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About Hex

There is  
one art, 
no more,  
no less: 
to do  
all things  
with art- 
lessness. 


The Inventors

Basic Strategy

3 Problems


Hex is a two-player board game, played on a diamond-shaped board made of hexagons. The size of the board may vary, but there are always an equal number of hexes along each edge. 
5 x 5 Hex Board
a 5x5 Hex Board
 
The players, White and Black, each own two opposite edges of the board. The players take turns placing their pieces on any open hex. Either side may move first. 

The object of the game is for each player to create an unbroken chain of their own pieces, which connects their two edges of the board. The first player to create such a chain is the winner. It does not matter what path the chain takes across the board in order to connect the two edges. 

a win for White
a win for White
 
Hex was created in 1942 by the Danish inventor Piet Hein, and independently by the American mathematician John Nash in 1948. The game was known as Polygon in Denmark, where it was very popular in the 1940's, and as Nash in the United States, where it was played in university mathematics departments. 
 
In 1952 it was marketed in the U.S. by Parker Brothers, who gave it the name Hex. The commercial game is no longer available, but Hex has retained its popularity over the years among game players, mathematicians, and computer scientists.
Hex-7 The Inventors
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