Description

Politics is played on a board (referred to as the political field) consisting of an outer square, and a series of inner squares of various sizes arranged within the outer square, each of them rotated 45 degrees from each other so that their corners bisect the other squares' sides. These points (24 of them) are referred to as stations. The two players have different colored pieces. There are three sizes of game piece; each player has two statesmen (large,) four politicians (medium,) and six voters (small,) for a total of twelve, referred to as that player's phalanx.

The game begins with players taking turns placing any one of their pieces on any one station. Like Mill, when a player is able to line up three of his pieces in a row, he is then entitled to remove one of his opponent's pieces, but in the case of this game, only voters may be removed in this fashion. Unlike Mill, pieces in Politics may jump and capture each other as in Checkers, in any direction, once the initial placement phase is concluded. A piece may only jump a like-sized or smaller piece. To win, one must reduce the opponent to only two pieces, or to immobilize his remaining pieces.