inclusive chess?

[flok]

Hi,

Just had an idea: a chess variant where the queen and king are equally valuable. As long as you have either (or both) of them, and either of them can move without being caught, you're fine (so the same rules as apply for old chess). I thought of the part where the queen can make "longer" moves than the king, but one could say that that is because in reality people are also not different in what they physically can (not making them different in value). I pondered about the pawn and the bishop. Not sure about those. Maybe keep them as they are?

Love to hear suggestions and constructive criticism.

[lkaufman]

That is equivalent to normal chess with the rule added that losing the queen loses the game instantly, although you need to specify whether you need your original queen or any queen (i.e. from promotion). This would eliminate most endgames and so would appear to reduce draws a lot, but I'm not sure it actually would do so. It might instead lead to more draws as winning a pawn would be much harder to convert to a win if queens can't be exchanged. It would also increase perpetual checks, so a rule forbidding that might be necessary. I thought of this myself years ago, but I'm skeptical that it would reduce draws. You may have different motivations for the proposal; for me the main point of reforms in chess is the draw problem. In general, any ideas that give an alternate route to victory besides checkmate should help, but as noted there are exceptions to this. I'll also note that if your motivation has anything to do with gender equality, it is not valid because the queen is not always a female in other languages.

[hgm]

That is equivalent to normal chess with the rule added that losing the queen loses the game instantly, although you need to specify whether you need your original queen or any queen (i.e. from promotion).

What you describe is 'absolute royalty', but it is not what the OP proposed: he said the game would continue if either of them could move. So it would be fine to let your King or Queen be captured, as long as you still have the other left ('extinction royalty'). You are of course right about the complications introduced by promotion: in such a variant you would typically either forbid promotion to Queen, or also allow promotion to King. (E.g. in Spartan Chess the Spartan army starts with two Kings, as extinction royalty, and promotion to King there is allowed, but only if you don't already have two.)

When the winning condition involves capturing an unrestricted Queen, the game will in practice be a certain draw, as a Queen is simply too difficult to checkmate. You would need an advantage of 3 Queens or so (assuming promotion to Queen is still allowed), and perhaps only 1 in a thousand games would ever achieve such an advantage. This is a general problem with sliding royals. In Caissa Brittannia (where the royal piece of course is the Queen), this problem is solved by the extra rule that the royal Queen is not allowed to move through check.

I once conceived the asymmetric variant 'Pink Chess', where (instead of K+Q) white has two Kings and black has two Queens. The Kings would be extinction royals (i.e. one can be sacrificed, and you need to checkmate the remaining one), while the Queens would be absolute royals that could not pass through check. (I am not sure whether that is balanced very well.)

Pink Chess

theme=MV firstRank=1 symmetry=none
darkShade=#FFE0E0
royal=5
royal=6
extinction=1
Pawn::::a2-h2,,a7-h7
Knight:N:::b1,g1,,b8,g8
Bishop::::c1,f1,,c8,f8
Rook::::a1,h1,,a8,h8
Queen::nQ::,,d8,e8
King::::d1,e1

[Edit] One hairy detail: the rule of not passing through check is implemented as a kind of e.p. capture of the moving royal, and thus would not apply on the move that captures the last-remaining King.

[Guenther]

Hi,

Just had an idea: a chess variant where the queen and king are equally valuable. As long as you have either (or both) of them, and either of them can move without being caught, you're fine (so the same rules as apply for old chess). I thought of the part where the queen can make "longer" moves than the king, but one could say that that is because in reality people are also not different in what they physically can (not making them different in value). I pondered about the pawn and the bishop. Not sure about those. Maybe keep them as they are?

Love to hear suggestions and constructive criticism.

What about making K+Q hybrid pieces, with half the power of both? So let's say they can both move max 4 fields diagonal or linear and both are able to catch other pieces, but they are not allowed to be in 'check' after their move. (or may be just one of them, to make it more dynamic?)
(And both should be able to castle)

One could also add an extra rule for losing, except when both hybrid royals are gone, saying if none of them wouldn't (even if other pieces could move) be able to move legally (kind of stalemate) they would lose too. With rule two the start position must be slightly different, otherwise Black would be already stalemated in move 1,thus may be start both with a setup of already moved d3/e3 + d6/e6 pawns.

No idea though, if this delivers enough balance between active and passive play, just a suggestion w/o any test ;-)

[No4b]

I played a couple of games with my friend where rules were changed so that Queen was acting as a king.
In my fairy engine it is also possible to make any piece act as King (ie that piece must be captured for a win), so i played a fair bit of games where Bishop, Knight, Rook, and a bunch of different fairy pieces were `king`.

From this experience i must say that (generally) the more powerful the piece that act as `king` the harder it to win the game.
In general chess, one extra passed pawn is often enough to win the game.
But if you use Q or R as a `king` extra Queen in the endgame can be not enough to mate.

Using Knight or Bishop (or a piece of equivalent power) is mostly fine though.

[hgm]

Well, it takes already Q+R to checkmate a royal Bishop on 8x8 (BQR-B). With two Rooks it is only possible when both royal Bishops are on the same shade. Which they would not be if you start them on e1/e8.

[Tibono]

A nice variant I enjoy playing is Chessplus.
Pieces (except for the king) can be combined and later on split again; leading to shorter games, more dynamic, and fun.
Joined pieces can move according to both patterns of moves each individual piece can perform (no need to learn complex additional rules).
So, you can develop faster (combining pieces with pawns from the starting position), gain tempi and range (moving 2 pieces in one single move, then splitting them later on), including long range promotions for pawns associated to fast moving pieces, perform surprising attacks or strong defenses when splitting apart two pieces... Really fun!
I purchased plastic pieces to play over the board (they are rather inexpensive) but should you own an Android device, you can give a try using the free app! (includes a computer opponent with scaled levels).

[lkaufman]

That is equivalent to normal chess with the rule added that losing the queen loses the game instantly, although you need to specify whether you need your original queen or any queen (i.e. from promotion).

What you describe is 'absolute royalty', but it is not what the OP proposed: he said the game would continue if either of them could move. So it would be fine to let your King or Queen be captured, as long as you still have the other left ('extinction royalty'). You are of course right about the complications introduced by promotion: in such a variant you would typically either forbid promotion to Queen, or also allow promotion to King. (E.g. in Spartan Chess the Spartan army starts with two Kings, as extinction royalty, and promotion to King there is allowed, but only if you don't already have two.)

When the winning condition involves capturing an unrestricted Queen, the game will in practice be a certain draw, as a Queen is simply too difficult to checkmate. You would need an advantage of 3 Queens or so (assuming promotion to Queen is still allowed), and perhaps only 1 in a thousand games would ever achieve such an advantage. This is a general problem with sliding royals. In Caissa Brittannia (where the royal piece of course is the Queen), this problem is solved by the extra rule that the royal Queen is not allowed to move through check.

I once conceived the asymmetric variant 'Pink Chess', where (instead of K+Q) white has two Kings and black has two Queens. The Kings would be extinction royals (i.e. one can be sacrificed, and you need to checkmate the remaining one), while the Queens would be absolute royals that could not pass through check. (I am not sure whether that is balanced very well.)

Pink Chess

theme=MV firstRank=1 symmetry=none
darkShade=#FFE0E0
royal=5
royal=6
extinction=1
Pawn::::a2-h2,,a7-h7
Knight:N:::b1,g1,,b8,g8
Bishop::::c1,f1,,c8,f8
Rook::::a1,h1,,a8,h8
Queen::nQ::,,d8,e8
King::::d1,e1

[Edit] One hairy detail: the rule of not passing through check is implemented as a kind of e.p. capture of the moving royal, and thus would not apply on the move that captures the last-remaining King.

Sorry, I focused on the "both" in the original post, as the "either" king or queen, which was apparently implied, was so obviously hopelessly drawish that I didn't even consider that it was a serious suggestion. The version I describe (where you need both king and queen to survive) is a viable variant, but only engine tests could say whether it is more or less drawish than normal chess. A version of this that would eliminate most draws would be that the loss of all units of the same type (i.e. all 8 pawns, or both knights, or both bishops, or both rooks, or the queen (and any new queens), or king) loses the game. Has anyone ever proposed this before?

[hgm]

A version of this that would eliminate most draws would be that the loss of all units of the same type (i.e. all 8 pawns, or both knights, or both bishops, or both rooks, or the queen (and any new queens), or king) loses the game. Has anyone ever proposed this before?

Actually it has, exactly that way: Extinction Chess.

[lkaufman]

A version of this that would eliminate most draws would be that the loss of all units of the same type (i.e. all 8 pawns, or both knights, or both bishops, or both rooks, or the queen (and any new queens), or king) loses the game. Has anyone ever proposed this before?

Actually it has, exactly that way: Extinction Chess.

Wow, invented by Wayne Schmittberger. I remember playing a game of chu shogi with him something like forty years ago! His version differs a bit from what I describe in that it allows pawns to promote to kings and hence does away with check and checkmate, which I agree makes sense given the proposed rules. Is there any computer program that plays the game at superhuman level?