Protogilt

Board & Setup

8×4 board, 16 pieces per side, 32 in total. All pieces start face-down. The first player to flip a piece claims that color — Red vs Black.

Pieces & Rank

Red: General (帥), Advisor (仕), Elephant (相), Chariot (俥), Horse (傌), Cannon (炮), Soldier (兵)

Black: General (將), Advisor (士), Elephant (象), Chariot (車), Horse (馬), Cannon (包), Soldier (卒)

Both sides share the same rank order, from highest to lowest: General, Advisor, Elephant, Chariot, Horse, Cannon, Soldier.

Movement

On each turn, you may either move one of your revealed pieces or flip a face-down piece. A piece moves one step orthogonally — up, down, left, or right.

Capture Rules

A higher-ranked piece captures a lower-ranked one. When equal ranks meet, the attacker wins.

General cannot capture Soldier; Soldier can capture General. Soldier is the lowest rank and cannot capture Cannon.

Cannon cannot capture directly. It must jump over exactly one piece to capture, with no rank restriction.

Special Rules

Chariot Rush (車直衝): The Chariot may move multiple steps in a straight line and capture an enemy piece at the end, ignoring rank restrictions. When only one step away, normal rank rules apply.

Cannon Leap (炮翻山): The Cannon may jump over one piece to land on any empty square in a straight line, and may also jump to capture any enemy piece regardless of rank.

Victory

Eliminate all of your opponent's pieces to win.