https://www.marksteeregames.com/Cephalopod_rules.pdf
Dice are used as playing pieces in Cephalopod. The dice are not rolled. They're added to and captured from the board. For example, if there's an unoccupied square with a 1, 2, and 3 next to it, you can place a 6 in that square and remove the 1, 2, and 3, because 1 + 2 + 3 = 6. It's a capture-from-within mechanism.
Cephalopod is perhaps my most well known game. I gave it a fresh UI for Board Game Arena with an ultra-minimal theme. The 'board' is nothing more than translucent shading on the BGA provided wood background. The 'dice' are nothing more than pips.
I minimized the presence of the Finish button. A Finish button is not needed on most turns, and will only pop up during your turn if you've already selected 2 dice for capture and there's the possibility of selecting more. I don't like gratuitous Finish buttons, so it only appears when absolutely necessary.
Cephalopod is largely a tactical game. You want to get 6's because 6's can't be captured. There are 'countdowns' to the next opportunity to form a 6 and you want to control the tempo so the next 6 will be yours.
Cephalopod is halfway between Rive and Oust on the concentration scale. I play Rive quickly, carelessly, and largely thoughtlessly. There are wild swings in advantage and I keep my fingers crossed that it'll end on an upswing for me. There's a pseudo luck in Rive akin to dice rolls in Backgammon.
Oust is a very contemplative game. Players spend a lot of time on all of their moves. Oust is not forgiving of mistakes.
There are more opportunities for meaningful analysis in Cephalopod than in Rive. But not as many as in Oust.
Cephalopod has a churn rate of about 6 to 1. On the 15 square board there will be around 90 turns. On the 25 square board there will be a lot more turns (though of course Cephalopod is finite). Play is normally fairly fast, so it's not too time consuming in real time. In turn based it could take a while.
I hope you will enjoy Cephalopod.
Mark
Dice are used as playing pieces in Cephalopod. The dice are not rolled. They're added to and captured from the board. For example, if there's an unoccupied square with a 1, 2, and 3 next to it, you can place a 6 in that square and remove the 1, 2, and 3, because 1 + 2 + 3 = 6. It's a capture-from-within mechanism.
Cephalopod is perhaps my most well known game. I gave it a fresh UI for Board Game Arena with an ultra-minimal theme. The 'board' is nothing more than translucent shading on the BGA provided wood background. The 'dice' are nothing more than pips.
I minimized the presence of the Finish button. A Finish button is not needed on most turns, and will only pop up during your turn if you've already selected 2 dice for capture and there's the possibility of selecting more. I don't like gratuitous Finish buttons, so it only appears when absolutely necessary.
Cephalopod is largely a tactical game. You want to get 6's because 6's can't be captured. There are 'countdowns' to the next opportunity to form a 6 and you want to control the tempo so the next 6 will be yours.
Cephalopod is halfway between Rive and Oust on the concentration scale. I play Rive quickly, carelessly, and largely thoughtlessly. There are wild swings in advantage and I keep my fingers crossed that it'll end on an upswing for me. There's a pseudo luck in Rive akin to dice rolls in Backgammon.
Oust is a very contemplative game. Players spend a lot of time on all of their moves. Oust is not forgiving of mistakes.
There are more opportunities for meaningful analysis in Cephalopod than in Rive. But not as many as in Oust.
Cephalopod has a churn rate of about 6 to 1. On the 15 square board there will be around 90 turns. On the 25 square board there will be a lot more turns (though of course Cephalopod is finite). Play is normally fairly fast, so it's not too time consuming in real time. In turn based it could take a while.
I hope you will enjoy Cephalopod.
Mark