Malefiz

Lore & Background

The name Malefiz borrows the obsolete German word meaning 'misdeed' or 'bad action', derived from the Latin maleficus, meaning 'mischievous' or 'profane'. The game requires a board, 20 pawns (5 in each of 4 player colors), 11 barricade pieces, and a 6-sided die. At the start, each player's pawns are placed in their five-space houses along the bottom, and barricade pieces are set on eleven specially marked spaces.

Reader's Guide

Gameplay involves rolling a die and moving one pawn per turn a number of steps equal to the roll. Pawns may travel in any direction and turn at corners but cannot double back or skip steps. Houses are not counted; the first counted space is immediately above the house. Pawns may pass other pawns without effect, but landing on an occupied space captures that pawn, returning it to its house. Barricades cannot be passed; they must be captured and then relocated to an unoccupied space, but not in houses or the bottom row. A pawn cannot move if it would pass a barricade or overshoot the top space. The first player to land a pawn on the uppermost space wins. The game is notable for its barricade mechanic, which adds strategic blocking and rerouting, distinguishing it from its Pachisi ancestor.

Did You Know?

• Malefiz is also known as Barricade.
• The word Malefiz is derived from the Latin maleficus, meaning 'mischievous' or 'profane'.
• The game includes 11 barricade pieces placed on specially marked spaces.
• A player may forgo a move only if none of their pawns can be moved.

Origins & Heritage

Malefiz, also known by the name Barricade, is a strategy board game that traces its lineage to the ancient Indian game Pachisi. While Pachisi traditionally employs a circular board layout, Malefiz departs from that tradition with a non-circular design, making it a distinct descendant rather than a direct copy. The game was invented by Werner Schöppner and has been published by Ravensburger since 1960, giving it a long and continuous presence on the market spanning over six decades. This longevity suggests the game has maintained appeal across generations of players. As a strategy game, it sits within a tradition of competitive board gaming that stretches back thousands of years to the Indian subcontinent, yet it carries the hallmarks of mid-twentieth-century European game design in its components and rules. The fact that it has remained in continuous publication since 1960 under the Ravensburger imprint speaks to its enduring place in the hobby.

Etymology & Naming

The title Malefiz carries a linguistic history that reaches back to classical Latin. The word is an obsolete German term meaning "misdeed" or "bad action," and it derives from the Latin maleficus, which conveys the sense of something "mischievous" or "profane." Choosing such a name for a board game is a deliberate evocation of wrongdoing and transgression, fitting for a game in which players capture one another's pieces and must navigate around obstacles. The alternative name Barricade, by contrast, points directly to the most distinctive mechanical element of the game: the eleven barricade pieces that block paths and must be captured before a pawn can proceed. Together, the two names capture the dual nature of the experience—there is a moral undertone of mischief and a physical reality of barriers that players must overcome. The etymology grounds the game in a Germanic linguistic tradition while the Latin root connects it to a much older European vocabulary of moral judgment.

Components & Setup

A complete Malefiz set comprises a single gameboard, twenty pawns divided into four colours of five each, eleven barricade pieces, and one standard six-sided die. At the start of play, each player's five pawns are arranged in their designated five-space houses, which are typically positioned along the bottom edge of the board. The eleven barricade pieces are distributed across specially marked spaces on the playing surface. This setup creates an immediate asymmetry: while pawns begin in orderly rows, the barricades introduce fixed obstacles scattered through the middle and upper regions of the board. The limited number of pawns—only five per player—means that every capture carries significant weight, since losing a piece reduces a player's mobility and options for the remainder of the game. The single die adds an element of chance to an otherwise strategic framework, as the number rolled determines exactly how far a pawn must travel. The four-colour system supports up to four simultaneous players, making the game well-suited to group settings.

Movement, Capture & Victory

On each turn, the active player rolls the die, selects one of her five pawns, and moves it a number of steps equal to the roll. A pawn may begin traveling in any direction and turn at corners, but it is forbidden from doubling back along its own path or forgoing any steps. Pawns may pass over other pawns of any colour without consequence; capture occurs only when a pawn finishes its move on a space occupied by another pawn, which is then returned to its owner's house. Barricades, however, are impassable—a pawn may not be moved if doing so would cause it to pass a barricade. When a barricade is captured, the capturing player must relocate it to an unoccupied space, though it cannot be placed in the four houses or the seventeen spaces in the bottom row. A player may forgo her turn only if none of her pawns can legally be moved. The win condition is straightforward: the first player to land a pawn in the uppermost space on the board is the winner, creating a race dynamic layered with the tactical complexity of managing obstacles and protecting one's pieces.

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