Exxit

Exxit → French.

Exxit

Other Names: Exit,
Hex-It

Inventor: Vincent Everaert,
2003

Ranks: boardless

Sowing: Single laps

Region: France, Internet

Exxit is a modern sowing game created by the French Vincent Everaert in 2003 and published by Jactalea in 2006. The game was first called Exit, then Hex-It, before it attained its final name. Some rules (such as the initial set-up and the scoring) were slightly changed even after 2005.

It is a boardless boardgame, which is played with hexagonal tiles that placed during the game on a flat surface by two players: Black and White.

Exxit won the "Concours International de Créateurs de Jeux de Société" in 2004. The first World Championship was held on June 3, 2007, in Paris (France) and won by Axel Indygo after winning the final game against Yannick Nounouille with 28 : 20 points. The game can be played online at BoardSpace and Boîte à jeux.

Material

8 black pawns, 8 red pawns (for "White") and a stock of 39 reversible hexagonal tiles shared by both players. Pawns are stackable.

Rules

Start-up position

The game starts from a core area of four hexagonal tiles (2 black, 2 red), on which the first pawns are placed. There are two red tiles side by side in the center and a black tile on each side that are facing both red tiles. Red moves first.

General principle

The pawns form stacks of any height starting with a singleton (height 1). The pawn on top determines the stack's ownership.

The object of the game is to extend the player's territory by placing new hexagons.

Types of moves

Placing a pawn

On his turn a player may place a pawn on any empty hexagon, if he can't "dance" (see below).

Sowing

The contents of a friendly stack can be distributed (similar to the sowing in mancala games), one by one, starting with the bottom piece, in a straight line towards an enemy stack, if the following conditions are met:

there must be enough pawns to land a pawn on the opponent's stack
the tiles in-between must be vacant
the opponent's stack is not taller than the stack which is sown

The remaining pawns are continued to be sown behind the opponent's stack. If there are still pawns left, when the edge of the board is reached, the remaining stack is dropped on a "virtual" tile just beyond the board. Its pawns then become prisoners, which cannot be moved.

Sowing is known as "dancing" or "dealing" in Exxit.

Exception : a "dance" / "deal" isn't performed, if the last pawn is placed on a virtual tile already occupied by prisoners.

Freeing a prisoner

On his turn a player can free a prisoner outside the territory, when its virtual tile is adjacent to at least two real tiles. The freed pawns are returned to their owner. Each stack (even if it consisted of just one pawn) is replaced by a tile, which has the color of the player who effected the liberation. If more prisoners adjacent to the last tile can be freed afterwards, this is done too.

Order of moves

Sowing is mandatory and "dances", which drop pieces off the board, take priority over any other sowings that do not.

Passing is only permitted if a player cannot move.

End of the game and winner

The game ends when either of the following occurs:

the initial stock of 39 tiles has been used up
both players must pass
the same position is repeated three times

The winner is the player whose total territory made up of individual "islands" is more valuable: each tile of the largest island of each color scores two points, each tile of the other islands (even if they are of equal size) scores 1 point. If the number of points is equal, the game is a draw.

External Links

References

Castellini, N.: Tavole da gioco. In: Il Fogliaccio degli Astratti 2010; 7 (55): 30-31.

Copyright

Updated and corrected translation from French Wikipedia: The original article Exxit, http://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Exxit, is available under the GNU Free Documentation License (GFDL). Its history is here.