POLYGONARC

The game on one page

Polygonarc is played by 2, 3 or 4 players. Each has a pawn of one colour and a single thing to do: paint the board in that colour.

The board is made of square tiles of 7 × 7 round squares. You assemble 2 (7 × 14) or 4 (14 × 14) depending on the number of players — the board is not a setting, it follows.

A square under your pawn becomes yours. Everything else in the game — the die, the cards, the towers, the knockouts — exists only to help you take them faster than the others, or to slow you down.

• Winning on zones: reach the target number of squares in your colour.
• Winning on knockouts: send an enemy pawn back to its start 5 times.

Setting up

1. The board. Assemble the number of tiles matching the number of players.

2. The colours. Each player takes a pawn and 2 protection towers. The available colours are red, blue, green and yellow.

3. The starts. Each pawn goes on its starting square, in the middle of an edge of the board. The starts are not chosen: they follow from one another by rotation, so nobody is better placed than their neighbour.

4. The deck. Shuffle the 102 cards face down beside the board. No hand, no reserve: you only touch the deck when the die says so.

5. The first player is whoever placed their pawn first — or anybody: the first turn favours nobody, since everything starts with a die roll.

A turn

A turn is one die roll. Nothing else is decided beforehand.

Even, you move. You go 1, 2 or 3 squares depending on the die, one square at a time, in whatever direction you like — including changing direction along the way. Every square crossed becomes yours.

Odd, you draw. The card applies immediately, whether it suits you or not. There is no hand: nothing is kept for later, nobody picks their moment.

Stuck? If no move is possible — edges, dead squares, enemy towers — the turn passes to the next player. It is not a penalty, just a dead end.

Taking squares

The square under your pawn is always your colour. No exception: after a move, after a teleport, after a return to the start. If it belonged to somebody, it changes sides.

Encircling. When blank squares end up completely surrounded by yours, they all become yours at once. The board edge does not close an encirclement: you really have to go all the way round.

Obstacles. A card that captures in a line stops at the first obstacle and does not skip it. Obstacles are: the board edge, a dead (black) square, an enemy tower, a starting square, an enemy pawn. A square already yours is crossed.

Dead squares. A black square is out of play for everyone: nobody stands on it, nobody crosses it, it counts for nobody.

Pawns and knockouts

Landing on an enemy pawn’s square sends it back to its starting square and scores you one knockout. The squares it had taken stay theirs: you hunt the pawn, not the territory.

5 knockouts and the game is won, whatever the number of squares. That is the second path to victory, and it is real: an aggressive player can win while last on zones.

Protection towers

Each player has 2, planted by the card that gives them. A tower covers a block of 4 squares (2 × 2), free or already yours. Opponents can neither enter them, nor take them, nor cross them.

A destroyed tower leaves its squares in the colour of the player who planted it: you demolish the protection, not the territory.

The cards

The deck holds 102 cards, split into 45 different cards: 30 bonuses (blue) and 15 penalties (red).

Blue or red, the card acts right away. A bonus helps you, a penalty hurts you, and neither is kept. Some ask you to aim at a square: you choose, and the effect fires.

Not every card comes in the same number. 22 cards exist in only 1 copy in the whole deck: « Tide », « Backfill », « Foreshore », « Quicklime », « Tunnel », « About-face », « Keep » and « Requisition »…. A whole game can go by without seeing a single one.

When the deck is empty, the discard pile is reshuffled and play goes on. Nothing is lost, everything comes back.

Giving up aiming loses the card. That is the price of instant activation: the card has been played, it goes back nowhere.

The points that catch people out

These rules do not fit on a card. They are here, and nowhere else.

• The shield (Counter-order) stays next to your name and cancels the next card played against you: a forced move of your pawn, a demolition of your tower, a dead square right next to you, a hijacked bonus. It protects from nothing else, and it vanishes the moment it has served. One at a time: drawing a second while you already have one sends the card to the discard pile.
• “Make it two!” waits for your next even roll to double your steps. An odd roll does not waste it: it waits.
• Momentum adds steps and stacks with “Make it two!”. It is the only combination that adds up.
• Anchor only costs the victim their turn if they roll even: on an odd roll they draw as usual and the anchor dissolves.
• Reversal hijacks the next bonus an opponent draws — never a penalty, and never another Reversal. If several players laid one down, the oldest is served. A shield pushes the theft back.
• Passage crosses one dead square, which comes back to life and becomes yours. It crosses neither edges nor towers.
• An effect laid in front of you never stacks with itself. The second identical card goes to the discard pile. True of the shield as of the doubling.

Winning

On zones: the first to reach the target number of squares in their colour wins immediately.

On knockouts: 5 enemy pawns sent back to their starts, and it is over.

The timer. Online, each turn lasts 30 seconds. When time runs out, the game plays the simplest action for you: roll, draw, apply the card, give up aiming. Nobody is held up by somebody who walks away.

A game in 10 steps

10 moments from a real two-player game that lasted 110 rounds. They are ordered by what they show, not by when they happened: the round number is given on each one.

Every card

45 different cards, 102 copies in the deck. Blue = bonus, red = penalty. Both apply the moment they are drawn.

The 30 bonuses

The 15 penalties