The blocking grid — workers fight for spots
Worker placement is the engine of many modern board games. The core feel: take a useful spot, and your opponent can't have it.
From Simplified worker placement (like in Stone Age).
What it shows a designer
Worker placement at its smallest: taking a spot denies it to the other player. It shows how turn order and denial create decisions even with no luck at all.
Credits
- Made by
- Made for this tool, as a short exercise in worker placement, the mechanism of games such as Stone Age
What you need
- a sheet of paper
- a pen
- four small objects per player, different for each player (coins, eraser bits, paper clips)
How to play
- Draw the grid. Draw a 3×3 grid on paper. Label columns: WOOD, STONE, GOLD. Rows: 3 points, 2 points, 1 point.
- Take turns placing. Each player has 4 tokens. Toss a coin to see who starts. Take turns placing ONE token on any empty spot.
- Spots block once taken. Once a spot has a token, no one else can place there this round.
- Score. After all tokens are placed, score the points shown by where your tokens sit.
- Three rounds. Clear the grid and play two more rounds, with the other player starting each time. Whoever has more points after three rounds wins; equal totals are a draw.
After playing, talk about
- Did blocking feel mean or fun?
- When did you predict opponent's move?
- Was the choice — high spot or save tokens — interesting?
Its blocks
Download it as a design (.md)In boardgameBuilder, Open game puts its blocks on the canvas. Changed, the same file can come back here from Propose a game.