Conspirateurs is a two- or four-player strategy board game said to have been invented in 18th-century France. Robert Charles Bell believes the game to date from after 1789, following the French Revolutionary Wars, "a period of feverish political activity with factions conspiring against each other".
Conspirateurs resembles other games such as Halma, Ugolki, Chinese Checkers, and Salta in that pieces jump without capturing over friendly or enemy pieces, to move more quickly to their destinations.
The gameboard consists of 17×17 gridded lines. At the centre is a specially marked or coloured area made up of 5×9 intersection points representing a "secret meeting place". On the board's perimeter, 39 points are specially marked or coloured to identify sanctuaries.
The game pieces (men) are always placed on the points, using either marbles or pegs in holes, or flat-bottom pieces. In two-player games, each side has 20 men; in four-player games, each side has 10 men. The sets of men are distinctively coloured.
Play begins with an empty board. Players choose colour, with Black having the first turn. Players alternate turns. The game proceeds in two phases:
After the drop phase is completed, one of the players shouts a warning that they have been discovered, and the conspirateurs scatter to hide in sanctuaries. A sanctuary may hold at most one man. The first to bring all his men to sanctuary wins the game.
Bibliography
. Robert Charles Bell . The Boardgame Book . Conspirators . 128–29 . Exeter Books . 1983 . 0-671-06030-9.