Playable Pieces

Roads, settlements, cities, the robber, and land/resource tiles are the parts players physically handle. They carry no processor, battery, or software.

Roads, buildings, and land tiles use resistor identification. The robber uses presence detection because there is only one robber. Pieces own the passive electrical signature and mechanical fit; Smart Hex firmware owns interpreting it. Neither the resistor nor the contact establishes whether a placement is legal.

The pieces depend on stable board contacts, a shared resistor registry, and calibration that accounts for contact variation. The hardware page explains the interface and unresolved mechanics. There is no software page because no software runs inside the pieces.