DRAW YOUR SWORD. RAISE YOUR SHIELD. RUIN THEIR PLANS.

The rules are simple.

Create an unbroken path for your swords. Block your opponent’s paths with shields. Score more points than they do.

Naturally, they are trying to do precisely the same thing to you.

Swords and Shields is a tactical print-and-play board game for two players, combining straightforward rules with an increasingly vicious contest of planning, obstruction and second-guessing.

Every tile creates a possibility.

Every shield closes one down.

Every apparently brilliant plan lasts until your opponent notices what you are doing and drops something inconvenient directly in its path.

EASY TO LEARN. DIFFICULT TO MASTER.

In Swords and Shields, players compete to create scoring paths across the board.

Swords score when their paths remain open all the way to the far side. Shields block those paths, denying points and forcing players to reconsider their plans.

Players take turns placing tiles, attempting to extend their own routes while disrupting those of their opponent.

The result is a game of:

• Tactical tile placement

• Route building and area control

• Blocking and counterplay

• Bluffing and misdirection

• Short-term opportunities

• Long-term planning

• Quietly resenting the person sitting opposite you

The basic objective is immediately understandable, but the interaction between paths, boards and opposing moves creates considerable tactical depth.

A move that scores now may expose an important route later.

A defensive shield may prevent your opponent from scoring but leave your own position cramped.

An apparently harmless tile may be the beginning of a path that becomes extremely difficult to stop.

You must consider not only what you intend to do, but what your opponent thinks you intend to do—and what they are preparing while you are congratulating yourself upon having deceived them.

PATHS AND BLOCKS

A sword without a clear path scores nothing.

A shield placed at the right moment can dismantle several turns of careful preparation.

The game rewards players who can build towards several possibilities at once, recognise emerging threats and force their opponent to choose between equally unpleasant alternatives.

Do you extend your strongest route or begin another before it can be contained?

Do you block an immediate threat or preserve the tile for something worse?

Do you reveal your plan early or disguise it among several plausible moves?

The pieces may be simple, but the decisions are not.

There is no hidden deck handing one player a miraculous answer. Both players can see the developing position and understand the danger.

The difficulty lies in doing something about it.

CHANGE THE BATTLEFIELD

Swords and Shields can be played using between one and five boards, arranged in different ways to alter the shape and scale of the game.

A smaller playing area creates a tighter, faster struggle in which every space matters.

Additional boards create more routes, more opportunities and more room for elaborate plans to go catastrophically wrong.

The rules are also easy to modify, allowing players to experiment with different layouts, victory conditions and variations.

This makes the game suitable for:

• Quick tactical matches

• Longer and more elaborate contests

• Tournament or league play

• Home-made scenarios and variants

• Introducing new players to abstract strategy games

• Repeated play without relying upon randomised content

• Use as a game within a role-playing campaign

Change the board arrangement and the tactical problem changes with it.

The swords remain sharp.

The shields remain obstructive.

The person across the table remains entirely untrustworthy.

A GAME WITHIN YOUR GAME

Swords and Shields can also be introduced into a tabletop role-playing setting as an in-world board game.

It might be played by soldiers passing time in a fortress, nobles settling wagers at court, scholars testing one another’s tactical ability or criminals deciding who receives the more profitable share of a robbery.

Characters might play it to:

• Win money or information

• Impress an important patron

• Gain access to an exclusive club

• Distract a suspicious guard

• Challenge a rival

• Demonstrate tactical intelligence

• Settle a dispute without immediately reaching for actual swords

• Discover that their opponent takes losing very badly

A match can provide colour and characterisation during a role-playing session, or become the centre of an encounter in its own right.

Perhaps the local champion must be defeated before they will answer questions.

Perhaps the arrangement of the tiles contains a coded message.

Perhaps the entire contest is merely keeping the characters occupied while something considerably less sporting takes place elsewhere.

It is a complete tactical game, but Games Masters are encouraged to steal it and put it to further work.

PRINT, CUT AND PLAY

This edition of Swords and Shields is supplied as a PDF download for print-and-play.

Print the boards and pieces, cut them out and begin playing.

No elaborate set-up is required. No miniatures need painting. No campaign needs preparing. You merely require the printed game, an opponent and enough table space to discover how personally you take being blocked one move before scoring.

For players who prefer a physical edition, a professionally printed hardcopy print-and-play version is available from Lulu.

A deluxe edition is also available from The Game Crafter, featuring heavy card boards and tactile mahjong-style playing tiles.

Simple rules.

Deep tactics.

Two players.

One of you has already left a path undefended.