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Blokus

2007 Schools Wikipedia Selection. Related subjects: Games

                Blokus
       Players     2–4
      Age range    5 +
     Setup time    < 1 minute
    Playing time   20 - 30 minutes
    Random chance  None
   Skills required Strategic thought
         BoardGameGeek entry

   Blokus is an abstract strategy board game for two to four players,
   invented by Bernard Tavitian and published in 2000 by the Sekkoia
   company. It has won several awards, including the Mensa select award
   and the 2004 Teacher's Choice Award. Tavitian, an engineer and artist
   was inspired to create the game while trying to find an appropriate
   frame for a painting of an orchestra made up of geometric figures.

   The correct pronunciation of the name Blokus has been the subject of
   some debate. The game's inventor is French, and implies that a French
   pronunciation may differ, but he referred the question to game's US
   distributor, who responded: "We pronounce it with a "soft o" as in
   "block." But many customers seem to pronounce it with a "long o" as in
   "Blow-kus.".

Gameplay

   Closeup of Blokus game in progress
   Closeup of Blokus game in progress

   The goal is to get rid of all of the 21 pieces you initially start off
   with. The pieces are all of the free polyominoes using one to five
   squares (rotations and reflections don't count). On each player's turn,
   they can put one of their remaining pieces on the 20 square by 20
   square board. Each piece must connect to another piece of the same
   colour by at least one touching corner, but no two pieces of the same
   colour can share an edge (so they cannot tessellate into each other).

   The novice typically tries to seal off an area for themselves to reduce
   the area the opponents can access. But since pieces only are connected
   via their corners, another player can easily pass through. It is
   therefore difficult to cut off other people from accessing 'your' area.
   Instead, the successful tactic is to try to expand into as many areas
   on the board as possible. In other words, game strategy is dominated by
   offence rather than defence. Blocking is possible to an extent by
   cutting off an opponents access to the corners of their pieces using
   yours in strategic ways.

   The smaller tiles are very useful during the later stages of the game:
   the smaller a piece is, the better it is at occupying the holes in the
   tiles of other colours, and thus opening up new areas of the board for
   expansion. It often happens that no player can finish off all their
   tiles. The score is calculated by deducting a point for each square
   left on a player's remaining pieces (leaving you with a negative
   score). Should you ever manage to play all your pieces, you get a bonus
   score of +15. Achieving this, and having played your single-square
   piece last gets you another five points for a final score of
   +20.cumulatively.

   In a four player game, each player takes a different colour, and play
   rotates around in a clockwise direction. With two players, each player
   takes two colours, starting in opposite corners. This allows further
   strategy, as a player can sacrifice one of their colours in order to
   strengthen the position of their other colour in order to try and play
   all the pieces of that colour and win the bonus score.

   In the three-player game, the players take turns playing for the fourth
   colour (blue). Because the players must play out of corners of the
   board, one player will always be playing out of the corner opposite to
   blue. It is widely believed that this is an advantage. The reason for
   this is that blue is generally used as a tool to block the other
   player’s moves. For most of the early game, the player opposite blue is
   too far away to be successfully blocked, but can still use the colour
   itself to block others. Various methods have been suggested to solve
   this problem, but it is recommended that players come to an agreement
   among themselves that best suits their preferences.

Variant rules and boards

   The 21 Blokus tiles.
   The 21 Blokus tiles.

   As Blokus is a very simple abstract game, it lends itself to fans
   developing variant rules of play. Since there are only two rules to
   begin with, it is easy to add rules without breaking or unbalancing the
   game. Here are a few such variants:

Draft Blokus

   This variant solves the problem of a three-player game by allowing all
   players to play pieces from all different colors. The strategy in Draft
   Blokus is quite a bit subtler than in standard blokus, and the draft
   that takes place before the game is almost a game unto itself.

   The players take turns drafting the pieces that they will play with.
   Each color is drafted separately until each color has been drafted. The
   players alternate taking first pick of each colour. Once every piece
   has been drafted, play proceeds as normal.

   Notes: each player has a mix of pieces of different colors, but the
   rules for placement are the same. Sometimes a situation will arise in
   which a player skips a turn for lack of a move, but then is able to
   play again later due to subsequent moves made by other players. Though
   this does not contradict the rules of Blokus, it would be impossible in
   a standard game of blokus.

Reverse Blokus

   This variant is an unusual alternative, and is like playing a game of
   standard blokus as poorly as you can. This variant works well in games
   of two, three, or four players, though the three-player game suffers
   from the same imbalance as in standard blokus.

   Once no players can make any more moves, the player with the fewest
   tile segments on the board wins.

Variant Two Player

   In this alternate way to play with two players, the board is divided
   down the middle, and both players play only on a single half of the
   board, each playing with only a single colour. Otherwise, the game is
   played identically.

Obstacle Blokus

   The game is played with one, two, or three players. Each player chooses
   one colour, and the remaining colors become the obstacle colors. The
   players first take turns placing the obstacle colors. Once the obstacle
   colors have been exhausted, the players choose starting corners (these
   are not chosen at the beginning of the game) and play proceeds as
   normal.

Cooperative Blokus

   Four players work together with the goal of having all players place
   all their pieces on the board by the end of the game.

Team Blokus

   A four player game, where they make teams consisting of two players.
   The members of a team play cooperatively with one another with the goal
   of having all their pieces places on the board by the end of the game.
   Game play proceeds as normal.

Pirate Blokus

   Played as normal Blokus, except that the 1 piece (gold coin, or eye
   patch) must be played first. Originally suggested by amaretto and
   phillylama, 2 of the World's best players from the online Blokus.com
   game site. Players are encouraged to talk like pirates.

Expansions and spinoffs

Blokus Duo/Travel Blokus

   Blokus Duo uses a smaller (14×14) board, two of which are marked as the
   starting squares, and supports only two players. Each player chooses
   one colour (purple, orange), and the order of play is determined by any
   mutually agreeable method. The first piece played by any player must
   cover the starting squares.

   This game tends to be faster and more aggressive, since the players
   start in the middle of the board, as opposed to its edges.

Blokus Trigon

   Blokus Trigon uses pieces made up of triangles rather than squares, and
   is played on a hexagonal board. The game can be played with three
   players without giving one player an undue advantage.

Blokus Giant

   Blokus Giant is essentially like regular Blokus, except bigger (with
   the game board being about 2' square).

   Retrieved from " http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blokus"
   This reference article is mainly selected from the English Wikipedia
   with only minor checks and changes (see www.wikipedia.org for details
   of authors and sources) and is available under the GNU Free
   Documentation License. See also our Disclaimer.
