Hey, its Sunday today and I decided to clean my store room; that also preserves my precious board games. And there beneath all the games was my Carrom Board. One of my favorite games. However, with the busy schedule and variety of games available today, I had completely forgotten it. Many like me would have done the same. That’s the reason I thought of writing something about Carrom and refresh the memories.
Playing Carrom
Carrom is a classic game played all over the world especially in Asia and Far East. This game has been given various names: Indian Finger Billiards, Carom, Carroms, Carrum, Karum, Carum and table billiards.
For Playing Carrom you need a Carrom board, the size could be of your choice ( Mini carrom boards are also available for children), Carrom men – a set of nineteen light discs – nine white, nine black and one red (referred to as the Queen) and a Striker.
Carrom is usually played in teams with 2-4 players. The opponent sits in the opposite direction. 3 players can play carrom game against each other for points. The game is played on a square, wooden board with four corner pockets. The goal is to collect points by sinking your nine pieces, and the “queen” in red, in the pockets before your opponent. The game begins by flicking the striker at the target pieces.
Here are simple rules and tips of Carrom:
1. Arrange the carrom discs with the red “queen” in the middle and the whites should be lined up to form a “Y” around the “queen” and blacks to replace the empty spaces around the “queen” and the whites.
Setting Carrom Discs
2. Each player is allowed to only strike from that side where he sits.
3. The contestant holding white plays first or a toss of a coin can also decide who plays first.
4. Your continue to play as long as you keep sinking your pieces – luck shots count and all combinations are permitted.
5. The red queen can be pocketed at any time after sinking your first piece but must be sunk before your last one. After winning the queen, you need to sink one of your pieces, thereby ‘covering’ it, into any pocket in the next shot, or she is returned to the center spot.
6. Once the queen is covered, whoever clears their pieces first wins the carrom board game.
Tips:
Strikers
To be sure that you are playing accurately and the striker is really on line, try to touch the striker with your fingernail.
The striker may not touch the pieces in diagonal arrow line. (This rule only applicable in India)
If you sink the striker, you will be penalized a turn and another green piece will be added to the board.
If in a single shot you sink more than 1 green piece, you will be rewarded with an extra turn.
Do not sink any red pieces. If you sink a red piece, you will lose a turn, even if you sank a green piece in the same shot.
For the web lovers online carrom game is also available on the net. A free version of carrom called Couronne has been developed by MiniClip. The board is the same as a carrom board, but the pieces are green and the striker is yellow. The objective is to sink all of the green pieces to move up in the levels.
If you are also a carrom lover and have some additional information and tips to share please mail me I would be glad to add.
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