The game is for two players, black and white. Equipment::
The board is 7x7 or
6x7 squares, with grooves between the squares to guide the placement of
barriers.
Each player has 3
(or 4) movable pawns called roamers,
and
25 barriers.
The object of the game is
to
win by capturing all of your opponents roamers.
Actions:
There are five basic actions.
Placing a roamer on any unoccupied square.
Placing a barrier
ressting on
it's
long sidein
any
unoccupied groove.
Flipping a friendly barrier from the resting position
to standing on
it's short side.
Moving a resting
friendly
barrier
to a new position, anywhere on the board.
Moving a roamer. Roamers can move 1 or 2 squares
in any
orthogonal direction, landing in an empty square.
Roamers can jump over one
friendly roamer or one
resting friendly
barrier,
but not an enemy barrier or roamer.
Barriers that are jumped over are flipped to the standing position,
which makes
them immovable and impassable to both players.
Entrapment
and Capturing:
A roamer which is surrounded on all four sides is entrapped. If
the
roamer could not
escape the
entrapment square by moving, or moving a neighboring roamer, it is captured immediately.
If a second roamer becomes entrapped, it is captured immediately.
If two or more roamers become entrapped as the result of a
single
move, the moving player chooses which one to capture.
Therefore, a player can never have more than one entrapped
piece.
The Play:
White moves first. Black and white alternate
placing a
roamer, on any unoccupied square.
After black places his final roamer, white can either move
a
roamer or place a barrier.
For the remainder of the game, players alternate taking two
actions per turn.
The first action must
be to
move a roamer. If a roamer is currently entrapped, it must be
moved.
The second action may be either to move a roamer or to place a barrier.
If the roamer moved on the first action was entrapped,
and it
is still entrapped, no other roamer may be moved.
If no unplaced barriers are available, you can move any
resting barrier
to a new position..