Parallel Chess War

Parallel Chess War is the playing of 4 parallel chess games at once, first game won wins the whole war. This means that during play some of the board(s) can sometimes affect the strategy a player uses on some of the other board(s), in that he may find it appropriate to take desperate or risky measures on some board(s), if possible, when he sees that the tide is turning against him on other board(s).

This variant was inspired by an image of a four level (possibly 3D) chess set from the 1960s Batman TV series episode 'The purr-fect crime', with Bruce Wayne (Adam West) thinking over his next move (vs. Dick Grayson [Burt Ward]). The rules they were playing by were not revealed in the show, and I decided to invent a game based on the image of the four level set in the scene, using my own ideas for its rules. Note that White moves first on just 2 of the four levels in this variant, and note it would not be considered a 3D variant by historic convention.

There is a preset available for play on Game Courier.

Setup

Pieces

Each player moves, in independent chess games played on each of the 4 boards, until a checkmate occurs on one board (or a resignation), and that wins the whole 'game' (or war). Note that pieces or pawns never move between any of the 4 boards.

White on his first 'turn' moves once each only on boards C and D, and from then on each player's 'turn' consists of making one move on each of the four boards, from his left to his right (i.e. Black in order moves once on board D then on C, B and A, then afterwards White moves once on board A then on B, C and D, and then it's Black's 'turn' again, and so on). Note that with the preset, moves for each board on each 'turn' must be entered manually, i.e. seperated by semi-colons.

If any board's game is agreed to be a draw, one player places his king on that board next to the other player's king, where adjacent squares for the kings are possible, and play on that board is discontinued for the rest of the 'game' (war), with any draws not counting (except that draws resulting on all 4 boards would mean that the 'game' [war] is a draw). A draw offer for any specified particular board(s) is offered at the end of a player's overall turn, with a comment to that effect.

Last revised by Kevin Pacey.