Guide ยท ๐งฑ
How to Play Tetra Blocks: Line Clears, Tuck Techniques and Speed Survival
Written by Lin ยท Updated 2026-10-27 ยท 1 min read
Tetra Blocks is the falling-block classic: seven piece shapes drop one by one, and complete horizontal lines blast away. It speeds up every ten lines, so the midgame is a negotiation with the clock.
Steps
- 1
Keep the skyline low and even
Bumpy stacks force ugly placements and bury your options. Build valleys deliberately: the classic hole problem starts when you stack a piece over a gap you meant to fill.
- 2
I pieces are trenches
The long I piece is the only way to clear four lines at once. Leave a full-height, straight trench on one side and bank the I when it comes - do not spend it flattening bumps.
- 3
The tuck
Rotate pieces under overhangs as they fall - a T or S slipped into a one-cell ledge clears lines that look unreachable. Tucks are how you recover from a dirty stack without waiting for the perfect piece.
- 4
Last-moment rotation
The drop does not lock instantly: you can rotate and nudge a piece after it lands for a fraction of a second. Late rotation saves boards that looked lost.
- 5
Every ten lines, the price rises
The speed curve punishes perfectionism. Past mid-speed, prefer any clean line over the beautiful double: one messy clear is recoverable, one hesitation is not.
- 6
Keep one emergency well
Dig one narrow column as a garbage dump and guard it - every bad piece goes there, and the rest of the board stays functional. Stack flat, bank the I, tuck when dirty, and the speed curve becomes a rhythm.
The flat-stack law
Before the specifics, the frame that holds {t} together.
Techniques
Everything under this heading rests on the points below.
Speed survival
Here is the short version first, then each idea unpacked.
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