From the standard starting position, both players can guarantee a draw with perfect play. Canadian checkers and Singaporean/Malaysian checkers (also locally known as dum) are played on a 12×12 board.Įnglish draughts was weakly solved in 2007 by a team of Canadian computer scientists led by Jonathan Schaeffer. There are many other variants played on 8×8 boards.
The most popular forms are English draughts, also called American checkers, played on an 8×8 checkerboard Russian draughts, Turkish draughts both on an 8x8 board, and International draughts, played on a 10×10 board. The name 'draughts' derives from the verb to draw or to move, whereas 'checkers' derives from the checkered board which the game is played on.
Starting position for English draughts on an 8×8 draughts boardĬasual games usually last 10 to 30 minutes tournament games last anywhere from about 60 minutes to 3 hours or more.ĭraughts ( / d r ɑː f t s, d r æ f t s/ British English) or checkers ( American English) is a group of strategy board games for two players which involve diagonal moves of uniform game pieces and mandatory captures by jumping over opponent pieces.
