Check out this video to see how to play Hackenbush:

If you want to play this game, I suggest having one person draw any starting position they’d like. The other player chooses colors and goes first.

I find this game to be much more fun to analyze than it is to play–there seems to be a curious connection between familiar numbers and Hackenbush positions.

I’ll leave the ball in your court.

Check that this game from the end of the video is actually a zero game. What number makes sense for this mystery position called bluered? Can you make sense of a position that is three pieces tall? Say blueredred? What other numbers can you find on the Hackenbush Number Line?