Proposed Rule Change - King Capture

I guess my only argument here is that chess variants are variants for a reason. Everything you've said is factually correct but in the context of 4 player chess and other variants it is irrelevant, simply because the inherent mechanics for each game is different. For example, regicide is its own game rule, where every player is allowed to "hang their king" (this means checks, pins, etc. aren't forceful moves). Another example is stalemate: some variants are programmed to have stalemate be a condition for losing, which aligns with your "Chess is not about trapping the king; otherwise, a stalemate would also be a victory." statement that you made in response to my albeit flawed explanation of checkmate. In some games, stalemate is a win condition. It all depends on what we are talking about.

What I'm trying to say is that we can't simply change the rule for one specific case because that would break so many other cases where the mechanic is viable, maybe even crucial to the gameplay of that variant. Especially in 4pc, where many tactics are built around double checks and discovered attacks, removing this mechanic because that's how it works in a completely different game would be a silly idea.

That's my take

I partially disagree. 4pc should seek to be as logically similar to 2pc as possible, for purely functional reasons. We do not have the playerbase etc. to survive on our own and so we need to seek to be as attractive as possible to 2pc players as possible.

For example, we have En Passant. This is arguably a very stupid rule (in regular chess, it is more of a headache to beginners than anything else) but the reason we have it is because regular chess does.

The point here is I think it is very important that things should line up to 2pc as possible. Not to the extent of making 4pc king capture rules nonsense (as would be a hypothetical rule that would make king capture impossible to preserve 2pc checkmating situations) but I think it should be a priority.

I simply disagree that "tactics built around double checks and discovered attacks" are crucial to 4pc. They are, but imo not in relation to the question. At minimum, looking at the game, I would not be frustrated in the least if the option to king capture were taken away; like En Passant it doesn't seem to matter much either way. Seeing as these king capture moves increase things at most one cycle in depth I don't think it's fundamental. I can't think of any other games off the top of my head but if everything is like the game mentioned in the beginning it doesn't seem to matter much; it's fairly arbitrary to the complexity and skill of the game

you're right everyone's oppinion is important

Alright, ill give my final thoughts on this topic and hopefully put it to rest.

You are making two very different arguments, one with merit and one without merit, and because u refuse to choose between the two arguments your position becomes muddy, with the only constant being that king capture = bad. To which I think is the fundamental difference between our positions, I do not mind king captures in the slightest and u seem to think it breaks all chess law.

Ill break down both of your arguments, starting with your second paragraph.

Argument 1. King captures (given a position where you have exposed you king to capture and this is possible) should not have priority over checkmate.

After reading your second paragraph I seriously questioned if I was getting through to you at all. It seems as if you are still arguing that you should've won your self partner game while hanging your own king.

Again, king captures having priority over checkmate is fully consistent and not at all contradictory. Your king is in danger first being that it is literally hanging, and any threat on an opposing king, even if that is checkmate, would come after your king is captured.

"Most of all, the current ruleset breaks the most fundamental of all chess rules: a player wins by checkmate."

Well no, not in this case. 99 percent of the time that is correct, but this is an outlier. I've explained multiple times why this is the case. Please reread this thread.

Argument 2. Players should be forced to respond to king capture threats as to avoid an actual king capture.

This has merit and can be discussed. As I said in my original reply, the question is simply if a king capture threat is identical to a regular check and warrants the same response. Because of the indirect nature of this threat vs the direct threat of a check from a single player, I'm inclined to believe not forcing a response is consistent with how the rest of the game is played.

Although that does result in a king capture, that simply does not bother me. Although it is a new and unusual outcome in a chess based game, I see it as the only consistent outcome of this unlikely position. Myself and other have embraced this and I think you should as well

I also believe changing the rules to force a player to react to this threat to prevent this event from happening would create more complications than it would solve. Seeing other comments in this thread, it seems most people dont see an issue with a game ending in king captures, so adding this new rule would be an unnecessary and unwanted change to current gameplay.

However if you want to take a poll and see where the consensus falls I would be on board. If most people would rather see this change implemented, I would totally be okay with it.

If you should never be allowed to hang your king, then why do you claim (a few sentences later) that "[the king capture] was created to confront and patch this loophole of allowing your king to hang."

"You are never allowed to hang your own king in order to deliver a threat to another king."

The second part of this sentence was the essence of this statement. Yes, in this one unique situation exclusive to 4pc you are indirectly "allowed" to hang your king, but u may not exploit this to deliver check or checkmate.

TL;DR: imo king capture is a harmless rule. I don't really think we can adhere to 2pc anymore than we already are because we are literally playing a variant of chess; these are games that are MEANT to be different from the original, and I believe we are doing a good enough job of being as close to home as possible while also introducing new ideas that make the games more interesting.

I disagree with your first point. I think we already as close as possible to regular chess and changing the rules to appeal to 2pc players for "purely functional reasons" just to increase the playerbase would be detrimental to the nature of chess variants and their uniqueness.

As to your point about En Passant, I would say it is a different scenario: it would be removing something that chess already has. With king captures, it is adding something that chess doesn't already have. This is the point of chess variants.

Removing king captures, in a sense, would be like removing fairy pieces. Just because it doesn't work like that in regular chess doesn't necessarily mean we should 100% adhere to the principles of chess and not have king captures.

I agree when you say that these two rules have very little importance in the overall view of 4 player chess, but as a CGA I feel inclined to speak of the hundreds of other custom variants where king captures and en passant and other gamerules play a crucial role. That's what make variants unique. We as a community have created so many interesting works of art by implementing custom fairy pieces and a variety of gamerules.

Perhaps these rules aren't necessary in 4pc, but would it hurt to keep them? You yourself mentioned that the existence of king captures "increase things at most one cycle in depth", so how would it be detrimental in any way to keep the rule?

I assume you are mainly an FFA player (correct me if I'm wrong), so you might have a differing opinion on how certain gamerules affect the game compared to me, a teams player, but from my viewpoint the role that tactics have in a teams game is much more elevated than its 2p counterpart. The ability to capture a king becomes a groundbreaking rule in this case and is the difference between a win and a loss in many games: they just happen way more often than you think. If I had to give an example, I played about 30 games of hyperbullet teams a few days ago, and I believe there were 3-4 instances of king captures in those matches. Of course, 30 games is not really a large sample size, especially because it's hyperbullet and not rapid, but even then I would still consider the king capture rule to at least be a playful and harmless gamerule that makes every game just that much more intriguing and fun to play.

2 A.M. me is a bad writer (not that 12 A.M. me is any better), so I will first clarify two points. First, I want to say that I simply and only disagree with the logic behind your argument. I don't care much either way on king captures. Second, I think we agree that whatever is decided is a fairly harmless decision, maybe? anyway

"The ability to capture a king becomes a groundbreaking rule in this case and is the difference between a win and a loss in many games."

Primarily FFA, though I've played more than enough teams games (a thousand) to be mediocre. I guess I think it's something about as inconsequential as it can be for something that is win/loss altering. I guess it's somewhat subjective, but that in itself argues for my point. If I and laundry man (who is a strong teams player) don't seem to think it matters too much. If it matters to only half of a tiny sample size (of the people who cared enough to comment) then maybe it isn't a very important game rule. But this is somewhat irrelevant to my main point which is not really about king captures.

"I disagree with your first point. I think we already as close as possible to regular chess and changing the rules to appeal to 2pc players for "purely functional reasons" just to increase the playerbase would be detrimental to the nature of chess variants and their uniqueness." "I agree when you say that these two rules have very little importance in the overall view of 4 player chess, but as a CGA I feel inclined to speak of the hundreds of other custom variants where king captures and en passant and other gamerules play a crucial role. That's what make variants unique. We as a community have created so many interesting works of art by implementing custom fairy pieces and a variety of gamerules."

So this is a question of how much should 2pc affect variant game rules.

I think I should rephrase my argument to this: "when a game-rule is close to arbitrary (i.e not fundamental or even that important to the game), it is typically better to mirror 2pc". Another way to say it: "we should not change variants just to change variants, there should be a reason"

(the reason I talked about king capture is because I see it fairly close to arbitrary, which would lead into my argument)

To ask a rhetorical question, let's say you don't like En Passant. Should Chess960 (which only changes one thing) get rid of En Passant? Why?

To talk about Fairy Pieces, it is hard to say something generally because not all fairy pieces are arbitrary (Capablanca Chess etc.) but I think it is obvious that randomly adding in fairy pieces as the regular 4pc gamemode would be stupid. That's a bit of a strawman, but anyway hopefully you kind of get what I'm getting at

Reysbull – first, I’d like to thank you for contributing to this thread because I can tell that you’re frustrated. Your perspective is always welcome, and your thoughts have sparked great discourse. I’m going to respond to your assertions, but please don’t take offense to anything I say.

1) You claim that because I refuse to choose between my two arguments, my position becomes muddy.  This statement is misguided. In my original post, I clearly state (i) my proposed rule and (ii) an ALTERNATIVE rule in the event that my proposed rule is not implemented. Perhaps you misunderstood my original post. My proposed rule is that players should be forced to address king capture threats. My alternative rule is that (in the event that my proposed rule is not implemented), king captures should not enjoy super-priority.

2) Super-priority of king captures. You explain that “king captures having priority over checkmate is fully consistent and not at all contradictory. Your king is in danger first being that it is literally hanging, and any threat on an opposing king, even if that is checkmate, would come after your king is captured.” First, the concept of king captures having priority over checkmate would sound absurd to the average 2PC chess player. When rules sound absurd to 2PC chess players, that should be a sign of a bad rule. Second, the crux of your statement (I believe?) is the following: players must first address a threat on their own king before they can attack their opponent’s king. So then, why must checkmated players not address the attack on their own hanging king before capturing an opponent’s king? Your statement is not clear. I agree that players should be forced to address threats on their own king (hence, my proposed rule). If, by chance, you are arguing that king captures should have priority over checkmates because the king capture threat is necessarily initiated before the checkmate threat is initiated, this argument would also be misguided. It does not matter when threats are initiated; it should only matter when threat become complete. If the checkmate happens before the king capture can be completed (assuming king captures should even be viable to begin with), then the checkmate should have priority over the king capture.

3) “Although it is a new and unusual outcome in a chess based game, I see it as the only consistent outcome of this unlikely position. Myself and other have embraced this and I think you should as well.”  You consistently refer to king captures as a “loophole,” “outlier,” “new and unusual,” etc. Instead of elevating king captures (especially unforced king captures) above checkmate, it is much more consistent and intuitive to remove this new and unusual loophole/outlier (by forcing players to address king capture threats). I am happy to embrace new and exciting rules, but you’re asking me to accept an arbitrary rule that violates important fundamental principles of standard chess. Please see HSCCCB’s posts for an explanation of why 4PC should not adopt arbitrary rules.

4) “I also believe changing the rules to force a player to react to this threat to prevent this event from happening would create more complications than it would solve. Seeing other comments in this thread, it seems most people dont see an issue with a game ending in king captures, so adding this new rule would be an unnecessary and unwanted change to current gameplay.” Implementing my proposed rule would not introduce more complications than it would solve. The only complex question that would need to be addressed is how to treat forced king capture threats (in my original post, I argue that forced king capture threats should be equivalent to stalemate). I understand that adding this new rule may be unwanted, but I believe it is necessary if we wish to adhere closely to the rules of standard chess.

Also HSCCCB, laundry man agrees with you 100%. Thank you for your contributions as well!

The king is always captured in standard chess (unless the game is drawn of course). You just don't do the actual move because it is redundant. In 4PC it is not redundant since the game might continue and thus having your piece on that square affects the game, and in the event that you could capture with more than one piece then you have to make a decision on which one to use (irrelevant in 2P).

In your game example, after the king capture, red King is no longer mated, AND yellow has another turn. So if green were to do something stupid like move another piece, then red king can simply capture the queen to survive. I think this is why the game continued?

EDIT: Forgot that you can just back up to a position and play from there... king capture is the only legal move for red!

Hi Magic_sofa,

Thank you for your post.

I disagree with your premise: "The king is always captured in standard chess (unless the game is drawn of course). You just don't do the actual move because it is redundant."

You claim the king is always captured in chess. The reality, however, is quite the opposite. The king is NEVER captured in standard chess. You cannot hang your king like you can hang normal pieces. If you try to hang your king in standard chess, your opponent cannot capture your king and win the game. Instead, you are forced to play a different move.

The reason king captures do not exist in chess is not because it would be redundant; the reason is that the rules of chess do everything they can to avoid the possibility of a king capture. If a king capture is the ultimate goal of chess, stalemate would essentially be equivalent to checkmate, and players would be allowed to hang their kings.

In standard chess, victory is obtained through checkmate. I understand that many 4PC players think that king captures should be prioritized above checkmate, but there is simply no basis in standard chess. Allowing checkmated players to play a move on their turn (and possibly win the game) is preposterous.

4PC players can do all the mental gymnastics they want to try to justify king captures, but it doesn't change the fact that king captures violate basic principles of standard chess, which implements so many rules that are specifically aimed at avoiding the possibility of king captures.

Checkmate is when the king cannot avoid capture. I think you are reading far too much into the superficial tradition of not actually moving the piece to capture the king in 2PC. It is just a tradition, since the winner is clear there is simply no real reason to perform the move on the board. If you decided to ignore this tradition, it would only change the physical (or virtual) motions on the board, NOT the rules of the game.

Stalemate is definitely an interesting aspect of the rules, but remember stalemate happens when the opponent has no legal moves because all their pieces are blocked or, in the case of the king, all open squares are under attack. So yes, the king is not allowed to move into danger. Your example in the 4-player game does not involve moving the king into danger, and therefore does not violate this rule.

As I mentioned, the king capture was your only legal move, because it prevented checkmate on your own king. The mechanic of changing from checkmate to just check is only possible in four player games. With two players, you only get one chance to save your king, so either you are in check (escapable), or in checkmate (not escapable). With four players, that dynamic changes because there are multiple chances for a checking situation to change. So it is in fact more consistent with the standard rules (king must be saved) to allow you to reduce your threat level from checkmate, to check.

Consider this: if the rules didn't allow you to capture that king, you would have no legal moves at all. Wouldn't that mean stalemate?

Your idea of checkmate is mistaken. If king captures are the reason why checkmate is a win, then stalemates should also be a win (because the king also cannot avoid capture in a stalemate).

You claim that there is a "superficial tradition of not actually moving the piece to capture the king in 2PC." This idea is also mistaken. Under no circumstance should a king ever be taken in standard chess. This is not a superficial tradition. It is a fundamental aspect of chess that so many rules are intended to uphold.

You claim that checkmate is a win because a king capture is impending. This is an incorrect belief. Otherwise, why would king captures not be a win in other circumstances? Not only are king captures never a win, but they are never even allowed in standard chess. A checkmate is a win because the creators of chess wanted to create only one win condition: to place your opponent in a completely vulnerable position such that his king is in check and cannot escape check by playing a single move.

An unforced king capture threat is not nearly as dominant as checkmate (yet the rules of 4PC currently deem unforced king capture threats to be superior to checkmate...a ridiculous notion). An unforced king capture threat is much more similar to a check or a pin. Because players cannot ignore a check and cannot ignore a pin to the king, players should also not be allowed to ignore king capture threats in 4PC.

You also claim "[i]t is just a tradition, since the winner is clear there is simply no real reason to perform the move on the board." This statement is absurd. Why do games end at checkmate, rather than at forced mate in 1, 2, 3, 4 or 10? There would also be no real reason to perform the forced mate. There is a reason why games end with checkmate, and not with a king capture: king captures violate so many fundamental pillars of chess.

Lastly, I understand that your argument in the last few paragraphs of your post make sense in your head, but it is not rooted in any principles of chess. I followed you for a bit, but you claim the king capture was my only legal move because it prevented checkmate on my own king. This statement sounds so wrong and violates so many principles of chess.

Also, I don't understand your hypothetical question. Please explain. In my game, I should've been forced to address the king capture threat.

Forced mate only happens if the attacking player makes the correct moves.

In your game, your only legal move was to capture the king. You were not allowed to move any other piece in any other way. It's definitely a brain twister and I'm just inferring the rules here, from what I can see it looks like you were given that single legal move because it removes blue's attack on your king and changes what looks like checkmate to just a regular check. This logic simply cannot be applied to two player chess. I would argue that it is consistent with two player chess, meaning that it is an extrapolated rule that only applies to 4PC but does still follow the same logic as 2PC as best as possible.

The fundamental pillar of chess is that you must capture the king. Check is only check because your king COULD be captured. If you can't escape, then it is checkmate - your king is able to be captured by the opponent, and you are unable to prevent it from happening. You are confusing what is done on the board vs what the rules mean.

its good the way it is

This may be unrelated but i'd like to see capture the king brought into some kind of rated FFA mode. At the moment the only way to play is casual 'regicide'. In FFA capture the king would make teaming checkmates more difficult, slightly slowing the game down. It may be an argument that FFA should be capture the king anyway.