like your “flanking” concept. I think that where we can help it, we shouldn’t ignore the evidence of the canon re the rules of Dejarik.
I like Darth Telson’s “flanking” idea–it’s a way to account for attacks from behind without the complicated notion of which way a piece is “facing.” However, I also really like your “Combined Attack,” “Combined Defense,” and “Hold” ideas. The “Flip” ideas sounds alright–I’ll have to try it out and see how I feel about it.
One rule variation I’d like to see added: The “Corner”: If a piece wins a push or counter-push against another piece, and the loser has no adjacent space onto which it can be pushed, then the piece is killed. (Obviously, if the “Flip” rule were used, then even if a flip could be applied, it wouldn’t matter; the fact that the piece was cornered and could not be pushed onto an adjacent space would be enough.)
Ki-Aaron-Mundi:
I am intrigued by this “Corner” variation. I’ll have to test it. To be honest, I’ve never seen a situation where there’s nowhere to push, though of course, if one added this rule, they would no doubt start appearing.
As for “the complicated notion of which way a piece is ‘facing’”, I would say that I have played many times without having any trouble with it, so I’m keeping it. However, if you find it more fun with Darth Telson’s rules, or some combination of his and mine, or even with the original rules by Rissa, by all means use them. There’s no law that says we must all play the same way(it’s not an organized sport), and the only way to determine the best variant is to try many.
Happy Dejariking(Yes, I know that’s not a word),
Sam Starrett