Limestone Shaft
ROOT HOLLOW
A specimen cut down through a limestone mine. Gatherers come down from the mouth of the shaft, one tier at a time, after the single sprout glowing at the bottom. Place the three seeds you roll into the pods on the four tiers and survive 10 waves.
New here? Press Descend and a short tutorial walks you through five moves.
Daily Hollow
2026 / 09 / 17
The same line-up, the same rolls for everyone. A deterministic puzzle with no luck in it. Only puzzles confirmed to be solvable are set. You may undo three times.
Result
Free Browser Tower Defense
The board is a four-tier shaft cut down through a limestone mine. One pod hangs on each tier, and every turn you decide which tier to put the three seeds (pips 1-6) falling from the mouth of the shaft into. Gatherers climb down on ropes and drop one tier per turn; when one drops from the lowest tier it reaches the sprout at the bottom and your sap falls. A bloom every three defeats lets you grow a pod, and surviving the 10 waves (12 on hard) before your sap runs out wins the game. Three difficulties, a daily puzzle with the same rolls for everyone, and a tutorial. Free, no sign-up, and it plays straight from a phone browser.
Rules, how to win and tipsGuide
Instead of buying towers, you divide the pips you rolled among four pods. In games where you save money and build wherever you like, getting stronger means more options. In Root Hollow the pods are fixed to the four tiers of the shaft, and you cannot add any. The only thing you gain is the three rolls that arrive each turn. A 6 in the thorn deals 6 damage, but in the mist it stalls on 3 or more, in the bind it hauls a gatherer up a tier on 4 or more, and in the nectar it carries the pips +2 into the next turn. The same 6 changes value with its destination, so the decision is not what to build but how to hand out the numbers you hold.
| Pips | In the thorn or spore | In the mist, bind or nectar |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Thorn: 1 damage. Spore: 1 above and below | Neither mist nor bind reaches. Put it in the nectar to make 3 |
| 2 | Thorn: 2. Finishes a digger with 2 left | An upgraded mist stalls. The nectar makes it 4 |
| 3 | Thorn: 3. Spore: 2 each above and below | Mist stalls for one turn. You can build a jam |
| 4 | Thorn: 4. Finishes a digger exactly | Mist stalls. Bind hauls it up a tier |
| 5 | Thorn: 5, but a warden halves it to 2 | Both mist and bind work. The nectar makes it 7 |
| 6 | Thorn: 6. Spore: 3 each above and below | Bind hauls it up. The nectar grows it to the cap of 8 |
Rinblog publishes a few more free browser games that use dice and reading your opponent. None of them need an account, and they all play one-handed like this one.
© Rinblog
Root Hollow is a one-player tower defense played on a four-tier shaft cut down through a limestone mine. Every turn three seeds (dice, pips 1-6) fall from the mouth of the shaft, and you hand them out to the four pods hanging on the tiers. Gatherers climb down on ropes and drop one tier per turn; when one drops from the lowest tier it reaches the sprout at the bottom and your sap falls. Defeat every gatherer in the 10 waves (12 on hard) to win; if your sap reaches 0 you lose. A game takes about 5 to 8 minutes.
There are only four. (1) The shaft runs tier 1, tier 2, tier 3, tier 4 from the top, and a tier holds at most one gatherer. If the tier below is occupied, nothing can drop into it. (2) Three seeds are rolled each turn and you place them in the pod of any tier (two in the same pod is fine). (3) End the turn and every gatherer drops one tier while the next one comes down from the mouth of the shaft. (4) When one drops from tier 4 you lose 2 sap (5 for the foreman), and at 0 you lose. Sap starts at 10 on easy, 8 on normal, 6 on hard.
There are five pods, told apart by shape, not color: a downward cone is the thorn, a rippling membrane the mist, a hexagonal sac the nectar, a square shackle the bind and a grainy sphere the spore. The letters T, M, N, B and S are also carved right above them. You start with thorn on tier 1, mist on tier 2, nectar on tier 3 and thorn on tier 4; the bind and the spore become available when you choose them at a bloom.
| Pod | Shape | Effect | Upgraded |
|---|---|---|---|
| Thorn | Cone | Pips of damage to the gatherer on its tier | pips+1 |
| Mist | Membrane | On 3 or more pips, stalls that gatherer for one turn | works from 2 |
| Nectar | Hexagon | Carries the pips +2 into the next turn (holds one, cap 8) | becomes +3 |
| Bind | Shackle | On 4 or more pips, hauls that gatherer up one tier | works from 3 |
| Spore | Grainy ball | Half the pips (rounded up) to the tiers above and below | half+1 |
The bind only works when the tier it would haul into is empty; if that tier is occupied it stalls instead. The spore never hits its own tier.
The five gatherers are told apart by height, outline, gear and the ring at their feet. The shortest is the looter, the largest is the foreman, and only the warden has a metal sheen. Health shows as a number on the stone tag above the head, and the meter around the tag shows how much is left. The letters D, W, R, L and F are carved into the bottom left of the tag.
| Gatherer | HP | Speed | Trait |
|---|---|---|---|
| Digger | 4 | 1 tier | No trait. Low and leaning forward, with a round basket on its back. |
| Warden | 6 | 1 tier | Halves odd pips. Only its plated torso shines like metal. |
| Runner | 3 | 2 tiers | Drops two tiers per turn. Slender and long-legged, with a double ring at its feet. |
| Looter | 5 | 1 tier | Seals the pod it lands on for one turn. A big sack on its back. |
| Foreman | 12 | 1 tier | +1 HP every two tiers. A wide hat and two lanterns. Arrives in waves 5 and 10. |
The only way to win is to defeat every gatherer in the 10 waves (12 on hard). You lose if your sap reaches 0, or if you pass the cap on turns (waves x 8). Your score is counted in compost, and every defeat scores (digger 3, runner 3, looter 4, warden 5, foreman 10). Finish one with damage exactly equal to its health for +2; overkill costs up to -3. Winning also adds your remaining sap times 2. So points grow not by defeating gatherers but by defeating them exactly.
Every gatherer you defeat becomes compost and piles up in the bottom left corner. There are two uses. The slab beside the vessel, Pour, costs 10 + 3 per previous pour of compost and wins back 1 sap; the slab where the thick root meets the wall, Feed, costs 14 + 6 per previous feed and adds 1 bloom. The cost rises each time, so a single game affords three or four uses in total. Your score counts all the compost you ever earned, so spending it never lowers your score. Defeat, compost, rebuild - that loop is the heart of the defense.
First, remember that a gatherer which reaches tier 4 (just above the sprout) will always drop onto the sprout next turn. Keep the pips that can finish it for tier 4. Next, finishing with damage exactly equal to its health earns +2 compost while overkill costs points, so a digger with 4 HP wants a 4. Low pips of 1 or 2 barely dent anything in the thorn, so put them in the nectar and use them as 3 or 4 next turn.
A placed seed can be taken back one move with Undo (ending a turn cannot be undone). In Today's Hollow you get three.
Show the tutorial againTutorial
Today's Hollow changes at midnight (Japan time) and gives everyone the same line-up and the same rolls. There is no luck in it, so compost (your score) can be compared. Before a puzzle is set, a solver (beam search) confirms it can be cleared, and only puzzles that careless play cannot clear are kept. Your score earns 1 to 3 stars, you may undo three times, and the result can be shared to X (the solution and the rolls are not shared). The number of days cleared in a row is recorded too.
It is a one-player tower defense played on a board cut into four tiers of a limestone shaft. Each turn you place the three seeds you rolled (pips 1-6) into the four pods hanging on the tiers, beat back the gatherers who drop one tier at a time from the mouth of the shaft, and guard the single sprout glowing at the bottom. Survive the 10 waves (12 on hard) to win; if your sap reaches 0 you lose. A game takes about 5 to 8 minutes.
Instead of saving money to buy towers, you divide the three dice you roll each turn among four pods. The positions and kinds of the pods are set from the start and you cannot add more. A 6 in the thorn deals 6 damage, but the mist stalls a gatherer on pips of 3 or more, the bind hauls one up a tier on 4 or more, and the nectar carries the pips plus 2 into your next turn. The same roll is worth different things depending on where it goes, so the decision is not where to build but how to hand out the numbers you hold.
The thorn (a downward cone) deals damage equal to the pips to the gatherer on its tier; the mist (a rippling membrane) stalls that gatherer for one turn on pips of 3 or more; the nectar (a hexagonal sac) carries the pips plus 2 into the next turn (it holds one seed). Grow a pod with a bloom and you can also choose the bind (a square shackle: on 4 or more it hauls the gatherer up one tier) and the spore (a grainy sphere: half the pips, rounded up, to the tiers above and below). Upgrading either raises the effect by 1 or lowers the pips it needs by 1.
There are two uses. The slab beside the vessel at the bottom, "Pour", costs 10 + 3 per previous pour and wins back 1 sap; the slab where the thick root meets the wall, "Feed", costs 14 + 6 per previous feed and adds 1 bloom to grow a pod. The cost rises each time, so a single game affords three or four uses in total. Your score counts all the compost you ever earned, so spending it never lowers your score.
It is the chance to grow a pod, and it comes every three gatherers you defeat. You pick one of the four pods and either switch it to another kind or upgrade it. Feeding compost to the roots also adds one. The board is never hidden: the four pods float and pulse, so you can look at the tiers while you choose.
There are five: the digger (4 HP, no trait), the warden (6 HP, halves damage from odd pips), the runner (3 HP, drops two tiers per turn), the looter (5 HP, seals the pod it lands on for one turn) and the foreman (12 HP, heals 1 HP every two tiers it drops; it arrives in waves 5 and 10). You tell them apart by height, outline, gear and the ring at their feet rather than by color, and their health shows both as a number on the tag and as a meter around it.
It is a puzzle that changes at midnight (Japan time) and gives everyone the same line-up and the same rolls. There is no luck in it, so compost (your score) can be compared. Before a puzzle is set, a solver (beam search) confirms it can be cleared, and only puzzles that careless play cannot clear are kept. Your score earns 1 to 3 stars, you may undo three times, and the result can be shared to X (the solution and the rolls are not included).
Every gatherer you defeat scores (digger 3, runner 3, looter 4, warden 5, foreman 10). Finish one with damage exactly equal to its health for +2; overkill costs you up to -3. Winning also adds your remaining sap times 2. Points grow not by defeating gatherers but by defeating them exactly.
It is completely free and for one player. There is no opponent to wait for; open it and start. No account and no app install. There are three difficulties, and first-timers get a tutorial that walks through five moves on the real board.
It runs in the browser alone. No download and no plugin, and it works one-handed in portrait on a phone, a tablet or a computer. The 3D uses WebGL, which any recent phone browser handles. Your results and daily streak are saved in the browser you use and are not shared with your other devices.
No. Even when no seed can be placed, "End turn" always moves things on. The same gatherer can be stalled only once per tier, and there is a cap on turns (waves x 8), so every game reaches an end.