TZAAR, designed by Kris Burm and published in 2007, replaced TAMSK as the second game in the GIPF Project series. Two players command three types of pieces (Tzaar, Tzarra, and Tott) on a hexagonal board, capturing opponents’ pieces by moving onto them and stacking their own pieces to increase their power. A player loses immediately if they run out of any one piece type, or if they cannot capture on their mandatory first action of a turn.
Community consensus places TZAAR near the top of the GIPF Project, with many abstract strategy enthusiasts considering it the series’ most intense and confrontational entry. The dual loss conditions create a unique strategic texture that distinguishes it from other abstracts, and the stacking mechanic produces escalating power dynamics that keep games tense from start to finish.
Three Types, Total War
The dual loss conditions are TZAAR’s most distinctive feature. You lose if any one of your three piece types is completely eliminated from the board. This means you can’t focus exclusively on aggressive play or purely on building tall stacks. You have to maintain representation across all three types while simultaneously threatening to eliminate one of your opponent’s types. The constant juggling between offense and defense creates a mental pressure that few abstracts match.
Stacking transforms the game’s power dynamics as it progresses. When you stack pieces on top of each other, the resulting tower captures anything equal to or shorter than itself. This creates a clear risk-reward trade-off: tall stacks are powerful attackers but reduce your board presence, while keeping pieces spread out maintains coverage but leaves each piece vulnerable to taller opponents. Deciding when to consolidate and when to spread is the game’s central strategic question, and the answer changes with every board state.
The two-action turn structure forces players to balance capture with construction every single turn. Your first action must be a capture (or you lose). Your second action can be another capture or a stack. This mandatory aggression prevents the game from settling into a defensive stalemate, which is a common problem in abstract games. Every turn must include at least one act of violence, and that requirement keeps the game moving toward resolution.
Games develop a natural intensity curve that mirrors a well-structured thriller. Early turns involve cautious positioning and selective captures. Mid-game sees stacking begin in earnest, with tall pieces starting to dominate portions of the board. The endgame becomes a desperate scramble to protect vulnerable piece types while trying to eliminate your opponent’s last remaining pieces of a specific kind. This arc emerges organically from the mechanics without any designed escalation mechanism.
The hexagonal board creates natural corridors and chokepoints that make positional awareness essential. Pieces on the edges of the board are harder to reinforce but also harder to attack from multiple angles. Central pieces are accessible but exposed. Learning to read the board’s geography and position your pieces to exploit it adds a spatial dimension to the game that pure capture-based abstracts often lack.
The Abstract’s Hard Edge
Accessibility is limited by the game’s unforgiving nature. One careless move can leave a piece type exposed for elimination, and mistakes are often immediately and permanently punished. New players may lose several games before they develop the defensive awareness necessary to stay competitive, and those early losses can be discouraging. The game doesn’t offer any forgiveness for learning-phase errors.
Skill gaps produce one-sided games with little drama. An experienced TZAAR player will systematically target a newcomer’s weakest piece type and close the game out efficiently. Without the randomness that helps level the playing field in many games, mismatched opponents will have an unsatisfying experience regardless of which side they’re on.
The abstract nature means zero thematic engagement. The three piece types have names but no personality, and the board has no story to tell. Players who need context for their decisions, a reason beyond pure strategy to make one move rather than another, will find TZAAR as dry as an algebraic equation. It’s beautiful in the way mathematics is beautiful, and that’s a specific taste.
Two-player exclusivity with no solo variant limits the game’s practical utility. This is a game for exactly two people with no alternatives, and the absence of any AI opponent or puzzle mode means it needs a willing human partner every time it comes off the shelf.
The Weight of Three Crowns
TZAAR’s central lesson is that strength in one dimension creates vulnerability in another. Every piece you stack makes you more powerful locally but reduces your presence globally. Every capture you make removes a threat but also brings you closer to the point where you can’t find a mandatory capture on your turn. The game is built entirely on trade-offs, and the best players are the ones who manage those trade-offs most efficiently while exploiting their opponent’s imbalances.
Should You Play TZAAR?
This game is for abstract strategy enthusiasts who want intense, confrontational two-player competition. If you enjoy the GIPF Project, if you appreciate Chess but want something with a different strategic texture, or if you’re looking for an abstract game where every single turn feels consequential, TZAAR delivers. It’s one of the best games in its genre.
Skip it if you need theme, if you want a forgiving learning curve, or if you don’t have a regular opponent of similar skill. TZAAR rewards dedicated play between matched opponents and offers very little to anyone outside that specific arrangement.
The Verdict on TZAAR
TZAAR is abstract strategy stripped down to its fighting weight. The dual loss conditions, mandatory captures, and stacking create a game where every turn is a strategic decision with real consequences, and the intensity builds naturally to dramatic conclusions. It’s not welcoming, it’s not thematic, and it’s not forgiving. But for two players who want pure competitive strategy with no padding, TZAAR is as good as the genre gets.