Officer Chess

I came up with the idea of Officer Chess in 2019, but left it unpublished, as I had felt unsure of its merits. It was inspired by my earlier Sac Chess (which uses only 12 piece types). Some years later Very Heavy Chess was invented independently by Jean-Louis Cazaux, with the same 14 piece types being used (but it's played on a much bigger board). In some cases I had preferred slightly different names, for a relatively small number of the unorthodox piece types used.

There are presets available for play on Game Courier. With rules enforced Officer Chess, without Officer Chess.

Setup

Pieces

Officer Chess uses the 6 piece types of chess, plus 8 unorthodox piece types:

Amazon — Can move like a Queen or Knight.

Ship — Can move like a Rook, Knight, or Ferz. Also known as Heroine.

Freemason — Can move like a Bishop, Knight, or Wazir. Also known as Templar or Popess.

Chancellor — Can move like a Rook or Knight. Also commonly called Marshall.

Archbishop — Can move like a Bishop or Knight. Also commonly called Cardinal.

Sailor — Can move like a Rook or step one square diagonally like a Ferz. Known in Shogi as Dragon King.

Missionary — Can move like a Bishop or step one square orthogonally like a Wazir. Known in Shogi as Dragon Horse.

Judge — Can step one square in any direction like a non-royal King or leap like a Knight. More commonly known as Centaur.

Rules

Officer Chess follows the rules of chess, except as noted below.

In Officer Chess, castling is as in chess (though on the second rank). Pawns move as in chess and promotion is on the last rank, to any piece type in the setup, except for K.

Threefold repetition of position or stalemate is a draw as in chess, and the 50 move rule is also in effect (i.e. game drawn if no captures or pawn moves have been made before 50 consecutive moves by both sides).

Notes

In Officer Chess, possible are Fool's Mate and some versions of Scholar's Mate, like in orthodox chess. The Freemasons lurking in their corners at the start of a game can prove quite deadly at times, in the event of a big mistake by an opponent if he has castled kingside. One way to try to preempt such a possibility early on is to make a kingside fianchetto of the king's bishop (as in chess openings) - that is, push the pawn in front of the knight one square forward, then put the bishop in front of the knight.

Last revised by Kevin Pacey.