Each of 28 hex tiles displays one of three shapes in one of three colors and one of three sizes. Players take turns placing a tile from their hand next to a previously-placed tile on the board that shares at least one attribute (shape, size, or color)with the new tile. The object is to be the first player to form a row of four adjacent tiles.
Mancala is not just used as the name of a game, but also used as the name for the whole Mancala Family of pit-and-pebble games. The game known as Mancala in the USA is best known in Africa as Wari.
Play involves scooping up pebbles from a pit and sowing the pebbles, one at a time, into the other pits. These games were probably created in Africa hundreds (if not thousands) of years ago.
The board for a "standard" Mancala game is composed of two by six pits, and a larger scoring pit on each side. Two players sit across from each other over the board. The large scoring pit to each player's right is "her" scoring pit.
Ultimate Stratego is an updated version of the original which introduces 3 new gameplay modes. The Lightning Game pits 2 players against each other in fast-paced 1-on-1 combat. The Campaign Game introduces 4 army combat, giving each player control of 2 armies instead of 1. Finally, the Alliances Game is a 4 player partnership battle. Ultimate Stratego features a double sided square combat board and introduces revised rules and new ranks to the original game.
Blokus Trigon is an abstract strategy game from the makers of Blokus. The board pieces have changed from square to triangular. Game play is similar to Blokus, as players try to get rid of all their pieces. The only caveat to placing a piece is that it may not lie adjacent to your other pieces, but instead must be placed touching at least one of your pieces already on the board at a corner.
There is a solitaire version where one player tries to get rid of all the pieces in a single sitting.
Components:
Hexagonal playing board with 486 triangles on the board
4 sets of 22 pieces in red, blue, green and yellow
1 piece made up of one triangle.
1 piece made up of two triangles.
1 piece made up of three triangles.
3 pieces made up of four triangles.
4 pieces made up of five triangles.
12 pieces made up of six triangles.
Set up:
Layout your hexagonal silver board and give each player a set of 22 squares.
Game Play:
Each player begins at one of the marked spaces on the board. The order of play is blue, yellow, red, green colors.
As the play progresses, each new piece is placed on the board. The new piece placed must touch another piece of the same colour and it can only touch at the corners. The constraint is never touch along the sides.
When a player is blocked and cannot place any more pieces on the board, they must drop out of the game. The other players continue until they are blocked or no one is able to place any more pieces on the board.
Scoring:
When all the players are blocked, each player must count the number of triangles that they were unable to place on the trigon board and calculates their score as follows:
Any triangle that is not placed on the board counts towards a negative point.
15 points are awarded as a bonus, if the player has all 22 pieces placed on the board.
This bonus increases to a 20 points if the 22 pieces were placed on the board with the single triangle being placed last.
The winner is the person with the maximum points!
Note: This game is available by request only and requires having a membership to play.
See game associate for details.
Magnet won 2010 Runner Up Abstract Game of the Year in Games Magazine.
An abstract game where players try to get their king to the middle of the board. Each player has 12 blocks, 11 of which can be promoted 1, 2, or 3 times, thus increasing their movement capability (the king cannot be promoted so don't promote all your other pieces, or you will give away your king's location). A "magnet," a black pawn, is placed on a gridded point and affects all of a player's pieces on lines radiating out from that point, moving them closer to the magnet. You can capture other pieces in this way, removing them from the board.