I have played 10 to 15 games over the board of grand chess being able to place your own pieces. It is very interesting. The pawns stay on the 3rd and 8th rows, while the pieces have NO restrictions, bishops can be on the same color. What is the most interesting is that you have 20 squares to place 10 pieces so there is much room for experimentation and variation.

How we play over the board is all the pawns are placed, then white and black alternate placing one piece at a time, white starting. This makes it very interesting because black has the advantage by seeing white's plan first, then being able to place his piece with a little more insight than white has. So being black and white both have their advantages-- white has the first move once the game starts, but has the disadvantage of having to place his pieces first.

Since the rooks and king can be anywhere on the 2 rows, it doesn't make that much sense to "castle" with the rook and king, so we play castling where the king can move 3 horizontal and 1 vertical move if he is not in check, not passing through check, and hasn't moved before, and not passing through any pieces. Also he cannot capture any pieces while doing the castling move. Castling is a much needed move which grand chess lacks because the king is often a sitting duck in the center.

I have played with promotion like in grand chess- which is one move sooner than usual, and the promotion behind the pawn rows. Some interesting positions have resulted from being able to promote early, but I have not played enough to know which is more balanced for the game.

It's really neat that part of the strategy and fun of the game happens placing the pieces. It's really nice to be able to come up with different setups of placing pieces. And it's a different game from the very beginning.