← Play Charbhar
How to play Charbhar · चर-भर
An old two-player strategy game from Haryana. “Char” (चर) is to capture, “Bhar” (भर) is to fill. The board is almost full, one place is empty, and every move matters.
The goal
Capture all of your opponent's pieces, or leave them with no move they can make. Players can also agree to a draw, and either player can resign.
The board and the start
- Pieces sit on the crossing points of the lines, not in the squares. The board is 5×5, 7×7, 9×9 or 11×11.
- On a 7×7 board 48 of the 49 points are filled: 24 pieces each. Only the centre point is empty.
- Red (player 1) fills the top half, Blue (player 2) the bottom half. The middle row is split: left of the centre is Red, right of it is Blue.
- Red moves first.
Moving and capturing
- Move: one step along a drawn line to an empty point next to your piece. No line, no move.
- Capture: if an enemy piece is next to yours along a line and the point right behind it, on the same line, is empty, jump over it, land there, and the enemy piece is removed. You may capture in any direction a line allows, backwards too.
- Chain: after a capture, if your piece can capture again from where it landed, you may keep going in the same turn, always with the same piece. Capturing is never forced, so you can stop whenever you like.
The Veer ⚡ (वीर, the warrior)
- A piece that reaches the opponent's last row becomes a Veer, shown with a V.
- A Veer can move one or two steps in a turn along a line. A two-step move passes over one empty point.
- A Veer can also capture from two steps away: your Veer, an empty point, an enemy, then an empty landing point, all on one line.
- A Veer is captured like any other piece. If a piece becomes a Veer in the middle of a chain, it carries on with Veer powers.
Board types
- Square:
- horizontal and vertical lines only.
- Diamond:
- the square board plus four long diagonal lines joining the middle of each side.
- Full diagonal:
- every point is joined to all eight neighbours.
- Star:
- the corners are cut off, and two diagonal lines cross the board.
Playing online
- Guests can play with a name of their choice. Guest games are never saved and have no rating.
- Signed-in players have their games saved (you can replay them) and a rating that starts at 1000. A win by capture or blockade is +15 and a loss is −10. If a game ends by resignation, the winner gets +10 and the loser −10. A draw changes nothing.
- A game between a guest and a signed-in player is not saved and not rated for either of them. Only signed-in players appear on the leaderboard.
- Time per turn: if the clock runs out, the turn is skipped. Either player can ask to change the timer; the opponent has to accept.
- Undo, draw and pause need the opponent to agree. Against the computer, undo is instant.
- A game with no move for 20 minutes is closed, unless both players paused it.
- Anyone can watch a live game and chat with the other watchers. Players chat with each other.