The goal
Two armies of forty pieces start hidden from each other on a 10x10 board. You win by capturing the enemy flag. A second win condition exists: if your opponent has no piece left that can move - only bombs and the flag - the game ends in your favour too.
The board
The board is ten squares by ten. Two lakes, each four squares, sit in the middle rows and nothing can enter them. Each player deploys on the four rows nearest to them, one piece per square, so all forty pieces are used in every game.
How pieces move
- A normal piece moves one square up, down, left or right. Never diagonally, never over another piece, never into a lake.
- The Scout may move any number of empty squares in a straight line in one turn.
- Bombs and the flag never move at all.
- You may not move onto your own piece, and you may not stay still: every turn is one move.
How fights are resolved
Move onto an enemy piece and the ranks are compared. Higher rank wins and stays on the square. Lower rank is removed. Equal ranks are both removed. The winner never changes square, so a piece that has just won a fight is standing where the loser was.
All twelve ranks
- 10 Marshal - 1 per side. Beaten only by a bomb or a Spy that attacks it.
- 9 General - 1 per side.
- 8 Colonel - 2 per side.
- 7 Major - 3 per side.
- 6 Captain - 4 per side.
- 5 Lieutenant - 4 per side.
- 4 Sergeant - 4 per side.
- 3 Miner - 5 per side, the only piece that removes a bomb.
- 2 Scout - 8 per side, the only piece that moves more than one square.
- Spy - 1 per side. Captures the Marshal when it attacks; dies to everything else.
- Bomb - 6 per side. Cannot move. Destroys any attacker except a Miner.
- Flag - 1 per side. Cannot move. Captured flag ends the game.
Setup rules
All forty pieces go on your own four rows. There is no rule about where the flag must sit, which is why corner-flag-with-three-bombs became the default. The only legal restriction is the deployment area itself.
The three special rules people get wrong
- The Spy is one-directional. Spy attacking a Marshal captures it. Marshal attacking a Spy removes the Spy.
- Only Miners defuse bombs. A Marshal attacking a bomb is removed like any other piece.
- Scouts move far but fight badly. A Scout is rank 2, so it loses to almost everything it attacks; its job is to reveal, not to capture.
How to play Stratego online here
The home page board is you against the computer. The two-player board is the shared-screen version for two people on one device. Both are free, both run in the browser without a download.
A first-game checklist
- Flag in a back corner, bombs around it, Miners within two squares.
- Scouts in the front row to probe early.
- One Marshal and one General kept back until the enemy Miners are gone.
- Do not attack unknown squares with expensive pieces in the first ten moves.
- Count the opponent's Miners: once they are gone, your bombs cannot be cleared.