IceFrogs

IceFrogs
Designed by Jason Spears & Erik Oosterwal
Players jump their pyramids across the board in an attempt to get a piece into their opponent's start space.
:Players	Players:	2 - 3
:Time	Length:	unknown
:Complexity	Complexity:	Low
Trios per color:		5
Number of colors:		1 per player
Pyramid trios:
Monochr. stashes:		1 per player
Five-color sets:
- - - - - - Other equipment - - - - - -
Poker Chips
Setup time:		4 minutes
Playing time:
Strategy depth:		Medium
Random chance:		None
Game mechanics:		Jumping, Stacking
Theme:		Abstract
BGG Link:		IceFrogs
Status: Complete (v1.0), Year released: 2008

IceFrogs is an abstract strategy game for 2-3 players. (More players may be possible but it needs to be tested.) Players jump their pyramids across the board in an attempt to get a piece into their opponent's start space.

Components

36 Poker Chips (1"-1.5" in diameter is best.) Each player gets 15 pyramids in a single color, 1 stash, (5 small, 5 medium, 5 large.)

Setup

Lay out the 37 poker chips per the diagram. The light green circles are the start spaces.

Setup for 2 players

Setup for 3 players

Game Play

Pick a player to go first. (The tallest, flip a coin, highest roll on a die, whatever.)

Each turn, a player may

1) move a pyramid that is already on the board, or

2) place a new pyramid from their supply on their start space and then move this new pyramid.

If they have no pyramids in their supply, they must move a pyramid on the board. A piece may not be left on the start space.

Movement

A pyramid may be moved one space to an adjacent space. The space it lands on may be empty or may contain a pyramid of equal or greater size as the top (or only) piece in a stack. A pyramid cannot be placed on top of a smaller pyramid.

The purple pyramid here can move to an empty space or it can stack on top of the large blue pyramid or medium purple pyramid. It is not allowed to stack on top of the 1-pip blue pyramid because pyramids cannot land on pieces smaller than themselves.

A pyramid may also jump over one space containing one or more pyramids, so long as the top pyramid in the stack is of equal or smaller size. A pyramid may not jump over a pyramid larger than itself. A pyramid can jump in any of the six directions and can move to the start space, so long as it doesn't end the turn there.

This purple pyramid may not jump over the medium blue pyramid to the right because the medium pyramid is bigger than it. But it can jump over the stack on the left, because the piece on the top of that stack is the same size or smaller than the jumping pyramid.

From one space, a pyramid may move over one other occupied space to land on the space after the occupied one. If this space was empty, the pyramid may move again to jump over another pyramid or be placed on top of an adjacent pyramid.

This blue pyramid may jump over the small purple, the medium blue, and then the stack topped with the medium purple. It is not forced to keep jumping during this journey; it has the option of stopping any of the green dots shown on the poker chips.

A pyramid can land on top of a piece of equal or greater size. A pyramid cannot land on top of a piece smaller than itself.

In this same situation, if there were a small piece on the ending space, the blue pyramid would be able to jump the first two hops, but could not jump over the large-and-medium stack because doing so would cause it to land on a piece smaller than itself.

If this space a pyramids lands on is occupied, the player's turn is over.

In this same situation, if there were a large piece on the third hop, the blue pyramid would be able to land on the large piece. Doing so would end its movement because landing on an occupied space always ends your movement, so it could not jump over the medium blue pyramid to its right.

Only the top most pyramid in a stack may be moved. With this it is possible to trap an opponent's pyramid on a space.

Game End

The game is won by the first player to move a pyramid into their opponent's start space.

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License

http://i.creativecommons.org/l/by-nc-sa/3.0/us/88x31.png
This work is distributed by Jason Spears & Erik Oosterwal under the Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 3.0 License.