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What makes a game an abstract strategy game?

Every hobby has a definition it loves to argue about, and “abstract strategy” is ours. The short version: no luck, nothing hidden, and a theme so optional you could replace every piece with a bottle cap. The long version is much more interesting — because the borderline cases (backgammon! Stratego!) teach you more about games than the clear ones do.

This shelf covers the definition and everything it touches: perfect information, the luck-versus-skill spectrum, why abstract games skip the story, and how to recognize a genuinely deep game in a store full of shallow ones.

Articles on this shelf

• What is an abstract strategy game? A plain-English guide

  The one-sentence answer, the three tests, where familiar games land, and how to join the oldest gaming family there is.

• Perfect information: games with nothing to hide

  What it means when both players can see everything — and why open boards produce a special kind of honesty (and sting).

• Luck vs. skill: how much of your favorite game is chance?

  A practical way to place any game on the luck–skill spectrum, and what dice really do to a contest.

• Does a game need a story? Why abstract games skip the theme

  Dragons sell boxes, but the game underneath is structure. What themes add, what they hide, and why abstracts go without.

• Almost abstract: backgammon, Stratego, and other borderline cases

  The family's favorite arguments — games that pass two tests out of three, and what each near-miss teaches.

• How to spot a deep game (in a store full of shallow ones)

  Five signs a game will still be interesting after fifty plays, and the red flags that say it won't survive five.

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