What's this all about?

Xiangqi (Chinese chess) is the East Asian sibling of Western chess. Two "armies" — Red and Black — face off on a board. You play Red. Instead of a king, each side defends a General. Once the General is trapped with no way out, the game ends — that's checkmate. Xiangqi San Cai adds a second, quieter path to victory: infiltration with the Attenac (more on that shortly).

The board: lines, not squares

The biggest difference from Western chess: pieces sit not in squares but on the intersections of lines — like in Go. Two features shape the board:

• The river in the middle splits the board in two. Some pieces may never cross it; others actually gain mobility once they do.
• The palace is a small 3×3 area right behind each side's back row. The General and Advisor may never leave it.

Xiangqi San Cai adds a second, horizontal plane: Ren 人 (the plane of Human, below, where the game begins) and Tian 天 (the plane of Heaven, above). Some pieces can move between the two, others can't.

The pieces — what they mean and how they move

Every piece carries its own "degree of freedom": how tightly it's bound to order and place, or how freely it may move.

• General 帥/將 — moves only 1 point straight, and only within its own palace. The most important piece, but the least mobile.
• Advisor 仕/士 — 1 point diagonally, also only in the palace. Guards the General from close by.
• Elephant 相/象 — jumps exactly 2 points diagonally (like a small "X"). Never crosses the river — a pure defender of its own half. If the point in between is occupied, the jump is blocked.
• Horse 傌/馬 — moves like the knight in Western chess (1 square straight + 1 diagonal outward). Important: a piece standing directly next to the Horse (on the way there) blocks the jump in that direction — known as "the horse's leg is blocked".
• Chariot 俥/車 — moves any distance in a straight line, like the rook in chess. The strongest "ordinary" piece.
• Cannon 炮/砲 — moves like the Chariot, but to capture it must jump over exactly one other piece (a "screen"). Without a screen it can only move, not capture.
• Soldier 兵/卒 — at first moves only 1 point forward. After crossing the river it may also move sideways — it gains freedom over time, but can never move backward.
• Attenac — the new piece in Xiangqi San Cai (more on this now).

The Attenac — the heart of Xiangqi San Cai

The Attenac moves 1 point in any of six directions — including up/down between Ren and Tian. It cannot capture and cannot be captured either: if touched by an enemy piece, it's frozen for a few moves instead and loses time from its reserve (starting at a 3:00-minute equivalent). Once that reserve runs out, the next touch removes it from the game for good.

Its goal: slip into the enemy palace unnoticed and stay there for two of its own consecutive moves, untouched. Pull that off and you win by infiltration — without ever having threatened the General at all.

How a game unfolds

1. At the start, choose one of the five marked lines (green) as your Attenac's starting position.
2. Then tap one of your pieces — its possible destinations light up green.
3. Tapping a highlighted square makes the move. If an enemy piece is there, it's captured (except for the Attenac — see above).
4. Red and Black alternate turns until checkmate, infiltration, or stalemate decides the game.

A few tips for getting started

• The General can never leave the palace — so it doesn't need "escape routes", but it does need cover from the Advisor and Elephants.
• Watch out for undefended pieces — Chariots and Cannons in particular are valuable.
• The Attenac is vulnerable early on: a single wrong advance can quickly get it frozen. Watch where the enemy Attenac stands before sending out your own.
• The second plane (Tian) isn't a risk-free hiding spot — the Attenac can still be discovered there.

The rest of these rules (below, in detail) spell out every rule once more precisely — a reference to come back to once you've got the basics down.