Learn the hunt.
Bagh-Chal is a traditional strategy game from Nepal.
The essentials
Four tigers start in the corners; twenty goats begin off-board. Goats start, then turns alternate. Play on intersections, along drawn lines.
Place one goat per turn until all twenty have entered. Afterwards, goats step to an empty neighboring point. Captured goats do not return.
Tigers step or jump straight over one goat to an empty point beyond, following connected lines. Remove that goat. Captures are optional, never chained.
Tigers win by capturing five goats. Goats win by leaving all four tigers without a legal move.
Core rules: UC Berkeley GamesCrafters. Optional single captures follow this arcade's explicit playing profile.
One turn, one connection. Goats can do this only in the movement phase.
The landing must be empty. Only the goat in the middle is captured.
This arcade's playing profile
Traditional games have variants. Our engine uses the following explicit choices; they are not a claim of universal tournament rules.
- Connected diagonals only. The board draws every allowed path. Horizontal and vertical neighbors connect everywhere; diagonal connections start at intersections whose row and column sum is even.
- No repeated movement-phase position. Once every goat is placed, an action may not recreate a recorded movement-phase board with the same side to move. This is our precise implementation of the anti-repetition convention described by Ludoteka.
- A blocked side loses. The player to move must have a legal action. This also resolves a goat blockade and a position where repetition removes every available action.
- 400 total plies. If no winner has emerged after 400 individual turns, the game is drawn. This is an online house limit, not a traditional rule.
- Agreement and resignation. Online opponents may agree to a draw. Either player may resign. Computer tables have resignation but no negotiated draws.
Your first table
Choose a friend or the computer, then goats or tigers. A friend receives the opposite side. Goats always start—even if the computer controls them. The difficulty scale runs from 400 to 2400 in steps of 100; these are approximate labels, not independently measured Elo ratings.
Click a gold point to place a goat. To move, select one of your pieces, then a gold destination. Arrow keys navigate the board; Enter or Space activates a point. The server supplies every legal destination and checks every action.
Your opponent link takes the unoccupied seat; your spectator link opens the gallery. You can reserve zero to twelve spectator seats. Keep invitation links private. Refreshing this tab reconnects your seat; choosing “New table” forgets it here.
Ready to play →