Alquerque

How to play alquerque

From the book's pages

• Two players have twelve pieces each, black and white, set up as in figure A. The centre point is empty. The players move one piece each in turn.
• A piece may be moved to any adjacent point along the lines. The diagonals run only through every other point, as the board is drawn.
• If one of your pieces stands directly opposite one of the opponent's, and the point behind it is empty, you jump over it and take it. The taken piece is out of the game.
• Several jumps one after another, zigzagging back and forth across the board, are allowed. That way you can take a row of pieces in one move.
• If you could have captured and did not, the opponent has the right to take your piece.
• The first to take all of the opponent's pieces wins.
• The book quotes the Libro de Juegos: it is an advantage to have the second move, and between two equally skilled players the game ends in a draw.

My choices

What the book does not say is filled in like this. Say so if anything should be different.

• White begins when no one chooses otherwise. If you want to try the book's advice, let the opponent begin.
• The right to take a piece applies to the piece that could have captured, and it is taken before you move yourself. You choose whether to use the right. If someone stops a chain of jumps early, nothing is taken.
• Pieces you jump over stay until the move is finished: the same piece cannot be jumped twice, and you cannot land on its point.
• A player who cannot move has lost.
• The same position three times, or sixty moves without a capture, is a draw.

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