Introduction

Che is a boardless tile placement game in which players strive to form closed regions with Truchet tiles.

Rules

Two players, Light and Dark, share a common pool of duotone Truchet tiles. Each tile has inverted colours on the front and back and may be played oriented either left or right.

       +---|---+   +---|---+
       |    \..|   |../    |
 Front __    \__   __/    __  (Light dominant)
       |.\     |   |     /.|
       |..\    |   |    /..|
       +---|---+   +---|---+ 


       +---|---+   +---|---+
       |....\  |   |  /....|
 Back  __....\__   __/....__  (Dark dominant)
       | \.....|   |...../ |
       |  \....|   |..../  | 
       +---|---+   +---|---+ 
 
         Left        Right 

Play: Light places a tile of their choice on the playing area. Players then take turns placing two tiles of their choice squarely adjacent to at least one existing tile such that all neighbouring edge colours match (the two tiles being placed to not need to be adjacent themselves).

Aim: A player wins by completing a closed region of their colour, which may be any size or shape. If a move achieves this for both players then the mover loses.

 +---|---+---|---+
 |../         \..|
 __/    ___    \__
 |     /...\     |
 |    /.....\    |
 +   |...+...|   +   Dark wins this game
 |    \...../    |
 __    \___/    __
 |.\           /.|
 |..\         /..|
 +---|---+---|---+ 

If the tiles run out before either player wins, then the owner of the largest region wins. A region's size is given by the number of dominant tiles that it contains. For example, Light has the largest region (size 5) in the following game; Light would win this game if the tiles ran out at this point.

         +---|---+                
         |../    |        
         __/    __            
         |     /.|      
         |    /..|     
 +---|---+   (...+               +---|---+---|---+ 
 |....\       \..|               |....\       \..| 
 __....\___    \_|               __....\___    \__
 | \.......\     |               | \.......\     |
 |  \.......\    |               |  \.......\    |
 +---|---+...\   +---|---+---|---+   \...+...\   +
         |....\       \...../         \.......\  |
         __....\___    \___/    ____   \___....\__ 
         | \.......\           /....\      \.....|
         |  \.......\         /......\      \....|
         +---|---+---|---+---|---+---|---+---|---+

Notes

It is generally better to play tiles of the opponent's dominant colour each turn.

New Rules

The following options trigger new rules that improve the game:
-group_area=n
-group_extent=n   

The group_area option inverts the winning condition so that the aim is to surround an enemy group, but a player loses if any friendly group reaches n tiles in area (counting dominant tiles). A player loses if their move achieves a win for both players.

The group_extent option triggers similar rules except that a player loses if any friendly group reaches n tiles in extent either horizontally or vertically (counting dominant tiles).

Recommended sizes are -group_area=16 and -group_extent=6.

History

Che rules copyright Cameron Browne © 2008.

The name “Che” is derived from the letters TRUCHET.

More details are available at the official Che page.

Implementation and Help file by Cameron Browne, March 2008.