Draughts glossary: the words used on this site

These are the words this site uses on its boards, in its lessons and beside its ratings. Each one has a short definition and a pointer to the page that explains it properly. Where the four rule sets disagree, the entry says so.

The pieces

• Man. The piece each side starts with: twelve on the 8×8 board, twenty on the 10×10 board. It moves one empty square diagonally forward. In American checkers it also captures forward only; in Brazilian, International and Russian draughts it captures forward and backward. See your first game.
• King. A man that has been crowned. It moves and captures along the diagonals in every direction. See four rule sets compared for how far it goes in each.
• Short king. The American king. It moves one square at a time in any diagonal direction, and captures by jumping a neighbouring piece to the empty square just beyond. See how to play American checkers.
• Flying king. The king of the other three rule sets. It travels any distance along an empty diagonal, and captures by crossing one opposing piece and landing on a free square beyond it. If one of those landings lets the capture go on, it must stop on one that does. See getting and using a king.

Captures

• Compulsory capture. In all four rule sets, when you can capture you must, and the moves on offer are then captures only. This is the usual reason a move is refused, as the questions page explains.
• Majority rule. Also called the most pieces rule. In Brazilian and International draughts you must choose the capture that takes the most pieces. A king counts as one piece, the same as a man, and among equal captures you choose freely. American and Russian have no such rule: you may take any capture on offer. See how to play Brazilian draughts.
• Multiple capture. A capture that goes on from its landing square. It must be completed, the captured pieces come off only when the move ends, and none can be jumped twice. See notation for how each rule set writes one.
• Shot. Giving up one or more men on purpose, so that the compulsory replies set up a larger capture of your own. The Combination theme in the puzzle trainer is built on this idea. See forcing captures.

The board and the end of the game

• King row. The far row where a man is crowned: squares 1 to 4 for White on the 8×8 board and 1 to 5 on the 10×10 board; squares 29 to 32 or 46 to 50 for Black. A man that reaches it in the middle of a capture is crowned and stops in American, is crowned only if the capture ends there in Brazilian and International, and is crowned and goes on as a king in Russian. See how to play Russian draughts.
• Long diagonal. The longest diagonal on the board: a1 to h8 on the 8×8 board, square 46 to square 5 on the 10×10 board. Some endgame draw limits depend on a lone king holding it. See draws and endgames.
• Blockade. A position where a side has pieces left but no legal move. If it is that side's turn, it loses, and no capture is needed. See winning by blockade.

Records

• Ply. One move by one side. Two plies make one full move, so when a draw rule counts 40 moves it means 40 by each player, or 80 plies. See draws and endgames.
• FEN. One line of text that records a position: who is to move and which squares each side holds. See notation.
• PDN. A text file that records a whole game: tags such as the players and the rule set, then the moves. You can download one from a finished game and paste its text into the analysis board. See notation.

Ratings and clocks

• Rating. The number that estimates your level from rated games between accounts. The server computes it with Glicko-2, starting at 1500, and you hold a separate rating for each rule set and time category. The numbers beside the computer opponents are labels, not ratings. See the questions page.
• Provisional rating. A rating whose deviation, the measure of how unsure it is, is still above 110. Deviation starts at 350, and a profile marks the rating Provisional until it falls that far. See the questions page.
• Time categories. Live clocks are sorted by an estimate in seconds: the starting time plus 40 times the increment. Under 180 is bullet, under 480 is blitz, under 1500 is rapid, and anything else is classical. So 5 minutes plus 3 seconds a move comes to 300 plus 120, or 420, which is blitz. A game with a day or more for each move is daily. The leaderboards keep one table per rule set and category.
• Arena tournament. For a set time, you are paired again as soon as your game ends. A win scores 2, a draw scores 1, and only games that end before the tournament does are counted. See tournaments.

The lessons put most of these words on a board, one step at a time.