Petteia
BGG rank
BGG #21,954
BGG rating
6.0

Petteia

Rules assistance for Petteia

Plain-language explanations of turns, card effects and disputed situations, with official source references and saved question history.

  • 2 players
  • 20 min
  • 5+
  • Complexity 2.2/5

For 2 players

Rules assistant for Petteia

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Answers come from the official rulebook, with the page to check.

Petteia is a board game for 2 players, 20 minutes per game, and ages 5 and up. It was designed by Moshe Callen and its main mechanics are Area Majority / Influence, Square Grid, and Grid Movement.

Similar games

About the game

Roughly translated as 'Robbers', this abstract battle game was known to be played by the Romans, and versions of the same game may well have been played before by the Ancient Greeks and Egyptians, and afterwards by the Persians. Games archaeologists and historians disagree hotly about just about every aspect of this game: board size, number and distribution of playing pieces, use of a king piece, age, priority, etc, etc; the list goes on. However, there is evidence that the game existed, both in literature and in archaeological finds. All this disagreement suggests that, as the game traveled out to the far flung regions of empire, it was altered and developed by gamers and gamblers. The basic Latrunculi consists of 1, 2, or 3 ranks of opposing pieces (the number differs), on a board divided into squares of a single color; the board itself could be 8x8, 10x10, 12x8, or variations thereof. The move of the pieces is a matter for discussion: the rook's move, queen's move, king's move from chess, or one square orthogonally have all been suggested. Capture is made when a piece has opposing pieces on either side of it. The winner is the player who captures all his opponent's pieces, although variations have been suggested, such as getting two pieces to the opponent's back rail. As noted above, many variations exist, including a version recently discovered in Colchester (the Roman capital of England, Camulodonum), which includes a 'king' or 'standard' piece. Games of the Hnefatafl family are probably further developments of Latrunculorum. BGG members will no doubt have disagreements, opinions, and variations to add to this 'base-line' summary. Moshe Callen is credited as a designer on this game for his work in researching, developing, and formalizing the rules of the game based on historical data for the nestorgames version of this game.

Designers

Publishers

  • (Public Domain)
  • Fratelli Fabbri Editori (Fabbri Editore)
  • L. P. Septímio
  • nestorgames
  • Taş Devrı Oyuncak
  • Geoludie
  • HistoryGames.it
  • Taberna Mercatoria

Questions and answers

Petteia supports 2 players according to the catalogue. This is the publisher’s listed player count, so the game is designed for exactly that number of participants. Variants for other group sizes, if any, are described in the rulebook of your edition, so check it before setting up a different configuration.