Knight Scattering Chess

By Sergey Sirotkin

Introduction

In Knight Scattering Chess, the Knights can neither capture or be captured, but can instead move opposing pieces starting the turn a Knight's move away as if they were Knights themselves, potentially capturing pieces on either side. The resulting game is sort of like an inside-out version of Mannis Charosh's Knight Relay Chess.

General Rules

The game is conducted by rules of FIDE Chess, except where noted otherwise below. The usual board and array are used, with the exception that the Knights can not capture nor be captured, and can be used to move opposing pieces.

Special Rules for Knights

Knight Scattering Chess has the following special rules for Knights:

• Knights may neither capture nor be captured (however, Knights may be used to capture, see below).
• An opposing piece a Knight's move away from a player's Knight may be moved like a Knight (including leaping over pieces). When so moved, the opposing piece being moved may capure pieces belong to either side.

  For example:

  +---+---+---+---+---+---+---+---+ | |:::| |:::| |:::| |:::| +---+---+---+---+---+---+---+---+ |:::| |:::| |:::| |:::| | +---+---+---+---+---+---+---+---+ | |:::| |:+:| |:p:| |:::| +---+---+---+---+---+---+---+---+ |:::| |:+:| |:::| |:+:| | +---+---+---+---+---+---+---+---+ | |:::| |:::| b |:::| |:::| +---+---+---+---+---+---+---+---+ |:::| |:+:| |:::| |:+:| | +---+---+---+---+---+---+---+---+ | |:::| |:N:| |:P:| |:::| +---+---+---+---+---+---+---+---+ |:::| |:::| |:::| |:::| | +---+---+---+---+---+---+---+---+

  In the above diagram, the white Knight (N) may move the black Bishop (b) to any of the squares marked with a red circle (+) or to capture either Pawn.
• While a Knight may not normally capture, a Knight may move an opposing Knight in a capturing move (but not to capture a Knight).

• If Knight is moved by an opposing Knight, that Knight may not move back to the square it vacated on the immediately following turn.

Special Rules for Pawns

Knight Scattering Chess has the following special rules for Pawns, due to effects of opposing Knights moving a player's Pawns:

• A Pawn returned to the 2nd rank regains the ability to make a non-capturing double move, including the risk of being captured en passant.
• A Pawn moved to the first rank may make a non-capturing double-move forward. It may be captured en passant by an opposing Pawn on the third rank when so doing.
• A Pawn moved to the 8th rank by an opposing Knight immediately promotes to a piece of the type chosen by owning, not moving, player.
• Pawns may promote to Queens, Rooks, Bishops or Knights as usual.

Variants

• Allow Knights to be captured as any other piece. This makes the resulting game more like usual Chess, as you don't have Knight's making unsupported raids in order to use a player's pieces against each other.

Equipment

Knight Scattering Chess can very easily be played with a Western Chess set. However, it may be hard to keep in mind that the Knights are uncapturable, and move opposing pieces. It might be useful to use Knights from a different set as a reminder.

Computer Play

An implementation of Knight Scattering Chess has been written for Zillions of Games. You can download it here:

• knight-scattering.zrf