Honor System

Leverage

Milton Bradley, 1983
For 2 Players

The gameboard is balanced on a fulcrum base. At the start of the game, the playing pieces are positioned on the board so that their weight is evenly distributed and the board is perfectly level.

As the game progresses and the pieces are moved, the balance will shift. Each player tries to move, jump and capture pieces in such a way as to tilt the balance down on his or her opponent’s side. If you’re a successful gameboard-tipper, you’ll most likely be a big Leverage winner. For each time there is an upset in the balance and the board is tipped, the player who was “tilted down” must remove specially weighted scoring pegs from the playing field. And whoever is forced to remove all of their scoring pegs first, loses the game!

Leverage is a two-handed strategy game with a decided new slant... for in this game, not only is the placement of pieces important, the weight of such pieces is also crucial.

Which piece will tip the balance? When will the gameboard shift? You’ll find out when you play Leverage, the strategy game that loves to catch you off balance!

OBJECT

Strategically move your playing pieces to tilt the gameboard down on your opponent’s side.

CONTENTS:

• 1 plastic gameboard
• 1 plastic fulcrum base
• 30 plastic playing pieces
• 18 plastic scoring pegs
• 2 plastic balance clips
• 1 label sheet
• 1 instruction booklet

HOW TO SET UP THE GAME:

1. LABEL APPLICATION: peel off the two name labels from the label sheet and apply them to the fulcrum base, one on either side, as shown in Figure 1.

2. Place the fulcrum base on a level playing surface. Sit the gameboard on the base, as shown in Figure 2, making sure that the tabs of the board fit into the grooves of the base as shown in Figure 2A. IMPORTANT: be sure that the gameboard and the base are positioned on a flat surface, for a sense of balance is crucial to game play!

3. PREPARATION AND SET-UP OF PLAYING PIECES AND SCORING PEGS: Break off the 30 blue and orange playing pieces and the 18 grey-scoring pegs from their runners. Make sure no plastic remnants are on the pieces or the pegs. You and your opponent each select a color — either the blue or orange pieces. Then you and your opponent each position your 15 playing pieces into the 15 white circled holes on your chosen side of the gameboard, as shown in Figure 3. These 15 white circled holed areas are called SAFETY ZONES. Note that your team of 15 playing pieces is made up of three different size pieces: 3 large pieces; 5 medium pieces; and 7 small pieces. Each is shown below, in Figure 3. Also, you and your opponent each must position 9 scoring pegs at the end row of your side of the gameboard, as seen in Figure 3.

4. TO ADJUST THE BALANCE: after all the playing pieces and scoring pegs are positioned, hold one end of the gameboard down so it rests on the playing sur­face, release it and watch the board rock. If it rocks evenly, the balance is level; if one end appears heavier than the other and the board rocks unevenly, then you must attach two balance clips to the board to level it out.

Here's how to attach the balance clips:
A. First, break off the two clips from the runner. Make sure that no plastic remnants remain on the clips. See Figure 4 for a look at a ready-to-attach clip.

B. Clamp on the clips to the "up" end (the lighter end) on opposite sides, as seen in Figure 5. To level out the board, move the clips away from the base until the balance is restored. PLEASE NOTE: to move the clips, do not unclamp them. Rather, just slide them together along the edge of the board, moving them forwards or backwards... in whichever direction that will level out the board.

HOW TO PLAY THE GAME:

1. Decide who plays first. Players alternate turns, always making one move each turn.

2. WHERE TO MOVE: basically, you try to move your pieces out of your Safety Zone towards your opponent’s Safety Zone. Your opponent tries to do the same, moving his or her pieces towards you and your Safety Zone. Your prime objective, however, on all plays is to upset the balance and tip the gameboard down on your opponent’s side.

3. BASIC MOVEMENT RULES:
A. You are allowed to move only your own color playing pieces.

B. You are allowed to move only one of your playing pieces each turn.

C. Your pieces can move in any direction: vertically, horizontally or diag­onally.

D. Your pieces can only move to vacant spaces, that is, empty holes.

E. You may either make simple, single moves, that is, move one of your pieces to an adjacent empty space. Or you may make a multiple move, that is, move one of your pieces more than one adjacent space by jumping over other pieces (yours and your opponent’s, too). See “Jumping” in Rule 4, below, for more information.

F. When making a multiple move, it is possible to capture an enemy piece or pieces by jumping over it or them. See “Capturing” in Rule 5, for more information.

G. You may move your playing pieces in and out of either Safety Zone.

H. You may never move your playing pieces into the end rows where the scoring pegs are positioned.

See the Playing Piece Chart, for a quick look at playing piece movement.

4. JUMPING: jumping is the only way you may move your piece more than one space in a turn. Here are some rules about jumping...

A. You may jump in any direction: vertically, horizontally or diagonally.

B. You may only jump to a vacant space.

C. You may jump over your own pieces and enemy pieces, too. If you jump over a “capturable enemy piece, you must remove it from the board. See “Capturing” in Rule 5, for more information.

D. You may jump into, out of, and around in either Safety Zone.

E. AND MOST IMPORTANT: any piece may jump any other piece, that is, any size piece can jump or be jumped by any other size piece.

F. In mulitple jumping, your piece can move in all 3 directions in the same jump. Take a look at a legal multiple jump in Figure 6. More details here.

In Figure 6, Player B has made an interesting multiple jump moving in and out of his or her own Safety Zone, advancing into enemy territory and finally landing in Player A’s Safety Zone. Player B jumps diagonally, vertical and horizontally 7 times to do so! IMPORTANT: notice, any size piece can jump any piece of its own color and any piece of the opposing color.

G. Jumping is always optional, that is, on your turn you may decide to make a single move to an empty adjacent space rather than making a multiple move by jumping.

For a quick look at what pieces are capturable, see the Playing Piece Chart.

H. In multiple jumps you may make "circular" jumps, that is, you may doubleback and rejump the same piece again in the same move. The "jumped-twice" piece, however, cannot be a capturable piece. See Rule 5 Sections A and B for details on capturable pieces.

5. CAPTURING: capturing is the way to remove enemy pieces from the board to upset the balance and to possibly tilt down the gameboard. Here are some rules about capturing...

A. You can only capture by jumping. And you can only capture if you jump certain size pieces. Here’s what’s capturable and non-capturable...

SMALL PIECES CANNOT BE CAPTURED BUT CAN CAPTURE MEDIUM AND LARGE PIECES

LARGE PIECES CANNOT CAPTURE ANY PIECES

MEDIUM PIECES CAN CAPTURE MEDIUM PIECES AND LARGE PIECES

For a quick look at what pieces are capturable, see the Playing Piece Chart.

B. When you jump over a capturable piece, immediately remove the “jumped-over" piece from the board. Do not wait until the end of your move to remove the piece.

C. You can never capture in a Safety Zone...yours or your opponent's.

6. Here is a Playing Piece Chart which quickly summarizes piece movement, jumping and capturing...

7. TILTING DOWN THE BOARD: continued playing piece movement will up­set the balance and the board will tilt down. Here’s how to react when this hap­pens...

If the board tilts down on your side, first try to level it out by lifting it up with your hand. If the board drops down again on your side after attempting to balance it, you are considered penalized and must remove ONE scoring peg from your end row to regain the balance. Remove one peg and try to level out the board with your hand. If it balances, then you do not have to remove another peg; if it does not balance, remove another scoring peg. Notice, you always have one chance to level out the board with your hand before remov­ing a scoring peg! IMPORTANT: it doesn’t matter who made the move that upset the balance. What does matter is who is penalized by the loss of balance... and the player that is always penalized is the player whose gameboard side tilts down!

8. THE NO-TESTING RULE: on your turn, if you move a piece to a vacant space and take your hand off such a piece, the move is considered complete. You cannot test pieces and move them to spaces just to see if such a weight change could affect the balance.

9. Play as outlined above until either of the following two situations occur: Either when a player has no more scoring pegs left in his or her end row and the gameboard tilts down on his or her side.

Or when a player moves all of his or her remaining pieces into the opposing Safety Zone.

HOW TO WIN THE GAME:

If you tilt down the gameboard on your opponent’s side and your opponent has no scoring pegs left to remove from his or her end row, then you win the game! You can also win, if you move all of your remaining playing pieces on the board into your opponent’s Safety Zone while having more scoring pegs in your end row than your opponent.

SOME STRATEGIES:

Your objective is to tip the balance down on your opponent’s side. There are two basic ways to do this. Either avoid capture as best as possible keeping your own force intact and “weighty" as you move into enemy territory. Or sacrifice your capturable pieces quickly so you can move into enemy territory with a small, swift force to trap your opponent’s heavyweight pieces there. In both strategies, the weight should be concentrated on your opponent’s side so the gameboard will tilt toward him or her.

© 1983 by Milton Bradley Co. under Borne & Universal Copyright Conventions. Made In U.S.A