On the way to work today i came up with the idea for a "Tafl Chess" variant - basically the pieces have the same moves as in regular chess but capture is by flanking (like in Tablut) rather than substitution as in normal chess. I played a game out when I got home and it seems to work - any thoughts?

Haven't checked to see if this has been discussed before (apologies if so), but has anyone ever encountered Arimaa before? I just found it on Wikipedia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arimaa if you want to take a look). Interesting looking game - now I just have to find a way to play it!

Walter Montego: ok cool!

yaayy :]

ChessChampion: It's not unprogrammable. Zillions of Games has it. I think the Chess Variants site has it too, but I'm not sure of that. I and others have requested Ultima on BrainKing.

The dread Immobilizer is coming your way! :)

y is it unprogrammable? :[
dat variant is probly my favorite of all of them...

I play dice chess alot and came up with a idea...what if king is to move but will put him in check or if he is in check?...it would be nice to elimiate king move into check and also be able to roll only possible pieces to stop when you are in check...what do you think?

Mike

Dogod: I once played this game in a correspondence club, as you described, except that there was no restriction on how far a friendly piece could be repelled. One useful tactic was positioning a piece behind a passed pawn, thereby pushing to the eighth rank for an immediate promotion! It was especially effective by moving a Rook or Queen, so that the newly gained Queen was defended.

emmett: we already got something like this.. loop chess

Sibahi: Ultima? You mean the ''unprogrammable" chess game?

Also, I like the idea of Knightmating Chess. 8x8 board, exchange the knights for kings, exchange the kings on the E file for a knight, and checkmate the knight.

For short, knights play the king's role.

Ray Garrison: I totally agree

Pason69: In the rules the game ends as checkmate happens. There will be no ice age because there will not be a new move in the case of a checkmate.

kid_game_2001:
I meant if the wKing is on moved d3-d4, wPawn on e4 and bPawn on e5. Then he is in check, and as I see how Black can escape the check since Pawn e5 can't move... Sorry if I was confusing you!

Pason69: I'm not quite sure I understand that exactly. But if I am thinking about it correctly it would be like this

Pawns only move forward (of course)
If a pawn cant move because of any piece in front of it, then the pawn cant move. The piece blocking the pawn is safe
Pawns can only capture on diagonals. That would go for the king as well. The king would only be in danger if the pawn was on a diagonal.
If I understand your question right, nothing would happen. The king is safe as long as it is directly in front of the pawn

kid_game_2001:

Sound very different, but interesting, Just one question: What happens if you move into check, and the opponent can't stop the check, eg a pawn that cant move forward?

Alright here is a variant that I thought might be good for Brainking. I do remember reading about it on the internet somewhere so no idea if it is copyright or not.

It has the same standard chess setup. 8x8 board. Same usual pieces in chess.
It works like regular chess, in other words you have to checkmate the enemy king.
The difference, is that you CANT put the rival king in check. Check is an illegal move. You can only check the rival king if it is a checkmate.
This means that you can move your own king into a position where it is in check by another piece. In that case, your opponent must stop the check, either by blocking the check or moving away.
If you do move your king in check, you should NOT be allowed to move it to a spot where it is attacked by 2 or more pieces. As that way it would be a win if you moved your king to where it was attacked by 2 enemy pieces.

Basically,
Check is illegal
You can move your own king into check (only if the square is attacked by just one piece)
Opponent must stop the check (move or block)
You win when you checkmate the opposing king

Bughouse is an interesting type of chess where four players, two per team, play chess on two boards. When one member of a team takes a piece, his partner gets to drop that piece on his own board.

I know a lot of you know this, and I know bughouse chess has been suggested to Fencer.

Maybe we can have a variation on this, where only two opponents play (without teams), yet the players play simultaneously on two boards. The boards can be shown on the same screen. When a piece is taken off of one board, it can be dropped on the other board.

it is not checkmate imho if blacks can waits for ice blocks as a defence

I'm not sure if it's answered before somewhere, but here it comes: What is the purpose of IceAge chess, to mate the King or take the king? It is a difference if you put him checkmate as white in move 20, he makes his 20th move and then the ice stops the mate Eg backrank mate with wRe8, BKg8, Pf7,g7,h7: Blacks 20th move (he is mate) Kh8, and now the ice age comes...

I had an idea for a chess variant tonight. It would be called something like slide-rule chess. One horizontal row in a regular chess game would randomly slide one space to the right or left, with all the pieces on them, after every move.

I noticed Korean Chess hasn't been mentioned for over a year, is it still being worked on? It's not that different from Chinese Chess so it shouldn't take too long to implement...

Ultima is a very good chess variant that was invented by Abbott in the early 1960s. It is has been one of my favourite variants of the past two decades. I would love to see the game at this site, possibly with a tweak or two in the rules. I have some very good suggestions as to minor rule changes, having played hundreds of games of this variety. Is anyone else interested in seeing ULTIMA at brainking.com?

jannix: No spam please! And this board is only for chessvariants  which are not supported here.
Message was deleted.

The Standerd rules apply, except in the following.
There is no notion of check, checkmate or stalemate. The player capturing the opponent's king wins.
Every piece has a charge generating a magnetic field, except the two kings which have a neutral charge. White pieces are positive, and Black are negative (or vice versa, of course :)
When a piece is moved to a specific square, their closest neighbours at the same rank and column (not diagonal) are repelled if they have the same charge (hence the same colour), and attracted if they have an opposite charge (hence have different colours). A king isn't repelled or attracted, doesn't repel or attract and has a blocking effect on the magnetic field lines
all pawns/pieces have a magnetic feild of 3 squares in all non-diaganol directions, and as soon as a piece or pawn is blocked by another piece, it stops moving.
Yes, bishops can change color.

Fencer: Flybaboo is a low-cost company which makes it a little bit nearer !

nabla: I wish I could drop by, if only it would be nearer to Prague.

Salkkuman: Same rules as the ones used on FICS and ICC for those who know them : pawn is promoted, remains physically a pawn but assumes the power of the announced piece. When captured it reverts into a simple pawn. No pawn drops on 1st/8th rows. Drop-check and drop-mate allowed.

nabla: Which rules do you use? pawn is promoted on hand/other board(this one is fun)/normally? Pieces can be placed as you like put not pawn in first row?

For those who like Bughouse (the fast and fun 4-player version of the game called Loop Chess here), I will organize a gathering in Geneva from August 18 to August 21.
Although Geneva is know as an expensive city, the gathering is one of the cheapest possible : if you register in the following weeks, you can get free accomodation, plus the usual free sandwiches and drinks for the whole gathering.
International participation will include the swede Maarten Aronsson, one of the world's best.
All details can be found here !

pleasepleaseplease:)

In most ways, it is the same as standerd chess.
The Exceptions
Pieces or pawns can travel through time according to the following rules:
1: The piece has to be next to the King
2: The King can't be in check
3: The peice can't travel more than 10 moves
4: The peice can only travel foward in time
5: If the King is in check on the move the peice was supposed to come in, and the only legal move is to move the King to get out of check, then the peice is lost in time, and it gets captured.
6. You cannot say "I have to move the Queen, so i'm going to let my pawn get lost in time." That is illegal.
7. The piece can appear at any empty square, and pawns cannot appear on the first or last rank
For the king, the same rules apply except #s 1 and 4.
Traveling back in time:
1. only the King can do it.
2. The King can't be in check
3. It is limited to 5 moves back
4. It is limited to 2 backwards moves per person
5. There has to be at least 1 other piece or pawn of the same color, and another King does not count.
Winning the game:
There are 3 ways to win the game.
1. Checkmate one or more Kings
2. Make your opponent's King lost in time
3. Fork 2 or more Kings in a way that your opponent can't capture the forking peice
An example of notation:
1. d2//to5 Nc6
2. e4 Nf6
3. Qg4 Nd4
4. e5 Nf3+xP
5. Qxf3 Ng4
6. K//to2
2. K a4// FTF
In this game, White sent a pawn to move 5, Then on move 4, Black Checked the White King, Which captured the pawn.
White sent his king back in time to undo
the pawn capture, and FTF means from the future.
I very much like this variant, and it would be easy to program.

Benedict Chess is quite fun. At least the few times I've tried it.

Fencer: I agree, of course !

nabla: I think it would be better if it does NOT revert to a pawn. Let's use it as it is, just like in Loop Chess.

Fencer: Yes, at least the last time I played with the inventor we played with promotions. We didn't have the case of a promoted piece being taken, I don't see why it should revert to a pawn (except for being bughouse-like), but I can ask him what he thinks about it.

nabla: One more question - is this game played with pawn promotions? And if so and a promoted pawn is captured, can it be recycled as the promoted piece or does it turn back to a pawn?

The player with the move selects a possible destination square, and his opponent chooses which one of the possible pieces moves to that square.
I would *very* much like to see that variant here, but I am probably biased as I invented it :-)
Details, examples and a playing board can be found here (still awaiting some updates).
I already talked with Fencer about this variant, but I am posting this in case some of you are interested to try it over the board. Transcriptions of played games that are sent to me will be included in the aforementioned web page !

Fencer: OK !

nabla: Synchronous version is easier to implement.

Fencer: Oops, I forgot that Bughouse was discussed here too. Do you really intend to use the synchronous version of bughouse (I don't think that it is popular at all, but it may not be that bad), or the standard version where you can play on either board at either time ? If playable, the latter would probably generate a lot of traffic, as some lost seconds can lose the game :-)

Fencer: No he can't (of course the king can capture other own pieces).

nabla: About the Recycle Chess discussion - can a player capture his own king?

Salkkuman: Yes, it is possible and planned.

andreas: I like this game on live really much. I think communication with the players is really important. That's why this game could be maybe played only with two players?(One players controls both boards). It would make it faster and easier.

sounds nice

It would be very nice to have a "synchrounus" version of Bughouse for 2-players here, see Bughouse and Tandem Chess, section "Bughouse per e-mail".

My new gamepreset at chessvariants.com:
http://play.chessvariants.org/pbm/play.php?game=Grosses+Schach+10x10&settings=Englisch_rules_1
Isn`t it nice?

Cubs93: Yes, bughouse is most cool, but it don't think it could be played here, as it is to be played only in live mode and with very fast time controls ; otherwise, there are very long and painful double sits (you and your partner's opponent both wait for the other to play).
You'll probably have to play Loop Chess instead (and I think that its close cousins Hostage Chess / Recycle Chess are scheduled for future implementation).