Your objective is to move all of your marbles from your colored triangle to the colored triangle opposite you. But wait … What is the objective?īefore you start moving your pieces around the board, you need to know where and why you’re moving them. Now, simply toss a coin to determine who makes the first move and it’s game on. You are done setting up and ready to play. There are different ways of playing depending on how many players are in each game, but we’ll cover those details more below. Just place the board in front of you and fill in the colored triangles with their corresponding color for as many players as are playing – between two and six. The hexagon’s outer edges are made up of five marble holes from each of the star points. The board is in the shape of a six-pointed star with each point assigned a different color.Įach of these points has ten pegs or marble holes to place your pieces and face one another from across a hexagonal field of additional marble holes. Set up is as easy as saying “Chinese Checkers”. It was, in fact, invented in Germany in 1892) The Easy Set-Up (Trivia fact: Chinese Checkers does not originate from China.
Because we are going to be teaching you how to play. Well, blow the dust off that old board and pull up a seat. What are the rules to Chinese Checkers and how do you play? Or, perhaps you’ve never played it before and want to learn this game with its intriguing looking game board. He is then declared the winner.So you’ve found that old Chinese Checkers board you had as a kid and want to play, but you can’t remember how to play. The game is over when a player has moved all of his pieces into the point opposite where he began. All pieces stay on the board throughout the game.ħ. Jumping over an opponent's piece does not capture it.
Further jumps may optionally be made by this piece in the same turn, to whatever number the player pleases, while the piece is in a position to do so.Ħ. a piece may jump over a single adjacent piece of any colour, in any of the six directions, into the empty space beyond. a piece may be moved to an adjacent playing space. A player takes his turn by moving one of his pieces in one of the following ways: (i). Play then moves clockwise around the board.ĥ. Players decide, at random or by agreement, who takes the first turn. Six players occupy every point of the star.Ĥ. When two play, they start opposite one another three players occupy alternate points of the star so that no player starts directly opposite another four players occupy positions in which each player is opposite another. Each player starts with ten pieces, arranged in one of the points of the star.ģ. Chinese checkers is played on a star-shaped board, of 121 points.Ģ. As the game is neither a variant of checkers nor is it Chinese, this is a fine example of the irony of commercial marketing! In the United States this game became Chinese checkers. This had a star-shaped board, rather than the square board of halma, but the rules were largely unchanged. In 1892 another variant was published in Germany, called Stern-Halma. In 1948 a variant called grasshopper was published, allowing play with a standard draughts set. An 18th century gaming board marked out like a halma board suggests it may have earlier origins, but it was not until the 1880s that it was published and came to the attention of the wider world. The game of halma, whose name means "jump" in Greek, is an entertaining product of the Victorian era. History of Halma, Grasshopper and Chinese Checkers It is in the construction of long "ladders" of pieces that may be jumped that a player gets ahead in the game.
Pieces move to adjacent spaces, but may also jump over one another like in draughts (though without capturing). Players race their pieces from their starting positions, across the board to the opposite end. Unlike most race games, performance is dictated completely by skill rather than any luck element. Chinese checkers, made by Jaques of London.Ĭhinese checkers is a race game for two, three, four or six players.