Nine Men's Morris terms you'll see at the table, explained briefly
Nine Men's Morris (mill game, merels)
The classic two-player medieval board game on 24 points with 9 men each, won by forming mills — three men in a row along the marked lines.
Man (piece)
Your playing piece — each player starts with 9 men. Men are placed in stage one and slide along lines in stage two.
Mill
Three men of one colour filling one of the 16 straight board lines (8 horizontal + 8 vertical; no diagonals). Completing a mill removes one enemy man.
Capture (removing)
Taking an enemy man off the board after completing a mill. Removed men never return.
The mill exception
A man inside an enemy mill is protected while that player has any other man. If every enemy man stands in a mill, all of them become removable.
Opening and closing
Deliberately moving a man out of a mill so it can be moved back to re-form the mill later — every closure earns a new capture, with no limit on repeats.
Flying
A player with exactly three men may move to any vacant point, not just an adjacent one. Only the three-man side flies.
Point (junction)
One of the 24 positions on the board where men stand. Points connected by a drawn line are adjacent.
Placing (stage one)
The opening phase: players alternate putting one of their 9 men on any empty point.
Moving (stage two)
The middle phase: slide one man along a marked line to an adjacent empty point. Men never jump.
Draw
The game is drawn on threefold repetition or 50 consecutive moves without a capture; a 300-move safety limit also applies.