Spanish Draughts

Spanish Draughts

Spain’s national variant combining flying kings with the majority capture rule and a preference for capturing kings over men when chains are equal. Notable for its board orientation: the white square is at each player’s bottom-right (opposite to English Draughts).

Setup

Board: 8×8 checkered board, dark squares only. Oriented with a white (light) square at each player’s bottom-right corner.

Pieces: 12 men per player on dark squares of the three nearest rows.

First move: White moves first.

Rules

• Men movement: Men move diagonally forward only, one square at a time.
• Men capture: Men capture diagonally forward only by jumping. Men CANNOT capture backwards.
• Mandatory capture: Captures are compulsory.
• Majority rule with king preference: When multiple capture sequences are available:
  1. Must choose the sequence capturing the most pieces.
  2. If tied on quantity, must choose the sequence capturing the most kings.
• Immediate removal: Captured pieces are removed immediately.

King Promotion

• Flying kings: Kings move any number of unoccupied squares diagonally in any direction.
• King capture: Kings capture by jumping over a single opponent piece at any distance along a diagonal, landing on any open square beyond.
• Promotion rule: A man reaching the back row is promoted to a king. If a man reaches the back row during a multi-jump, the sequence ends and it is promoted.

Winning

A player wins when their opponent has no legal move: all pieces captured or all pieces blocked.

Draws

The game is a draw when:

• Both players agree.
• The same position occurs three times.
• 20 consecutive king moves pass with no capture.

Strategy

The king preference in the majority rule creates forced-capture traps: arrange a position where your opponent must capture your king (because it makes the chain “higher value”) while this opens a devastating counter-attack. Flying kings combined with no backward capture for men means promoting first gives a decisive strategic advantage.

Attribution

Traditional variant. Public domain. Governed by the Federación Española de Damas. Source: Wikipedia (CC-BY-SA).