European Hive Convention and Open 2026
The EHC is a two-day event for Hive enthusiasts with engaging seminars and a competitive International tournament.
It is also open to those who want to learn Hive from zero!
The main event will be an Open tournament on Saturday 5th September 2026 (all day), followed by talks and free play on Sunday 6th, in the morning.
Read the blog article about the 2024 edition to see what to expect (it was great!).
5-6 September 2026
You're free to join either or both days.
Rome (Italy)
Price 23€ (includes Saturday lunch)
Reduced fee for Juniors.
Spectators and newcomers can learn free of charge!
Ticket & Registration
You are free to participate on either of the two or both days. All you have to do is to fill out the registration form. To participate in the tournament you will need to also buy the entry ticket.
- To play in the Open tournament on Saturday the entry fee is 23€, Junior ticket (under 18) is 15€ (includes lunch meal).
- The Convention on Sunday is free to anyone who wants to attend.
- Visitors are welcome to come at any time, watch the matches and learn how to play!
Prizes & Exclusive Gadgets
- The top 3 players of the Open and the top Junior will receive: board games and gadgets offered by Gen42 and Ghenos Games, and honey-based items offered by Ambrosoli.
- The winner of the Open will also receive a prestigious trophy!
- Every participant of the Open will receive: tote bag of the event, Hive badges, Ambrosoli honey-based energy drink and lunch at the venue!
The most important matches will be live streamed on the Gen42 YT channel!
Organisers
Gen42
London-based board game company founded by John Yianni, known for creating strategic games like Hive, Tatsu, and Army of Frogs, and other award winning games.
Ghenos Games
Ghenos is the Italian retailer specializing in board games, logical puzzles, and creative leisure products, offering a wide range of items through their online store and physical locations.
La Civetta Ludopub
La Civetta hosts a fantastic space in the heart of Rome where you can play over 6,000 board games and enjoy great food while having fun.
Partners
Ambrosoli
Ambrosoli brings the quality of nature to the world of strategy games, supporting the European Hive Convention 2026 with the passion and tradition of a brand that has made history.
Gaming association 'Il Gufo'
The association 'Il Gufo' is an official Italian Risk! club and organises board game events in all Rome since 2008!
Trottola Urbana
Trottola Urbana is an Italian social enterprise working in the field of play culture. It runs a permanent venue in Milan and regularly brings real, face-to-face play into public spaces, treating play as a cultural practice with value in itself.
Schedule
Friday 4th September
(optional) friendly dinner for those who want to meet already the rest of the community! Time and place will be decided later on.
Saturday 5th September: Open Tournament
Number of rounds and exact times can change depending on the number of participants.
- Opening: 9:30
- Rounds 1–2: 10:00–13:00
- Lunch break: 13:00–14:30
- Rounds 3–5: 14:30–19:30
- Dinner: 20:00
Sunday 6th September: Convention
- Talks: 10:00–11:30
- Free play, chat and coaching: 11:30–13:30
- Final remarks, Closure and lunch: from 14:00
Changes to the schedule could be made to improve the quality of the event. The final schedule will be updated here and emailed to the participants a few days before the Convention starts.
Talks - Sunday 10.00 am
Nobody Learns Hive Alone
Rouben Vitali, Elisa Palladino (Trottola Urbana)
Let's be honest: you didn't fully get Hive on your own. Someone sat down across from you and challenged you. That gesture is already social infrastructure — nobody just calls it that.
At Trottola Urbana we put real play into motion: real people, sitting face to face. And the game stays the point, never the pretext. Over three years we've played in squares, libraries and courtyards, and since June we also have our own venue for play culture in Milan. What we've learned is that play works socially precisely when we let it stay play — free, honest about its rules, with no hidden homework dressed up as fun.
We'll tell you what really happens at a table between strangers, what a social enterprise can do to make that table possible, and why the work this community is already doing, without any label on it, deserves to be recognised for what it is.
Saving the queen is hard: Hive is EXPTIME-complete
Daniele Muscillo, Francesco Carboni (University of Rome La Sapienza)
Chess, Go and Checkers are not just difficult for people. Once generalized to boards of arbitrary size, they become mathematically difficult even for supercomputers: deciding which player has a winning strategy is EXPTIME-complete, meaning that no algorithm can do substantially better than trying every possible sequence of moves, which requires exponential time. That result is what places these games among the hardest natural problems we know.
This workshop investigates where Hive sits in that landscape. We consider the generalized game, in which each player has an arbitrarily large supply of pieces but still a single Queen, and we study the complexity of deciding whether a player has a winning strategy from a given position. The result we present is that Hive joins the same hardness club as Chess and Go: EXPTIME-completeness.
We will explain what such a statement actually means, and how one proves a result of this kind — by showing that Hive games starting from suitably crafted configurations can faithfully simulate other games already known to be that hard.
How to convince your friends to play your favourite games
Karolina Salerno Černa (Gen42)
Improving Nokamute’s Evaluation and Search Using Genetic Algorithms
Jonathan Davies
How to reach the venue
The venue is "La Civetta LudoPub" where people meetup every day to play and enjoy great food! It is located in the heart of Rome, not too far from the Colosseum!
The venue can be easily reached in less than 10 min walk from two Metro Stations: San Giovanni (Line A and C) and Re di Roma (Line A). Line C has been opened recently and some stations look like open-air museums!
How to reach Rome
Rome has two main airports: Fiumicino and Ciampino. They are both located less than 1 hour from the city centre:
- Fiumicino is connected via train to Termini Train Station.
- Ciampino is connected either via train (Ciampino Airlink) to Termini Train Station or bus 520 + Metro line A to the venue.
Termini Train Station is at less than 20 min from the venue via Metro (line A).
What to Visit
Rome has endless historical sites and monuments! Suffice to say that the venue is 25 min walk from the Colosseum!
Where to stay
Several hotels are available in the area, without considering many other Airbnb and hostel options, these are just some: Domus Appia 154, Caravel Hotel, Scout Centre.
Where to eat
Lunch on both Saturday and Sunday will be at the Convention Venue. For the other meals, we will organise dinners together if you want to join, or you can find several restaurants and bistrot accessible at walking distance: Trattoria da Danilo, I Vitelloni, many bakeries and places where to have 'pizza al taglio'!
Participants registered so far
1. Gabriele Dallu (Italy)
2. Federico Roselli (Italy)
3. Francesco Salerno (Italy)
4. Daniel Gamberini (Italy)
5. Paul Bruckert (Germany)
6. Pedro Antonio Álvarez Ruiz-Dorizzi (Spain)
7. Isabel Ruiz (Canada)
8. Marietta Kovacs (Hungary)
9. David Toth (USA)
10. Leonardo Caviola (Italy)
11. Jonathan Davies (UK)
12. Mattia Gioele Acri (Italy)
13. Marco Sperindei (italy)
14. Robert Užar (Croatia)
15. Joel Morales (Mexico)
16. Joaquín Ruiz (Spain)
17. Jan Bąk (Poland)