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Custodian Dice is an abstract strategy game played on a 5 × 5 grid. Players capture opposing dice by surrounding them on multiple sides.

Objective

Capture enough of your opponent’s pieces so they are no longer able to capture any of yours.

Components

• 1 5 × 5 game board
• 10 regular dice
  • 5 dice in one colour
  • 5 dice in another colour

Setup

1. Each player takes five dice of their own colour and rolls them.
2. Each player places their five dice in a starting line on the row of the board closest to them.

Gameplay

A player’s turn consists of four steps:

1. Select
2. Move or Jump
3. Rotate or Flip
4. Capture

Select

Choose one of your available dice.

Move or Jump

Move the selected die exactly as many spaces as shown on its top face.

When moving, you may not:

• Move diagonally
• Move over other pieces
• Move back onto a space you just left

You may change direction during movement, as long as the full movement total is completed and all movement is orthogonal.

Jumping

Instead of moving normally, if your die is adjacent to any other die and there is an empty space directly behind that die, you may jump over it.

You cannot both move and jump on the same turn. You must choose one or the other.

Rotate or Flip

After moving or jumping, the selected die must change faces.

If the die moved

Rotate the selected die 90° to one of its adjacent faces.

The die may not be rotated to its opposite face.

For example, if the die shows 1, it may be rotated to 2, 3, 4, or 5, but not 6.

If the die jumped

Flip the selected die to its opposite face.

Opposite faces are:

• 1 ↔ 6
• 2 ↔ 5
• 3 ↔ 4

Capture

After movement and rotation or flipping, check for captures.

Pieces are captured by Custodial Capture. To capture an opposing die, it must be sandwiched between two of your dice in a straight orthogonal line.

A piece is only captured when the active player creates the sandwiching position. Moving your own die into a position where it is sandwiched does not cause it to be captured.

Multiple simultaneous captures are possible from a single move, including multi-layered sandwich captures.

End of the Game

The game ends as soon as one player has fewer than two dice remaining.

That player loses.

Variants

No Jumping Variant

For a more restrictive game, remove jumping from the available movement options.

This makes movement more cramped and makes it harder to escape certain positions, while also reducing the mental overhead of considering jump moves.

Chaos Reigns Supreme

Instead of rotating or flipping a die after moving or jumping, roll the die.

Whichever face it lands on becomes its new face until it moves again.