Gamehelpchinesecheckers

Goal

You own 10 marbles that start in the triangle at the bottom of the board. These marbles are the only ones you're allowed to move.

Your goal is to bring all of them as fast as possible in the opposite triangle, at the top.

Moves

When it's your turn, you can either :

• Move one marble to an adjacent free hole, in any direction - even backward.

• Perform one or more consecutive hops.

    • A hop is defined as a jump over any adjacent marble - your own or your opponent's - to a free hole beyond it.

    • Jumping over a marble does NOT remove it from the board.

    • You may change direction between 2 consecutive hops.

    • While hopping, you may temporarily pass through a hole in a side triangle but you're not allowed to stay there.

On BGA, after selecting a marble, legal moves are highlighted in white. Simply click the final position you want to reach.

Scoring

You score one point each time one of your marble moves one step closer to the goal. It's therefore possible to gain several points at once with a well-calculated series of hops. It's also possible to score 0 if you move sideways or even to lose points if you move backwards.

This scoring method guarantees that the game always ends when a player reaches 120 points - when all their marbles are inside the goal area.

When this happens, the game ends immediately. The player with 120 points is the winner and all other players are ranked by their score.

Strategy

• With hops you can progress much faster than with single steps. Try to align marbles to create a "ladder" that enables a large series of hops.

• Avoid keeping an isolated marble at the back. Catching up is hard.

• Watch your opponent's moves. If you see them building a ladder, try to block them.

• With 4 or 6 players, it's usually better to cooperate with the player in front of you at the start of the game. If you don't, your shared opponents - players on the sides - will probably progress faster than both of you.