Line Claim

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Line Claim is a free online territory game for one player: the board itself is the prize, and you take it one cut at a time. Standing on ground you already own, nothing can touch you. Step off it and you start drawing a line — and until that line gets back to safe ground it can be cut, which costs a life and gives you nothing. Close the loop and the game fills in whichever side of it has no drifter inside, so a claim is a judgement about where the drifters are as much as about how much you can carve off. The scoring is deliberately lopsided. A claim is worth four points a cell, plus a bonus that grows with the square of its size, so eighty cells taken in one cut are worth about twice eighty cells taken in two. That is the entire risk curve: short safe nibbles along the edge will get you there eventually, long cuts across the open middle are worth several times more and are exactly where the drifters are. Two bots proved it — a cautious one that never walked more than three cells from safety cleared boards slowly and scored ten thousand; a bold one that always cut for the far side scored twenty-three thousand and was cut to pieces in nine runs out of ten. Four boards, three lives, drifters that get faster and more numerous, and a clock on each board. Fixed-step and seeded, so Replay deals the same board.

How to play Line Claim

1. Press Play. You start on the frame around the board — that frame is already yours.
2. Arrow keys or WASD move you. On ground you own, movement is free and nothing can touch you.
3. Step into the open and you start drawing a line behind you. This is the only way to gain ground, and the only time you are in danger.
4. Get the line back to any ground you own to close the loop. The line becomes yours immediately.
5. The game then fills in every enclosed region that has no drifter in it — so how much you gain depends on where they are, not only on where you drew.
6. A claim is worth four points a cell, plus a bonus that grows with the square of its size. One big cut beats two small ones of the same total area.
7. Drifters bounce around the open space. If one touches your line, the line is lost, you go back to where you left safe ground, and it costs a life.
8. They bounce off claimed ground, so every cut you make changes how they travel.
9. You cannot cross your own line — a loop that crosses itself has no inside.
10. Take 75% of a board to move on. There are four boards, each with more drifters and faster ones.
11. Each board has a clock. Running it out costs a life and gives you a fresh clock, so stalling on the frame is not a plan.

Tips

• Take the long cut when the drifters are at the far end. The square bonus means one cut of eighty cells is worth roughly twice two cuts of forty.
• Cut toward a wall, not along it. A line that reaches the opposite side encloses a whole region; a line that runs parallel to the frame encloses almost nothing.
• Watch which side of your line the drifters are on before you close it. The side with a drifter stays open, so a badly placed cut gains you the smaller half.
• Every claim changes their bounce. After a big cut, take a moment on safe ground to see where they settle rather than stepping straight back out.
• Corners are the cheapest big claims early on — two short lines across a corner can enclose a surprising amount.
• When a drifter is heading toward your line, the nearest safe ground is usually behind you, not ahead. Backing out costs nothing but the cells you drew.
• Nibbling the edge does work, and it is how you survive a bad board. It just will not pay — the safe grind scored less than half the bold one when both were measured.
• Late on a board, the open space is small and the drifters are packed into it. That is when a nibble is worth more than a cut.

FAQ