Rules for the game of Cluster

1. The gameboard is comprised of 46 holes of two different depths, 20 of which are shallow (no chamfer) and 26 which are deep (with chamfer). 2. Each player has eight pieces, four short and four long. 3. The gameboard is placed lengthwise between the two players. 4. At the beginning of the game, each player places four long pieces of his color into the four shallow holes immediately in front of him. Then, each player places his four short pieces (of the same color), into the four deep holes ON THE OPPOSITE SIDE of the board, but immediately in the second row in front of his opponents four tall pieces. 5. So, the starting position has four tall pieces (white) in the first row, and four short pieces (black) in the next row and on the opposite side of the board, just the reverse, four tall pieces (black) in the first row, and four short pieces (white) in the next horizontal row. 6. The object of the game is for one player to get all eight pieces of his color into any contiguous (connecting) patten AND with all the tops of the pieces level. This means that all four tall pieces must be in deep holes and all four short pieces must be in shallow holes. There can be no intervening vacant holes or opponents pieces. The winning formation may be a chain or a cluster of pieces, but all 8 pieces of the same color must be the same height and connected to each other. 7. The movement of the pieces is as follows: a)a player may jump with any one of his eight pieces, regardless of location, any number of pieces, regardless of color, in a straight line (one direction only) landing in the first vacant hole in the direction in which he is jumping, or b) a player may move any one of his pieces one space into any adjoining vacant hole. 8. Clarification: a) a player may never jump over an empty hole (he must land in the first vacant hole in the line in which he is jumping). So, if there are four pieces of varying color and levels in a line, he may jump all four pieces, but must land in the first vacant hole. If there are no vacant holes in the line in which he wants to jump, then he may not jump in that direction. Short pieces can jump tall pieces and vice versa. 9. Clarification: A piece may jump laterally (sideways from side to side) or diagonally along any line which is at 60 degrees to the ends of the board, so there are only two kinds of directions in which a piece may jump; sideways (back and forth) AND diagonally (back and forth). A player may jump with the same piece as many times as he wishes, but each jump counts as a turn. 10. Clarification: If a piece is stranded at the end of the board with several empty spaces between another piece on the board, that piece may only move one space per turn in order to join up with the other pieces or before it can jump multiple pieces in a single jump. 11. Clarification: At the beginning of the game all 16 of the pieces (8 of each color) are in the wrong depth holes. That is all of the tall pieces are in shallow holes and all of the short pieces are in deep holes. So, for a player to win with a clustered formation, he must move each one of his eight pieces at least one time in order to get each piece in a proper depth hole so that all eight pieces of his color are connected and of the same top level. 12. Note: the difference in length between a tall piece and a short piece is the same as the difference in the depth between a shallow hole and a deep hole, so when a short piece is in a shallow hole and a tall piece is in an adjoining deep hole, the two pieces will have the same visual height on the game board.