How to play Vagabond: four in a row rules

Some of you may remember our post about future plans where we said we want to make a puzzle where a player would play against an opponent, something like a bigger and more complex version of tic-tac-toe. So we finally created this new game.

Vagabond is our new free “four in a row” board game for two players. And we would like to dedicate an article to it and explain how to play it.

Almost everyone has played some version of four in a row puzzle game. The player moves a piece or puts a new piece on the board, the opponent moves or puts a piece next and the first one to line up four wins. It is one of those games where rules take ten seconds to learn and then players keep playing it for years.

The rules

• The player never adds new pieces. Four checkers are given at the start of the game and that is all that is needed.
• The board is a 6x6 grid, each player has four checkers. White moves first.
• Tap one of your checkers, then tap a free node it can reach.
• A checker walks along the grid lines only. Never diagonally.
• It can travel as far as the open path allows, but it can never pass through another checker. A piece of any color blocks the way.
• The first player to line up all four of their checkers in a horizontal, vertical or diagonal line wins.
• All the time both players see everything that happens on the board - their own and their opponent’s moves.

What surprised most people that we showed the game to is that a checker can make as many turns as needed to get from A to B. As long as the path is not blocked it is considered as one move.

Another thing that surprised some players is that even though movement is never diagonal, a diagonal line of four is a win (same as horizontally or vertically).

Ways to play

We intended that the game would be played online. You can play against a random stranger or against a friend with a short code. For such games we added a 60-second timer for a move, which is enough time to think, so that a player wouldn’t be constantly questioning whether their opponent abandoned the game or just thinking. We also added pass and play mode to play together on one device if you have your friend sitting right next to you.

If you prefer not to play against real people, there are also three bots, each with their own character. Pip is the easiest, Marlow is smart but sometimes makes mistakes. And Sable is the one that usually beats you.

We also added a tiny element of progression to the game, to reward players that play the most. Finished games give the player “Miles”, a single score which can only go up, and the player’s rank climbs from Drifter to Vagabond as you play.

So, try playing Vagabond and let us know what you think. You can play it for free in the browser, on desktop and on mobile, with no download and no account.

Play Vagabond free →

Let us know in our Discord server how you are playing Vagabond. Against the bots, next to a friend on one device or maybe online against strangers? And should Sable get a harder brother, or is it hard enough already? For now I know only two humans that could beat him.