Pai Sho

"neutral"

- I always told you Pai Sho was more than just a game.



Pai Sho is a two-player strategy game. The game enjoys popularity throughout the world, as many people from all nations have been seen playing it. It is still popular after a century long war. Pai Sho is also used by the secretive Order of the White Lotus to identify its members.

Rules
Tile guide (Note that the Rose Tile can be substituted for a Snapdragon tile for Aesthetic purposes)
 * 1) The object - To arrange your pieces in a way to gain the most points by generating "harmonies", and by avoiding the generation of "disharmonies".
 * 2) The rules - Each player may take one of four moves during their turn:
 * 3) *Play one piece on an intersection.
 * 4) *Move one of the pieces up, down, left, or right to an adjoining intersection, as long as they don't interfere with tile rules.
 * 5) *Use the wheel to rotate the pieces around the wheel clock-wise.
 * 6) *Pass their turn.
 * 7) **A tile may not end its turn on a point occupied by another tile that it cannot capture.
 * 8) **A player may move a tile any number of spaces shorter than its maximum movement value.
 * 9) **Flowers may end their turn on an intersection composed of both red and white spaces regardless of their color.
 * 10) **Flower tiles laced onto an opposing color intersection by a tile capable of moving other tiles are returned to the players reserve pile.
 * 11) Harmonies - Certain flower tiles go along with other tiles (called a "harmony") or they will go against other tiles ("disharmony"). At the end of each game, for each set of tiles that are in harmony next to each other generates 1 point. For each tile that is in disharmony next to each other causes the owner of the tile to lose 1 point. Pieces must be owned by the same player to generates harmony or disharmony. The harmonies are displayed lower on this page.To form a harmony, the two tiles must be owned by you, and they must be connected by any number of the lines in one cardinal direction. There can be no opposing or disharmonious tiles in between your two tiles. However, there may be boat and neutral harmony flower tiles in between.
 * 12) Removing tiles - Landing on a tile may or may not remove it from the board. To move one, it must be an opposite tile, and owned by your opponent. The Dragon and Lotus rules still apply here, and all removed tiles are placed into The Pot.
 * 13) Ending the game - The game ends when one player is left with only three harmonious tiles, a player forfeits, or a player forms a consistent chain of harmonies around the center point and wins the game.
 * 14) How to score - At the end of the game, each player tallies the points scored for all the harmonies they completed. Red flowers in red spaces and white flowers in white spaces in a harmony get one extra bonus point. All pieces that a player owns that is within 3 spaces from a White Lotus tile gains an extra point also. Each player then subtracts 1 point for each piece that they have on the board. The player with the most remaining points wins.
 * 1) *White Flowers
 * 2) *Jasmine: Harmony with Lilly and Rhododendron. Disharmony with Rose.
 * 3) *Lilly: Harmony with Jasmine and White Jade. Disharmony with Chrysanthemum.
 * 4) *White Jade: Harmony with Lilly and Rose. Disharmony with none.
 * 5) *Red Flowers
 * 6) *Rose/Snapdragon: Harmony with White Jade and Chrysanthemum. Disharmony with Jasmine.
 * 7) *Chrysanthemum: Harmony with Rose and Rhododendron. Disharmony with Lilly.
 * 8) *Rhododendron: Harmony with Chrysanthemum and Jasmine. Disharmony with White Dragon.
 * 9) *Non-flowers
 * 10) *Knotweed: May be placed on any point. When played, all pieces that are next to knotweed orthogonally (or at a right angle to) are dead. Any piece, even the owner of the knotweed's pieces, that is placed or moved next to a knotweed is dead. Knotweed may not move, or be moved by other pieces. The point of this tile is to lessen your opponent's tiles, and therefore their points.
 * 11) *Wheel: When played, rotate all the pieces around it clock-wise. Wheels cannot be moved by any tile but another wheel. At the end, each player loses 1 extra point for each wheel they have on the board, even if they are considered dead.
 * 12) *Boat: Use this piece to "push" another piece orthogonally as well as the piece next to it. This may only be done if there is an empty space behind the second piece that the boat tile is moving (which would be behind the first piece), and if the move is normally legal.
 * 13) *Rock: Players may not play or move a piece so that it is next to an opponent's rock, orthogonally or diagonally.
 * 14) *Special Tiles
 * 15) *White Dragon: Harmony with the Lilly and Rose. Disharmony with Rhododendron.
 * 16) *White Lotus: Players gain 1 point for each piece that they own within 3 spaces from a White Lotus at the end of the game. No harmonies or disharmonies. This tile is a "wild card".

The Tiles: The player has 12 different types of tiles divided into three groups, which are white flowers, red flowers and non-flower tiles.

Pai sho tiles:


 * 3 White Dragon
 * 3 White Lotus
 * 6 Jasmine
 * 6 White Lily
 * 6 White Jade
 * 6 Rose
 * 6 Chrysanthemum
 * 6 Rhododendron
 * 3 Knotweed
 * 3 Wheels
 * 3 Rocks
 * 3 Boats

The Board: The game is played on a circular board with an 18 x 18 square grid with the corners cut off. In the center is a diamond shape divided into quarters with white and red at opposite corners. A total of 256 spaces are required to be on a Pai Sho board.

It may also involve betting in some way. In Book 1 Episode 13 "The Blue Spirit", Iroh is shown winning a pot after winning a Pai Sho game.

Order of the White Lotus
Pai Sho is also used by the Order of the White Lotus to identify its members. In "The Desert", Uncle Iroh plays a game as a way of identifying himself as part of the society. The key to recognition between members includes scripted dialog revolving around the opening move of placing a White Lotus tile in the center of the board, followed by the rapid placement of pieces in an exact pattern that mirrors the central piece. It is possible that this dialog has several outcomes to allow not only identification as a member of the group but also as a certain rank within the group (Iroh is a Grand Master).

Notable Players

 * Iroh
 * Aang
 * Gyatso
 * Fung

Trivia

 * Pai Sho bears a resemblance to Go, Chinese Checkers, and checkers.
 * The name of the game bears resemblance to a Tibetan game called Sho-pa. Although Sho-pa in reality is a gambling game and is not at all similar to chess or checkers.
 * The name bears even more resemblance to the Chinese tile game, Pai Gow.