Hex sort strategy

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• Hex Tower Sort▶Hex Tower Sort

How a hex sort board works

In Hex Tower Sort the board is a honeycomb of pale hexagon cells. Below it sits a tray with three short towers, each made of stacked hexagon tiles in one bright color such as pink or mint green.

You drag a tower from the tray onto any empty cell. With a mouse you click and drag; on a phone you drag with your finger. Once a tower is placed it stays on that cell.

When the tray is empty, a fresh set of three towers appears. The board has a fixed number of cells, so every tower you place takes up space until it merges away. A full board ends the run.

How stacks merge

Merging is the heart of hex sort. When a tower lands next to a tower with the same color on top, the matching tiles slide across and pile up into one taller stack.

In our first level of Hex Tower Sort, two pink towers placed side by side merged straight away, and the counter at the top jumped from 0 to 20 of 40. That counter is the level goal: it fills as you clear tiles, and the level is done when it is full.

Because only the top color counts, a merge can start a chain: when tiles slide off a tower, the color underneath is now on top and may match another neighbor.

Look at the whole tray before you place anything

You get three towers at a time, and you can place them in any order. Before you drag the first one, look at all three and at the board. Ask which tower can merge right now and which ones will need a new spot.

Place the towers that merge first. They clear tiles and free space, and the board you are left with may give the other towers a better home than it had a moment ago.

If none of the three can merge, think about where each one will be useful later: next to a color you expect to see again, not in a spot that blocks two other groups.

Keep the center open

A hexagon cell in the middle of the board touches six others. A corner cell touches far fewer. That makes the middle the place where merges are most likely, because a tower there has the most neighbors to match.

Try to keep a few middle cells free so you always have a spot where a new tower can meet several colors. Use edge and corner cells for towers you do not expect to merge soon.

If the middle fills with mixed colors, the board gets stuck quickly: new towers have nowhere useful to go, and each drop takes another cell.

Group colors on purpose

Put towers of the same color next to each other whenever you can, so they merge at once. When you cannot, place a tower one cell away from its color so a later tower can bridge the gap.

Avoid surrounding a tower with colors it will never match. A lone tower boxed in by other colors is a cell you have lost until the neighbors clear.

Watch the top colors more than the colors underneath. Only the top layer decides what merges next, but knowing what is underneath tells you what will be revealed after a merge.

Common mistakes

Dropping towers wherever there is space is the fastest way to fill the board. Every placement should either merge now or set up a merge later.

Filling the middle first leaves you with corners and edges, the cells with the fewest neighbors, right when you need merges the most.

Placing the first tower without checking the other two in the tray often blocks the spot the second or third tower needed.

Getting started in Hex Tower Sort

The first level, called First Bite, starts with a hand pointer and a short instruction, so you learn the idea in a few seconds. A panel on the right shows rewards that unlock at levels 3, 6, 10 and 15.

The game runs in your browser on a computer or a phone, and there is nothing to install.

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