Tiddlywinks - Skill Versus Strategy, and Comparable Games

Skill Versus Strategy, and Comparable Games

The important appeal of the game for many players is the required combination of manual dexterity and strategic thought. Tiddlywinkers often claim that the game combines physical skill (such as in snooker or golf) with the strategy of chess. What is true is that tiddlywinks is unique in the combination of skill and strategy it requires. Strategy in tiddlywinks is often rather deep, since winks can be captured. Strategic and tactical planning involves anticipating opponents' moves rather than just building a sequence of one's own moves. Another factor that complicates the game is that there is a time limit to the play of the game, rather than until some objective in the game has been met.

All in all, tiddlywinks goes beyond the purely cerebral nature of a game such as chess. The fact that shots can be made or missed, together with the continuum of possible outcomes, makes strategy much less rigid than in chess, and prevents planning more than seven or eight shots in advance.