Dots (game)

This article is about the paper-based strategy game. For the iOS video game, see Dots (video game).
Example of game

Dots (Czech: Židi, Polish: Kropki, Russian: Точки) is an abstract strategy game, played by two or more people on a sheet of squared paper. The game is superficially similar to Go, except that pieces are not taken, and the primary target of dots is capturing enemy dots by surrounding them with a continuous line of one's own dots. Once surrounded, dots are not playable.

An animation of a game opening

Rules

The game is played on a grid of unspecified finite dimensions. Players take turns adding a dot of their own colour to an intersection of the grid: this intersection must be empty of dots, and cannot be inside a claimed territory.

A player may claim a territory of any non-zero size by connecting a circuit of his or her own dots by straight or diagonal lines, each segment no more than one space in length. These lines cannot cross existing lines, making it possible for a player to pre-empt their opponent by intersecting their line diagonally before they can draw it.

The game ends when a player can no longer place a dot. The winner is the player who has covered the most total space in their territories. An opponent's territory does not count if it is inside another's territory.

An alternate scoring system is that a player receives one point for each dot of the opponent's colour which is inside their own territory.

This article is issued from Wikipedia - version of the Tuesday, March 29, 2016. The text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution/Share Alike but additional terms may apply for the media files.