I design my own pieces and 3D print or carve them. At least I try to, my 3D printer hates working and I don't always have the time for carving. There are websites where you can upload STLs (instructions for a 3D printer to print a certain file) and someone else prints them and sends them to you, which is helpful if you don't want/can't buy one. I haven't made any physical fairy pieces yet, but I'm working on designing them. I actually made a thread recently about this, I'm gonna be posting new designs on there over time: https://www.chess.com/forum/view/chess-equipment/custom-set-with-fairy-pieces I like those house of saunton archbishops and chancellors, I think I might take inspiration from them.
Variants OTB
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Sep 29, 2023
0
#3
JkCheeseChess wrote:
i use orthodox pieces and make believe
Yeah obviously you can substitute pretty much anything for any kind of piece and it will work. Doesn't exactly look any different on a book shelf though lol
Sep 29, 2023
0
#4
kirfickleslups wrote:
I design my own pieces and 3D print or carve them. At least I try to, my 3D printer hates working and I don't always have the time for carving. There are websites where you can upload STLs (instructions for a 3D printer to print a certain file) and someone else prints them and sends them to you, which is helpful if you don't want/can't buy one. I haven't made any physical fairy pieces yet, but I'm working on designing them. I actually made a thread recently about this, I'm gonna be posting new designs on there over time: https://www.chess.com/forum/view/chess-equipment/custom-set-with-fairy-pieces I like those house of saunton archbishops and chancellors, I think I might take inspiration from them.
Nice that's a pretty cool idea. In an ideal world I would take the time and learn how to do it myself but yeah, the house of staunton ones are pretty sexy. I would like to see what your idea of a dragon bishop looks like. That's gotta be the coolest looking piece ever if someone can design one.
I'm curious how people play these variants OTB. Obviously stuff like KOTH and 3+check is easy to figure out but I'm more curious about these variants with unique pieces and obscure board sizes. 4 player boards are widely available now, as is 10x10 and even 12x12 as those are a mainstay of international draughts and Canadian checkers. But for instance, XXL chess is a 14x14 board and Gothic chess is 8x10.
Also, I see plenty of Chaturaji sets on ETSY and other places but oddly enough can't find a good Chaturanga set. Often the two get conflated in some form or another but an authentic vintage looking Chaturanga set would look great with the elephant, chariot and minister.
Then there's the matter of pieces. I actually found on chess house they sell a Capablanca Chess Set --
and House of Staunton has a very nice but rather pricy set as well, equipped with some very elegant looking archbishops and chancellors --
These 10x10 boards can double as checker boards but the unique design of these variant pieces make it a very distinctive set I would love to get my hands on. I suppose you can also use this for Gothic Chess (the improvement to Capablanca Chess) but you'd have to limit yourself to 8 ranks instead of 10 but the file count is correct. Also, you know have the two extra pieces to play Seirawan Chess (the other improvement to Seirawan Chess) OTB.
However, XXL chess has many other pieces that I doubt can be found. Are there any DIY suggestions to create a set with these esoteric pieces? I wonder what a Dragon bishop would look like?
I love collecting pieces and different boards so it would be cool to expand my inventory to more obscure variants. I suppose one could take up woodworking and make whatever they want themselves which is something I would love to take up but time is limited these days and I'm not sure I have time for another hobby (chess sure takes up a lot of it to begin with lol). But let me know if anyone has any links to variant pieces, some ideas to play variants OTB or anyone's in person variant stories.