Unlur

Unlur is a two-player connection game that was invented by Jorge Gómez Arrausi in 2001 and was the winner of the 2002 Unequal Forces Game Design Competition. The game is played on a hexagonal grid of hexagons, as in the figure. The objective of the game is to create either a chain connecting three non-adjacent sides (a "Y") or a chain connecting two opposite sides (a "line").

The players, Black and White, have different objectives. Black must create a black Y, while White must create a white line. If a player achieves the opponent's objective, they lose the game. That is, if Black creates a line without at the same time creating a Y, White wins. Similarly, if White creates a Y without at the same time creating a line, Black wins. If a player creates both a line and a Y in the same move, they win.

The contract

Since a line requires fewer pieces than a Y, White has an easier objective than Black. Therefore a generalizations of the pie rule is used to balance the game. During the first phase of the game, both players play with the black pieces and take turns placing them on the board (excluding the border) or passing. If a player passes, the other player becomes Black and the player who passed becomes White. White makes the next move in the game. This first phase is referred to as the "contract phase".