Watch the 2021 Solo World 4 Player Chess Championship Finals this Saturday and Sunday!
Starting June 26, 2020 at 2:00 p.m. U.S. Eastern (18:00 UTC/ 11:00 PST), a battle will begin between four players for the third World Solo Championship of Four Player Chess, a Chess.com variant where each game is contested by four sets of pieces. These contestants are fighting for a single prize of $1000 USD.
- Watch the Four Player Chess championship this Saturday, June 26, and Sunday, June 27, live on Twitch.tv/chesscomevents at 11 a.m. PST / 2 p.m. EST.
- New to Four Player Chess? Read our guide to the game for rules and strategy, and then jump in to play.
The four finalists won their way through a field of 16 in earlier play to reach the finals. The championship will be determined by 3 sessions of play in a best-of-9 format. The first player to reach 2.25 points will be declared the champion. The current schedule for this Championship Final:
Games 1-5: Saturday, June 26, 2021 at 18:00 UTC (11:00 PST)
Games 6-9 (if needed): Sunday, June 27, 2021 at 18:00 UTC (11:00 PST)
Channels featuring commentary: https://www.chess.com/tv (18:00 UTC-21:00 UTC Saturday and 18:00 UTC-19:00 UTC Sunday) and https://www.twitch.tv/chesscomevents
Streamers: Evgeni Miller @JonasRath (https://www.twitch.tv/jonas_rath) Vahan Nalbandyan @Cha_ChaRealSmooth (https://www.twitch.tv/chachachess), Jai Sandhu @Radon (https://www.twitch.tv/7991radon), and Tournament Director Luke Romanko @e4bc4qh5qf7 (https://www.twitch.tv/fourplayerchess).
Miller (first ever 4PC Solo World Champion) and Romanko are volunteer administrators/moderators of the four player chess community with extensive experience in variations of each type of 4 player chess game. Nalbandyan has been known for having the world's highest Solo and FFA ratings, and he has performed highly in both Solo and Teams championships. Sandhu is also a very high rated FFA player and is consistently the highest rated 4 player chess fog of war player. These four chess personalities will comment on all the World 4 Player Chess Championship action while explaining the rules and basic strategies to the audience.
A game of Anonymous Solo Four Player Chess (from the last game of Round 3 in the First Solo Championship).
The battlefield features four new Solo Finalists:
[1] Lars Johan Brodtkorb ( @icystun )
[2] Michael T. Tieber ( @empty_k3 )
[3] José Bolea ( @jbolea )
[4] Suneth Karunaratne ( @Suneth )
Our #1 seed @icystun, from Norway, qualified for the championship. This is Brodtkorb's fifth W4PCC final as he is a Defending Champion for both the Team and Solo Championships and a finalist for last year's Antichess Championship. Brodtkorb is the only player to have qualified for all World Championships except one. Brodtkorb is the Championship Preliminaries. Brodtkorb is not only an accomplished chess player nearing a Fide Master title, he is one of Norway's best sailors. During the post-match interview of the preliminaries, Brodtkorb correctly predicted Bracket 2's finalist in the exact number of games played ("empty_k3 in 4").
Our #2 seed @empty_k3, a 26-year-old from Austria, qualified for the championship through outstanding performance in rated Solo games. He has played in all three Solo championships, and has faced Brodtkorb during one bracket each year, but this is the first time they have encountered in the Final. Tieber loves to tutor math and play volleyball, and play poker, and his username exists from his favorite hand in Texas Hold'Em, King-3 offsuit. During the post-match interview of the preliminaries, Tieber correctly predicted Bracket 3 and 4's finalists.
Our #3 seed @jbolea , a 28-year-old from Spain, qualified through a Championship Qualifier. Bolea played in the preliminaries of the first Solo W4PCC. Bolea is rated above 2000 FIDE and is on the way to receive a FIDE title.
Our #4 seed @Suneth, from Sri Lanka, qualified through a Championship Qualifier. Currently, Suneth is working as a senior software developer. Suneth feels the game of Solo depends on 50% luck and 50% talent. He hopes everyone will have a great match in the upcoming games of this final and looks forward to meeting all in the finals.
Unlike in Teams, Free-For-All/Solo players have varying strategies from aggressive to conservative to opportunistic to a mix of them. The championship games are anonymous but the players will guess who each other are based on play and sometimes change their strategies to camouflage and/or hide their identities. No one will want a single player to run away with a victory, so elite play from all will make this match interesting!
Championship Format:
- 1 minutes + 5 second increment; Anonymous, standard 8th rank promotion as 1-point queen with en-passant and dead-king-walk features.
- Winner of each game earns a score of 1; 2nd-4th place earn 0. Ties for first will be split equally. The game will be decided in 9 or less games; the first player to reach 2.25 wins will be declared the 2021 World Solo Champion.
- After each game, players will rematch each other (until after the third game of the day) and the matchmaker will pick randomly.
- If two or more players reach or exceed “2.25” at the same time, the higher score wins. If their score is the exact same, the player with higher score in the next most recent game will be declared the 2020 World Solo Champion. If all four players draw during all 9 games, the winner goes to whoever moved last before the draw, second to whoever moved second to last, etc.
- The third World Solo Champion will earn a prize of $1000 USD.
More Information:
- 2020 World Solo Four Player Chess Championship Information / Results (must join club to read):
- Four Player Championship Rules
Watch, Learn and Play:
