Rated Comments

You can't castle on first move and move the rook on the second. The program says it's an illegal move because "there is no rook there".

I played this game as a boy around 1960. The object of the game was to put the opponent's General in danger 6 times in a row. You did not have to checkmate as in chess. I cannot find any information other than what you have posted, but I would sure love to get my hands on a copy of the game.

Thank-you for your post.

So, a couple months ago, I wondered about a circular board that uses the center.

I figured someone must have invented it, and looked through CV.
Apparently my google skills are weak, because I didn't find this or any other.   :-(
So I began working on it.
It took some thinking, but I more or less hammered out the rules on paper.

Today I stumble across this!  It has identical movement rules to what I have come up with!  Brilliant!
Also, this looks to be a nice little variant.

If only I had found Diplomat Chess before I spent that time reinventing the round rules......

The idea of Knights promoting into a set list accessable by both sides is an interesting one.  It should encourage aggression.

However, the high probablity of uneven play drops the game's rating.  Maybe if the pieces were closer in value....

Not knowing which side will get thid king is also interesting.
There are some unusual ideas here.

I've got to comment on this....a crazy lot of ideas in this game.

I think they need to be refined, but I am attracted to the unusual.
This is definitly unusual!

I strongly encourage continuing work on this....I love the idea of 'choosing different armies'!

Sirlin's Chess2

Betza's Chess with Different Armies

Fantasy Grand Chess

And your idea of a one-time enhancement Trance (spell) appears to be an excellent idea of something different while not being too powerful.

However, I think the rules need some clarification.
In particular, the army 'Hologram' appears underpowered rules-as-written.  You gain the ability to suicide your queen to teleport your king.  Useful, but only so much.  You can't use it offensively (teleporting your king to the front lines is not smart) and if you use it to get the king out of check you're already in a bad way, and probably only delaying the inevitable.
Meanwhile, you loose the ability for the queen to capture--but it can still be captured, apparently.  So the queen is essentally useless.  (The rules specify only that the queen cannot capture.  All other rules being the same as chess, that means the queen can be captured.  A queen that cannot capture or be captured is useful as a blocking piece--is that what you meant?) 
The Trance is not that powerful, only allowing the queen the ability to capture kingwise.  (If the queen is uncapturable, this is very powerful.)
I'm left with the conclusion that you must have meant the queen cannot capture or be captured.

I've played a fair bit of Sirlin's Chess2, so I'm going to make a bunch of posts to move the rules onto CV website, in case the game is ever abandoned by Sirlin games.  I will also comment on the game in general.
Sirlin's Chess2 is quite balanced, and has clearly gone through a lot of playtesting.  Being developed by a modern boardgame company owner clearly shows here!

First, Sirlin's Chess2 adds 3 things:

1)win by centerline invasion
2)dueling stones; possible loss of an attacking piece
3)different armies.

Quote from offical rules:

New Win Condition: Midline Invasion
You can still win by checkmate, but you also win if your king crosses the midline of the board. Each move has added significance, because you must weigh how much it helps or hurts each player’s chances of winning by king crossing the midline in addition to the usual considerations of furthering a checkmate.
Just like in Chess 1, it’s illegal to move into check, so to win by Midline Invasion, your King must land on the 5th rank without being in check. Unlike Chess 1 though, there are no stalemates. If you have no legal moves, you lose the game.  While stalemates are common in Chess 1, they aren’t needed in Chess 2 because the Midline Invasion rule provides an even stronger option that a player can aim for when he’s down on material.

In practice, against reasonablely competent players, the majority of games will end by midline invasion.  For one thing, whoever is winning can typically move his king up before he checkmate's his opponent.  The big change, however, is when a player starts to loose, he will usually make a quick attempt at midline invasion win.  This makes the transition between the mid- and end-game very chaotic.
Most non-chess boardgame players will find this a very exciting change; instead of a long slow grind as one player increases his advantage, the the game ends in an explosion of desperate dashes-for-the-midline.  While the player who is in a better position will still usually win, there is more hope for the loosing player.  Having more on the line, it is more exciting for both players, despite the fact that the game still usually ends as expected.
This also esentially eliminates the chess endgame--which most casual players consider the most boring.  Once a player has a significant advantage, chess tends to grind toward an inevitable conclusion.  This is why experienced chess players will conceed when the game gets past a certain point--going through the motions is just a waste of time.
As a side affect, Sirlin's Chess2 games tend to be shorter.  Modern boardgames (not chess variants) tend toward shorter is better, so non-chess enthusasts would generally consider this a good thing.

This is where Sirlin's modern boardgaming design experience is showing....he has designed a change that appeals to the masses (more exciting desperate chance of a win) and eliminated the masses least favorite part of chess (the grinding endgame) and shortened the game in one simple rule.

There is just one problem.
MOST CHESS PLAYERS DON'T LIKE IT.
I don't like it either!!!
Effectively getting rid of checkmate just feels WRONG.

Sum it up=theoretically a good change that appeals to casual players, but chess enthusists won't like it at all.

Dueling
Quote from offical rulebook:

Dueling

Dueling allows you to spend a new resource called stones to threaten to destroy a piece that takes one of your pieces. Try to trick the opponent into wasting his stones because if he runs out first, you automatically win any further duels.

You start with 3 stones and gain 1 stone each time you capture an enemy pawn, up to a maximum of 6 stones.

Whenever you would capture any piece, the defender can initiate a duel. If your piece is higher rank than his (ranks: pawn -> knight/bishop -> rook -> queen), he must pay 1 stone to initiate a duel. To duel, you each put 0, 1, or 2 stones in your closed fists, then simultaneously reveal them. All stones revealed are destroyed. The winner of the duel is the one who showed more stones--ties go to the attacker.

If the attacker wins a duel, he takes the piece in question as in normal Chess. If the defender wins, he still loses his piece, but the attacker ALSO loses the piece he attacked with.

Initiating a duel and bidding 0 is a bluff to make the opponent waste stones. The attacker calls your bluff by bidding 0 himself. He wins because attacker always wins on a tie and in addition, the attacker can choose to gain 1 stone or cause the defender to lose 1 stone. (A player can't have more than 6 stones.)

Kings cannot be involved in duels because they have "Diplomatic Immunity." (They can't initiate a duel or be dueled.)

Players with 0 stones cannot initiate duels, but they can be dueled against. When you duel against a player with 0 stones, you must bid 1 and you automatically win the duel. If you lose a pawn in a duel, your opponent does gain a stone.

Dueling is another change designed to switch the game up.  Normal chess has a very mathmatical quality to it--good players can predict moves very far in advance.  The farther forward you can think, the bigger your advantage.

Dueling changes this.  Now, sometimes you won't keep a victorious piece.  Consequently, there is only so far out it is practical to predict moves, leveling the playing field a little bit.
Dueling accomplishes this WITHOUT resorting to chance.  The number of stones each player has is public knowledge, and he who correctly reads the importance of the current board position and his opponent will win the duel.  (And the attacker has the advantage, so ties in skill will result in the same board state as if no duel occured.)  However, this requires a very different set of skills than chess.

Consequently, it is possible for someone who is really really good at typical chess to be beaten by a player who is better at reading his opponent and bidding accordingly.  Someone who is bad at bidding may be winning--until they run out of stones.  This gives the othe player a big advantage.

By broadening the useful/necessary skills to win AND lowering the ability to look ahead, a larger variety of player types can be effective players.  Plus each duel is a mini-game, which gives flashes of excitement in the middle of the game.

Again, Sirlin's skill at designing modern boardgames shows.  This is a rule that should appeal to the masses and create some excitement, while lowering the necessity of mapping out future moves.

There is just one problem.
MOST CHESS PLAYERS DON'T LIKE IT.
I don't like it either!!!
Effectively making it uncertain if you are keeping a piece just feels WRONG.

Sum it up=theoretically a good change that appeals to casual players, but chess enthusists won't like it at all.

This page contains the rules for this game:

Sirlin's Chess2-the Sequel

I agree that name reeks of hubris.  However, that page has all the discussion about the game on it.  I would be great if this page were linked to it in the main body of text.

Another clean design by Gary Gifford.  Nothing here but the pawns, king, and fully-loaded trojan horse.  Set-up-your-pieces opening, essentially.  Interesting, but personally I prefer a bigger variety of pieces.

I can still admire the clean design!

Excellent time travel twist on chess!  Beautiful!

One of the very best variant on the site!

Truly beautiful concept, and it appears to work.  (I have not had an opportunity to try it myself, yet.)

Reading through the comments, much of the complaints seem to focus on the power of the knightrider's ability to reach the back row and promote.  I wonder if anyone has considered that the knightrider move and the promotion rules may not work together perfectly?  Changing them would result in a different game, but possibly a better one.  Just a thought.

This is a very nice-playing modest variant. I've greatly enjoyed my games of it. I can absolutely recommend this game as an excellent variant tournament choice. It gets a lot of mileage out of a pair of fairly simple changes. The initial set-up is excellent; it gives good play. The weak piece is a very nice choice, and provides a nice companion/foil for the bishop and knight.

I just began play-testing and I like it a lot.  My thoughts so far:

There is a tiny bit of ambiguity as to whether the “same file rule” from Shogi is meant to apply to pawn drops (presumably it is not). I believe it can be played either way. I haven't tested it yet, but to try, the following condition could apply:

A pawn may not be dropped onto the same vertical diagonal of any other non-promoted pawn belonging to the same player.

Or an even stricter alternative:

A pawn may not be dropped onto the same rank or file of any other non-promoted pawn belonging to the same player.

In the illustrations for piece movement, notice how the rook travels through one edge and then through the opposite edge of each square in its path (even if the 'square' curves a right angle), while the bishop travels through one corner and then through the opposite corner of each square in its path, but seems to be prohibited from doing so on the curved squares (from the black bishop's position in the diagram). If this prohibition were lifted, that same black bishop's range of movement would include traveling from one curved edge square to the next and then back across the board horizontally, forming a loop back to it's original position.

Also, although it is not explicitly mentioned in the original rules, I think it's probably a good idea to declare that a rook or  a queen (or a bishop) may not land on the square from which they originated on that turn, even if a path to it exists unobstructed.

Finally, my thoughts about the pawn. The language and illustration of the original rules regarding pawn movement suggests that pawns capturing moves and non-capturing moves are executed in the same way (unlike conventional chess). Optionally, one could alter the rules for pawn movement so that it moves (but does not capture) exactly one square in either of the orthogonal directions that is away from its own side of the playing board or it can capture to the cell diagonally ahead of it (if there is an enemy piece occupying that square).

I just made my copy of the board yesterday, and have only had the opportunity to play-test the original rules.  But yeah, it was a lot of fun!  Thanks!

Thanks for the response, that is kind of what I thought but wasn't sure. 
Greg

Hello Anthony

Thank you for replying after all these years that the post has been up.  I saw your post, I do care, and I am replying here.  I am the Michael Ireland who wrote the original post.  I have been trying to reply through my account but it has gone dormant and I haven't been able to successfully logon, so am replying anonymously.  I have not found my answers yet but I am pretty sure this is NOT byzantine chess.

I will do my best to answer your questions.

It has been a long time since I played the game but this is how I think it worked. The board is made up of "rings" and "crosses" (spaces).  There is a centre star (space) in the middle which acts like a cross in all regards but a piece cannot start there. Each player starts with all of their pieces off the board.  There is a king, 2 rooks (flat tops), 2 bishops (spikes) and 4 pawns per side. On their first turn (white goes first) each player places their king anywhere on the board on any "cross" but not on the centre star (I believe that no piece could start on the centre star because it gives too much of an advantage to start there - but I am not 100% certain of the rule).  Then in the second and subsequent turns, each player can either move an existing piece or bring another piece onto the board as per turn 1.  The goal of the game is to checkmate your opponent's king as in regular chess.  Different pieces move differently.  A pawn or the king can move from one cross to another cross in any direction.  A rook moves up to 3 crosses up or down, or one cross to the side.  A bishop moves up to 3 crosses around one of the rings, or one cross up or down.  Any piece once on the board can enter the star in the middle.  A rook can move through it.  A player can take an opponent's piece by moving a piece into their opponent's piece's cross.  Once a piece is removed from the board it is gone.  I don't belive there is a special move in this game that makes a pawn become another piece like a rook or bishop.

That is it, essentially, but again, I am putting this together from a hazy recollection having not played for 40 years or so.

I hope this answers your questions but I want to say that your query made me go through the process of writing things down here and in a way, helped me work back to an approximation of how the game worked (with a few pieces of the puzzle still needed).  I think I could try playing it again and seeing how things worked.

I have not given up hoping someone will see this and recognize the game and the rules, but talking about it is always good.  So thank you again for replying!

Michael Ireland

PS: I did come up with one tantalizing lead about the manufacturer Arne Basse and this particular chess variant set.  Online I found a photo of a regular chess set that clearly was made by the same manufacturer because the board had the same leather surface (but with a regular chess grid) and the carved wooden pieces were the same except there were queens and knights. No other information was attached to the photo sadly but it was an interesting find.

Interesting board shape. I'm currently not absolutely sure that bishops are quite as strong as rooks, on average.

This game makes for a fine blend of two already interesting games.

At first when playing I felt like I was starting out missing an important pawn, but then I remembered that in chess, the Exchange Variation of the French Defence can produce plenty of interesting and decisive games, even between strong players.

Please add random piece link in this website.

Nice.  Thank you for making a page for this awesome utility!  I have moved the comments about this from the CwDA page here.

The page for this game was very old and the content wasn't really appropriate as a formal description of this historic game, so I have completely rewritten it.  The original version can still be found here.

Very good stuff. I have seen one of these before in person while in Japan and was amazed. Beautiful and fun to play variant. I really like the Taikyoku shogi. I wonder if that george guy makes those too, or even makes these still. 

Just played this very interesting game. A single Knight won the game when White was at a larrge disadvantage being down a bishop and a rook. 

(note b2=P means b2 is flipped and a Pawn is revealed. Pawns are desginated P and there is no short-form notation)

1. c2=P   c7=C
2. Pe2-e3   ....

Otherwise Cc7xc1 #

2. ...       Cc7xc1 (xB)
3. Ke1-e2 Cc1xa1 (xP)
4. g2=N    b7=B
5. Ng2-f4  Bb7xh1 (xR)
6. Nf4-e6

After a careless capture at h1, which yielded a rook advantage (rook is the strongest unit on board at the start), Black resigns at this point, since Nxg7 or Nc7 are both checkmates and no possible move could defend both squares. The King could not move as its only revealed piece, the e7 pawn, is blocked by the white Knight. Other unrevealed p

I am currently playing a game of Odin's Rune Chess, and I really like it, as much the rules and gameplay, as the runic theme. The Forest Ox is a terrific piece, maybe too powerful... I like the rather strong Pawns. I generally appreciate modern variants that use non-conventional Pawns, it effectively renews the dynamics of a chess game. And their initial colorboundness isn't a default at all, for me.

I was wondering if Pawn promotion could be integrated in this game - even if it is not necessary since Pawns can go back and the need for new material is less crucial, since the vulnerabiliy of the Kings without moving possibilities makes situations of insufficent material less likely. Promotion possibilities should be limited, since Pawns can reach the last rank in only four moves; for example, they could only promote to previously captured pieces of his own colour; or there could be limitations to the maximum number of pieces of each type present on the board (4 Valkyries, and 4 Forest Oxen, for example - which is already a lot). One can also think of the opportunity to permit the promotion to King (here too, the maximum number must be limited or promotion be only to previously captured Kings). But the game plays already well, I don't think it needs a promotion rule. I was just wondering how promotion could affect the gameplay, and if it could be interessant as a variant.

Edit: my comment about the possibility of promotion wasn't very pertinent. Promotion doesn't make much sense in this game.

I think it's a fusion between Wildbeast and Xhess not XChess. XChess is a variation with an hourglass.

Chris

Hi, it's always good to hear criticism. And i think you've got it right.

Personally i give you the pieces i much like when playing Musketeer Chess: Hawk, Unicorn +++ and my favorite is the Archbishop combining Bishop and Knight abilities. I much like sacrificing my Queen for an Archbishop !!

Musketeer Chess idea was to get rid of the big amount of draws and also opening learning (long theoretical lines). The idea is also to give black a more important role by deciding the final combination of pieces, adapting his strategy to white's choice which will lower for sure the importance of white's advantage as the side who begins the game; But this needs for sure a precise play.

You pointed out the fact that the Board is overcrowded. Of course it becomes a problem if you choose to gate you r pieces whithout a prior clear strategy and this will hamper you from exploiting the huge potential of the new pieces.

The newly added pieces are strong and they bring so much excitment and tactics from the first move ! So the slightest lack of attention can be punished (more spectacular wins) but also if you lower your attention even with a huge material advantage on the board, your opponent can surprise you and mate you using the newest pieces whom some can mate alone.

Yes, Musketeer Chess is not a perfect game, but Classic Chess became mostly a game of "knowledge" and opening learning and is for sure less attractive for average kids and players that want to improve their level but are frustrated by this learning.

Elite tournaments are less spectacular and games most usually finish with draws.