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Dipole Chess. A cross between Chess and the game Dipole by Mark Steere. (8x8, Cells: 64) [All Comments] [Add Comment or Rating]
Thomas wrote on Sat, Nov 8, 2008 03:14 PM UTC:Good ★★★★
This variant I find very interesting.

Additional idea: let the pieces make a non-capturing move laterally or
backwards with demoting the piece to the next lower kind, e.g. in the
order queen -> rook -> bishop -> knight -> pawn. This is buying more time,
and also combinations may include the demotion of a piece to alter its way
of moving.

The king is maybe too vulnerable in these variants. A defended Queen on
any of the three squares in front of the King mates, and also a defended
rook directly in front of it. Three pawns can also mate.

One might add the rule that the king may also move laterally or backwards
when attacked. I think this does not lead to cycles, but if there are
Rooks and Nightriders, a cycle is possible:
white: King e2, Rook e1
black: King e5, Nightrider f7
1. Kd3+ Kd6+
2. Ke2  Ke5

💡📝Rich Hutnik wrote on Sun, Aug 17, 2008 04:05 AM UTC:Good ★★★★
I have run this multiple times in Zillions and got to play it with Joe Joyce today.  I have to give it a thumbs up.  The game has one on edge most of the time.  There is room for a single mess up multiple times in the game that can cost you.  This happened when I played Joe.  I actually had the game locked, then bungled with my King and he won.  It is amazing that by removing a few rules, you can end up with chess going in an entirely different direction.

Well, that is my brief review to explain my experience.  Beyond this, I want to get people to look at this game and argue for how much less depth it has then normal (FIDE) Chess.  My take here is that, while the game forces more restrictions, there are critical key points in the game, that force one to even have to evaluate deeper in the decision tree in order not to lose.  Joe described this as 'Chaotic'.  In a 'Butterfly effect' sort of way, I would agree here.

Anyhow, if anyone wants to argue that Dipole Chess is a lot more shallow than regular chess, due to the lack of moving backwards, I would like to hear the arguments.  I will say that Zillions is a bit prone to not playing it well, making stupid mistakes, and not reading context of pieces to one another.

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