New idea for chess960

I was thinking, why not let us choose our own army setup?

For me at least, it's infinitely more interesting than getting a random position and playing that. People could master their own setups, theory would still be almost as useless. You would see traditional setups(R-N-B-Q-K-B-N-R) against hybrids, totally bonkers stuff too!

I did some analysis of the possible positions with Droidfish on my phone, and it also seems that just about everything is playable! And the classical setup is by no means better than others! A decent example is R-B-B-Q-K-N-N-R which seems to be very strong..

I would probably suggest that castling be kept in the traditional way-i.e. if a rook begins away from its pawn, you forfeit castling on that side, but this stuff doesn't really matter yet :P

Any thoughts/suggestions?

I thought the whole idea was to be given totally random starting positions.

Pretty much removes the point of Chess960

hey bg!

Well it would be a new variant of chess I suppose, but doesn't it sound enticing? I mean it's my army, why not choose my setup :P

                    Have you ever heard of random and double random ??

I sort of like this idea. Playing chess this way would be strange! For example, some people could voluntarily choose to have same colored bishops, and other stuff. My setup would probably be K-B-B-R-R-N-Q-N.

But problems arise when you have to decide who shows their setup first...

                    What the hell are you talking about, "who shows 1st" ??

Well, we have variants of standard chess, so I guess a variant of 960 isn't unthinkable.

                    Batgirl, I don't think the OP understands what 960 is.  What's new about his idea  ??

RonaldJosephCote wrote:

                    What the hell are you talking about, "who shows 1st" ??

He means in theory some setups could be used against specific other setups. So the person that must tell the opponent their setup first has a disadvantage

skotheim2 wrote:

Pretty much removes the point of Chess960

I feel so too, because then you could at least get a general feel of the opening in your setup. Still would be a good game though

I like the idea, but think that choosing the opponent's army setup (without him/her knowing before the game starts) is a better idea (it diminishes opening prep more effectively). Either way, it adds an element of incomplete information without randomisation, still doesn't qualify as gambling, while Chess960 alas does, which is important because many jurisdictions have been shutting down or segregating real money gambling.

                     Thank you AKAL.  That's double random.  That problem wouldn't exist in 960.

                            Jurisdictions have been shutting down 960 because your gambling on it ????

Not yet  But if someone tries to monetise Chess960, the laws will be a problem. (I mean allowing players to actually win and cash out money, not a subscription-based service like chess.com.)

                         Jesus Christ, I can't follow you people at all. You said in post 12 its a problem, and now in post 15 its not ????    We were talking about chess, and the 960 possible ways of starting the game. In double random, your side doesn't have to match your opponents side. People have allways gambled on football but that doesn't change the rules of the game.

'Double random' where opponents pick each other's (or their own) armies doesn't use a random number generator, so from the legal viewpoint it's less gambly (a game of skill), even though in reality it's gamblier 

Thanks for the feedback guys.

I would say In an OTB game you'd just write down your setup on paper before hand.

Yes, exactly, and keep the sheets of paper face down until the clock is started. It's even easier to pull off online, though. 

It's a bit like Stratego™ Chess.