Ok so I think that we're focusing a bit too much on the endgame here and forgetting the meta nature of this game. Although your rooks might not come out until the late mid game or early endgame, they are worth a lot and if choosing rooks is a bit stronger than the rest of the pieces, the opponent will target your rooks even in the mid game. It may be easier to protect your rooks, than your other pieces, but I think that really just leads to different play styles, not an imbalance. I don't think the bishop is at all a problem, as it is less mobile and relatively easy to trap in the mid game with most play styles. Remember that the opponent doesn't know what your royal piece is and probably won't until they either capture it unknowingly or you give them a hint like moving it instead of a higher value piece when forked. Also, like someone said, a game of chess can normally be forced into a draw with even close to optimal play. The rook may have some balancing problems but I don't think it's enough to completely remove it as an option, and the bishop is not at all close to a major problem.
Test Game 010 - Possible Flaw in Ahab Chess
i think you should make it so that rooks are not allowed but kings are allowed to be ahabs
I've played quite a few irl test games where you're allowed to use the king as a royal and it's always been relatively balanced. Because when I see my opponent (or my opponent sees me) castle early it's a very reliable indicator that they've chosen they're king as a royal, and from there I keep my royal a secret. They're stuck trying to find my royal but I know exactly where theirs is. I do think that a rule prohibiting both people from choosing a royal king is worth considering, but I'm not sure if it's necessary. I do know that if the king is royal that castling is a bit strong and maybe a rule is necessary to implement that says you can only castle if your king isn't royal, or just no castling at all. In my experience though, castling has never been to much of an issue. Then again it could be because I'm not that good at chess and neither are my irl chess friends so that could be swaying my games.
Did you record notation for any of those games?
I don't think kings are weak enough that it would be an advantage to choose your king as a royal.
I haven't played this variant very much, but I would assume that the best strategy no matter your royal is to activate all your non-royal pieces, which for most games would include the king. I think that as chess players we're just not used to using our king as an attacking piece, and so we automatically assume that it's not useful, whereas in reality, if you develop it towards the center, it can be just as useful as a knight or bishop.
And, imo, anything that makes rooks less powerful as Ahab is a good thing.
Did you record notation for any of those games?
No sorry, some of these games were years ago. I thought of this a while ago and played it with some irl chess friends and only remembered it when you first posted the variant and I thought "well this is a pretty simple variant, so I'm not surprised others have thought of it before." I have played it recently as well, and I'll start recording the games from now on. From the top of my head, we could notate the royals as 0.royal,royal before the first move, the 0 because it's the '0th move'. For example, 0.b,gN means that white has chosen their b pawn and black has chosen their g knight.
...I haven't played this variant very much, but I would assume that the best strategy no matter your royal is to activate all your non-royal pieces, which for most games would include the king. I think that as chess players we're just not used to using our king as an attacking piece, and so we automatically assume that it's not useful, whereas in reality, if you develop it towards the center, it can be just as useful as a knight or bishop...
Having played a decent amount of games of ahab chess, non-royal chess (no royal pieces), and gay chess (queen replaced with king & only lose if both kings are checkmated or captured), I can confirm that a non-royal king has a surprising amount of utility as a minor piece, as no other piece besides the queen controls all adjacent squares, so it can attack all pieces except a queen without being threatened. It is limited by its lack of range, as all other pieces can move more than 1 space, but it can do most other things well, such as protecting pieces or taking up space. It's certainly not quite as good as a knight or bishop, but it's close enough that it's still worth 3 points.
Hi, take a look at rook mate variant for comparison. It is regular chess with a royal rook but the addition of N-check.
Yeah mostly. I think that should just be the default for variants tbh
Bare piece rule would solve this problem, right?
Because if there's not bare piece rule, the official royal is never got mated
see luke the thing with long-range pieces is that it's impossible to corner them unless you have enough pieces to cover all the squares.
and i assume 4 queens is the bare minimum, assuming the rook is in the corner, but in reality you'd probably need more than 5
Fairy stockfish: 4 is enough