Jumpers 2026

Jumpers is a duel between two colonies of jumping spiders on a diamond-shaped web. Real jumping spiders don't spin webs to trap prey; they stalk, leap, and pounce, and they depend on sure footing to launch. In the game, your spiders can only move by leaping over another spider, so every jump needs something to push off from. A colony that stays together can travel, grow, and strike, while a spider left alone on the web is stranded with nowhere to leap.

Each player starts with four spiders huddled in their own corner of a 6×6 diamond grid, with a reserve of spiders waiting off the board (12 for whoever moves first, 13 for whoever moves second). Spiders sit on the points and move only along the lines. Every turn is one of two things. If you can capture, you must: leap over an adjacent enemy spider onto the empty point beyond, removing it for good, and keep pouncing with that spider as long as more captures line up. If no capture is available, you hop instead: leap over one of your own spiders, chain further hops if you like, then bring a new spider in from your reserve next to where you landed. That means the colony is always either attacking or growing, and never simply waiting.

You win when your opponent starts a turn with no legal move: nothing to capture, and no way to hop and bring in a new spider. Usually that happens because their spiders have been split apart and isolated, each one alone with no friend to leap over. It can also happen when their reserve runs dry and there's no capture in sight. There are no draws; every game ends with one colony stranded.

The skill lies in balancing aggression with cohesion. Pushing forward to hunt the other colony stretches your own spiders thin, and a careless leap can leave one exposed to capture or cut off from the group. Strong players keep their spiders linked in chains that can always leap onward, spend reserve spiders where they strengthen those chains, and look for the capture that doesn't just remove an enemy but severs the last link holding their opponent's colony together.

—description from the designer

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