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This page is written by the game's inventor, (zzo38) A. Black.

Alien and Predators Symmetric

It is based on the game Alience Vs Predators, however I made a symmetric game and made some other changes, including more clearly rules.

Setup

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PPPPPPPPPP
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Y.OA..CO.Y

Pieces

You should use shogi-like pieces which face, or use flat pieces which is white on one side and black on other side. Initially the Amazons (three per player, six in total) begin off-board; all other pieces start on the board.

Rules

  1. Each player may, once per game, as a move, place three Amazons of their color on their first three ranks such that none are horizontal, vertical, or diagonal, or knight's move from each other (regardless of what is in between). They must be placed on vacant spaces, or on spaces containing a piece (of either color) that there is currently only one piece of that kind and color on the board currently (those pieces are removed). It is not allowed to make this special move if you are unable to place all three Amazons. (Placing them in check is OK.)
  2. Lose if you have no royal pieces on board.
  3. A flipped piece is immune to being captured for one turn.
  4. Player with no legal moves while it is their turn, but still has royal pieces on board, is end the game in a draw.

Notes

I do not know how long you should wait before placing the Superkings, or how long it expects before such a move is even available. It is, however, one way to avoid checkmate if you have the king checkmate, then placing more royal pieces makes it harder to be checkmated. Furthermore, you might have your amazon capture opponent's king, now you have another king, too.

Note that if you captured too many opponent pieces by your amazon/superkings then you fill up your first three rows, then even if opponent has only one more king remaining and no other royal pieces, your amazon still cannot capture them (therefore, you haven't won yet)! Such situation is probably really unusual, though.

The further variant may be with pieces "eggs", having cards in your hand to tell you what is inside of eggs (therefore, would also involve hidden information). Such further variant has not been made up yet. (There is the asymmetric game with eggs (without hidden information) although the one I am making is the symmetric game.)



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By (zzo38) A. Black.
Web page created: 2012-12-03. Web page last updated: 2013-12-10