Dai dai shogi
Dai dai shōgi is a large board variant of shogi. The game dates back to the 15th century and is based on the earlier dai shogi. Apart from its size, the major difference is in the range of the pieces and the "promotion by capture" rule. It is the smallest board variant to use this rule.
Because of the terse and often incomplete wording of the historical sources for the large shogi variants, except for chu shogi and to a lesser extent dai shogi, the historical rules of dai dai shogi are not clear. Different sources often differ significantly in the moves attributed to the pieces, and the degree of contradiction is such that it is likely impossible to reconstruct the "true historical rules" with any degree of certainty, if there ever was such a thing. It is not clear if the game was ever played much historically, as the few sets that were made seem to have been intended only for display.
Rules of the game
Objective
The objective is to capture the opponent's king. Unlike standard shogi, pieces may not be dropped back into play after being captured.Game equipment
Two players, Black and White, play on a board composed of squares in a grid of 17 ranks by 17 files'' with a total of 289 squares. The squares are undifferentiated by marking or color.Each player has a set of 96 wedge-shaped pieces of 64 different types. In all, the players must remember 68 different moves. The pieces are of slightly different sizes, from largest to smallest they are:
- 1 King
- 1 Queen
- 1 Rushing bird
- 1 Free demon
- 1 Free dream-eater
- 1 Water buffalo
- 1 Dragon king
- 1 Dragon horse
- 1 Square mover
- 1 Racing chariot
- 1 Rook
- 1 Bishop
- 1 Golden bird
- 1 Great dragon
- 1 Standard bearer
- 1 Fragrant elephant
- 1 White elephant
- 1 Lion
- 1 Lion dog
- 1 Dove
- 1 She-devil
- 1 Blue dragon
- 1 White tiger
- 1 Right chariot
- 1 Left chariot
- 1 Phoenix
- 1 Kirin
- 1 Poisonous snake
- 1 Old kite
- 2 Violent oxen
- 1 Flying dragon
- 1 Enchanted fox
- 1 Old rat
- 1 Enchanted badger
- 1 Flying horse
- 1 Prancing stag
- 2 Savage tigers
- 1 Hook mover
- 1 Long-nosed goblin
- 1 Northern barbarian
- 1 Southern barbarian
- 1 Eastern barbarian
- 1 Western barbarian
- 1 Neighboring king
- 1 Blind monkey
- 2 Ferocious leopards
- 2 Evil Wolves
- 2 Violent bears
- 1 Right general
- 1 Left general
- 2 Gold generals
- 2 Silver generals
- 2 Copper generals
- 2 Iron generals
- 2 Wood generals
- 2 Stone generals
- 2 Angry boars
- 1 Cat sword
- 2 Reverse chariots
- 2 Lances
- 2 Side movers
- 1 Vertical mover
- 2 Howling Dogs
- 17 Pawns
Each piece has its name in the form of two Japanese characters marked on its face. On the reverse side of some pieces are one or two other characters, often in a different color ; this reverse side is used to indicate that the piece has been promoted during play. The pieces of the two sides do not differ in color, but instead each piece is shaped like a wedge, and faces forward, toward the opposing side. This shows who controls the piece during play.
Listed below are the pieces of the game and, if they promote, which pieces they promote to.
Table of pieces
Relatively few pieces promote in dai dai shogi. A few pieces only appear upon promotion.† The first kanji of Howling Dog may not appear in some fonts. It is a combined 口 and 奇.
‡ The great elephant is mentioned as the promoted lion dog in the Shōgi Rokushu no Zushiki, but not in the other two Edo-era sources, when the lion dog does not promote.
†† The second character in 'wizard stork' is not present in most fonts: it should be 而 atop 鷦.
Setup
Below is a diagram showing the setup of one player's pieces. The way one player sees their own pieces is the same way the opposing player will see their pieces.Game play
The players alternate making a move, with Black moving first. A move consists of moving a piece on the board and potentially promoting the piece. Each of these options is detailed below.Promotion
Unusually for a large-board shogi variant, only a minority of pieces are able to promote. The rule for promotion in these larger games is different from smaller board variants.A piece promotes at the end of its first move to make a capture. Promotion has the effect of changing how the piece moves, and is effected by turning the piece over after it moves, revealing the name of its promoted rank. Promotion for pieces able to do so is both compulsory and permanent.
This is very different from smaller shogi variants, where pieces promote when they cross a promotion zone, and where promotion is optional. The dots on the dai dai shogi board that would represent promotion zones in other games only function as placement guides for the initial setup of the two camps.
Most promoting pieces promote to a piece that exists in the initial setup of the board. However, such a promoted piece cannot then promote a second time as its namesake does. For example, a lion promotes to a furious fiend. However, while an eastern barbarian promotes to a lion on its first capturing move, it does not further promote to a furious fiend on its second. Rather, it remains a lion for the rest of the game. This should be obvious from the game pieces, which only have two sides.
If a piece which is only able to move forward reaches the far rank, it is unable to move further and must remain there until captured.
Movement and capture
An opposing piece is captured by displacement: That is, if a piece moves to a square occupied by an opposing piece, the opposing piece is displaced and removed from the board. A piece cannot move to a square occupied by a friendly piece.Each piece on the game moves in a characteristic pattern. Pieces move either orthogonally, or diagonally. The lion, lion dog, and furious fiend are exceptions, in that they do not move, or are not required to move, in a straight line.
If a piece that cannot retreat or move aside advances across the board until it can no longer move, it must remain there until captured. This applies to the pawn, lance, stone general, wood general, and iron general.
Many pieces are capable of several kinds of movement, with the type of movement most often depending on the direction in which they move. The movement categories are:
Step movers
Some pieces move only one square at a time.Limited ranging pieces
Some pieces can move along a limited number of free squares along a straight line in certain directions. Other than the limited distance, they move like ranging pieces.Jumping pieces
Several pieces can jump, that is, they can pass over any intervening piece, whether friend or foe, with no effect on either. These are the lion, kirin, phoenix, and possibly the poisonous snake.Ranging pieces
Many pieces can move any number of empty squares along a straight line, limited only by the edge of the board. If an opposing piece intervenes, it may be captured by moving to that square and removing it from the board. A ranging piece must stop where it captures, and cannot bypass a piece that is in its way. If a friendly piece intervenes, the moving piece is limited to a distance that stops short of the intervening piece; if the friendly piece is adjacent, it cannot move in that direction at all.Hook moves (changing tack)
The hook mover and long-nosed goblin can move any number of squares along a straight line, as a normal ranging piece, but may also abruptly change tack left or right by 90° at any one place along the route, and then continue as a ranging piece. Turning a corner like this is optional.The range covered by a hook move is the equivalent of two moves by a rook, or two moves by a bishop, depending the piece. However, a hook move is functionally a single move: The piece cannot capture twice in one move, nor may it capture and then move on. It must stop before an intervening piece, and must stop when it captures, just like any other ranging piece. It can only change direction once per move.
Lion moves (multiple captures)
The lion, lion dog, and furious fiend have sequential multiple-capture abilities, called "lion moves". The details of these powerful moves are described for the lion, below.Individual pieces
In the diagrams below, the different types of moves are coded by symbol and by color: Blue for step moves, yellow for jumps, green for multiple capture, and gray for range moves, as follows:Piece names with a grey background are present at the start of the game; the four with a blue background only appear with promotion. Betza's funny notation has been included in brackets for easier reference, with the extension that the notation xxxayyyK stands for an xxxK move possibly followed by an yyyK move, not necessarily in the same direction. By default continuation legs can go into all directions, but can be restricted to a single line by a modifier 'v'. The default modality of all legs is the ability to move and capture: other possibilities are specified explicitly. Thus while aK moves twice as a king and can capture on both its moves, mKaK moves twice as a king but must stop when it captures.
| King 玉将 gyokushō | King 王将 ōshō | - | - | - | - | - | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Check and mateWhen a player makes a move such that the opponent's king could be captured on the following move, the move is said to give check to the king; the king is said to be in check. If a player's king is in check and no legal move by that player will get the king out of check, the checking move is also a mate, and effectively wins the game.A player is not allowed to give perpetual check, or perpetually chase enemy pieces. Game endA player who captures the opponent's king wins the game. In practice this rarely happens; a player will resign when loss is inevitable and the king will be taken on the opponent's next move because of the tradition that it is seen as an embarrassment to lose.A player who makes an illegal move loses immediately. If the same position occurs four times with the same player to play, then the game is no contest. Game notationThe method used in English-language texts to express shogi moves was established by George Hodges in 1976. It is derived from the algebraic notation used for chess, but differs in several respects. Modifications have been made for dai dai shogi.A typical example is P-8g. The first letter represents the piece moved. Promoted pieces have a + added in front of the letter.. The designation of the piece is followed by a symbol indicating the type of move: - for an ordinary move or x for a capture. Next is the designation for the square on which the piece lands. This consists of a number representing the file and a lowercase letter representing the rank, with 1a being the top right corner and 17q being the bottom left corner. If a lion captures by 'igūi’, the square of the piece being captured is used instead of the destination square, and this is preceded by the symbol '!'. If a double capture is made, than it is added after the first capture. If a capture mandates the player to promote the piece, then a + is added to the end to signify that the promotion was taken. For example, CSx7c+ indicates a cat sword capturing on 7c and promoting. In cases where the above notation would be ambiguous, the designation of the start square is added after the designation for the piece in order to make clear which piece is meant. Moves are commonly numbered as in chess. StrategyPiece valuesAccording to the German Chu Shogi Association, the average values of the pieces are :
These average values do not take into account the special status of the king as a royal piece. They have also been normalized so that the pawn is worth 1 point to avoid fractions. Additionally, pieces gain in value if they have a good chance of promotion. This is particularly significant for the old kite and poisonous snake, which promote to the two most powerful pieces in the game. |