Chariot against horse and two advisors is a book win, and one of the most misplayed endings at club level. The winning method, the full-guard fortress to avoid, and the drills that lock it into memory.
The classical endgame treatises give a short verdict on this material balance: a lone chariot beats a horse with two advisors (单车胜马双士), provided the attacking side keeps its own General safe and knows the method. Add two elephants to the defence, so that the horse is backed by the full guard of two advisors and two elephants, and the same chariot can only draw.
That difference is the whole story of this ending. With elephants, the horse always has a safe square to return to and the advisors are never short of protection. Without them, the defending pieces have to protect each other, and the chariot can always attack the one that is doing the protecting.
Step one: put your General to work
The attacking General is not a bystander. The flying-general rule means the two Generals cannot face each other on an open file, so a General placed on the central file takes that file away from the enemy General and pins any defender that stands between them. In a chariot ending the first move is often not a chariot move at all: it is a General step to the side of the palace, so that it can later occupy the file the chariot needs.
With the General active, the chariot has a partner. Threats that the horse and advisors could parry one at a time become double threats, and double threats are how a single piece beats three.
Step two: drive the horse away from the palace
A horse standing in front of its own palace, protected by an advisor, is the defender's best setup. The chariot cannot take it and the advisors cannot be reached behind it. The method is to attack the horse from the side along the rank, forcing it to a square where it no longer covers the palace corners, and then to switch the chariot to the file the horse just left.
Horses are slow and their moves can be blocked. The chariot should aim for squares that attack the horse and sit on the point the horse would need to pass through, so that the horse's only retreat is away from the palace. Once the horse is separated from the advisors by two moves, the ending is technically won.
Step three: win an advisor, then mate
With the horse out of range, the chariot attacks the advisors. An advisor on the palace corner is protected only by the other advisor and by the General; the chariot checks along the rank, the General must move, and the advisor that was pinned by the flying-general rule falls. With one advisor gone the General is exposed on the diagonal, and the chariot, with the friendly General holding the central file, delivers mate in a handful of moves.
The order matters here as well. Taking an advisor while the horse can still return to the palace usually allows a fork of chariot and General. Patience first, material second.
The fortress to avoid
If the defender still has elephants, do not spend an hour trying to break in. The full guard of horse, two advisors and two elephants is a draw against a lone chariot, and the practical way to win is to keep a soldier. Chariot and soldier against the full guard is a win when the soldier can reach the palace, so in the middlegame it pays to preserve one crossing soldier before trading down to the chariot ending.
For the defender the lesson is the mirror image: keep an elephant at any cost, keep the horse next to the palace, and never let the enemy General reach the central file unopposed.
Drills
Set up chariot and General against horse, two advisors and General with the horse in front of the palace, and play it against the computer on XiangqiPlay until you can win from the starting position ten times in a row. Then add one elephant to the defence and confirm that you can no longer win without a soldier. Finally add a soldier to the attack and win the full-guard position.
Fifteen minutes a day for a week is enough. Endings like this are the difference between a rating that stalls and one that climbs, because they turn every won middlegame into a full point.
Mr. Tan Wei
XiangqiPlay newsroom
