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Checkers

Checkers, also known as English draughts or American checkers, is a two-player strategy board game played on an 8×8 checkered board with alternating light and dark squares, where each player controls 12 pieces, typically red and black, starting on the three rows closest to them on the dark squares.^[1]^[2] The objective is to capture all of the opponent's pieces or block them from making any legal moves, with pieces moving diagonally forward one square at a time unless capturing, in which case they jump over an adjacent opponent's piece to an empty square beyond, removing the captured piece from the board.^[1]^[2] Captures are mandatory, and multiple jumps in a single turn are required if available, while a piece reaching the opponent's back row becomes a king, gaining the ability to move and capture diagonally in any direction.^[1]^[2] The game's origins trace back to the ancient board game alquerque, evidenced by carvings from 1400 BCE in Egyptian temples and archaeological finds from around 600 BCE in the Middle East and Mediterranean, later spreading to other regions including India, where pieces moved along diagonal lines on a 5×5 grid.^[3] Modern checkers evolved in the 12th century in southern France, likely by adapting alquerque to an 8×8 chessboard and using backgammon pieces, initially known as fierges or ferses before being renamed jeu de dames by the 15th century.^[3]^[4] The oldest known printed reference appears in Antonio de Torquemada's 1547 work in Valencia, Spain, and rules such as compulsory capture—known as jeu forcé—were standardized in France during the 16th century.^[3]^[4] Checkers spread across Europe and to the Americas, with the English version solidifying around 1800 and becoming popular in North America, later promoted through organizations such as the American Checker Federation (founded in 1948), which maintains official rules and organizes tournaments.^[4]^[1]^[5] Variations exist worldwide, including international draughts on a 10×10 board and Brazilian draughts adapting 10×10 rules to an 8×8 setup in the 1930s, but the 8×8 format remains the most widely played, valued for its simplicity and depth in tactics like forking and pinning.^[3] The game has been referenced in ancient texts by Homer and Plato and enjoyed by historical figures such as Napoleon and Ulysses S. Grant, underscoring its enduring cultural significance.^[3]

Rules and Gameplay

Board and Setup

The standard checkers board is an 8×8 grid comprising 64 squares in alternating light and dark colors, with gameplay restricted to the 32 dark squares.^[6]^[7] The board is positioned so that a dark square occupies the bottom-left corner from each player's viewpoint, ensuring consistent orientation for both sides.^[7]^[8] Each player deploys 12 pieces, referred to as men, on the dark squares within the three rows nearest their edge of the board, leaving the central four rows empty.^[6]^[7] For the player with black pieces, these occupy squares numbered 1 through 12 starting from their left; the opposing player with white pieces places theirs on squares 21 through 32.^[7] At setup, all pieces are identical men, with no kings present initially.^[6] Pieces are distinguished by color, commonly black versus white or black versus red, to clearly identify ownership.^[6]^[8] The player controlling the darker-colored pieces (black) initiates the game, after which turns alternate between opponents.^[6]^[7] While the 8×8 board defines standard play, non-standard setups for introductory purposes may employ smaller grids to accommodate beginners, though such variations deviate from official configurations.^[9]

Pieces and Movement

In standard American checkers, also known as English draughts, there are two types of pieces: men, which are the standard uncrowned pieces, and kings, which are promoted pieces with enhanced capabilities.^[10]^[11] Each player begins with 12 men, placed on the dark squares of the board.^[7] Men can only move diagonally forward, advancing one square at a time to an adjacent empty dark square.^[10]^[11]^[7] This forward-only restriction limits their mobility to progressing toward the opponent's side of the board. In contrast, kings possess greater versatility, allowing them to move one square diagonally in any direction—either forward or backward—to an adjacent empty dark square.^[10]^[11]^[7] This backward movement enables kings to control more of the board and respond to threats from multiple angles. Promotion occurs when a man reaches any of the four dark squares on the opponent's back row, known as the king row.^[10]^[11]^[7] Upon arrival, the man is immediately crowned as a king, often visually represented by stacking another piece on top or using a distinct marker, and it may not continue moving on that turn.^[11]^[12] This promotion mechanic introduces strategic depth, as advancing a man to the king row can significantly alter the balance of power in the game.

Capturing Mechanics

In checkers, capturing occurs when a player's piece jumps diagonally over an adjacent opponent's piece to an unoccupied square immediately beyond it, provided the landing square is empty.^[12] This mechanic applies to both men (regular pieces) and kings, though men can only jump forward while kings may jump in any diagonal direction.^[12] The jumped-over piece is thereby captured and removed from play. Capturing is mandatory under official rules; if a capture is available, the player must execute it rather than making a non-capturing move.^[12] When multiple capturing options exist, the player may select any legal sequence without obligation to choose the one that maximizes the number of captures.^[12] In a single turn, a piece may perform multiple jumps if additional captures become available after landing, and the player must continue jumping until no further captures are possible from the current position.^[12] Captured pieces are removed from the board only after the completion of the entire multi-jump sequence, ensuring the full path is assessed before clearance.^[12] Historically, failing to capture when required could result in a "huffing" penalty, where the opponent removes the offending piece as punishment, but this rule is rarely enforced in modern play and has been largely supplanted by simply requiring the correct move to be made.^[13]

Endgame and Winning

In standard English draughts, also known as checkers, a player achieves victory by capturing all of the opponent's pieces or maneuvering their own pieces to leave the opponent without any legal moves, effectively blocking all possible advances or captures.^[12]^[13] This win condition emphasizes the importance of material superiority and positional control, particularly as the board clears in the later stages of play.^[14] Draws occur when neither player can force a win, with specific rules governing such outcomes to ensure fair play. These include mutual agreement by both players at any point, the threefold repetition of the exact same position (verified by a referee in tournaments), or the passage of 40 consecutive moves without any uncrowned piece (man) advancing toward the king row or any captures taking place.^[12] Insufficient material, such as both sides possessing only kings that cannot compel a capture due to their positioning, typically results in a draw under the 40-move rule, as no progress toward a win is possible.^[12] Basic endgame tactics in checkers revolve around simplified positions where kings dominate, adapting concepts like opposition and zugzwang from chess to the draughts board. Opposition refers to the strategic alignment of kings to seize control of central or critical squares, restricting the opponent's king mobility and often forcing it into a vulnerable corner or edge; for example, in a two-kings-versus-one endgame, gaining opposition allows the superior side to trap the lone king without allowing escape.^[14]^[15] Zugzwang, meanwhile, arises when a player must move but any available option weakens their position, ceding the initiative and potentially enabling the opponent to execute a decisive capture or block; this is particularly potent in king endgames where space is limited and every move counts.^[15] These tactics prioritize precise king coordination over aggressive captures, as endgames often hinge on who controls the tempo and last move.^[14] In competitive checkers, time controls add pressure to endgame decisions, potentially forcing hasty moves that lead to losses. Under World Checkers/Draughts Federation guidelines for English draughts tournaments, players face an initial control of 30 moves per hour, followed by 15 moves every subsequent half-hour; exceeding the allotted time results in an automatic loss, even if the position on the board favors the timed-out player.^[12] This system encourages efficient play in drawn-out endgames, where calculating opposition or avoiding zugzwang requires careful time management.^[12]

History and Origins

Ancient Predecessors

Alquerque, the primary ancient predecessor to checkers, originated around 1400 BCE, with evidence from carvings in Egyptian temples and archaeological finds dating to approximately 600 BCE in the Middle East, Mediterranean, and India. The game was played on a 5×5 grid where pieces moved diagonally along lines and captured by short jumps over adjacent opponents into empty spaces, establishing the core mechanics of diagonal movement and jumping captures central to checkers. Known in Arabic as quirkat, it emphasized strategic capturing with multiple jumps allowed in a single turn.^[3]^[16]

Medieval Development

Alquerque spread to medieval Europe primarily through Islamic Spain during the period of Moorish rule (711–1492 CE), where cultural exchanges facilitated its integration into Christian kingdoms, and further disseminated via interactions during the Crusades and Reconquista.^[17] By the 12th and 13th centuries, it adapted to an 8x8 checkered board borrowed from chess, transforming into a diagonal-play variant often called fierges or ferses in southern France and Spain, with pieces starting on dark squares and capturing by leaping forward.^[3] This shift allowed for more complex positions while retaining Alquerque's core jumping rules, marking a synthesis of ancient influences with emerging European board game traditions.^[18] The promotion mechanic—or crowning—emerged in 13th-century European play, enabling a piece reaching the opponent's back row to become a king with enhanced mobility, including backward movement, adding depth to endgame tactics and distinguishing the evolving game from its Alquerque roots.^[3] Key documentation of these early rules appears in the 13th-century Spanish Libro de los Juegos, commissioned by King Alfonso X of Castile in 1283, which describes alquerque de doze—a version with 12 pieces per player on a lined board—outlining setup, diagonal jumps for captures, and the absence of huffing penalties, providing the earliest comprehensive European record of proto-checkers gameplay.^[17] This treatise not only preserved the game's mechanics but also illustrated its cultural significance in medieval courts, bridging Islamic scholarly traditions with Castilian scholarship.^[3] In the 16th century, the game saw further development in France, with the oldest known printed reference in Antonio de Torquemada's 1547 work in Valencia, Spain. Rules such as compulsory capture—known as jeu forcé—were standardized during this period, solidifying the mechanics of mandatory jumps.^[3]

Modern Standardization

The standardization of English draughts emerged in the 18th century through key publications that codified rules for the game on an 8×8 board, building on medieval practices such as crowning pieces upon reaching the opponent's baseline. Charles Cotton's The Compleat Gamester (1674) included one of the earliest printed descriptions of draughts in English, outlining basic movement, capturing by jumping, and the huffing rule for failing to capture, thereby helping to formalize play among British audiences.^[19] This work marked an initial step toward consistency, though regional variations persisted. By mid-century, William Payne, an English mathematician, published An Introduction to the Game of Draughts in 1756, the first dedicated rulebook for the game, which detailed strategies, select games, and refined mechanics like mandatory captures, establishing a reference that influenced subsequent editions and players across Britain.^[20] In the 19th century, the game's spread to America led to divergences from British norms, with regional adaptations emerging amid growing popularity in taverns and homes. American checkers retained the 8×8 board but incorporated subtle rule variations, such as preferences for "short" kings (limited to one square diagonally) in some areas, diverging from the more flexible English style. A notable offshoot was pool checkers, played on an 8×8 board with backward movement and captures allowed for men and flying kings, believed to trace back to the era of slavery in the American South.^[21] Formal organizations arose to further codify rules and promote competitive play. The English Draughts Association was established in 1898 following a meeting in Liverpool, aiming to unify standards, organize tournaments, and publish official guidelines that resolved ambiguities in capturing sequences and endgame conditions, solidifying English draughts as a structured pursuit.^[22] Twentieth-century efforts focused on global unification, particularly for the 10×10 international variant, which had gained traction in Europe since the late 19th century. The Fédération Mondiale du Jeu de Dames (FMJD), founded on September 13, 1947, in Paris by federations from France, the Netherlands, Belgium, and Switzerland, standardized rules for international draughts, including long-range king movements and the maximum capture rule, fostering worldwide championships and reducing national discrepancies.^[23]

Variants and Regional Forms

International Draughts

International Draughts, also known as Draughts-64 or 10×10 draughts, is the most prominent international variant of the game, governed by the Fédération Mondiale du Jeu de Dames (FMJD). It is played on a square board divided into 100 equal squares, alternately colored black and white, with only the 50 dark squares used for play. The board is oriented such that each player has a long diagonal of 10 squares to their left. At the start, each player deploys 20 men—black or dark-colored for one side and white or light-colored for the other—positioned on squares numbered 1 through 20 for black and 31 through 50 for white, with the white player moving first.^[24] In terms of movement, ordinary pieces, referred to as men, advance diagonally forward one square to an unoccupied dark square in the next row. Upon reaching the opponent's promotion line (squares 1–5 for white or 46–50 for black), a man is crowned a king and gains enhanced mobility. Kings, often called flying kings due to their extended range, can move diagonally forward or backward any number of successive empty squares along the diagonal they occupy, effectively traversing multiple squares in a single turn. This contrasts sharply with the 8×8 variants like English draughts, where kings are limited to single-square diagonal moves; the larger 10×10 board in International Draughts accommodates these long-range maneuvers, fostering more strategic depth and positional complexity.^[24]^[25] Capturing is a mandatory element of gameplay, with both men and kings able to jump over an opponent's piece diagonally to an empty square beyond, removing the captured piece from the board only after the full move concludes. Men may capture either forward or backward, a rule that extends their tactical options compared to some 8×8 forms where men capture only forward. Multiple jumps are obligatory if available, and the player must select the sequence that captures the maximum number of opponent pieces, prioritizing quantity over other factors like positioning. This maximum capture rule, enforced strictly, often leads to intricate combinations and is a hallmark of the variant's dynamic play.^[24]^[25] The variant enjoys widespread popularity across Europe and Africa, where it serves as a competitive standard. The FMJD, founded in 1947, oversees its global promotion and tournaments, with 32 member federations in Europe—including powerhouses like the Netherlands, Russia, and France—and 16 in Africa, such as Senegal, Côte d'Ivoire, and Cameroon, reflecting strong regional engagement and frequent hosting of international events.^[26]^[27]

American Checkers and English Draughts

American checkers, also known as English draughts, is a two-player strategy board game played on an 8×8 checkerboard consisting of 64 alternating light and dark squares, with gameplay restricted to the 32 dark squares.^[7] Each player begins with 12 uncrowned pieces, called men, positioned on the three rows closest to them: for the player with dark-colored pieces (who moves first), the men occupy squares 1 through 12, while the opponent's lighter-colored men start on squares 21 through 32.^[7] The board is oriented such that each player's bottom-left corner is a dark square, ensuring consistent setup.^[13] This configuration emphasizes tactical positioning and diagonal maneuvers, distinguishing it from variants like international draughts, where kings possess greater mobility over multiple squares. Men move diagonally forward one square to an adjacent empty dark square during non-capturing turns, advancing toward the opponent's baseline.^[7] Capturing is compulsory and occurs by jumping over an adjacent opponent's man to an empty square immediately beyond it, with the captured piece removed from the board; men can only capture forward, not backward, and multiple jumps must continue if available, potentially forming chains in a single turn.^[13] A man reaching the opponent's last row is crowned a king, gaining the ability to move or capture diagonally in any direction—but only one square at a time, unlike the long-range capabilities in international play.^[7] Kings likewise must capture when possible and can chain jumps across the board, but their short-range limitation keeps games focused on close-quarters strategy rather than sweeping advances.^[28] In some traditional American play, particularly in informal or historical contexts, the "blowback" or huffing rule applies: if a player fails to make a compulsory capture, the opponent may remove (huff) the offending piece before their turn, enforcing strict adherence to jumping requirements.^[13] This rule, also known as blowing, has largely been abolished in official competitions by organizations like the American Checker Federation, replaced by simply requiring the missed capture to be replayed, but it persists in casual settings to maintain game integrity.^[29] The game ends in victory for the player who captures all opposing pieces or blocks them from any legal move; draws occur by mutual agreement or repetition of positions.^[28] English draughts and American checkers share deep cultural roots in Anglo-American social life, particularly from the 19th to early 20th centuries, when the game was a staple in British pubs as a low-stakes diversion for patrons and in American parlors as a relaxing family or social pursuit.^[30] In Britain, draughts complemented pub traditions of communal games like dominoes and cards, fostering conversation over ale in alehouses dating back to the 18th century.^[31] Across the Atlantic, it featured prominently in middle-class homes and soldierly pastimes during the 1800s, valued for its simplicity and strategic depth amid the era's growing interest in board games as moral entertainments.^[32] These settings underscored the game's accessibility, bridging classes and generations in everyday leisure.^[33]

Other National Variants

Turkish Draughts, also known as Dama, is played on an 8×8 checkered board with orthogonal movement rather than diagonal, distinguishing it from many other variants.^[34] Each player begins with 16 men placed in the two rows closest to them, leaving the back row empty, and the lighter-colored side moves first.^[35] Men move one square orthogonally forward or sideways but cannot move or capture backward or diagonally.^[34] Capturing is mandatory and occurs by jumping orthogonally over an adjacent opponent's piece to an empty square immediately beyond, with men limited to forward or sideways jumps only.^[35] A man promotes to a king upon reaching the opponent's back row, and kings move any number of unobstructed squares orthogonally in any direction, like a chess rook, allowing long-range mobility.^[34] Kings capture in all orthogonal directions by jumping over an opponent's piece from any distance, landing on any empty square beyond it, and multiple captures must maximize the number of pieces taken, with captured pieces removed immediately.^[35] The game ends in victory for the player who captures all opponent's pieces or blocks them from moving, though draws can occur via threefold repetition.^[34] Brazilian Draughts represents a hybrid variant influenced by international rules but adapted to an 8×8 board, making it more accessible while retaining complex capturing dynamics.^[36] Each player starts with 12 men on the dark squares of rows 1–3 (for white) and 6–8 (for black), leaving rows 4–5 empty, and play proceeds diagonally on the 32 dark squares.^[36] Men move one square diagonally forward to an empty adjacent square but can capture both forward and backward by jumping over an opponent's piece to an empty square beyond.^[36] Promotion to king occurs when a man reaches the opponent's back row, and kings move any number of squares diagonally forward or backward, stopping on any empty square.^[36] Capturing is compulsory, requiring the sequence that takes the maximum number of pieces, with men and kings able to jump in any diagonal direction during multi-captures; however, men do not promote mid-capture unless landing on the promotion row at the sequence's end.^[36] This backward-capturing ability for men adds aggression compared to some traditional forms, and the game concludes with the capture of all opponent's pieces or immobilization.^[36] Russian Draughts, a widely played 8×8 variant, emphasizes dynamic captures with rules that allow men to engage more aggressively than in English draughts.^[37] Players start with 12 men each on the dark squares of rows 1–3 and 6–8, moving diagonally on those squares, with the lighter pieces going first.^[37] Men advance one square diagonally forward but capture by jumping forward or backward over an adjacent opponent's piece to an empty square beyond, enabling backward captures uncommon in some variants.^[37] Upon reaching the opponent's back row, a man becomes a king, which can then move and capture any number of squares diagonally forward or backward, functioning as a long-range piece.^[37] Captures are mandatory but allow player choice among equal options, and multi-capture sequences can promote a man to king mid-turn if it lands on the promotion row, continuing the sequence if possible.^[37] While the standard setup is uniform, some regional play incorporates column-specific piece arrangements for variety, though official rules maintain the conventional positioning.^[37] Victory is achieved by capturing all opponent's pieces or leaving them without legal moves.^[37] In African traditions, Fanorona from Madagascar exemplifies a culturally rooted variant with multi-directional capturing, diverging from board-based jumping mechanics toward line-based removals.^[38] Played on a 9×5 grid of points connected by lines (in the common Fanoron-Tsivy form), each player deploys 22 pieces filling the board except the center, with white moving first and all initial moves being captures.^[38] Non-capturing moves (paika) allow sliding one piece to an adjacent empty intersection along a line, but capturing is mandatory if available and occurs in two modes: by approach (moving next to an unbroken line of opponent's pieces to remove them) or by withdrawal (moving away from such a line to remove it).^[38] Captures can chain multiple times in a turn but prohibit revisiting points or repeating directions, emphasizing strategic positioning over simple jumps.^[38] This contact-based system, akin to but more fluid than checkers captures, aims to eliminate all opponent's pieces, with the game's depth arising from its interconnected board geometry.^[38]

Invented and Non-Traditional Variants

Breakthrough, invented by Dan Troyka in 2000, is an abstract strategy game that modifies traditional checkers mechanics on an 8x8 board to emphasize pawn promotion races.^[39] In this variant, each player starts with 16 pieces on the first two rows, and pieces move one square forward or diagonally forward to an empty space, or capture by advancing diagonally to replace an adjacent opponent's piece, removing it from the board.^[39] There are no kings or backward moves, and the objective is to reach any square on the opponent's back row with one piece, making draws impossible under perfect play.^[40] This design shifts focus from capturing all opponents to breakthrough advancement, rewarding aggressive forward play.^[39] Suicide checkers, also known as giveaway checkers or anti-checkers, inverts the standard winning condition while retaining core movement and capture rules on an 8x8 board.^[41] Players must capture when possible, but the goal is to lose all one's own pieces first or leave the opponent unable to move, often by maneuvering to force captures on vulnerable squares like 14 or 19 for black.^[41] Described by Richard L. Frey as a game of limited strategic depth, it disrupts conventional tactics by encouraging sacrificial positions over defensive ones.^[41] Dameo, a 2000 invention by Christian Freeling, reimagines Turkish draughts rules with orthogonal movements and captures on an 8x8 board, promoting fluidity in piece advancement.^[42] Men move one square orthogonally forward or sideways, while kings move any distance orthogonally; captures occur by short or long jumps orthogonally, with priority to multiple captures.^[42] Promotion happens upon reaching the opponent's back row, and the game ends by capturing all opponent pieces or immobilizing them.^[42] This variant draws from Turkish dama's sideways mobility but eliminates diagonal restrictions for broader tactical options.^[42] Hexdame, created by Christian Freeling in the early 1980s, adapts international draughts to a hexagonal board of 66 hexes, arranged in 11 rows of alternating lengths to counter draw-heavy play.^[43] Pieces move forward to adjacent hexes (up to three directions) and capture by jumping over an adjacent opponent to an empty hex beyond, with men unable to retreat until promoted.^[43] Kings move and capture in any direction any number of hexes, and the win condition mirrors standard draughts: capture all opponents or block moves.^[43] The hexagonal geometry introduces unique opposition dynamics and side-edge advances, distinguishing it from square-board traditions.^[43]

Naming and Cultural Aspects

Global Names and Terminology

The game known as checkers in the United States and draughts in the United Kingdom and other English-speaking countries outside North America reflects a key linguistic divide in Anglophone nomenclature.^[44]^[3] In the U.S., "checkers" emerged around 1712 as a reference to the checkered board on which the pieces are played.^[44] By contrast, the British term "draughts" dates to circa 1400, deriving from the Old English "dreaht" or "dræht," meaning a pull or drag, alluding to the movement of pieces across the board or an earlier association with chess moves involving drawing pieces.^[45] Globally, the game bears diverse names rooted in Romance languages, often centered on the concept of "ladies" or promoted pieces. In France, it is called "dames" or "jeu de dames," a term recorded as early as the late 14th century and linked to the promotion of pieces to queen-like status.^[45]^[3] The Swedish equivalent is "damspel," directly translating to "ladies' game," emphasizing similar promotional mechanics.^[46] In Russia and former Soviet states, the predominant variant is known as "shashki," a term specific to the 8x8 board version played there.^[47] Spanish- and Portuguese-speaking regions refer to it as "dama," again evoking the promoted piece, with this name applying to both standard and flying-king variants.^[48] Regional slang adds further variation, particularly in informal or variant-specific contexts. In the southeastern United States, especially among African American communities, the game is commonly called "pool checkers," a nod to its popularity in social settings like pool halls.^[21]^[49] In European contexts, particularly French-speaking areas, the 10x10 international variant is frequently termed "international dames," distinguishing it from smaller-board forms.^[50] These colloquialisms highlight how local culture and rule adaptations influence everyday terminology without altering the core game's identity.

Piece Designations and Strategies

In checkers, unpromoted pieces are designated as "men," while promoted pieces become "kings." Capturing occurs via a "jump," where a man or king leaps over an adjacent opponent's piece to an empty square beyond it, removing the jumped piece from the board; jumps are mandatory when available.^[51]^[52] A "multi-jump" extends this by allowing the capturing piece to continue jumping over additional opponent pieces in the same turn if possible, potentially chaining several captures.^[52] The term "fork" describes a tactical position where a single piece threatens to jump two or more opponent pieces simultaneously, forcing the defender into a disadvantageous response.^[53] Basic strategies in checkers emphasize control of the board's center for greater mobility and options, piece trades to gain advantage in kings or positioning, and early king development to dominate endgames.^[54]^[55] Cultural strategy literature from the mid-20th century, such as Millard Hopper's Win at Checkers (1956), popularized these terms and concepts among English-language players, illustrating forks and multi-jumps through annotated games to teach positional play.^[56] Across variants, terminology varies; for instance, in international draughts, the promoted piece is known as a "flying king," which moves any number of unoccupied squares diagonally, enhancing its strategic reach compared to the short-range kings in American checkers.^[57] The game has also appeared in Renaissance art as "jeu de dames," often symbolizing social interactions or courtly themes.^[58]

Competitive and Organizational Landscape

Major Championships

The World Checkers Championship in the 8x8 English draughts variant traces its origins to the mid-19th century, with informal competitions emerging in the 1840s among players in Britain and the United States. The first formal international match occurred in 1905 between representatives from Great Britain and the United States, establishing a tradition of title matches that evolved into recognized world championships across variations like 3-move restriction and go-as-you-please (GAYP). Notable champions include Alex Moiseyev of the United States, who dominated the 3-move world title from 2003 to 2013, securing five championships in 2002, 2003, 2005, 2009, and 2011, and also claimed the GAYP title after defeating Ron King of Barbados in 2000. Other prominent figures, such as Marion Tinsley, held multiple titles in the mid-20th century, underscoring the event's prestige in North American and British checkers circles.^[59]^[60]^[61] The International Draughts World Championship, governed by the World Draughts Federation (FMJD), began in 1885 with the inaugural tournament in Amiens, France, and has been held biennially since the late 19th century, primarily as matches or tournaments on the 10x10 board. Early dominance by French and Dutch players gave way to broader international participation after FMJD's formal organization in 1948. Recent men's winners include Yuriy Anikeev of Ukraine in 2023 via tournament in Curaçao, and Jan Groenendijk of the Netherlands, who claimed the title in both 2024 (match against Anikeev in the Netherlands) and 2025 (tournament in Yaoundé, Cameroon). In the women's division, Viktoriya Motrichko of Ukraine emerged as champion in 2025 during the event in Trinidad and Tobago, continuing a lineage of strong Eastern European and Central Asian competitors.^[62]^[63]^[64] The United States National Tournament, organized annually by the American Checker Federation (ACF), serves as a key domestic competition in English draughts, featuring divisions for 3-move, GAYP, and other formats since the early 20th century. It includes dedicated women's and junior events to promote inclusivity and youth development, with the National Youth Tournament held concurrently for players under 21. Recent 3-move winners include Alex Moiseyev in 2012 and co-champion Lubabalo Kondlo (South Africa) in 2014, while GAYP titles went to Richard Beckwith in 2013 and 2015; in 2025, Crispin Odhiambo claimed the 3-move national crown at the Vidor, Texas event. Women's highlights feature Wilma Wolverton as a multi-time champion in the early 2000s, and juniors like Yevhen Bohush, the 2024 US National Youth Champion. These tournaments culminate in qualifiers for world-level play, fostering a robust competitive pipeline.^[65]^[61]^[66] Post-COVID adaptations have influenced major checkers events, with federations like FMJD and ACF incorporating online formats for qualification and select championships in 2024 to accommodate global participation amid lingering travel restrictions. For instance, FMJD's 2024 world title match between Groenendijk and Anikeev utilized hybrid elements, while platforms hosted ongoing online tournaments that bridged in-person gaps; by 2025, most events reverted to fully in-person formats, such as the Yaoundé tournament, though digital tools persist for broader accessibility.^[63]^[67]

International Federations

The World Draughts Federation (FMJD), founded in September 1947 in Paris by the national federations of France, the Netherlands, Belgium, and Switzerland, acts as the principal international governing body for international draughts, also known as ten-by-ten checkers.^[62] It standardizes rules across member nations, regulates anti-doping through adherence to World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) principles, and promotes the sport by organizing world championships in categories such as men, women, youth, and veterans while pursuing Olympic recognition via affiliations with the International Mind Sports Association (IMSA).^[62] As of 2025, the FMJD includes 74 member federations representing over 80 countries.^[68] In the 2020s, the FMJD has emphasized digital transformation and inclusivity, launching an online portal for exclusive tournament registrations to streamline global participation and developing social programs with multilingual educational resources and low-cost online events to broaden accessibility for diverse players.^[69]^[70] In 2023, the federation relocated its headquarters to Lausanne, Switzerland, enhancing its administrative framework for international coordination.^[71] The American Checker Federation (ACF), formed in 1947 from the merger of the American Checker Association (established 1906) and a rival organization founded in 1937, serves as the primary U.S. body for English draughts, enforcing standardized rules and maintaining official player ratings.^[72] It promotes the game domestically through annual national and youth tournaments, a bimonthly bulletin featuring strategies and news, and international outreach to players in countries like Canada and Australia.^[65] The English Draughts Association (EDA), established in 1898 to advance draughts across British territories, functions as a longstanding authority for English draughts in the United Kingdom, organizing regional events and preserving historical playing conventions.^[73] Over its 125-year history, the EDA has focused on community engagement and rule consistency, supporting British participation in sanctioned international competitions.^[73]

Computational and Theoretical Dimensions

AI and Computer Programs

The development of artificial intelligence for checkers, particularly English draughts, has been a significant milestone in computer science, demonstrating advances in search algorithms, machine learning, and game-solving techniques. Early efforts in the 1980s and 1990s focused on heuristic search methods to create competitive programs, with checkers serving as a domain simpler than chess yet complex enough to challenge computational resources.^[74] The Chinook program, developed at the University of Alberta starting in 1989 under Jonathan Schaeffer, represents a landmark in checkers AI. Initially designed to defeat the human world champion, Chinook employed alpha-beta pruning and endgame databases to achieve superior play. In August 1994, it won the Man-Machine World Checkers Championship against reigning champion Marion Tinsley after six draws, when Tinsley forfeited due to illness, marking the first time a computer program defeated a human world champion in a board game.^[75] By 1996, Chinook was awarded the title of world man-machine champion, solidifying its dominance. A major achievement came in 2007, when the Chinook team announced that English draughts had been solved through exhaustive computation, proving that perfect play by both sides results in a draw. This involved 18 years of parallel computing to build endgame databases and prove the initial position is a draw with perfect play, evaluating approximately 10^{14} positions. The solution highlighted the practical challenges of checkers' vast state space, estimated at 10^20 positions.^[76] Post-2017 advancements have incorporated deep neural networks inspired by AlphaZero, which uses reinforcement learning and Monte Carlo tree search (MCTS) to self-train without human knowledge. For instance, adaptations for Russian checkers and international draughts have shown these methods achieving strong performance by evaluating board states through policy and value networks, often surpassing traditional engines in unseen positions.^[77] Since English draughts was solved, AI research has advanced engines for unsolved variants like international draughts, with programs such as Aurora Borealis achieving superhuman performance in championships as of 2025. In the 2020s, open-source and freeware engines like KingsRow, updated as recently as 2024, have integrated machine learning techniques such as neural networks for position evaluation, enabling high-level play in English and international variants.^[78] Milestones in accessibility include mobile applications that incorporate AI opponents for training, such as AI Factory's Checkers app, which offers adjustable difficulty levels, game review, and classic openings to help users improve strategy.^[79] By 2025, integrations with virtual reality platforms have emerged, allowing immersive AI versus human play; for example, the Backgammon, Chess & Checkers VR app on Meta Quest features AI opponents at varying difficulties in a 3D courtyard environment.^[80]

Game Complexity and Solvability

Checkers is a finite, impartial game of perfect information between two players, with no elements of chance, where the objective is to capture or block the opponent's pieces on a checkered board. The state-space complexity, representing the total number of reachable legal positions from the starting configuration, quantifies the scale of the game's positional variety. For English draughts—the predominant 8×8 variant also known as American checkers—this complexity is estimated at $5 \times 10^{20} positions, a figure derived from exhaustive computational analysis that accounts for board symmetries, piece promotions, and mandatory captures. In 2007, English draughts was weakly solved through a landmark computation by Jonathan Schaeffer and his team at the University of Alberta using the Chinook program, which exhaustively explored the game's database to determine that perfect play by both sides results in a draw from the standard opening position. This solution required evaluating approximately $10^{14} positions across 18 years of distributed computing, establishing checkers as the most complex popular board game solved to date under standard rules. The achievement highlights the feasibility of solving games with moderate state-space sizes using retrograde analysis, where endgame databases are built backward from terminal positions. International draughts, the 10×10 variant governed by the World Draughts Federation, presents significantly greater challenges and remains unsolved as of 2025, with ongoing human championships underscoring its open strategic depth. Its state-space complexity is estimated at approximately $10^{28} positions, over a million times larger than English draughts due to the expanded board and increased piece mobility, rendering full enumeration beyond current computational capabilities.^[81] From a theoretical perspective, generalized versions of checkers—allowing arbitrary board sizes n \times n—belong to the complexity class PSPACE-complete, meaning that determining the winner under optimal play requires polynomial space but potentially exponential time, as proven via reduction from known PSPACE-complete problems like Bipartite Planar Geography.^[82] This classification applies similarly to generalized draughts variants, emphasizing the inherent hardness of impartial capturing games even as specific instances like English draughts prove tractable.

Similar Capturing Games

Fox and Geese is an asymmetric capturing game typically played on a cross-shaped or radial board, where one player controls a single fox piece and the other manages multiple geese. The fox captures by jumping over an adjacent goose into an empty space beyond it, removing the jumped goose from the board, with multiple consecutive jumps permitted in a single turn if opportunities arise.^[83] This jumping mechanic parallels the capture system in checkers, though the geese cannot capture the fox and instead seek to block its movement through numerical superiority.^[84] Halma features a board with triangular home areas, where pieces advance toward the opponent's corner without capturing, but employ leaping moves over adjacent pieces—friendly or enemy—into vacant squares immediately beyond. Multiple leaps can chain together in one turn, changing directions freely, which resembles the multi-capture sequences in checkers but serves relocation rather than removal.^[85] In the Super Halma variant, leaps extend over pieces at any distance along a straight line, provided the landing mirrors the approach distance, further emphasizing extended jump chains without elimination.^[85] Lasca, invented by chess champion Emanuel Lasker in 1911, adapts checkers' jumping captures on an 11x11 board but introduces stacking: a capturing piece lands atop the opponent's, trapping only the top enemy piece while lower ones remain playable. Captures are mandatory, with multi-jumps required if available, directly mirroring checkers' compulsory huffing and removal enforcement to prevent missed opportunities.^[86] This creates dynamic sheep-like herding tactics, as stacked pieces influence future mobility without full board clearance. Modern hybrids like Hive, released in 2001, shift capturing to a tile-laying system on a hexagonal grid, where insect-themed pieces surround and immobilize opponents rather than jumping. Victory occurs by encircling the enemy's queen bee, preventing its movement, which evokes checkers' positional control but through adjacency and organic expansion instead of linear jumps.^[87]

Distinct but Overlapping Board Games

Backgammon is a two-player race game played on a board consisting of 24 triangular points arranged in four quadrants, where each player controls 15 pieces known as checkers that are moved according to dice rolls with the goal of bearing them off the board. Unlike checkers, which involves diagonal movement and capturing by jumping, backgammon emphasizes positioning, hitting opponents' checkers to send them to the bar, and re-entering them, with no promotion to "kings" but the use of a doubling cube—a die marked with powers of two—to propose increasing the stakes during play. This shared terminology of "checkers" for pieces and occasional inclusion in combined board game sets can lead to superficial confusion, though backgammon's linear layout and probabilistic elements make it mechanically distinct.^[88]^[89] Chinese Checkers, despite its name, is an abstract strategy game for two to six players on a hexagonal star-shaped board with 121 positions, using colored marbles that players advance toward the opposite star point by single steps or non-capturing hops over adjacent pieces. Originating as Stern-Halma in Germany in 1892—a multi-player adaptation of the earlier game Halma—it was renamed "Chinese Checkers" in 1928 by American publishers Bill and Jack Pressman as an exotic marketing tactic, unrelated to traditional checkers or Chinese origins, leading to widespread misidentification as a checkers variant in the United States due to the inclusion of "checkers" and visually similar round pieces. The game's lack of captures, removal of pieces, or adversarial jumping mechanics further distinguishes it, focusing instead on efficient pathfinding and blocking.^[90]^[91] Parcheesi, often regionally known as Ludo, is a four-player race game adapted from the ancient Indian Pachisi, featuring a cross-shaped board with 68 spaces, colored home areas, and safe zones, where players roll dice to propel four pawns around the perimeter to their goal, permitting stacking of multiple pawns on safe squares for protection against opponents' captures by landing on the same space. This visual overlap with checkers—through the use of disc-like pawns that can occupy shared spaces and frequent bundling in reversible or multi-game wooden sets—occasionally results in mistaken assumptions of similarity, but Parcheesi prioritizes dice-driven progression, home entry requirements, and non-diagonal movement without the jumping captures central to checkers.^[92]^[93]

References

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No information is available for this page. · Learn why
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ACF Rules for National Tournaments
### Summary of Standard Checkers Rules per ACF (Based on WCDF Rules)
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Draughts-64 in Brazil started to develop in the 30s of the twentieth century. Players played on a board 8 X 8 to the rules of draughts 10 X 10. The game became ...Missing: authoritative sources
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### Capturing Mechanics in English Draughts (Checkers)
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White is threatening to exchange piece <30>, with an easy win. As soon as black's pieces are on <36, 31 & 27> white uses Zugzwang by going to <32>.
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Classic games brought over from England, Europe and Asia included The Game of Goose, Fox and Geese, Mancala, and of course, checkers, chess, and backgammon.
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Turkish Draughts - MindSports
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### Rules for Russian Draughts
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checkers(n.) U.S. name for the game known in Britain as draughts, 1712, from plural of checker (n.1). So called for the board on which the game is played.
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Shashki is the traditional Checkers game of Russia and the parentgame of Bashni, the first column checkers game.
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Dama (Spanish / Portuguese Draughts) - MindSports
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Piece: A man or a king. This term is ordinarily applied to a single piecerather than to a king, which is a crowned piece. Circumlocution is frequently.
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None
### Summary of Recent US National Tournament Winners (3-Move, GAYP, Women’s, Junior) up to 2025
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FMJD - World Draughts Federation
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All registrations for FMJD tournaments will now be conducted exclusively online through our newly activated digital portal.Missing: certification inclusivity
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### Rules Regarding Jumps and Multi-Jumps in Halma
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30-day returnsThe portable chinese checkers game set includes clear instructions for each game, ensuring that players of all ages can easily learn and have fun. The ludo ...