Ok, I have not written up the rules yet but here's what you're going to need.
-a regular chess board (8x8)
-set of different color tokens for each player (up to 4) plus a 5th way to mark when something is walled. I use checker and chess pieces.
-print-out of the PDF available below cut up and used as cards
setup:
-shuffle the general objectives and deal two onto the table. These will dictate how you should play as these will give you bonuses at endgame.
-shuffle the private goals and deal 3 to each player, player then picks how many he wants to keep and gives the rest back. The amount of points a card is worth is dictated by the amount of squares it takes up, or the amount of pieces it has to capture.
-shuffle the power up! deck and give 5 to each player. These are special abilities that will allow you to capture other pieces and so on.
gameplay:
-have each person sit on one corner of the board. the two sides adjacent to your corner are the ones you can use to "drop" pieces onto the board.
- pieces that are dropped will continue to move till they hit an already existing piece or they fall off the other edge.
-player can play pieces that have been captured by another player from his side of the board.
- each player gets 1 move per turn. these moves can include
1. playing a piece
2. drawing a new power up
3. drawing new secret objectives (do this the same way you would draw objectives in the beginning)
-play continues until one person is out of tokens on HIS own side, tokens captured by other players do not count.
- every time a secret objective is scored, those tokens go out of play. If it's a captured tokens objective they are removed, but if its a shape objective on the board those pieces "wall" and cannot be removed from the board anymore.
scoring:
follow the completed objectives as well as the general objectives to score and see who won.
What I did when playtesting is right on the middle of the board you put one of every color. if it's 2 players you put two of each diagonaly, 3and 4 players 1 of each.
The way i think of it is. the edges of the board connected to your corner are like the top of a connect 4 board. So they would move just like that. You would place them at the "top" and they would move down and come out the other end.
The wife and I found out that putting pieces on the other player's sides can be VERY crucial in the end game. especially with an agressive player like me that will try to block off part of the board.
Also, the power up draw mechanic works best that whenever you finish an objective you draw back up to 5.
Thanks for trying it out guys.