The Fork

A fork is a tactic in which a single piece attacks two or more of the opponent's pieces simultaneously, threatening to capture at least one of them on the next move.

Any piece that can attack two or more spots at the same time can perform a fork. Therefore, other than soldiers that have not yet crossed the river, all pieces in Xiangqi can perform a fork.

There are generally three types of forks in Xiangqi:

1.      Horizontal fork

2.     Vertical fork

3. Diagonal fork

In the following example, the black H2 cannon and H4 horse are too close to each other, red can perform a horizontal fork by moving the G3 soldier to H3.

After the move, the red pawn is attacking the black cannon and black horse simultaneously. If black chooses to move away the cannon, then its H4 horse would be captured; if black tries to rescue its horse, then its cannon will be captured. Black is destined to lose a piece.

In the following example, we can move the red cannon from G3 to G5, which attacks the general and the black chariot at the same time.

After this move, black must defend his general, then red can capture his chariot effortlessly. When using a fork, it is usually a good idea to target your opponent’s general, as this forces our opponent to save his general and give up the other piece.

In this example, red can perform a diagonal fork by moving the horse from f6 to e4.

This diagonal fork attacks both black chariots. No matter which chariot black decides to defend, red can always capture the other chariot.

In this Xiangqi tutorial, we talked about the fork, which is a strategy in xiangqi that involves attacking two or more pieces at once with a single piece, creating a situation where the opponent must choose which piece to give up. If we familiarize ourselves with the fork, then we can easily spot opportunities to increase our advantage in the game.

Below is an exercise on fork. Challenge yourself with the puzzle to apply what you have learnt in the tutorial!

Practice makes perfect!