Games

Perhaps the most serious incident of the contests had occurred in one of the games of bat and ball; in this contest there are two men on each side, and the object is to keep the ball out of the hands of the other team; no one man may hold the ball for more than the referee's count of twenty; he may, however, throw it into the air, provided it is thrown over his head, and catch it again himself; the ball may be thrown to a partner, or struck to him with the bat; the bat, of course, drives the ball with incredible force; the bats are of heavy wood, rather broad, and the ball, about two inches in diameter, is also of wood, and extremely hard; this is something like a game of keep away with two men in the middle. I was pleased that I was not involved in the play. Shortly after the first knock off, in which the ball is served to the enemy, Gorm, who was Ivar's partner, was struck cold with the ball, it driven from the opponent's bat; this, I gathered, is a common trick; it is very difficult to intercept or protect oneself from a ball struck at one with great speed from a short distance; it looked quite bad for Ivar at this point, until one of his opponents, fortunately, broke his leg, it coming into violent contact with Ivar's bat. This contest was called a draw. Ivar then asked me to be his partner. I declined. It is all right, said Ivar, even the bravest of men may decline a contest of bat-and-ball. I acceded to his judgment. There are various forms of ball game enjoyed by the men of Torvaldsland; some use bats, or paddles; in the winter, one such game, quite popular, is played, men running and slipping about, on ice; whether there is any remote connection between this game and ice hockey.
{Marauders of Gor - 140}

I stopped for a moment to watch an amusing race. Several slave girls are aligned, on all fours, poised, their heads down. Then, carefully, a line of beans, one to a girl, is placed before them. She must then, on all fours, push the bean before her, touching it only with her nose. The finish line was a few yards away. "go!" I head. The crowd cheered on its favorites. On this sport, as well as on several others, small bets were placed. Sometimes a new slave, one who has recently been a haughty, arrogant free woman, is used in such a race. Such things, aside (pg. 39) from their amusing, and fitting, aspects, are thought to be useful in accommodating her to her new reality, that of the female slave. In them she learns something more of the range of activities that may be required of her.
{Magicians - 38}

Imnak and I sat across from one another, both cross-legged. He dropped a tiny bone to the fur mat between us.
Each player, in turn, drops a bone, one of several in his supply. The bone Imnak had dropped was carved in the shape of a small tabuk. Each of the bones is carved to resemble an animal, such as an arctic gant, a northern bosk, a lart, a tabuk or sleen, and so on. The bone which remains upright is the winner. If both bones do not remain upright there is no winner on that throw. Similarly, if both bones should remain upright, they are dropped again. A bone which does not remain upright, if its opposing bone does remain upright, is placed in the stock of him whose bone remained upright. The game is finished when one of the two players is cleaned out of bones.
{Beasts of Gor - 184}

I passed a few fellows playing dice. There are many forms of dice games on Gor, usually played with anywhere from a single die to five dice. The major difference, I think, between the dice of Earth and those of Gor is that the Gorean dice usually have their numbers, or letters, or whatever pictures or devices are used, painted on their surfaces. It is difficult to manufacture a pair of dice, of course, in which the numbers, two, three and so on, are represented by scooped out indentations. For example, the one side of a die is likely to have less scooped-out material missing than the six side of a die. Thus the one side is slightly heavier and, in normal play, should tend to land face down more often than, say the six side, this bringing up the opposite side, the six side in Earth dice, somewhat more frequently. To be sure, the differences in weight are slight and, given the forces on the dice, the differential is not dramatic. And, of course, this differential can be compensated for in a sophisticated die by trying to deduct equal amounts of material from all surfaces, for example, an amount from the one side which will equal the amount of the six side, and, indeed, on the various sides. At any rate, in the Gorean dice, as mentioned, the numbers or letters, of pictures or whatever devices are used, are usually pained on the dice. Some gamesmen, even so, attempt to expend the same amount of paint on all surfaces. To be sure, some Gorean dice I have seen to use the scooped-out approach to marking the dice. And these, almost invariably, like the more sophisticated Earth dice, try to even out the material removed from each of the surfaces. Some Gorean dice are sold in sealed boxes, bearing the citys imprint. These, supposedly, have been each cast six hundred times, with results approximating the ideal mathematical probabilities. Also, it might be mentioned that dice are sometimes tampered with, or specially prepared, to favor certain numbers. These, I suppose, using the Earth term, might be spoken of as loaded. My friend, the actor, magician, impresario and whatnot, Boots Tarsk-Bit, once narrowly escaped an impalement in Besnit on the charge of using false dice. He was, however, it seems, framed. At any rate the charges were dismissed when a pair of identical false dice turned up in the pouch of the arresting magistrate, the original pair having, interestingly, at about the same time, vanished.
{Magicians of Gor - 59}

Larls, larls! called a fellow. I win!
Alas, moaned the other. I have only verr.
Larls would be maximum highs, say, double highs, if two dice were being used, triple highs if three dice were in play, and so on. The chances of obtaining a larl with one throw of one die is one in six, of obtaining larls with two dice, one in thirty-six, of obtaining larls with three dice, one in two hundred and sixteen, and so on. Triple larls is a rare throw, obviously. The fellow had double larls. Other types of throws are urts, sleen, verr, and such. The lowest value on a singe die is the urt. The chances of obtaining, say, three urts is very slim, like that of obtaining three larls one in two hundred and sixteen. Verr is not a bad throw but it was not good enough to beat larls. If two dice are in play a verr and a larl would be equivalent on a numerical scale of ten points, or, similarly, if the dice are numbered, as these were, one would simply count points, though, of course, if, say, two sixes were thrown, that would count as larls.
{Magicians of Gor - 60}

A free woman, in swirling robes of concealment, veiled, appeared before me. Accept my favor, please! she laughed.
She held forth the scarf, teasingly, coquettishly. Please, handsome fellow! she wheedled. Please, please she said.
Please!
Very well, I smiled.
She came quite close to me.
Herewith, she said, I, though a free woman, gladly and willingly, and of my own free will, dare to grant you my favor!
She then thrust the light scarf through an eyelet on the collar of my robes and drew it halfway through. In this fashion it would not be likely to be dislodged.
Thank you, kind sir, handsome sir! she laughed. She then sped away, laughing.
She had had only two favors left at her belt, I had noted.
Normally in this game the woman begins with ten. the first to dispense her ten favors and return to the starting point wins. I looked after her, grinning. It would have been churlish, I thought, to have refused the favor. Too, she had begged so prettily. This type of boldness, of course, in one that a woman would be likely to resort to only in the time of carnival. the granting of such favors probably has a complex history. Its origin may even trace back to Earth. this is suggested by the fact that, traditionally, the favor, or the symbolic token of the favor, is a handkerchief or scarf. Sometimes a lady's champion, as I understand it, might have borne such a favor, fastened perhaps to a helmet or thrust in a gauntlet.
It is not difficult, however, aside from such possible historical antecedents, and the popular, superficial interpretations of such a custom, in one time or another, to speculate on the depth meaning of such favors. One must understand, first, that they are given by free women and of their own free will. Secondly, one must think of favors in the sense that one might speak of a free woman granting, or selling, her favors to a male. To be sure, this understanding, as obvious and straightforward as it is, if brought to the clear light of consciousness, is likely to come as a revelatory and somewhat scandalous shock to the female. It is one of those cases in which a thing she has long striven to hide from herself is suddenly, perhaps to her consternation and dismay, made incontrovertibly clear to her. In support of the interpretation are such considerations as the fact that theses favors, in these games, are bestowed by females on males, that, generally, at lest, strong, handsome males seem to be the preferred recipients of such favors, that there is competition among the females in the distribution of these favors, and that she who first has her favors accepted therein accounts herself as somewhat superior to her less successful sisters, at least in this respect, and that the whole game, for these free women, is charged with an exciting, permissive aura of delicious naughtiness, this being indexed undoubtedly to the sexual stimulations involved, stimulations which, generally, are thought to be beneath the dignity of lofty free woman.
In short, the game of favors permits free women, in a socially acceptable context, by symbolic transformation, to assuage their sexual needs to at least some small extent, and, in some cases, if they wish to make advances to interesting males. There is not full satisfaction of female sexuality, of course, outside of the context of male dominance.
{Players of Gor - 44}

He had won her in Girl Catch, in a contest to decide a trade dispute between two small cities, Ven and Rarn, the former a river port on the Vosk, the second noted for its copper mining, lying southeast of Tharna. In the contest a hundred young men of each city, and a hundred young women, the most beautiful in each city, participate. The object of the game is to secure the women of the enemy. Weapons are not permitted. The contest takes place in an area outside the perimeters of the great fair, for in it slaves are made. The area is enclosed by a low wooden wall, and spectators observe. When a male is forced beyond the wall he is removed from the competition and may not, upon pain of death, reenter the area for the duration of the contest. When a girl is taken she is bound hand and foot and thrown to a girl pit, of which there are two, one in each citys end of the field. These pits are circular, marked off with a small wooden fence, sand-bottomed, and sunk some two feet below the surface of the field. If she cannot free herself she counts as a catch. The object of the male is to remove his opponents from the field and capture the girls of the other city. The object of the girl, of course, is to elude capture.
{Beasts of Gor - 41}

Both the young men and women wear tunics in this sport. The tunics of the young women are cut briefly, to better reveal their charms. The young man wears binding fiber about his left wrist, with which to secure prizes. The young women, who are free, if the rules permit, as they sometimes do not, commonly wear masks, that their modesty be less grievously compromised by the brevity of their costume. Should the girl be caught, however, her mask is removed. The tunics of the girls are not removed, however, except those of the girls of the losing city, when the match has ended and the winner decided. The win is determined when the young men of one city, or those left on the field, have secured the full hundred of the women of the enemy. A woman once bound and thrown to the girl pit, incidentally, may not be fetched forth by the young men of her city, except at the end of the match, and on the condition that they have proved victorious. The captured women of the victorious city at the conclusion of the contest are of course released; they are robed and honored; the girls of the losing city, of course, are simply stripped and made slaves. This may seem a cruel sport but some regard it as superior to a war; surely it is cleaner and there is less loss of life; this method of settling disputes, incidentally, is not used if it is felt that honor is somehow involved in the disagreement.
{Beasts of Gor - 42}

I saw some fellows gathered about a filled, greased wineskin. There was much laughter. I went over to watch. He who manages to balance on it for a given time, usually an Ehn, wins both the skin and its contents. One pays a tarsk bit for the chance to compete. It is extremely difficult, incidentally, to balance on such an object, not only because of the slickness of the skin, heavily coated with grease, but even more so because if its rotundity and unpredictable movements, the wine surging within in. Aii! cried a fellow flailing about and then spilling from its surface. There was much laughter. Who is next? called the owner of the skin. This sort of thing is a sport common at peasant festivals, incidentally, thought there, of course, usually far from a city, within the circle of the palisade, the competition is free, the skin and wine being donated by one fellow or another, usually as his gift to the festival to which all in one way or another contribute, for example, by the donations of produce, meat or firewood. At such festivals there are often various games, and contests and prizes. Archery is popular with the peasants and combats with the great staff. Sometimes there is a choice of donated prizes for the victors. For example, a bolt of red cloth, a tethered verr or a slave. More than one urban girl, formerly a perfumed slave, sold into the countryside, who held herself above peasants, despising them for their supposed filth and stink, had found herself, kneeling and muchly roped, among such a set of prizes. And, to her chagrin, she is likely to find that she is not the first chosen.
{Magicians of Gor - 36}

At Stones however, I was genuinely pleased with myself. It has two players, who take alternate turns. Each player has the same number of Stones, usually two to five per player. The Stones are usually pebbles or beads, but in the cities one can buy small polished, carved boxes containing ten stones, the quality of which may vary from polished ovoid stones, with swirling patterns, to gems worth the ransom of a merchants daughter. The object of the game is simple, to guess the number of stones held the others hand or hands. One point is scored for a correct guess, and the game is usually set for a predetermined number of paired guesses, usually fifty. Usually your opponent tries to outwit you, by either changing the number of stones held in his hand or, perhaps, keeping it the same.
{Captive of Gor - 107}

Stones! Guess stones! called a fellow. Who will play stones? This is a guessing game, in which a certain number of a given number of stones, usually from two to five, is held in the hand and the opponent is to guess the number. There are many variations of Stones, but usually one receives one point for a correct guess. If one guesses successfully, one may guess again. If one does not guess successfully, one holds the stones and the opponent takes his turn. The game is usually set at a given number of points, usually fifty. Whereas the stones are often tiny pebbles, they may be any small object. Sometimes beads are used, sometimes even gems. Intricately carved and painted game boxes containing carefully wrought stones are available for the affluent enthusiast. The game, as it is played on Gor, is not an idle pastime. Psychological subtleties, and strategies, are involved. Estates have sometimes changed hands as a result of stones. Similarly, certain individuals are recognized as champions of the game. In certain cites, tournaments are held.
{Magicians of Gor - 35}

He retired to the canopy beneath which, with water, he sat, cross-legged, with his companion. Between them they had, in the crusts, scratched a board for Zar. This resembles the Kaissa board. Pieces, however, may he placed only on the intersections of lines either within or at the edges of the board. Each player has nine pieces of equal value which are originally placed on the intersections of the nine interior vertical lines with what would be the rear horizontal line, constituted by the back edge of the board, from each players point of view. The corners are not used in the original placement, though they constitute legitimate move points after play begins. The pieces are commonly pebbles, or bits of verr dung, and sticks. The pebbles" move first. Pieces move one intersection at a time, unless jumping. One may jump either the opponent's pieces or one's own. A jump must be made to an unoccupied point. Multiple jumps are permissible. The object is to effect a complete exchange of original placements. The first player to fully occupy the opponents initial position wins. Capturing, of course, does not occur. The game is one of strategy and maneuverability.
{Tribesman of Gor - 265}