A boardless game inspired by Hive of pinning opposing pieces and merging one's own until one player either runs out of moves (and loses) or merges enough pieces (and wins).

Inventor: Marek Kolcun

Achieve one of the following to win:

• Promote one of your pieces to rank 7 or higher
• Leave your opponent with no legal moves

[Add treatment of repetition]

• 12 square pieces which can indicate 6 ranks (from 1 to 6) in 2 colors (d6 dice work nicely)
  • 6 red pieces (belonging to player 1)
  • 6 blue pieces (belonging to player 2)
• A flat surface upon which an infinite square grid is imagined

1. Place 1 piece of each color adjacent to eachother in the center of the table (adjacency is always edge to edge, not corner to corner)
2. The remaining pieces of each player go to their hands to be placed during the game
3. Red starts

I'm not sure if there's a name for what in Hive is called the Hive, but I will use the word “Structure” to refer to it. The Structure is the contiguous block of pieces on the table (not in players' hands) which grows, shrinks, and evolves throughout the game. The following rules restrict how it may change, and are essentially unchanged from its inspiration, Hive. I've even kept the names because why come up with a different name for something which already has one?

• One Hive Rule
  • The Structure may never be split into 2 disconnected parts, not even during the execution of a move (only edge to edge counts for connection, not corner to corner)
• Freedom to Move Rule
  • A piece may never move somewhere it cannot slide to without disturbing the Hive
  • Unlike in Hive, where this rule does not apply when placing new pieces, in Cubeo this rule always applies, even when placing new pieces or removing them via merging (otherwise Beetle Factories would be too strong, since there are no Beetles or Pillbugs to fight an Inner Hive Game with)

Each turn, take one and only one of the following actions (passing is illegal):

• Place a piece from your hand onto the board (if your hand is empty or you cannot follow all these restrictions, you may not take this action)
  • It must be adjacent to at least one friendly piece
  • It must not be adjacent to any opposing pieces
  • It must be able to slide into place from the outside without disturbing the structure of already placed pieces (cf. Freedom to Move Rule)
  • It must be placed indicating rank 1
• Move one of your pieces already on the board (if you cannot follow all these restrictions, you may not take this action)
  • It must not break the structure in the moment it's lifted for the first step (cf. One Hive Rule)
  • It must move one face at a time around the edge of the structure exactly as many times as its rank, but it may double back
  • It must change the board position (ie, you can't simulate a pass)
  • It must not make any step through a gap which is too narrow to fit without disturbing the structure (cf. Freedom to Move Rule)
• Merge one of your pieces (A) into another one of your pieces (B) (if you cannot follow all these restrictions, you may not take this action)
  • You must have at least 3 pieces in the Structure before merging
  • Piece A must not break the structure in the moment it's lifted to merge (cf. One Hive Rule)
  • Piece A must be adjacent to piece B
  • Piece A must be able to move to where piece B is directly in one step without disturbing the structure (this rule does not concern itself with the rank of piece A) (cf. Freedom to Move Rule)
  • Piece A must be able to reach the outside of the Structure without disturbing it (cf. Freedom to Move Rule)
  • Increase the rank of Piece B by the rank of Piece A, then return Piece A to your hand

Of these variants, only three piece/rank size changes are implemented on Abstract Play: d8, d10, and d12, with the recommended goals (9, 11, and 13, respectively.

• Number of Pieces, Ranks, and Goal
  • By default there are 6 pieces per side, each has 6 possible (non-winning) ranks and the first to rank 7+ wins. This can be changed, though it's recommended to keep the number of Pieces and the number of (non-winning) ranks equal, and the Goal value 1 higher (as in the default game)
• Hex Pieces/Grid
  • Rather than the default square Pieces and Grid, hex Pieces and Grid may be used, as in Hive
  • Note that merging is an action not seen in Hive: the movement is on the same level, not going up a level, which impacts legal merges on a hex grid: in a diamond formation, the two center pieces cannot merge with eachother (cf. Freedom to Move Rule)

To experience the game of Cubeo with the geometry and Hive Structure of Hive, use 14 hexagonal pieces per side with 14 possible ranks (rank 15+ wins), on an infinite hex grid.

A boardless dice game. Walk your dice, merge pairs to raise pip values, and race to a winning merge — or leave the opponent with no move.

Inventor: Marek Kolcun

See BoardGameGeek: Cubeo.

You win by completing a merge that reaches the goal value (7 on d6, which is recorded as a winning merge), or if the opponent has no legal move.

Two dice of pip 1 start adjacent: player 1 at (0,0), player 2 at (1,0). The grid grows as pieces move. Default: six-sided dice, merge goal 7.

Each die walks a path of length equal to its pips on empty cells of the formation (including backtracking). A pinned die (blocked in) cannot walk. The walk must end on a different cell than it started (default); strict also forbids walks that only rotate or reflect the whole formation.

Merge: if you have at least three dice, you may slide one unpinned die that can leave the formation onto an orthogonally adjacent friendly die that shares its row or column. Pips add. Reaching the merge goal wins immediately.

The formation after a walk cannot be a rotation or reflection of the start.

Eight, ten, or twelve cubical dice per side; merge goals 9, 11, and 13.

• Current engine version: 20250105 (2025-01-05). On Abstract Play since 2025-01-09.

• https://boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/191916/cubeo