Sploof Rules

• designed by Matt Green
• 2 players

Start

The board starts as shown.

Each player starts with two friendly balls in their stock. The numbers in the display represent the number in each player’s stock, not the number on the board.

Play

Players take turns either:

1. placing a ball from their stock at any playable point, or
2. removing a red ball from the board, and increasing their stock by 2.

End

A player wins with a line of four touching balls of their colour (viewed from above). A player with no legal moves loses.

For example, the following game has been won by White.

Note that White’s winning line of four balls is straight when viewed from directly above, but not when viewed from other angles. The winning line can also be a more standard line of four along a row or column, as in this win for white:

However, a row can be blocked by balls crossing over it. The following game is not yet a win for white, although removing one of the supporting reds would unblock the winning row.