Construction of Chinese Chess Endgame Databases by Retrograde Analysis

Retrograde analysis is well-known and has been successfully developed in the design ofWestern chess1 endgame databases. However, there is little achievement using this technique in the construction of Chinese chess endgame databases. Although the two types of chess have the same number of pieces, similar individual characteristics for pieces, and comparable scales of the size of the boards, the fundamental differences in their playing rules lead to different construction schemes and results of endgame databases. In this paper, we describe our approach to the construction of Chinese Chess Endgame Databases when only one of the players possesses attacking piece(s). We show the results we have in constructing and analyzing a set of 151 endgame databases with a total of at most two attacking pieces, four defending pieces and two Kings. Our databases can be used by Chinese chess computer playing systems and computer aided Chinese chess training systems.