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Xiangqi

Chinese Chess

Xiangqi, or Chinese Chess, is an extremely popular game in the Eastern Hemisphere. It is currently played by millions (or tens of millions) in China, Taiwan, Thailand, Singapore, Vietnam, Hong Kong and other Asian countries. Xiangqi has remained in its present form for centuries. It is believed that both Xiangqi and Orthodox Chess derive from the original Indian game of Chanturanga.

(xiáng) (qí ) translates to Elephant Game. In Mandarin it is written as either Xiangqi, Xiang Qi or Hsiang-Ch`i and pronounced "Shiang-Chi". In Cantonese it is written as Jeuhng Keih and pronounced "Junk Kay".

The name Xiangqi has an interesting origin. Of China's four traditional arts -- qin (music), hua (brush painting), shu (calligraphy) and qí (strategy games) -- the latter term, qi, provides the final syllable of Xiangqi. There is much literature on Xiangqi, most of it in Chinese. There are, however, a few books available in English and other languages.

Xiangqi sets can be procured from a number of sources. The most obvious of these are shops in the Chinese districts of large cities. Often, such sets are quite cheap, consisting of a paper board and flat wooden counters inscribed with red and black pictograms. These traditional Chinese symbols may appear strange to the western eye, but can easily be recognized with a minimum of practice. (For more sophisticated sets, see below.)

• Shop for Xiangqi related products
• Xiangqi Variants

Rules

The board

The above board shows various L-shaped markings in order to distinguish the setup points of Pawns and Cannons. These markings are not present on all commercial boards.

Pieces

Each player has the following pieces:

The Xiangqi array is shown below:

Chinese Pieces	Movement	Westernized Pieces
	Rooks The Rook moves as an orthodox Rook. (See Rook for more information.)
	Knights (Mao) The Knight moves one point orthogonally followed by one point outward-diagonally. It may not leap over occupied points. (See Mao for more information.)
	Elephants The Elephant moves exactly two points diagonally. It may not leap over occupied points. Also, Elephants are confined to their home side of the river. Due to these limitations, the Elephant can see only seven points of the board. (See Elephant for more information.) [The symbols on red and black Elephants differ, but their moves are the same.]
	Mandarins The Mandarin (or Guard) moves one point diagonally. It may never leave the palace. [The symbols on red and black Mandrians differ, but their moves are the same.]
	King or General The King moves as an orthodox King, but cannot move diagonally. It may never leave the palace. (See King for more information.) [The symbols on red and black Kings differ, but their moves are the same.] The two Kings cannot face each other on an open file. For example, a red King on e1 and a black King on e9, with no piece on the e-file between them, is an illegal position. If either King sits exposed on an open file, the other King may not move to occupy that file.
	Cannons (Pao) The Cannon moves differently when it moves to capture than when it moves passively. The Cannon moves passively as an orthodox Rook The Cannon moves to capture as an orthodox Rook which is required to hop over a single screen. In other words, Cannons capture by hoping over a second piece in order to capture a third piece. For example, a Cannon on a1 can take a piece on f1 when exactly one of the points b1, c1, d1, or e1 is occupied by a piece of either color. Cannons only capture when hoping and only hop when capturing. They may never hop over more than one piece in a given move. (See Cannon for more information.)
	Pawns Unlike orthodox Pawns, the Xiangqi Pawn's passive move and capture move are always the same. A starting Pawn moves one point straight-forward. A Pawn crossing the river promotes, keeping its old move and gaining a new move -- a one-point step to either horizontal. Pawns do not promote on the last rank, where they can move only left or right. (See Xiangqi Pawn for more information.) [The symbols on red and black Pawns differ, but their moves are the same.]

Other rules

1. Red moves first.
2. The game is won by checkmating or stalemating the opponent King.
3. Perpetual check is forbidden. You cannot check your opponent more than three times in a row with the same piece and same board positions.
4. You cannot force an enemy piece to move to and from the same two points, indefinitely, in order to avoid capture. If you move a Rook to e5, threatening a Cannon on e6, and your opponent's only viable move is Cannon to f6, then you cannot force that Cannon to and from e6 and f6 by moving your Rook to and from e5 and f5, indefinitely. The purpose of this rule (and the above rule) is to avoid perpetual-check draws. Some of these situations are complicated, but the person who is forcing the perpetual move must usually break it off.
5. The game is a draw when neither side can force a checkmate or a stalemate.

Shop

More products are also available at:

Yutopian's Page for Chinese Chess. Page devoted to information on, and products for Chinese Chess. (Link.)

Variants on Chinese Chess

• Banchi. Link to site where you can play Banchi, a Xiangqi variant against a Java program.
• The game of three friends. A variant of Xiangqi for three players.
• The game of three kingdoms. Another variant of Xiangqi for three players.
• The game of three kingdoms. Photo's of a three-player Xiangqi variant.
• Who crosses the river first?. A variant of Xiangqi.
• 5 Tigers. A Xiangqi variant with unequal armies.
• Information on Chinese Chess playing cards.
• A different game, played with Xiangqi pieces.
• Chinese Chess variant for 7 players.
• Lucky Xiangqi.
• Yitong.

• Written by Hans Bodlaender.
• Certain parts of the text were taken from Steven Leary's FAQ for Chinese Chess.
• Thanks also to Ivan A Derzhanski for corrections to the linguistic information on the word Xiangqi.
• Thanks to John William Brown for editing this page in response to Xiangqi being selected as Recognized Variant of the Month
• Thanks to Robert Price for pointing out an error in the King's movement description

The above was authored by: Hans L. Bodlaender. .
The above was edited/posted by: John William Brown
Created on: July 01, 1996. Last modified on: November 01, 2001.

See also:

Comments

Date	Name	Rating	Comment
2005-10-28	andy thomas	None	i really like the cannons in xiangqi... and the fact that the game itself develops more quickly than 'fide' ... also that once the pieces become a bit unbalanced, the 'losing' side still seems to be able to mount an attack... in other words, material superiority is not as important as in 'fide'... one thing i really miss in chinese chess... there are no powerful bishops... but interestingly, the elephant can 'ambush' you because you forgot about it!... i don't know how many pieces i've lost to the otherwise 'weak' elephants... all because i forget, and the elephant does not forget!... i actually prefer xiangqi to 'fide'... i'm probably 'lower intermediate' level in both games... but they sure are fun!... anyway... getting back to the cannon... it is a very interesting piece... probably the single most interesting piece in either fide or xiangqi... when you cross over from fide to xiangqi... the cannon takes the most getting used to... at least that was my experience... finally, another site where you can play xiangqi is 'www.itsyourturn.com'... they have turn-based like brainking... i have seen some clubxiangqi players at iyt too...
2005-10-21	laurent	Excellent	PLAY BY EMAIL SERVERS : brainking.com recently included xiangqi!
2005-10-14	mandarin123.com	Excellent	Rules are well explained. Just wonder if there's forum dedicated to xiangqi discussion?
2005-10-11	Jay Haydon	Good	Hello! we are a supplier and manufacturer of playing equipment for the board game Go, recently we have also started offering Xiang Qi Sets in our online shop: www.gofigure.de/en/xiang_qi.shtml Would it be possible to add a link to Go-Figure! in your link list? Best regards, Jay Haydon Go-Figure! / Firma Prpic Ungererstrasse 124 80805 Munich Germany Tel: ++49 (89) 890-911-698 Fax: ++49 (89) 420-955-479 mail@gofigure.de www.gofigure.de/en
2005-10-10	Christine Bagley-Jones	None	try out shogi (japanese chess) and you will find another game better than 'classical' chess he he

This item has a total of 95 comment(s), 74 rating(s), and an average rating of Good. View all comments for this item.

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Last modified: Thursday, August 18, 2005