Translated by Tim Synge from the German Rules Printed by Heidelberger Spielverlag

BLOKUS – English rules Translated by Tim Synge from the German rules printed by Heidelberger Spielverlag.

1 CONTENTS

The game contains:  A gameboard with 400 squares  84 coloured pieces in blue, yellow, red and green (21 in each colour)

Figure 1 (“Bild 1”) shows the 21 pieces in the red set – each set has exactly the same distribution. There is one single square (the “solitaire” tile), one double square, two trebles, five “quads” and twelve “fivers” (pieces comprising a pattern of five squares).)

Each player tries to lay all 21 tiles in his/her colour set on the board.

3 PLAY

The same order of play is always followed: tiles are played in the order: blue, yellow, red, green. Tiles are distributed so that each player receives a set of 21 tiles in a single colour set.

 Each player must play his or her first tile in an unoccupied corner of the board (see “Bild 2”, where “Nein” means “Illegal play” and “Ja” means “Legal play”).  Each player then plays a tile in turn, so that it touches one or more corners (but never an adjacent side) of a tile of the same colour that is already on the board. (See “Bild 3”.)  Tiles may be played so that a side is adjacent to the side of a tile of a different colour (see “Bild 4”).  Tiles that have already been played may not be moved at any point in the game.

4 END OF THE GAME

If a player cannot legally play a tile, he or she is eliminated from the game and sits out the remaining turns. The remaining players continue, following the turn order as before. When no player can place a tile, each player counts his or her unused tiles and calculates his or her score:  Minus one point for each square not played  15 points if all 21 tiles were played  20 points if all 21 tiles were played and the solitaire tile was the last one to be played

“Bild 5” shows a completed game. All the blue tiles were played and that player won the game.  Blue played all 21 tiles and played his/her solitaire tile last: 20 points  Yellow was left with two quad tiles unplayed: minus eight points  Red was left with one treble, four quads and a fiver: minus 24 points  Green was left with one treble, three quads and a fiver: minus 20 points

5 LENGTH OF A GAME

A typical game lasts around 20 to 30 minutes.

6 VARIANTS

A number of variants are listed in the German rules.

 Two teams of two players: The order of play remains blue, yellow, red, green. Players sitting opposite each other each form a team. At the end of the game, each team counts up its aggregate score and the winning team is the one with the highest aggregate points.

 Two-player game: The order of play remains blue, yellow, red, green. The first player uses the blue and red tile sets and the second player uses yellow and green. The basic game rules are used. The aggregate score for the blue and red tile sets is totalled, similarly the aggregate score for yellow and green. The winner is the player with the highest aggregate score.

 Three players: The order of play remains blue, yellow, red, green. Each player chooses a colour. The fourth colour is used, so that each round, one player plays a tile from that set in turn. The player playing the neutral colour changes each turn. Scores are totalled as usual with no score being allocated to the neutral colour.

 Solitaire: The player may, while observing the basic rules of play, attempt either to play all 84 tiles on the board or to play all 20 quad tiles in an exact 8 by 10 rectangle. In doing this, the principle that tiles from the same colour set can touch at corners but not along adjacent sides must be observed.