ASALTO VS SENET

Asalto, also known as the Assault Game, German Tactics or Officers and Sepoys, is a board game for two players in which one player, playing as the officers, attempts to defend a fortress from their opponent's invading rebels. The game is a variant on the Fox and Geese theme, and is commonly played in Germany, France, and England. Asalto is an asymmetric game in which the players take on two very different roles: the rebels and the officers. The rebels' objective is to capture the two officers, surround them so that they cannot move, or occupy all of the points within the "fortress". The officers' objective is to capture enough rebels that these tasks become impossible. Asalto is played on a grid of 33 intersection points in the shape of a cross, with a specially denoted arm known as the fortress at the top of the board. The total number of pieces in an Asalto game is 26, composed of 24 rebels and two officers. Before play begins, the rebels are arranged so that they sit on the 24 intersection points outside the fortress, while the officers may be arranged at the player's discretion inside the fortress. The game begins once the rebel player takes the first turn.

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Senet is a board game from ancient Egypt. The earliest representation of senet is dated to c. 2620 BCE from the Mastaba of Hesy-Re, while similar boards and hieroglyphic signs are found even earlier. The game fell out of use following the Roman periodand its original rules are the subject of conjecture. Senet is the oldest known board game. Fragmentary boards that could be senet have been found in First Dynasty burials in Egypt, c. 3100 BCE. The first unequivocal painting of this ancient game is from the Third Dynasty tomb of Hesy (c. 2686–2613 BCE). People are depicted playing senet in a painting in the tomb of Rashepes, as well as from other tombs of the Fifth and Sixth Dynasties (c. 2500 BCE). The oldest intact senet boards date to the Middle Kingdom, but graffiti on Fifth and Sixth Dynasty monuments could date as early as the Old Kingdom. At least by the time of the New Kingdom in Egypt (1550–1077 BCE), senet was conceived as a representation of the journey of the ka (the vital spark) to the afterlife. This connection is made in the Great Game Text, which appears in a number of papyri, as well as the appearance of markings of religious significance on senet boards themselves. The game is also referred to in chapter XVII of the Book of the Dead. A study on a senet board in the Rosicrucian Egyptian Museum, dating back to the early New Kingdom of Egypt, showed the evolution of the game from its secular origins into a more religious artifact. Senet also was played by people in neighboring cultures, and it probably came to those places through trade relationships between Egyptians and local peoples. It has been found in the Levant at sites such as Arad and Byblos, as well as in Cyprus. Because of the local practice of making games out of stone, there are more senet games that have been found in Cyprus than have been found in Egypt.

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