Rules

Board and setup

The board is eight rows by nine columns. Each player secretly arranges 21 pieces in their nearest three rows, leaving six squares empty.

Movement and combat

Players alternate moving one piece one square orthogonally. Friendly pieces block movement. Moving onto an enemy starts a challenge. The stronger rank survives on the contested square; equal ranks remove both. An attacking flag captures a defending flag.

Special ranks

The spy defeats every officer and loses to a private. The private loses to every officer. The flag loses to every non-flag rank.

Winning

Capture the enemy flag, leave the opponent without a legal move, or have your flag reach the farthest row and survive the opponent's next turn. Resignation and clock expiry also end a timed game.

Henerals online draw rules

Three repetitions of the full position draw automatically. So do 100 consecutive moves without a challenge. Mutual draw offers become available after each player has moved ten times.

Scope

These are Henerals online rules. They are not presented as official tournament certification. Historical tournament formats used separate timing and adjudication rules; see history and sources.