Grid based board games make one promise: the square you are standing on is a decision. Whether they keep it depends on a handful of design choices that are easy to describe and surprisingly easy to get wrong.
Here is what the grid is actually for, and how to tell whether a game is using it.
What a grid buys you
A grid turns spatial relationships into countable facts. Range is a number. Adjacency is binary. Line of sight either exists or does not.
That precision is the whole appeal. In a game with measured movement you argue about millimetres. On a grid you count squares, and everyone agrees. Turns go faster and rules arguments mostly disappear.
The risk is that precision becomes bookkeeping. Grid based board games fail when counting squares is all you do.
The three things that make a grid matter
Asymmetric reach. If everyone threatens the same pattern, position collapses into distance. Different attack shapes, adjacent, ranged, projectile, piercing and area, mean the same square is safe from one opponent and lethal from another.
Terrain that changes the arithmetic. High ground, walls, hazards and impassable squares each alter what the grid means locally. A short vocabulary works better than a long one, because you want players thinking about position rather than consulting a table.
Forced movement. The moment a game lets you move someone else’s piece, every square acquires a second value: how bad would it be to be pushed from here?
A worked example
Trials of MAYA, out on Gamefound September 8, 2026, is a compact illustration of all three.
What is Trials of MAYA?
Trials of MAYA is an expandable card-driven arena combat game. It combines three genres: MOBAs, classic 90s tactics games, and TCGs without booster packs. It plays 1 to 4 players in 60 to 180 minutes for ages 14 and up, with nine asymmetric champions fighting on grid arenas.
On reach, attack shapes vary by champion. Adjacent attacks hit a neighbour. Ranged attacks fire in a straight line. Projectile attacks reach at range while avoiding obstructions. Piercing attacks hit multiple enemies in a line. Area attacks hit several adjacent enemies at once. Which of these you have depends on your champion’s traits, so the same three squares mean different things depending on who is looking at them.
On terrain, the vocabulary is deliberately short: walls, spikes, high and low ground, voids. High ground adds attack damage. Walls block movement and attacks. Spikes hurt anyone moving through. Voids are impassable. Nothing exotic, and that restraint is the point. It is enough variety to make position a live question every turn without the map becoming a second rulebook.
On forced movement, Push moves an adjacent entity away in a straight line and Pull drags one toward you. Both deal collision damage when the moved unit hits an obstruction such as a wall or another entity. That is what makes standing next to a wall a real consideration rather than a cosmetic one.
Rulebooks and public metadata are on BoardGameGeek, the full breakdown is on the official page, and there is a Tabletop Simulator build.
Testing any grid game
Play a turn and ask two questions.
Did you check what was adjacent to you before acting? If not, the grid is scenery.
Could an opponent have made your position worse without attacking you? If not, you are on a map rather than in a fight.
Grid based board games that pass both are the ones where positioning is genuinely the game. Gloomhaven, Summoner Wars, Warhammer Underworlds and Guards of Atlantis II all clear it in different ways, and each is worth a look depending on whether you want a campaign, a duel, a tournament game or a team fight.
Follow or back Trials of MAYA on Gamefound.