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74-766: The World Xiangqi Federation is the association of the national Xiangqi federations around the world, and has been a member of the International Mind Sports Association since 2015. On April 6, 1993 on the occasion of the 3rd World Xiangqi Championship in Beijing, China, the World Xiangqi Federation was founded. This China -related article is a stub . You can help Misplaced Pages by expanding it . Xiangqi Xiangqi ( / ˈ ʃ ɑː ŋ tʃ i / ; Chinese : 象棋 ; pinyin : xiàngqí ), commonly known as Chinese chess or elephant chess ,

148-539: A Chinese character identifying the piece type, and in a colour indicating which player has ownership. The black pieces are marked with somewhat different characters from the corresponding red pieces. On mainland China , most sets still use traditional Chinese characters (as opposed to simplified Chinese characters ). Modern pieces are usually plastic, though some sets are wooden, and more expensive sets may use jade . In more ancient times, many sets were simple unpainted woodcarvings; thus, to distinguish between pieces of

222-426: A 1925 game between Savielly Tartakower and Richard Réti . The same position, except shifted to the e- file , occurred in a 2009 game between Gata Kamsky and Vladimir Kramnik . The position in diagram 3 is an example of a pawn drawing against a queen . Stalemates of this sort can often save a player from losing an apparently hopeless position (see Queen versus pawn endgame ). The position in diagram 5

296-410: A battle between two armies, with the primary object being to checkmate the enemy's general (king). Distinctive features of xiangqi include the cannon ( pao ), which must jump to capture; a rule prohibiting the generals from facing each other directly; areas on the board called the river and palace , which restrict the movement of some pieces but enhance that of others; and the placement of the pieces on

370-430: A decisive material advantage, but Black could find no way to make progress because of various stalemate resources available to White. The game continued: Avoiding the threatened 73...Nc2+. 76...Nc2+ 77.Rxc2+! Kxc2 is stalemate. 77...Kxc3 is stalemate. 79...Rd3 80.Rxd3+! leaves Black with either insufficient material to win after 80...Nxd3 81.Kxa2 or a standard fortress in a corner draw after 80...Kxd3. Now

444-452: A double stalemate position was discovered by Enzo Minerva and published in the Italian newspaper l'Unità on 14 August 2007: 1.c4 d5 2.Qb3 Bh3 3.gxh3 f5 4.Qxb7 Kf7 5.Qxa7 Kg6 6.f3 c5 7.Qxe7 Rxa2 8.Kf2 Rxb2 9.Qxg7+ Kh5 10.Qxg8 Rxb1 11.Rxb1 Kh4 12.Qxh8 h5 13.Qh6 Bxh6 14.Rxb8 Be3+ 15.dxe3 Qxb8 16.Kg2 Qf4 17.exf4 d4 18.Be3 dxe3. The stalemate rule has had a convoluted history. Although stalemate

518-534: A draw is totally illogical, since it represents the ultimate zugzwang , where any move would get your king taken". The British master T. H. Tylor argued in a 1940 article in the British Chess Magazine that the present rule, treating stalemate as a draw, "is without historical foundation and irrational, and primarily responsible for a vast percentage of draws, and hence should be abolished". Years later, Fred Reinfeld wrote, "When Tylor wrote his attack on

592-463: A drawn endgame. Not 5.Rxb2+? Bxb2 6.Nc4+ Kb5 7.Nxb2 Bh5! trapping White's knight. 4. Rxd6+! Kxd6 5. Nxc4+! Nxc4 6. Rxb6+ Nxb6+ Moving the king is actually a better try, but the resulting endgame of two knights and a bishop against a rook is a well-established theoretical draw. 7. Kd8! (rightmost diagram) Black is three pieces ahead, but if White is allowed to take the bishop, the two knights are insufficient to force checkmate . The only way to save

666-688: A horse is called " hobbling the horse's leg" (蹩馬腿). The diagram on the right illustrates the horse's movement. Since horses can be blocked, it is possible for one player's horse to have an asymmetric attack advantage if an opponent's horse is blocked, as seen in the diagram on the right. The horse is sometimes called the "knight" by English-speaking players, due to their similar movements. Chariots (or rooks or cars ) are labelled 車 jū for Black and 俥 jū for Red in sets marked with Traditional Chinese characters and 车 for both Black and Red in sets marked with Simplified Chinese characters . Some traditional sets use 車 for both colours. In

740-466: A player to check or chase six consecutive times using one piece, twelve times using two pieces, and eighteen times using three pieces before considering the action perpetual. The above rules to prevent perpetual checking and chasing, while popular, are not the only ones; there are numerous end game situations. Each player controls an army of 16 pieces; the armies are usually coloured red and black. Pieces are flat circular disks labelled or engraved with

814-403: A stalemate was a drawn game. Throughout history, a stalemate has at various times been: Periodically, writers have argued that stalemate should again be made a win for the side causing the stalemate, on the grounds that the goal of chess is conceptually to capture the king and checkmate merely ends it when this is inevitable. Grandmaster Larry Kaufman writes, "In my view, calling stalemate

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888-415: A stalemate was standardized as a draw in the 19th century ( see § History of the stalemate rule , below ). Before this standardization, its treatment varied widely, including being deemed a win for the stalemating player, a half-win for that player, or a loss for that player; not being permitted; and resulting in the stalemated player missing a turn. Stalemate rules vary in variants and other games of

962-630: A strong-looking move that threatens 68.Qxf6, winning a third pawn, or 68.Rc7, further constricting Black. Black responded 67... Qc1 ! If White takes Black's undefended rook with 68.Qxd8, Black's desperado queen forces the draw with 68...Qh1+ 69.Kg3 Qh2+!, compelling 70.Kxh2 stalemate (second diagram). If White avoids the stalemate with 68.Rxg7+ Kxg7 69.Qxd8, Black draws by perpetual check with 69...Qh1+ 70.Kg3 Qg1+ 71.Kf4 Qc1+! 72.Ke4 Qc6+! 73.Kd3 !? (73.d5 Qc4+; 73.Qd5 Qc2+) Qxf3+! 74.Kd2 Qg2+! 75.Kc3 Qc6+ 76.Kb4 Qb5+ 77.Ka3 Qd3+. Gelfand played 68. d5 instead but still only drew. In Troitsky – Vogt , 1896,

1036-498: A theoretical draw for many moves. White's bishop is useless; it cannot defend the queening square at a8 nor attack the black pawn on the light a4-square. If the white king heads towards the black pawn, the black king can move towards a8 and set up a fortress . The players were not on speaking terms, however, so neither would offer a draw by agreement . On his 124th move, White played 124.Bg7, delivering stalemate. Korchnoi said that it gave him pleasure to stalemate Karpov and that it

1110-485: A widely used metaphor for other situations where there is a conflict or contest between two parties, such as war or political negotiations, and neither side is able to achieve victory, resulting in what is also called an impasse , a deadlock , or a Mexican standoff . Chess writers note that this usage is a misnomer because, unlike in chess, the situation is often a temporary one that is ultimately resolved, even if it seems currently intractable. The term "stalemate"

1184-446: A win (since any move would get the king taken), checklock should be a draw. (In a checklock position, no forward play is possible even if exposing the king to check is valid, so the king cannot get captured. The same logic would apply to deadlock.) If stalemate were a loss for the player unable to move, the outcome of some endgames would be affected. In some situations the superior side can force stalemate but not checkmate. In others,

1258-580: Is a strategy board game for two players. It is the most popular board game in China. Xiangqi is in the same family of games as shogi , janggi , Western chess , chaturanga , and Indian chess . Besides China and areas with significant ethnic Chinese communities, this game is also a popular pastime in Vietnam, where it is known as cờ tướng , literally 'General's chess', in contrast with Western chess or cờ vua , literally 'King's chess'. The game represents

1332-401: Is a special kind of stalemate, in which no move is possible even if one ignores the need to avoid self-check. George P. Jelliss has called this type of stalemate a deadlock . Adding a White knight on f2 would produce a checklock : a checkmate position where no moves are possible, even if one ignores the need to avoid self-check. In general, positions with no moves at all available (even ignoring

1406-412: Is given below: White played 1. Ngxf6+ Qxf6+ (if 1...exf6 then 2.Ne7#) 2. Nxf6+ exf6 3. c4 c5 4. a4 a5 , leaving a double stalemate position. 1.Ndxf6+ would not have worked, for then 1...exf6 is possible. (Under the present rules, the game would have ended after 1...Qxf6+, as the position is then dead: no sequence of legal moves leads to either side being checkmated.) The fastest known game ending in

1480-440: Is similar to algebraic notation for Western chess. Letters are used for files and numbers for ranks. File "a" is on Red's left and rank "1" is nearest to Red. A point's designation does not depend on which player moves; for both sides "a1" is the lowest left point from Red's side. [single-letter piece abbreviation][former position][capture indication][new position][check indication][analysis] Stalemate The outcome of

1554-399: Is sometimes called the "king" by English-speaking players, due to their similar functions as royal pieces . Advisors (also known as guards and less commonly as assistants , mandarins , ministers or warriors ) are labelled 士 shì ("scholar", "gentleman", " officer ", "guardian") for Black and 仕 shì ("scholar", "official", "guardian") for Red. Rarely, sets use

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1628-505: Is sometimes called the "rook" by English-speaking players, since it moves identically to the rook in Western chess. Chinese players (and others) often call this piece a car, since that is one modern meaning of the character 車. Cannons are labelled 砲 pào (" catapult ") for Black and 炮 pào ("cannon") for Red. The names are homophones , though sometimes 炮 is used for both Red and Black. The 石 shí radical of 砲 means "stone", and

1702-488: Is sometimes used incorrectly as a generic term for a draw in chess. While draws are common, they are rarely the direct result of stalemate. With Black to move, Black is stalemated in diagrams 1 to 5. Stalemate is an important factor in the endgame – the endgame setup in diagram 1, for example, quite frequently is relevant in play (see King and pawn versus king endgame ). The position in diagram 1 occurred in an 1898 game between Amos Burn and Harry Pillsbury and also in

1776-479: Is that king and lone minor piece against king cannot force stalemate in general. Emanuel Lasker and Richard Réti proposed that both stalemate and king and minor versus king (with the minor piece side to move) should give ¾ points to the superior side: this would effectively restore not only the old stalemate rule but also the old bare king rule. Kaufman and correspondence grandmaster Arno Nickel have proposed going even further, and giving only ¼ point as well to

1850-542: Is the "White to Play and Draw" study at right, composed by the American master Frederick Rhine and published in 2006. White saves a draw with 1. Ne5+! Black wins after 1.Nb4+? Kb5! or 1.Qe8+? Bxe8 2.Ne5+ Kb5! 3.Rxb2+ Nb3. 1... Bxe5 After 1...Kb5? 2.Rxb2+ Nb3 3.Rxc4! Qxe3 (best; 3...Qb8+ 4.Kd7 Qxh8 5.Rxb3+ forces checkmate ) 4.Rxb3+! Qxb3 5.Qh1! Bf5+ 6.Kd8!, White is winning. 2. Qe8+! 2.Qxe5? Qb7+ 3.Kd8 Qd7#. 2... Bxe8 3. Rh6+ Bd6 3...Kb5 4.Rxb6+ Kxb6 5.Nxc4+ also leads to

1924-442: Is today. However, Kaufman tested the idea of scoring stalemates higher than draws with the chess engine Komodo , and found that the impact is quite small because it is rare to be able to force stalemate but not checkmate: while all king and pawn versus king endgames become wins when the pawn is protected (except when the attacking king is trapped in front of its own rook pawn), this does not turn out to be common enough. The problem

1998-436: Is universally recognized as a draw today, that was not the case for much of the game's history. In the forerunners to modern chess, such as chaturanga , delivering stalemate resulted in a loss. This was changed in shatranj , however, where stalemating was a win. This practice persisted in chess as played in early 15th-century Spain. Lucena (c. 1497), however, treated stalemate as an inferior form of victory; it won only half

2072-410: Is used to indicate horizontal or lateral movement. For a piece that moves diagonally (such as the horse or elephant), the plus or minus sign is used rather than the period. Thus, the most common opening in the game would be written as: According to World Xiangqi Federation (WXF), in the case of tripled, quadrupled, or quintupled soldiers (pawns), there is no need to specify the P for pawn. Instead,

2146-554: The fifty-move rule . After 48...Qg6! 49.Rf8 Qe6! 50.Rh8+ Kg6, Black remains a piece ahead after 51.Qxe6 Nxe6, or forces mate after 51.gxf4 Re1+ and 52...Qa2+. The position at right occurred in Boris Gelfand – Vladimir Kramnik , 1994 FIDE Candidates match, game 6, in Sanghi Nagar , India. Kramnik, down two pawns and on the defensive, would be very happy with a draw. Gelfand has just played 67. Re4–e7 ? (first diagram),

2220-419: The "pawn" by English-speaking players, due to the pieces' similar movements. These approximate values do not take into account the position of the piece in question (except the soldier in a general sense), the positions of other pieces on the board, or the number of pieces remaining. In what follows, “minor piece” will refer to horses and cannons, and "defensive piece", unless otherwise specified, will refer to

2294-450: The Century". Evans sacrificed his queen on move 49 and offered his rook on move 50. White's rook has been called the eternal rook . Capturing it results in stalemate, but otherwise it stays on the seventh rank and checks Black's king ad infinitum (i.e. perpetual check ). The game would inevitably end in a draw by agreement , by threefold repetition , or by an eventual claim under

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2368-449: The bishop is to move it, resulting in stalemate. A similar idea occasionally enables the inferior side to save a draw in the ending of bishop, knight, and king versus lone king . At right is a composition by A. J. Roycroft which was published in the British Chess Magazine in 1957. White draws with 1. c7! after which there are two main lines: Some chess problems require "White to move and stalemate Black in n moves" (rather than

2442-431: The black side and 帥 (trad.) / 帅 (simp.) shuài ("marshal") on the red side. The general starts the game at the midpoint of the back edge, within the palace. The general may move and capture one point orthogonally and may not leave the palace, with the following exception. If the two generals face each other along the same file with no intervening pieces, the 飛將 ("flying general") move may be executed, in which

2516-468: The case of purely vertical movement, number of ranks traversed] The file numbers are counted from each player's right to each player's left. In case there are two identical pieces in one file, symbols + (front) and – (rear) are used instead of former file number. Direction of movement is indicated via an operator symbol. A plus sign is used to indicate forward movement. A minus sign is used to indicate backward movement. A dot or period or equals sign

2590-511: The character 士 for both colours. The advisors start on either side of the general. They move and capture one point diagonally and may not leave the palace, which confines them to five points on the board. The advisor is probably derived from the mantri in chaturanga , like the queen in Western chess. There is some controversy about whether "士" really is intended to mean "scholar", "gentleman" which would be "士人", or "guard", "guardian" which would be "衛士" (simplified Chinese: 卫士). One argument for

2664-477: The chess family . The first recorded use of stalemate is from 1765. It is a compounding of Middle English stale and mate (meaning checkmate ). Stale is probably derived from Anglo-French estale meaning "standstill", a cognate of "stand" and "stall", both ultimately derived from the Proto-Indo-European root *sta- . The first recorded use in a figurative sense is in 1885. Stalemate has become

2738-438: The context of xiangqi, all of these characters are pronounced as jū (instead of the common pronunciation chē ). The chariot moves and captures any distance orthogonally, but may not jump over intervening pieces. The chariots begin the game on the points at the corners of the board. The chariot is often considered to be the strongest piece in the game due to its freedom of movement and lack of restrictions. The chariot

2812-492: The defending player can use stalemate as a defensive technique to avoid losing (under the current rule): The effect if stalemates were to be scored as ¾–¼ would be similar but less severe, as then the weaker side would still be rewarded somewhat for avoiding checkmate via stalemate, just not as much as before. Not all variants of chess consider the stalemate to be a draw. Many regional variants, as well some variants of Western chess, have adopted their own rules on how to treat

2886-443: The famous endgame study composer Alexey Troitsky pulled off an elegant swindle in actual play. After Troitsky's 1. Rd1! , Black fell into the trap with the seemingly crushing 1... Bh3? , threatening 2...Qg2#. The game concluded 2. Rxd8+ Kxd8 3. Qd1+! Qxd1 stalemate . White's bishop, knight, and f-pawn are all pinned and unable to move. Stalemate is a frequent theme in endgame studies and other chess compositions . An example

2960-401: The first to third and eighth to tenth ranks of the board are two zones, each three points by three points, demarcated by two diagonal lines connecting opposite corners and intersecting at the centre point. Each of these areas is known as 宮 gōng , a palace. Dividing the two opposing sides, between the fifth and sixth ranks, is 河 hé , the "river". The river is usually marked with

3034-439: The game Milan Matulović – Nikolay Minev (first diagram). Play continued: The only meaningful attempt to make progress. Now all moves by Black (like 3...Ra3+ ? ) lose, with one exception. Now 4.Rxa6 would be stalemate. White played 4.Rc5+ instead, and the game was drawn several moves later. In the game Elijah Williams – Daniel Harrwitz (first diagram), Black was up a knight and a pawn in an endgame. This would normally be

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3108-418: The game located on every other point one row back from the edge of the river. They move and capture by advancing one point. Once they have crossed the river, they may also move and capture one point horizontally. Soldiers cannot move backward, and therefore cannot retreat; after advancing to the last rank of the board, however, a soldier may still move sideways at the enemy's edge. The soldier is sometimes called

3182-422: The game next to the elephants, on their outside flanks. A horse moves and captures one point orthogonally and then one point diagonally away from its former position, a move which is traditionally described as being like the character 日 Rì . The horse does not jump as the knight does in Western chess, and can be blocked by a piece of either colour located one point horizontally or vertically adjacent to it. Blocking

3256-403: The general is "in check". A check should be announced. If the general's player can make no move to prevent the general's capture, the situation is called "checkmate" ( 將死 ). Unlike in chess, in which stalemate is a draw, in xiangqi, it is a loss for the stalemated player. In xiangqi, a player—often with a material or positional disadvantage—may attempt to check or chase pieces in a way such that

3330-404: The general to move crosses the board to capture the enemy general. In practice, this rule means that creating this situation in the first place means moving into check, and is therefore not allowed. The Indian name king for this piece was changed to general because of Chinese naming taboos ; China's rulers objected to their royal titles being given to game pieces. Despite this, the general

3404-506: The intersections of the board lines, rather than within the squares. Xiangqi is played on a board nine lines wide and ten lines long. As in the game Go ( 圍碁 ; or Wéi qí 圍棋 ), the pieces are placed on the intersections, which are known as points . The vertical lines are known as files ( Chinese : 路 ; pinyin : lù ; lit. 'road'), and the horizontal lines are known as ranks ( Chinese : 線/綫 ; pinyin : xiàn ; lit. 'line'). Centred at

3478-415: The latter is that their functionality seems to be to guard/protect the general. The common Western translation "advisor" does not reflect this layer of meaning. Elephants (or bishops ) are labeled 象 xiàng ("elephant") for Black and 相 xiàng ("minister") for Red. They are located next to the advisors. These pieces move and capture exactly two points diagonally and may not jump over intervening pieces;

3552-531: The more common "White to move and checkmate Black in n moves"). Problemists have also tried to construct the shortest possible game ending in stalemate. Sam Loyd devised one just ten moves long: 1.e3 a5 2.Qh5 Ra6 3.Qxa5 h5 4.Qxc7 Rah6 5.h4 f6 6.Qxd7+ Kf7 7.Qxb7 Qd3 8.Qxb8 Qh7 9.Qxc8 Kg6 10.Qe6 (first diagram). A similar stalemate is reached after: 1.d4 c5 2.dxc5 f6 3.Qxd7+ Kf7 4.Qxd8 Bf5 5.Qxb8 h5 6.Qxa8 Rh6 7.Qxb7 a6 8.Qxa6 Bh7 9.h4 Kg6 10.Qe6 (Frederick Rhine). Loyd also demonstrated that stalemate can occur with all

3626-1146: The move is described as being like the character 田 Tián ("field"), in reference to the board's squares. Blocking an elephant with a diagonally adjacent piece is known as "blocking the elephant's eye" ( 塞象眼 ). Elephants may not cross the river to attack the enemy general , and serve as defensive pieces. Because an elephant's movement is restricted to just seven board positions, it can be easily trapped or threatened. The two elephants are often used to defend each other. The Chinese characters for "minister" and "elephant" are homophones in Mandarin ( Listen ) and both have alternative meanings as "appearance" or "image". However, in English, both are referred to as elephants, and less commonly as "bishops", due to their similar movements. Horses (or knights ) are labelled 馬 mǎ for Black and 傌 mǎ for Red in sets marked with Traditional Chinese characters and 马 mǎ for both Black and Red in sets marked with Simplified Chinese characters . Some sets use 馬 for both colours. Horses begin

3700-410: The moves fall in a cycle, preventing the opponent from winning. While this is accepted in Western chess, in xiangqi, the following special rules are used to make it harder to draw the game by endless checking or chasing, regardless of whether the positions of the pieces are repeated or not: Different sets of rules set different limits on what is considered perpetual. For example, club xiangqi rules allow

3774-500: The name for the cannon on both sides is 炮; the name for the horse on both sides is 馬; forward motion is indicated with 進 (pronounced jìn ); backward motion is indicated with 退 ( tuì ); sideways motion is indicated with 平 ( píng ); and numbers are written in Chinese either for both players or for just Black. Thus, the most common opening in the game might be written as: This system is unofficial and principally used by Western players. It

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3848-420: The need to avoid self-check) are called locks . In this position from the game Viswanathan Anand – Vladimir Kramnik from the 2007 World Chess Championship , Black played 65...Kxf5, stalemating White. (Any other move by Black loses.) An intentional stalemate occurred on the 124th move of the fifth game of the 1978 World Championship match between Viktor Korchnoi and Anatoly Karpov . The game had been

3922-414: The non-royal pieces that cannot cross the river, namely advisors and elephants. Other common rules of assessment: There are several types of notation used to record xiangqi games. In each case the moves are numbered and written with the same general pattern. It is clearer but not required to write each move pair on a separate line. The book The Chess of China describes a move notation method in which

3996-519: The path of attack. The piece over which the cannon jumps is called the 炮臺 (trad.) / 炮台 (simp.) pào tái ("cannon platform" or "screen"). Any number of unoccupied spaces, including none, may exist between the cannon, screen, and the piece to be captured. Cannons can be exchanged for horses immediately from their starting positions. Soldiers (or pawns ) are labelled 卒 zú ("pawn" or "private") for Black and 兵 bīng ("soldier") for Red. Each side starts with five soldiers. Soldiers begin

4070-555: The phrases 楚河 chǔ hé , meaning "River of the Chu ", and 漢界 hàn jiè , meaning "Border of the Han ", a reference to the Chu–Han War . Although the river (or Hanchu boundary ) provides a visual division between the two sides, only two pieces are affected by its presence: soldiers have an enhanced move after crossing the river, and elephants cannot cross it. The starting points of

4144-414: The pieces on the board: 1.d4 d6 2.Qd2 e5 3.a4 e4 4.Qf4 f5 5.h3 Be7 6.Qh2 Be6 7.Ra3 c5 8.Rg3 Qa5+ 9.Nd2 Bh4 10.f3 Bb3 11.d5 e3 12.c4 f4 (second diagram). Games such as this are occasionally played in tournaments as a pre-arranged draw. There are chess compositions featuring double stalemate. To the right are two double stalemate positions, in which neither side has a legal move. An example from actual play

4218-418: The players agreed to a draw , since 84...Kxb3 or 84...Rxb3 is stalemate, as is 84...Ra8 85.Rxc3+! Kxc3. Black could still have won the game until his critical mistake on move 82. Instead of 82...Nc3, 82...Nb4 wins; for example, after 83.Rc8 Re3 84.Rb8+ Kc5 85.Rc8+ Kd5 86.Rd8+ Kc6 87.Ra8 Re1+ 88.Kb2 Kc5 89.Kc3 a1=Q+, Black wins. This 2007 game, Magnus Carlsen – Loek van Wely , ended in stalemate. White used

4292-420: The point it occupies, to another point. Pieces are generally not permitted to move through points occupied by other pieces, the exception being the cannon’s capturing move. A piece can be moved onto a point occupied by an enemy piece, in which case the enemy piece is captured and removed from the board. A player cannot capture one of their own pieces. Pieces are never promoted (converted into other pieces), although

4366-634: The ranks of the board are numbered 1 to 10 from closest to farthest away, followed by a digit 1 to 9 for files from right to left. Both values are relative to the moving player. Moves are then indicated as follows: [piece name] ([former rank][former file])-[new rank][new file] Thus, the most common opening in the game would be written as: A notation system partially described in A Manual of Chinese Chess and used by several computer software implementations describes moves in relative terms as follows: [single-letter piece abbreviation][former file][operator indicating direction of movement][new file, or in

4440-420: The second-rank defense in a rook and bishop versus rook endgame for 46 moves. The fifty-move rule was about to come into effect, under which White could claim a draw. The game ended: White was stalemated. Although stalemate usually occurs in the endgame, it can also occur with more pieces on the board. Outside of relatively simple endgame positions, such as those above, stalemate occurs rarely, usually when

4514-436: The side that brings about a threefold repetition (which likewise has precedents in xiangqi, shogi, and Go ). According to his tests with Komodo, chess at the level of a human World Championship match would have a draw rate of 65.6%; scoring stalemate as ¾–¼ reduces the draw rate to 63.4%; scoring stalemate and bare king as ¾–¼ brings it to 55.9%; and scoring stalemate, bare king, and threefold repetition as ¾–¼ brings it all

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4588-425: The side with the superior position has overlooked the possibility of stalemate. This is typically realized by the inferior side's sacrifice of one or more pieces in order to force stalemate. A piece that is offered as a sacrifice to bring about stalemate is sometimes called a desperado . One of the best-known examples of the desperado is the game Larry Evans – Samuel Reshevsky that was dubbed "The Swindle of

4662-433: The soldier gains the ability to move sideways after it crosses the river. Almost all pieces capture using their normal moves, while the cannon has a special capture move described below. The game ends when one player checkmates the other's general. When the general is in danger of being captured by the enemy player on their next move, the enemy player has "delivered a check" ( 照將/將軍 , abbreviated as 將 jiāng ), and

4736-552: The soldiers and cannons are usually, but not always, marked with small crosses. The pieces start in the position shown in the diagram above. Which player moves first has varied throughout history and from one part of China to another. Different xiangqi books advise either that the black or red side moves first. Some books refer to the two sides as north and south ; which direction corresponds to which colour also varies from source to source. Generally, Red moves first in most modern tournaments. Each player in turn moves one piece from

4810-403: The soldiers are numbered starting from the frontmost soldier, and this number replaces the usual piece abbreviation. The file number is given immediately after as usual. Thus the notation to move the middle of a set of tripled soldiers on the 5th file to the 4th file would be: In older books written in Chinese the system is the same, except that: the names of the pieces are written in Chinese;

4884-563: The stake in games played for money, and this continued to be the case in Spain as late as 1600. From about 1600 to 1800, the rule in England was that stalemate was a loss for the player administering it, a rule that the eminent chess historian H. J. R. Murray believes may have been adopted from Russian chess. That rule disappeared in England before 1820, being replaced by the French and Italian rule that

4958-413: The stalemate rule, he released about his unhappy head a swarm of peevish maledictions that are still buzzing." Larry Evans calls the proposal to make stalemate a win for the stalemating player a "crude proposal that ... would radically alter centuries of tradition and make chess boring". This rule change would cause a greater emphasis on material ; an extra pawn would be a greater advantage than it

5032-523: The stalemate. This game was in turn introduced to the Western world , where it would eventually evolve to modern-day Western chess , although the stalemate rule for Western chess was not standardized as a draw until the 19th century (see history of the rule ). Chaturanga also evolved into several other games in various regions of Asia , all of which have varying rules on stalemating: The majority of variants of Western chess do not specify any alterations to

5106-453: The stalemated player. In chaturanga , which is widely considered to be the common ancestor of all variants of chess, a stalemate was a win for the stalemated player. Around the 7th century, this game was adopted in the Middle East as shatranj with very similar rules to its predecessor; however, the stalemate rule was changed to its exact opposite: i.e. it was a win for the player delivering

5180-548: The two sides, most corresponding pieces used characters that were similar but varied slightly. This practice may have originated in situations where there was only one material available to make the pieces from and no colouring material available to distinguish the opposing armies. The oldest xiangqi piece found to date is a 俥 (chariot) piece. It is kept in the Three Gorges Museum . Generals (or kings ) are labelled 將 (trad.) / 将 (simp.) jiàng ("general") on

5254-416: The way down to 22.6%. (The same reduction of draws would occur if stalemate, bare king, and threefold repetition were scored as 1–0 instead of ¾–¼, but the point of the ¾–¼ scoring is to allow the weaker side to still benefit from avoiding checkmate, while giving the stronger side something to play for even when checkmate cannot be attained.) Jelliss has suggested that under the logic that stalemate should be

5328-405: The 火 huǒ radical of 炮 means "fire". Both colours' pieces are normally referred to as cannons in English. The black piece is sometimes labelled 包 bāo. Each player has two cannons, which start on the row behind the soldiers, two points in front of the horses. Cannons move like chariots, any distance orthogonally without jumping, but can only capture by jumping a single piece of either colour along

5402-485: Was good to advance the b-pawn because he could win the white rook with a skewer if it captured the pawn. Play went: Now 60...Rh2+ 61.Kf3! Rxb2 would be stalemate (second diagram). Smyslov played 60...Kg4, and the game was drawn after 61.Kf1 (see Rook and pawn versus rook endgame ). Whereas the possibility of stalemate arose in the Bernstein–Smyslov game because of a blunder , it can also arise without one, as in

5476-417: Was slightly humiliating. Until 2021, this was the longest game played in a World Chess Championship final match, as well as the only World Championship game to end in stalemate before 2007. Sometimes, a surprise stalemate saves a game. In the game Ossip Bernstein – Vasily Smyslov (first diagram), Black can win by sacrificing the f-pawn and using the king to support the b-pawn. However, Smyslov thought it

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