Ice Towers

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IceTowers is an Icehouse game (http://www.wunderland.com/icehouse) – © 1999 by Andrew LooneyPage 1

IceTowers

an Icehouse game designed by Andrew Looney

What You Need

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Additional Equipment: None.

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Number of Players: 2 – 4 (best with 3 or 4)

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Playing Time: 5 – 10 minutes

Overview

IceTowers is a high-speed game of pyramid stacking, played without turns onany flat surface. Everyone plays at once, by “capping” other pieces with those of their own color. If yours is the top piece on a tower at the end of the game, youget points for the whole tower. As towers grow taller, you’ll be able to “mine”pieces out and replay them, or even “split” some towers in two. The game endswhen no more plays are possible.

Setup

Randomly scatter a set of Icehouse pieces across the tabletop, then stand themall upright where they lie. Assign a color to each player.

Play Options

Capping:

Stacking one of your pieces up on someone else’s totake control of it is the most common action in this game. Youmay only pick up and move freestanding pieces of your owncolor. In order to cap, your piece must be the same size or smaller and a different color than the piece you are capping.

Mining:

If you don’t control a tower (i.e. you don’t have the toppiece), but two or more of your pieces are inside the tower, youmay open up the stack and remove one of your pieces (your choice). Reassemble the rest of the tower and continue playing(but see the No Minebacks rule below).

Splitting:

Whenever two pieces of any other player’s color arenext to each other in a tower, you may split the tower in two, byseparating the pair of same-colored pyramids. You cannot splityour own pieces; if no one else chooses to do so, a tower mayremain unsplit.

IceTowers is an Icehouse game (http://www.wunderland.com/icehouse) – © 1999 by Andrew LooneyPage 2

Restrictions

No Turns:

IceTowers is unlike most games in that everyone plays all at once –there’s no waiting for your turn. As soon as everyone is ready, you can startplaying. You may carry out any of the three options for play at any time youchoose.

No Two-Handed Play:

Sometimes it will be necessary to use both hands(notably when mining), but as a rule, you can only use one hand while playingthis game. In other words, you can only conduct one play option at a time.

No Minebacks:

When you mine out a piece, you must immediately use it to capa different tower. If there are no legal plays available, you must set the piecedown in the open. (Etiquette note: it’s acceptable to take a moment to examineyour options, but you should then come to a decision and play the piece. Youcan’t sit holding onto it, waiting for something better to come up; indeed, othersmay insist that you play the piece before they take their next actions.)

Ending the Game

The game ends when all players agree that no more plays will be made. Oftenthis will happen automatically, when no more moves are possible, but generallythe players will need to agree that the game is over, since not all Splittingopportunities need be taken advantage of. Also, games may sometimesterminate due to a stalemate condition (see below).

Scoring

When the game is over, collect up all the towers you control and put them in frontof you. You get three points for each large piece you end up with, two points for each medium, and one point for each small piece. The player with the highestscore wins.

IceTowers is an Icehouse game (http://www.wunderland.com/icehouse) – © 1999 by Andrew LooneyPage 3

Stalemate Conditions

During the endgame, a couple of forms of deadlock are possible (althoughunlikely). If a stalemate situation arises, the game is ended and the deadlockedpieces are dealt with as described below.

Final Piece Showdown:

At the end of the game, you could wind up with anunplayed piece in your hand and nowhere attractive to put it. If there’s someoneelse in the same situation, neither of you will want to set down your last piece, for fear of it being capped by the other player. In this case, the game ends and theplayers just set their pieces down. Pieces left free-standing in this way are scoredas usual.

Tower Wars:

Occasionally, an infinite loop situation may arise, in which severalplayers can mine pieces and use them to take control of other towers, in a waythat seems unending. Should this occur, the first thing to do is to keep playing for a while longer, since an ending may still be possible.Think of it as a puzzle, and seek out the solution. For example, look for a chanceto mine out a piece that will cause two pieces of one color to come together, thusallowing you to split the tower and break up the situation. If no resolution can befound to a Tower War, however, the game terminates and all towers involved inthe war are removed, scoring no points.

Two Player Option

IceTowers is best when played by three or four players, but it can also be playedwith two. Each person plays two colors. The game proceeds as if there were four people in the game, with each player carrying out actions for both of the colorsthey are assigned. At the end, you get points for towers controlled by both of your colors, the winner being the player with the highest combined score.The two colors assigned to a player are still considered to be distinct, while theperson who plays them is considered to be a single player. You may cap one of your colors with the other. You can mine one color out of a tower controlled byyour other color. In order to split, two adjacent pieces must still be the samecolor, but only your opponent can split pairs in either of your colors.

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