nimgame 0.1.1

The Game of Nim

Play the Game of Nim

Rules:

For the general description of the Nim and similar games, see the Wikipedia page.

This game is played by 2 palyers (the computer can be a player). There are coins arranged in heaps. There may be any number of heaps and any number of coins in a heap.

Players take turns. In each turn, a player takes coins from a heap (only 1 heap). It must be at least 1 coin. There is no upper limit (but the heap size).

There are 2 types of the game:

• the “normal” game is where the player, who takes the last coin, wins

• the “misère” game is where the player, who has to take the last coin, loses

Usage:

After instantiating the Nim class, you need to get the heaps set up. The starting heaps then can analysed and the starting player set. If it is the Computer, it automatically does the 1st move. Then the Player is to do the next move, then the Computer moves, and so on. When no more coins left, the game ends.

Example:

import nimgame
nim = nimgame.Nim(error_rate=10)  # Request 10% error rate from the Computer
nim.setup_heaps()  # Create heaps randomly
nim.set_start(myturn=True)  # Indicate that the Player wants to start
nim.do_move(nim.Move('b', 4))  # From heap 'B', remove 4 coins
...
if nim.game_end():
    exit(0)

Available objects in the package

While different objects are defined in the source on different level (e.g. the Nim class in the source/core.py module), the necessary ones are made available on package level, i.e. nimgame.Nim refers to that class.

Nim:

the main class of the game

play_CLI:

function that interactively plays the gam in CLI

Move:

namedtuple with “heapdesig” and “removecount” keys for defining a move. “heapdesig” can be an int (heap numbers start from zero), or a letter (case insensitive). E.g. 1 is the sames as “B” or “b”.

ErrorRate:

namedtuple with “Computer” and “Player” keys for defining the required error rates in % for the players when both of them are simulated

HeapCoinRange:

namedtuple with “min” and “max” keys for defining heap number and sizes for automatic heap creation

Package content

source/core:

provides the Nim class and its public methods

source/calculations:

mixin of the Nim class with calculation methods

modules in “playing”:

functions to play the game

modules in “tests”:

play several games automatically and gather statistics

main:

in the root directory provides some interactions for executing automatic runs or interactive games. This runs too, when the package is called (see the “__main__” module).