The rules of touch are simple, but every player needs to know them. The team that defaults to the rules under pressure beats the team that has to think about them.
Touch is non-contact. There is no tackling, grabbing, blocking, or shoulder charging. A defender stops the attack by touching the ball carrier with one hand — that is the entire physical mechanism of the game. Any contact beyond the touch is a penalty.
A team gets six touches to score. After the sixth touch possession changes and the other team begins with a rollball. A try is scored by grounding the ball on or over the try line. Every play resets through the same loop: touch, rollball, build, score or turn over.
All passes must travel backward relative to the direction of play. A pass that goes forward — even slightly — is a turnover. The receiver must be at or behind the passer at the moment the ball leaves the passer's hands. This is the rule that catches the most experienced players out the most often.
After every touch, defenders must retreat 7 meters or to the try line if they are closer than 7 meters. The first job after any touch is to get onside. A defender who stays close gives away an offside penalty and breaks the team's line. A penalty resets defenders 10 meters back instead of 7 — a meaningfully bigger advantage that changes how the next play is built.
The touched player rolls the ball backward with their foot at the mark. The first teammate to pick the ball up is the dummy half. The dummy half has two specific restrictions: they may not score directly — they have to pass the ball before crossing the try line — and if they are touched while still holding the ball, possession changes immediately. They can pass, run, and draw defenders; they just can't score themselves or be the one tagged with the ball.
One more rule that swings games: an intercept resets the touch count to zero. If a defender catches a pass cleanly, their team takes over immediately and starts a fresh set of six from where they caught it — a much bigger swing than a normal turnover, because the intercepting team is now attacking with the full count and the opposition's line is out of position. It's the single biggest reason not to force a risky long or flat pass, especially late in the count.