How to play chess variants
Super-simple variant: Amazon Chess
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Sep 2, 2023
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#3
Hi Vedant,
On the desktop chess.com website application, the variants are available if you hover over "Play" in the upper left under the subheading "4 Player & Variants". The Variants are mostly unavailable on the mobile chess.com app (only Chess960 variants are available there).
Cheers,
Dean
I think just an Amazon is boring. I leveled up every piece by a bit (except for the pawns).
Instead of a knight, a Nightrider is here, which can continue its moves in the direction it goes. For example, a1-b3-c6-d8. Or a1-c2-e3-g4.
Instead of the bishop, an Archbishop is here, which is the combination of the knight and the bishop. Instead of the rook, there is a queen! And yes, I replaced the queen with the Amazon, and I replaced the king with a Kentaur, which can move as a king and as a knight, which makes it more difficult to checkmate. And you can promote pawns to any piece except a Kentaur and a pawn, of course. (Not to a rook, knight or bishop, though, because those are not contained in this game).
Instead of a knight, a Nightrider is here, which can continue its moves in the direction it goes. For example, a1-b3-c6-d8. Or a1-c2-e3-g4.
Instead of the bishop, an Archbishop is here, which is the combination of the knight and the bishop. Instead of the rook, there is a queen! And yes, I replaced the queen with the Amazon, and I replaced the king with a Kentaur, which can move as a king and as a knight, which makes it more difficult to checkmate. And you can promote pawns to any piece except a Kentaur and a pawn, of course. (Not to a rook, knight or bishop, though, because those are not contained in this game).
An engine vs engine bullet game. M is for aMazon because A is for Archbishop.
[FEN "rnbmkbnr/pppppppp/8/8/8/8/PPPPPPPP/RNBMKBNR"]
1. d4 d5 2. f4 Bf5 3. Me3 Me6 4. h4 Nf6
5. h5 Be4 6. b4 Nc6 7. c3 Ng4 8. Md2 b5
9. a4 Rb8 10. axb5 Rxb5 11. e3 a6 12. Rxa6 Rb6
13. b5 Rxa6 14. bxa6 g6 15. Bb5 Kd8 16. Nf3 gxh5
17. Ng5 Mf5 18. Nxe4 dxe4 19. Bxc6 Mg3+ 20. Kd1 Mxh1+
21. Kc2 e5 22. a7 Ke7 23. a8=M Nxe3+ 24. Mxe3 Mxg2+
25. Mxg2 Bg7 26. Mxc7+ Kf8 27. Me8# *
Note that neither engine currently has an internalized concept of piece safety / positional value so they develop heavy pieces like an Amazon immediately because their piece square table says centralizing a strong piece in 1 or 2 moves is really good and they can defend it.
Also note that while my engine will crush me on any time control any variant, it is not even close to Stockfish strong or even maximum bot strong.
Fet wrote:
I think just an Amazon is boring. I leveled up every piece by a bit (except for the pawns).
Instead of a knight, a Nightrider is here, which can continue its moves in the direction it goes. For example, a1-b3-c6-d8. Or a1-c2-e3-g4.
Instead of the bishop, an Archbishop is here, which is the combination of the knight and the bishop. Instead of the rook, there is a queen! And yes, I replaced the queen with the Amazon, and I replaced the king with a Kentaur, which can move as a king and as a knight, which makes it more difficult to checkmate. And you can promote pawns to any piece except a Kentaur and a pawn, of course. (Not to a rook, knight or bishop, though, because those are not contained in this game).
Instead of a knight, a Nightrider is here, which can continue its moves in the direction it goes. For example, a1-b3-c6-d8. Or a1-c2-e3-g4.
Instead of the bishop, an Archbishop is here, which is the combination of the knight and the bishop. Instead of the rook, there is a queen! And yes, I replaced the queen with the Amazon, and I replaced the king with a Kentaur, which can move as a king and as a knight, which makes it more difficult to checkmate. And you can promote pawns to any piece except a Kentaur and a pawn, of course. (Not to a rook, knight or bishop, though, because those are not contained in this game).
Checkmating a royal Centaur sounds incredibly difficult even with that stuff on the board. I guess there are mate positions I can think of with the Amazon in particular but it would still be really tricky. I may try making this and feeding it to my engine later although I might have to actually force it to cut down on how much quiescence search it does to not just lock up. I suspect that most games will be drawn or perpetual checks.
Probably the most interesting game I've gotten to happen. Originally rapid time control engine vs engine. Queen-looking piece is Amazon.
1. Nc3 Me6 2. d4 d5 3. Be3 Nc6 4. Md3 a5
5. O-O-O Nf6 6. Nh3 a4 7. Nf4 Md6 8. Nb5 Md7
9. c4 dxc4 10. Mxc4 e6 11. d5 exd5 12. Nxd5 Nxd5
13. Rxd5 Bd6 14. Bc5 Me6 15. Nxd6+ cxd6 16. Bxd6 f5
17. e3 Ra5 18. Rxa5 Mxc4+ 19. Bxc4 Nxa5 20. Bd5 Kd7
21. Bf4 b5 22. Rd1 g5 23. Bxg5 Kc7 24. h4 h5
25. b3 Bb7 26. bxa4 bxa4 27. Kb2 Re8 28. Bf7 Ra8
29. Bf4+ Kb6 30. f3 Nc6 31. Bd6 Ra5 32. Be6 Nd8
33. Bc4 Nc6 34. f4 Ba6 35. Be6 Bb7 36. Bc4 Ra8
37. Be6 Ra5 38. Bd7 Na7 39. Bb4 Rb5 40. Bxb5 Nxb5
41. g3 Bc6 42. Rc1 Be4 43. Bc5+ Kc6 44. Bf8+ Kb6
45. Rc4 Ka5 46. Rxe4 fxe4 47. f5 Nc7 48. f6 Kb5
49. f7 Ne6 50. Bd6 Kc6 51. Bb4 Kd5 52. Ka3 Ke5
53. Kxa4 Kf6 54. f8=R+ Nxf8 55. Bxf8 Ke6 56. Kb5 Kd7
57. Kb6 Kc8 58. Bd6 Kd7 59. Bc7 Ke6 60. a4 Kf5
61. a5 Kg4 62. Bd6 Kf3 63. Bf4 Ke2 64. Kc6 Kd3
65. Kb5 Kc2 66. a6 Kd3 67. a7 Kc2 68. a8=M Kb2
69. Ma4+ Kb1 70. Mb3# *
Hi Chess Variant Community,
I tried making a super-simple custom variant which I call Amazon Chess. It is simply a regular two-player 8x8 standard setup except replacing the queens with amazons (which have a combination of queen and knight moving abilities in a single piece). I played a couple of games against the futer to make sure it works and it was super fun. The futer wanted to bring out the amazons quickly and they have terrifying power so I opted to trade them off. Thus, the games transferred back to standard chess rather quickly. However, I think most people would probably keep them on the board longer so the games would probably be more interesting yet still be close enough to familiar chess for new folks to try the variant. If anyone wants to give it a try, hit me up, or make it yourself and try it with another player.
Cheers to fun chess variants,
Dean