Tactical chess

Tactical chess was invented by Viktor Sopilko (Kiev, Ukraine) in 2007. This game is quite popular. Here is the official website of Tactical Chess in Russian. It has a java application that helps two humans play this game (it have some discrepancies with rules). Note that sometimes official rules changes and they may be different from rules described here.

Setup

Game is played on 8x8 board. It starts blank. Each player have these pieces in reserve: 2 obstacles, 1 king, 1 queen, 1 rook, 1 bishop, 1 knight, 8 pawns, 1 royal rook, 1 royal bishop, 1 royal knight, 2 royal pawns (veterans), 2 cannons, 2 dragons, 1 prince, 1 fanatic, 1 killer (originally called joker).

The game has several phases: 1. Obstacles dropping. 2. Kings dropping. 3. Pieces droppong. 4. Battle. In first 3 phases (tactical) one may only drop obstacles and pieces on board, in 4th phase (strategical) it's allowed to move pieces. Drops counts as moves.

Phase 1 - drop 2 obstacles on first 4 ranks.

Phase 2 - drop king on first 3 ranks.

Phase 3 - drop 4 pieces on first 3 ranks.

Phase 4 - either move piece on board or drop piece from reserve on first 3 ranks. During any phase, expect phase 2 (king drop) one may pass and let opponent move again. Captured pieces cannot take part in game again.

Pieces

Note that here term "royal" don't mean piece, which have to be captured to win, here "royal" means promoted piece.

Obstacle cannot be moved and captured, only dragon and knight (and royal knight, with it's knight leaps) can leap over it.

King, queen, rook, bishop and knight moves as in classic chess.

Pawn moves 1-2 squares vertically forward or 1 backward and sideways. captures as in classic chess: diagonally forward. There is no en-passant.

Royal rook moves as in classic chess, but may leap over friendly pieces.

Royal bishop moves as in classic chess, but may leap over friendly pieces.

Royal knight moves as in classic chess, but may make several knight's leaps in same direction (like knightrider), but can capture only on it's first leap, and if captures, cannot leap further.

Royal pawn (veteran) moves 1-2 squares horizontally and vertically, may leap over pieces. Captures as pawn in classic chess.

Cannon moves without capturing as rook. Captures ("shoots") without moving to square, occuppied by opponent's piece, "rifle capture". It captures 1-2 squares vartically or horizontally, may shoot through pieces and obstacles.

Dragon moves without capturing as bishop, but can leap (fly?) over pieces of either side and obstacles. As cannon, it captures without moving, it "shoots". Shoots to pieces, wich are 1 AND 2 squares diagonally away. If there are 2 pieces, wich can be captured by shooting in same direction, it may not capture only 1 piece, both must be captured. Can capture friendly pieces. May not shoot through obstacles.

Prince moves as queen, but may captures only as king.

Fanatic moves as veteran, captures as king. When it captures, it "explodes": it is removed itself and all adjecent pieces (whatever side they belongs) are also removed. All pieces (expect cannon and dragon), wich captures it, are also removed from board, but adjecent pieces DON'T explode.

Killer moves as veteran, captures as king. Can capture only king and prince. Can be captured only by dragon, cannon and fanatic.

Rules

Pawn promotes to killer on last rank.

Veteran promotes to fanatic on last rank.

Rook, knight and bishop promotes to respective royal pieces on last rank.

Promotion is not optional.

Prince immediately becomes king if friendly king is captured.

To win, capture opponent's king when opponent have no prince on board. If there is prince, it becomes king, wich have to be captured to win.

Notes

Let me know if i described some rules unclearly.