Feral Worlds: Tabletop Games · Board Games · Classic rules
Hidden Ranks
Hide your ranks. Find the flag.
Setup
- Players: two: you and a bot. You are gold, at the bottom of the board.
- Armies: forty pieces each in the Full game, or eight each in the Quick game.
- Your setup: place your pieces on your four back rows, ranks hidden from the other player.
- First move: you move first.
How to play
- 1Move one piece. One square, up, down, left or right, onto an empty square. Never onto a lake or one of your own pieces.
- 2Strike by moving onto an enemy. When you step onto an enemy piece, both ranks are shown. The higher rank wins and the other is removed.
- 3Equal ranks are both removed. If two pieces of the same rank strike, both leave the board.
- 4The Scout runs. It moves any distance in a straight line through empty squares, and can strike at the end of the line.
- 5Bombs and Miners. Bombs and the flag never move. A piece that strikes a Bomb is removed, except a Miner, which removes the Bomb.
- 6The Spy’s one trick. The Spy is the weakest piece, but if it strikes the Marshal it wins. If the Marshal strikes it, the Spy loses.
- 7No shuttling. A piece may not go back and forth between the same two squares more than three times in a row.
Winning
Strike the other player’s flag, or leave them with no piece that can move. If neither happens before the turn limit, the game is a draw.
Scoring
| When pieces meet | Result |
|---|---|
| A higher rank strikes a lower one | The lower rank is removed |
| Two equal ranks meet | Both are removed |
| The Spy strikes the Marshal | The Marshal is removed |
| The Marshal strikes the Spy | The Spy is removed |
| Any piece strikes a Bomb | The striker is removed |
| A Miner strikes a Bomb | The Bomb is removed |
| You strike the enemy flag | You win |
The ranks, from strongest to weakest: Marshal (10), General (9), Colonel (8), Major (7), Captain (6), Lieutenant (5), Sergeant (4), Miner (3), Scout (2), Spy (S). Bombs (B) and the flag (F) never move.
Key terms
- Rank:
- A piece’s strength. A higher rank wins a strike.
- Strike:
- Moving onto an enemy piece. Both ranks are shown, and the lower is removed.
- Flag:
- The piece you protect and try to capture. It never moves.
- Bomb:
- A piece that never moves and removes any striker except a Miner.
- Miner:
- The one piece that can defuse a Bomb.
- Scout:
- The piece that moves any distance in a straight line.
- Spy:
- The weakest piece, which beats the Marshal if it strikes first.
- Marshal:
- The strongest piece. Only the Spy, striking, can beat it.
- Lake:
- A square that no piece can enter. The board has two groups of four.