Ruling — Checkers

You asked

How do I set up the game?

Answered counted as answered

Asked with: Checkersbg-2083-en-1e

To set up the game, follow these steps: 1. Players must be seated at their designated playing table prior to the starting time for that round [1]. 2. Players shall shake the hand of their opponent prior to the commencement of a round [1]. 3. One player uses 12 dark-coloured discs (Red) and the other uses 12 light-coloured discs (White) [2]. 4. The Red pieces are set on the first 12 squares of the player playing Red, starting right to left, Nos. 1 through 12 [2]. 5. The White pieces are set on the last 12 squares, Nos. 21 through 32, with No. 32 being the nearest double corner square [2]. 6. Players decide which colour they will play by random selection [2]. Methods for this include a coin toss, where the winner selects their colour [3], or one player placing a piece of each colour in closed hands behind their back and offering the choice to their opponent [3]. 7. The tournament controller decides where the draughts clock will be placed before the start of the game [4]. 8. All clocks should be wound up prior to play commencing, with each clock face registering the same time [4]. 9. At the start of each session, the referee shall start each clock in turn [4]. 10. The player whose turn it is to play shall have their clock started at the beginning of the game [5].

[1] RULEBOOK Checkers — Rulebook · p.14 · Section Four: The Conduct of Players

[2] RULEBOOK Checkers — Rulebook · p.3 · ` DRAUGHT PIECES AND THEIR ARRANGEMENT · ORDER OF PLAY · THE MOVES

[3] RULEBOOK Checkers — Rulebook · p.7 · Definition of a Win

[4] RULEBOOK Checkers — Rulebook · p.8 · Equipment and terminology: · Using a clock:

[5] RULEBOOK Checkers — Rulebook · p.10 · Time Controls: · Absent players: · Interrupting clocks. · Quickplay Finish

🔧 debug — where this ruling came from

outcome: ANSWERED — Answered
corpus profile: live
answerer pin (deploy-frozen, attribution only): gemma4:26b think:false 5571076f3d70
timings: search 232 ms · ask 6277 ms · total 2049837 ms
single-flight (PR-5): queued 2043320 ms · generation 6517 ms
retrieval refs (raw): [{"page": 3, "score": 0.048412, "snippet": "1.8 At the beginning of a game, one player has 12 dark-coloured discs (referred to as 'pieces' or 'men'), and the other player has 12 light-coloured discs. 1.9 The official draught pieces shall be of RED and WHITE colours for the dark and light pieces, respectively. These are sometimes referred to a", "headingPath": "` DRAUGHT PIECES AND THEIR ARRANGEMENT · ORDER OF PLAY · THE MOVES", "sharpsignalDocId": 150}, {"page": 1, "score": 0.046244, "snippet": "Draughts is a board game of skill played between two players who, following a fixed set of rules, attempt to win the game by either removing all of their opponent's playing pieces from the draughts board, or by rendering their opponent's pieces immobile.", "headingPath": "Rules of Draughts (Checkers)", "sharpsignalDocId": 150}, {"page": 9, "score": 0.032258, "snippet": "player shall be cautioned for the first offence, and shall forfeit the game for any subsequent offence. 2.10 Every indication given by the clocks is considered to be conclusive in the absence of any evident defect. 2.11 A draughts clock with an evident defect shall be replaced. The tournament direct", "headingPath": "Using a clock: · Time Controls:", "sharpsignalDocId": 150}, {"page": 10, "score": 0.031746, "snippet": "2.20 If a player does not complete the prescribed number of moves in the allotted time, the game is lost by that player regardless of the position on the board. 2.21 If a player is not present at the start of a session, their opponent, in consultation with the tournament controller shall start their", "headingPath": "Time Controls: · Absent players: · Interrupting clocks. · Quickplay Finish", "sharpsignalDocId": 150}, {"page": 12, "score": 0.03125, "snippet": "3.1 A 'score-sheet' is a sheet of paper that is prescribed for the recording of a game of draughts in a competition, and is the property of the organiser of the event. 3.2 Each player shall be furnished with a score sheet for every scheduled game. 3.3 All players are obliged to record each game play", "headingPath": "Section Three: Recording of games:", "sharpsignalDocId": 150}, {"page": 14, "score": 0.030769, "snippet": "4.1 The players shall take no action that will bring the game into disrepute. 4.2 Players must be seated at their designated playing table prior to the starting time for that round. 4.3 In the spirit of friendship players shall shake the hand of their opponent prior to the commencement of a round. 4", "headingPath": "Section Four: The Conduct of Players", "sharpsignalDocId": 150}, {"page": 13, "score": 0.030303, "snippet": "Time Shortage: 3.12 A player is said to be in time shortage when they have 5 minutes or less before their flag falls. 3.13 Any player in time shortage is not obliged to continue recording every move made in the game during this phase, but instead must place a tick on their score-sheet after every mo", "headingPath": "Section Three: Recording of games:", "sharpsignalDocId": 150}, {"page": 15, "score": 0.029958, "snippet": "4.9 Players are forbidden to distract or annoy their opponent in any manner, such as making any sounds or signs, pointing or hovering over the board. This includes unreasonable claims or repeated offers of a draw. 4.10 During the course of a game a player is forbidden from addressing any other perso", "headingPath": "Section Four: The Conduct of Players", "sharpsignalDocId": 150}]
citations (raw): [{"page": 14, "quote": null, "headingPath": "Section Four: The Conduct of Players", "sharpsignalDocId": 150}, {"page": 3, "quote": null, "headingPath": "` DRAUGHT PIECES AND THEIR ARRANGEMENT · ORDER OF PLAY · THE MOVES", "sharpsignalDocId": 150}, {"page": 7, "quote": null, "headingPath": "Definition of a Win", "sharpsignalDocId": 150}, {"page": 8, "quote": null, "headingPath": "Equipment and terminology: · Using a clock:", "sharpsignalDocId": 150}, {"page": 10, "quote": null, "headingPath": "Time Controls: · Absent players: · Interrupting clocks. · Quickplay Finish", "sharpsignalDocId": 150}]
boost provenance — errata + base rulebook (E2/E3): no registered errata card matched this query; base rulebook doc 150 boosted; rulesage.errata.boost-enabled=true, rulesage.errata.supersedence-enabled=true
base rulebook doc 150 boosted
answered-before recall: this ruling was answered, so past rulings were not offered
similarity threshold in force: 0.55 (rulesage.answered-before.similarity-threshold; the exact-question tier is not gated by it)
debug row retained until: Nov 6, 2026 14:45

retrieval — what the search arm returned

score = the fused retrieval score (reciprocal-rank fusion over the search arms) — NOT a cosine similarity. This ruling ran the THREE-ARM fuse (full-text + vector + the doc-priority boost arm, which carried the base rulebook and/or the errata corrections this query matched), whose arithmetic ceiling is 0.04918 — all three arms ranking the same chunk #1 (ceiling = arms/(k+1) at k=60). The measured healthy band 0.016–0.033 was measured on TWO-arm asks and does not bound this one: its high end is the two-arm ceiling, and a third arm has room above it. A chunk only one arm ranked highly lands near 0.016 (that one arm's #1 vote), so 0.03 here is an excellent hit, not a 3% match.

per-arm ranks (the rank each search arm gave a chunk): NOT DISCLOSED by the gateway. Fusion happens gateway-side and only the FUSED score crosses the wire, so rulesage cannot show them without a gateway change. The rank column below is the FUSED rank (position in the returned list), which is real.

token count per chunk: NOT DISCLOSED — chunk token counts are not reported on the ask path. The character counts below are of the bounded snippet/quote rulesage actually received — a real measurement of what we hold, never an estimate of the chunk.

fused rank	document	heading	page	fused RRF score	snippet chars
#1	RULEBOOK Checkers — Rulebook (corpus doc 150)	` DRAUGHT PIECES AND THEIR ARRANGEMENT · ORDER OF PLAY · THE MOVES	p.3	0.048412 (healthy, below this ruling's 3-arm ceiling 0.04918 (the measured band 0.016–0.033 was taken on two-arm asks and does not bound a 3-arm one))	300
#2	RULEBOOK Checkers — Rulebook (corpus doc 150)	Rules of Draughts (Checkers)	p.1	0.046244 (healthy, below this ruling's 3-arm ceiling 0.04918 (the measured band 0.016–0.033 was taken on two-arm asks and does not bound a 3-arm one))	254
#3	RULEBOOK Checkers — Rulebook (corpus doc 150)	Using a clock: · Time Controls:	p.9	0.032258 (healthy, below this ruling's 3-arm ceiling 0.04918 (the measured band 0.016–0.033 was taken on two-arm asks and does not bound a 3-arm one))	300
#4	RULEBOOK Checkers — Rulebook (corpus doc 150)	Time Controls: · Absent players: · Interrupting clocks. · Quickplay Finish	p.10	0.031746 (healthy, below this ruling's 3-arm ceiling 0.04918 (the measured band 0.016–0.033 was taken on two-arm asks and does not bound a 3-arm one))	300
#5	RULEBOOK Checkers — Rulebook (corpus doc 150)	Section Three: Recording of games:	p.12	0.03125 (healthy, below this ruling's 3-arm ceiling 0.04918 (the measured band 0.016–0.033 was taken on two-arm asks and does not bound a 3-arm one))	300
#6	RULEBOOK Checkers — Rulebook (corpus doc 150)	Section Four: The Conduct of Players	p.14	0.030769 (healthy, below this ruling's 3-arm ceiling 0.04918 (the measured band 0.016–0.033 was taken on two-arm asks and does not bound a 3-arm one))	300
#7	RULEBOOK Checkers — Rulebook (corpus doc 150)	Section Three: Recording of games:	p.13	0.030303 (healthy, below this ruling's 3-arm ceiling 0.04918 (the measured band 0.016–0.033 was taken on two-arm asks and does not bound a 3-arm one))	300
#8	RULEBOOK Checkers — Rulebook (corpus doc 150)	Section Four: The Conduct of Players	p.15	0.029958 (healthy, below this ruling's 3-arm ceiling 0.04918 (the measured band 0.016–0.033 was taken on two-arm asks and does not bound a 3-arm one))	300

chosen chunks — what the answer actually cited

#	document	heading	page	quote chars
[1]	RULEBOOK Checkers — Rulebook (corpus doc 150)	Section Four: The Conduct of Players	p.14	no quote on the wire
[2]	RULEBOOK Checkers — Rulebook (corpus doc 150)	` DRAUGHT PIECES AND THEIR ARRANGEMENT · ORDER OF PLAY · THE MOVES	p.3	no quote on the wire
[3]	RULEBOOK Checkers — Rulebook (corpus doc 150)	Definition of a Win	p.7	no quote on the wire
[4]	RULEBOOK Checkers — Rulebook (corpus doc 150)	Equipment and terminology: · Using a clock:	p.8	no quote on the wire
[5]	RULEBOOK Checkers — Rulebook (corpus doc 150)	Time Controls: · Absent players: · Interrupting clocks. · Quickplay Finish	p.10	no quote on the wire

generation — timing and the path taken

timing split: retrieval 232 ms · first delta 4125 ms · total 2049837 ms (retrieval and first-delta both measured from the START of gateway work, so first-delta INCLUDES retrieval — do not subtract)
full breakdown: queued 2043320 ms · retrieval 232 ms · ask 6277 ms · gateway work 6517 ms · total 2049837 ms
tokens in (the prompt the answerer read): 3701
tokens out (what the answerer generated): 320
tok/sec: 136.9 tok/sec — 320 output tokens in 2.338 s of generation
live seat (read from the running child): answering — gemma4:26b think:false · num_ctx 32768 (live-verified 14s ago)
stream path: streamed — the gateway pushed at least one accumulated draft
watchdog: first-token watchdog: 30s per arming window (rulesage.table.first-token-watchdog-seconds), re-armed once by the passages frame — so the worst case before a reader falls back to polling is 60s. Whether it actually fired is a BROWSER-side decision that never reaches the server, so it is not recorded here. The stream path above is the server's half of that story: whether a delta was emitted at all.
num_ctx · think posture: both are the CHILD's settings, not rulesage's, and no ask reply carries them — an answer never states which context window or think posture produced it. The live-seat line above reads them from the running child instead, where the gateway can answer for itself; it describes the child NOW, not this ask.

disposition

outcome: ANSWERED — Answered
abstain rationale (n/a — this ruling answered): answered — no abstain rationale applies

setup-shape — why the checklist band did or didn't render

decision: NO_APPROVED_CHECKLIST — setup-shaped, but no approved setup checklist exists for this game
pattern that matched: SETUP — "setup" / "set up"
matched words (in the normalized question): set up

errata registry — what the gate above had to match against

this game registers NO errata cards (edition 72), so "no registered errata card matched" above could never have matched one

Errata scope: the gate above matched this ruling's own edition only. When an ask also reads an expansion, that expansion's own registered errata cards stay outside the match — a stated phase-1 limitation, not a failed lookup.