Banqi is a quick, tactical game derived from Xiangqi, played on a 4×8 grid with 32 Xiangqi pieces placed face‑down and revealed during play. See the Wikipedia article for background and variants: [Banqi — Wikipedia](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Banqi).

## Rules (default set used in this app)

- **Board**: 4 columns × 8 rows (all 32 squares filled at start).
- **Pieces (per color, total 32)**: 1 General, 2 Advisors, 2 Elephants, 2 Chariots, 2 Horses, 2 Cannons, 5 Soldiers.
- **Setup**: Shuffle all pieces and place face‑down randomly. The first player’s first action is to flip one piece; that piece’s color becomes the first player’s color.
- **Turn options** (one action per turn):
- Flip one face‑down piece.
- Move one of your face‑up pieces one square orthogonally into an empty square.
- Capture by moving onto an opponent’s face‑up piece, following capture rules.
- **Movement**:
- All pieces move one square orthogonally (no diagonals, no jumping) except the Cannon when capturing (see below).
- **Capture/Rank**:
- A piece may capture an opponent piece of equal or lower rank.
- Default rank (high → low): General > Advisor > Elephant > Chariot > Horse > Cannon > Soldier.
- Exception: **Soldier captures General**; **General cannot capture Soldier**.
- **Cannon (special capture)**:
- To capture, a Cannon must jump over exactly one intervening piece (of any color, face‑up or face‑down) along the same row or column to land on and capture the first opponent piece beyond it.
- A Cannon’s non‑capturing move is still one square orthogonally.
- **End of game**: The player who cannot make a legal move on their turn loses (typical because all pieces are captured or blocked). Stalemate/draw rules may be added as an option in Settings (see Variants).