The original Unashogi is quite interesting, but has a fatal flaw. Because King drops are unrestricted, impasses are easily attained by dropping the King into the promotion zone, making draws very common, as most pieces have a forward bias to them making a King on the far side of the board very difficult to mate, especially if surrounded by friendly pieces.
I thought up with variant of Unashogi, called Unashogi II in this comment, which is the has the same rules as standard Shogi plus the following additional rules.
The board is initially empty and the players start with the usual
A piece cannot capture or move into the promotion zone in any way unless the friendly King is on the board.
If the friendly King is in the hand, Pawns and Lances cannot be dropped on the last four ranks, and Knights cannot be dropped on the last five ranks.
This is a corollary of the restriction against dropping where you cannot move.
The King can only be dropped on the first three ranks.
Edit: This solves the problem of impasses, but allows for easy checkmates if the first player drops his King early.
The original Unashogi is quite interesting, but has a fatal flaw. Because King drops are unrestricted, impasses are easily attained by dropping the King into the promotion zone, making draws very common, as most pieces have a forward bias to them making a King on the far side of the board very difficult to mate, especially if surrounded by friendly pieces.
I thought up with variant of Unashogi, called Unashogi II in this comment, which is the has the same rules as standard Shogi plus the following additional rules.
Edit: This solves the problem of impasses, but allows for easy checkmates if the first player drops his King early.