---
title: Blind Chess (Banqi)
slug: blind-chess
board: "4×8"
players: "2"
parent: chess
win: Capture all opponent's face-up pieces (opponent with no legal moves loses)
special: "Chinese hidden-piece game (Banqi, 暗棋) played on a 4×8 board (half a Xiangqi board). All 32 pieces placed face-down randomly. Each turn: flip a piece, move a piece, or capture. Piece ranks are unknown until revealed. Capture hierarchy: General defeats all except Soldier; Soldier defeats General. Cannon captures by jumping over exactly one screen (Taiwanese rules)."
engine:
  topology:
    type: grid
    rows: 8
    cols: 4
  players: [white, black]
  setup: "????/????/????/????/????/????/????/????"
---

## Blind Chess (Banqi)

{{svg:blind-chess-board.svg "Blind Chess (Banqi) — starting position"}}

Banqi (半棋, bànqí, “Half Chess”), also known as Dark Chess (暗棋) or Blind Chess, is a two-player Chinese board game played on a 4×8 grid — one half of the Xiangqi board. All 32 pieces are placed face-down at the start; players reveal pieces one at a time and the identity of unrevealed pieces is unknown. The rules documented here follow the Taiwanese version, which is widely played.

### The Board

4 files × 8 ranks = 32 squares. Pieces occupy the squares (not intersections). The board is played as half of a Xiangqi board, using only one side of the river.

### Setup

All 32 pieces are shuffled and placed face-down one per square in a random arrangement. Neither player knows what piece is on which square.

**Piece set (16 Red + 16 Black = 32 total):**

| Piece | Count per side |
|---|---|
| General (帥/將) | 1 |
| Advisor (仕/士) | 2 |
| Elephant (相/象) | 2 |
| Chariot (俥/車) | 2 |
| Horse (傌/馬) | 2 |
| Cannon (炮/砲) | 2 |
| Soldier (兵/卒) | 5 |
| **Total** | **16** |

The first player to flip a piece establishes their colour for the game (Red or Black, depending on the colour of the piece revealed).

### Turns

On each turn a player does exactly one of:

1. **Flip** a face-down piece, revealing it. The piece belongs to whichever colour it shows, regardless of who flipped it.
2. **Move** one of their own face-up pieces one square orthogonally (up, down, left, or right) to an empty adjacent square.
3. **Capture** an opponent’s face-up piece, subject to the capture rules below.

Face-down pieces cannot be captured.

### Movement

**All pieces move identically: one square up, down, left, or right.** There is no piece-specific movement in Banqi — the General, Soldier, and every piece in between all move the same way. The Cannon’s capture is the only exception.

### Capture Hierarchy (Taiwanese rules)

Pieces are ranked. A piece may only capture an opponent’s piece of **equal or lower rank**, with two exceptions:

**Hierarchy (high to low):** General → Advisor → Elephant → Chariot → Horse → Soldier

**Exception 1 — Soldier captures General:** Despite being the lowest rank, the Soldier can capture the General (and only the General with this rule). The General cannot capture Soldiers.

**Exception 2 — Cannon:** The Cannon is not part of the hierarchy. It captures any piece of any rank, but **must jump over exactly one intervening piece** (the “screen”) to do so. The screen piece may be friendly, enemy, or face-down. A Cannon cannot capture an adjacent piece (it must jump). The Cannon is vulnerable to capture by any piece except the Soldier.

### Win Condition

The game ends when a player has no legal moves. This most commonly occurs because all of that player’s pieces have been captured. The player with no legal moves **loses**.

### Stalemate

If one player repeatedly attacks an enemy piece it cannot capture, forcing an endless cycle (stalemate), rules vary by convention. Under Chinese Chess rules the instigating player must stop; under many casual rules, a stalemate results in a draw or the surrender of one piece to break it.

### Attribution

Banqi is a traditional Chinese game. Rules from en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Banqi.