Lines of Action

Lines of Action is an abstract strategy board game invented by Claude Soucie and played on a standard 8 by 8 board with each side starting with twelve pieces arranged along the edges of the board. Black and White alternate turns, with Black moving first, and each piece moves in a straight line horizontally, vertically or diagonally exactly as many squares as the total number of pieces, friendly or enemy, that sit anywhere along that line. A piece may jump over its own pieces while moving but can never jump over an opposing piece, and it captures an enemy piece by landing exactly on its square. The game has no concept of material advantage in the usual sense; the only goal is to maneuver all of one player's own remaining pieces into a single connected group, where connection counts orthogonally or diagonally between adjacent squares. This single, elegant winning condition produces sharp tactical play despite the game's simple rules, and it earned Lines of Action a recommendation from the Spiel des Jahres jury in 1988, helping establish it as a respected entry in the wider family of abstract strategy games played on a chess sized board.