Tiger Hunt

a new variant of The Maharaja and the Sepoys

A new variant of The Maharaja and the Sepoys has been invented by David Paulowich. He send me the following description of this game.

Rules

There are no Queens in this variant! White has a single piece on d1 called a Tiger (or is it a Tigress?) which is represented by the White Queen. The Tiger moves like a Queen or a Knight, but it cannot be placed on a square which is under attack by the opponent. Black has fifteen pieces, with an empty square at d8. Pawns do not promote. Each player must make a legal move on his turn or else forfeit the game. Thus a stalemated player has lost the game.

Note that this game uses exactly half of the chessmen. If you have a second board in the house, then you can set up another game with fifteen White pieces against a Black Tiger on d8. See the diagrams:

Board 1 White: Tiger (Queen piece) d1. Black: King e8; Rook a8, h8; Knight b8, g8; Bishop c8, f8; Pawn a7, b7, c7, d7, e7, f7, g7, h7.

Board 2 White: King e1; Rook a1, h1; Knight b1, g1; Bishop c1, f1; Pawn a2, b2, c2, d2, e2, f2, g2, h2. Black: Tiger (Queen piece) d8.

I will end with a sample game against a Black Tiger. This little comedy of errors shows how quickly fortunes can shift.