Design Document Part 1

While researching Vikings for the theme of my tafl iteration(Siggurdsson, 2013), I came across a naval battle that took place on the Baltic Sea in September 999 or 1000. The king of Norway Olaf Tryggvason was returning from a trip to Wendland (Pomerania) when he was ambushed by the kings of Sweden and Denmark. He was severely outnumbered, Olaf had roughly 11 warships while the combined forces of Sweden and Denmark had around 70. Olaf ships were captured one by one until his ship the Ormen Lange was finally surrounded. As the ship was surrounded king Olaf threw himself into the sea rather than be captured and tortured by his enemies.


This battle is going to be the theme for my game, it is almost identical to the actual game play of tafl. For my game pieces I will be using traditional Viking longboats and will try and replicate a sea setting on my board.