MazeMakers

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Maze Makers

Players 2-4
Length 15-30 minutes
Equipment Required single standard piecepack and pentominoes set (optional rules are included to play without it)
Designer JorgeArroyo
Version 1.0
Version Date2010-03-29
License Copyright 2006 JorgeArroyo. Released under the GNU Free Document License , dual-licensed CC BY-SA 4.0

Description

In this game players compete to find magical artifacts from an ancient maze. The maze is enchanted and players can change its layout using only their minds. This way they can help themselves in their search or hinder their opponents. Coins placed number up on the maze represent either monsters (stronger the bigger the number on the coin) or artifacts (if the suit, revealed only to the player that lands there, matches the player's suit). First player to find 3 artifacts and exit the maze wins.

This game was designed to be played with a piecepack set and a pentominos set. The pentomino pieces are the walls for the maze. It gives a nice 3D feel to the game (each square section of the pentomino pieces has to be of the same approximate size as the small squares from the piecepack tiles). If you don't have a pentominos set, there's an alternative mechanic, although it changes the game a bit.

Update (March 2010)

After a few more plays with the pentomino set I've decided to update the rules. Basically I've added the possibility of "stealing" a wall from another player so a player can't permanently block another player or a treasure. But a player who takes advantage of this rule must move that wall on their next turn. I've also updated the way walls are created with a pentomino set. Basically, pieces have to be totally inside the board and not all the 12 pieces are used in a game. Three are left out of play so the maze is not too crowded.

Rules

http://george.makasoft.net/piecepack/MazeMakers.pdf

Images

http://images.boardgamegeek.com/images/pic700261_md.jpg

A three player game in progress. My 6yo son playing green eventually won with me on a close second.

http://george.makasoft.net/piecepack/MazeMakers1.jpg

This is from an older set of rules, but it's almost the same except for how the coins are set on the walls and the fact pentomino pieces have to fit inside the board.

http://george.makasoft.net/piecepack/MazeMakers3small.jpg

A finished game using the optional rules for playing without a pentominos set. A close win by the suns player

Designer Notes

This game is actually my second game (it predates SpaceTraders but I hadn't written the rules down until recently) and has been tested a lot with 2 players. I think it works quite well for a short filler.

Reviews & Comments

Jorge, those are really nice pentominos. If you don't mind my asking, where did you get them? Are they from the Quintillions set sold by Kadon? -- ClarkRodeffer

Right now I'm not at home so I cannot tell you what company made it. I got them at an Educational/toy/office shop in Madrid called Abacus (they are all over Spain: http://www.abacus.es). It looks nice but the pieces don't fit perfectly well. I wish I could find a pentominoes set would fit the squares in the piecepack set though... --JorgeArroyo

Jorge, as Clark mentioned, the Kadon Quintillions set is really nice: laser-cut maple that does fit together well, and I'm pretty sure they use one-inch cube sizes, which should match the Mesomorph piecepack perfectly. --RonHaleEvans

My set is not as nice... it's not cut from one block of wood (it can't be seen so well in the picture). Still Kadon's set squares are 13/16" so they won't fit perfectly with the piecepack squares. Still, it'll probably work better than with my set which seems to be smaller. --JorgeArroyo

Also the new game "Cleopatra and the Society of Architects" from Days of Wonder has a set of pentomino tiles with 1 inch squares. -- Mark A. Biggar

Links

BGG page: http://www.boardgamegeek.com/game/24150


CategoryGame CategoryNeedsTesting ThemeFantasyCategory MechanicSetCollectingCategory MechanicMultipleBoardsCategory