Andantino
Andantino Rulebook
Table of Contents
Material
ANDANTINO includes a carrying case, 25 white hexagonal tiles and 25 red hexagonal tiles (called hexes). Other colours are also available on the nestorgames website.
Rules
Setup
The playing surface is initially empty. Place two hexes (one of each colour) adjacent to each other in the middle of the playing surface.
Each player takes a set of 24 hexes of the same colour (white or red).
Play
Starting with white, players alternate turns placing a hexagonal tile of their colour adjacent to at least 2 other hexes already played until the victory condition is reached or until all the tiles have been played, whatever happens first.
Variant (adjacency): The second player can disobey this adjacency rule once, by placing a hex adjacent to 1 tile only. This diminishes the first player advantage.
Aim
The game is won by the first player to either
a) complete a straight line of 5 consecutive pieces of their colour or…
b) fully enclose (i.e. "trap") any or more opponent's pieces inside a loop of 6 or more own pieces.
Note that traps can include gaps (empty areas) provided they're also fully enclosed by the surrounding pieces.
The game is drawn if neither objective is achieved by either player after all 50 pieces have been played.
Example: Red wins with a line of 5. (Diagram: a red line of five hexes across a mixed white and red cluster.)
Examples: White wins on the left example by surrounding red. Red wins on the right example by surrounding white, even if a gap is inside the loop. (Diagrams: a red loop enclosing white pieces on the left; a white loop enclosing a red piece and a gap on the right.)
Variant
If all 50 tiles have been played, players can continue playing by picking up already played pieces of their colour and legally placing them somewhere else until the victory condition is reached.
Scoring
To score your games, award 50 points for each win minus 1 point for every piece played by both players. Highest aggregate score after an agreed number of games have been played wins the series.