Choosing between two legal checkers jumps

Published

On this board a capture is not optional. If a man or a king can jump, you must jump. If the same piece can keep jumping, you must continue with that piece. What the rules do not choose for you is which jump, when more than one capture is legal. This article is that choice. The guide states the obligation. The learn hub is for the quiet turns before any jump exists.

1. Finish the whole chain before the first landing

A jump can be one hop or several. Before you choose the first direction, follow every later hop the same piece would be required to take. Landing squares matter as much as the piece you remove. A first jump that looks equal can lead to a second landing in the corner, or to a second landing beside your own men.

You cannot switch pieces in the middle of a chain. If you start with the man on the left, the later hops belong to that man. Look at the other piece’s chain as a separate choice, not as a continuation you can join later in the same turn.

2. A crown ends the chain

When a man lands on the king row, it becomes a king and the jump stops, even if another enemy piece sits where a further jump would have gone. That stop is not a bug. It is the rule on this site. A long chain that would have removed two pieces can be cut down to one piece if the first landing is the king row.

Compare that with a shorter-looking jump that does not crown and still has a second hop. The second hop may remove more than the crowning jump. Crowning is valuable. It is not automatically more valuable than the piece the stopped chain leaves behind.

3. Kings jump backward, men do not

A man’s chain only runs forward. A king’s chain can turn backward. If one of your kings and one of your men can each capture, they are different choices. The king may be able to jump back toward your own side and land next to a man that needs help. The man can only go on, toward the opponent’s king row.

Do not give the man’s forward-only path to a king in your head. A square “behind” the king is a legal landing. The same square behind a man is not.

4. Ask what can jump you on the square you land

The landing square is where your piece sits when the turn ends. If an enemy man or king can jump that square on the next turn, you spent the capture to offer a capture. A landing square next to your own piece is harder to jump without their piece landing in a crowd. A landing square on an empty edge is easy to see and sometimes easy to take back.

The obligation to jump does not oblige you to pick the landing they want. When two jumps are legal, the safer landing is allowed.

Examples on this board

  1. Two men, two directions. Your man can jump forward-left and remove one man, or forward-right and remove one man. The left landing is beside two of your own men. The right landing is on the edge with no friend next to it, and an enemy man already aims at that square. Take the left jump. Both captures satisfy the rule. Only one landing is still yours a move later.
  2. A crown that stops a second hop. A man can jump onto the king row, removing one piece, and the square beyond that row is off the board, so the new king stops. Another man of yours can jump a different piece and then hop a second piece without touching the king row. The crowning jump removes one. The other chain removes two. The crown can wait if the two-piece chain is really there.
  3. A king that can turn around. Your king can jump forward and land in the opponent’s half, or jump backward and remove a man that was about to reach your king row. The backward jump is legal because it is a king. The forward jump leaves their man one step from crowning. Take the jump that removes the man who is about to crown.
  4. A chain you cannot switch. The man on the left can jump twice. The man on the right can jump once, onto a square you like better. You cannot jump once with the left man and then move the right man. If you touch the left man, both of its hops happen. Choose the piece first, then accept that piece’s whole chain.
  5. Equal material, worse square. Both jumps remove a man, and neither crowns. One landing leaves your piece attacked by two enemy men with no capture of your own next. The other landing attacks a man of theirs. The second jump is the one that still does something after the forced capture is over.

Why it matters

Mandatory capture makes people feel they have no choice. They do, whenever two pieces can jump or one piece has two directions. The players who lose after a “forced” jump usually followed the first highlight and never looked at the other chain, the crown that would stop it, or the landing square they were giving away.

This was written on 2 October 2026 for the live checkers rules, including the stop when a man is crowned. It does not change the ten-minute online turn or the computer games saved on this device.

Closing

When more than one jump is legal, follow each chain to its last landing, notice if a crown would cut it short, and keep the landing square that is not a gift. Quiet positions belong on the counting page. The home page enforces the same mandatory jump, so a chain you trace here is a chain the board will keep you on.