Ready Chess

By Tony Quintanilla

Introduction

Ready Chess is an attempt to vary the movement and capture dynamics of Chess by having the pieces mutate to non-capturing pieces as soon as they capture. To recover they have to use a tempo.

Here I describe this idea as applied to FIDE Chess. However, it could be used with almost any Chess variant.

Setup

The standard Chess board and setup is used. 

Pieces

Pawn	The Pawn has its standard movement and capture capabilities with the following exception: upon capturing it mutates to a Ready-Pawn.  When promoting, if a capture is involved, the piece promoted to is a regular piece not a Ready piece.
Ready-Pawn	The Ready-Pawn has the standard movement capabilities of a Pawn, but may not capture. During a turn, instead of moving the Ready-Pawn, it may be mutated back to a Pawn.
Knight	The Knight has its standard movement and capture capabilities with the following exception: upon capturing it mutates to a Ready-Knight.
Ready-Knight	The Ready-Knight has the standard movement capabilities of a Knight, but may not capture. During a turn, instead of moving the Ready-Knight, it may be mutated back to a Knight.
Bishop	The Bishop has its standard movement and capture capabilities with the following exception: upon capturing it mutates to a Ready-Bishop.
Ready-Bishop	The Ready-Bishop has the standard movement capabilities of a Bishop, but may not capture. During a turn, instead of moving the Ready-Bishop, it may be mutated back to a Bishop.
Rook	The Rook has its standard movement and capture capabilities with the following exception: upon capturing it mutates to a Ready-Rook.
Ready-Rook	The Ready-Rook has the standard movement capabilities of a Rook, but may not capture. During a turn, instead of moving the Ready-Bishop, it may be mutated back to a Rook.
Queen	The Queen has its standard movement and capture capabilities with the following exception: upon capturing it mutates to a Ready-Queen.
Ready-Queen	The Ready-Queen has the standard movement capabilities of a Queen, but may not capture. During a turn, instead of moving the Ready-Queen, it may be mutated back to a Queen.
King	This is the standard Chess King. It does not mutate.

Rules

The standard rules of Chess apply except for the piece movement rules above. To summarize: each piece except the King upon capturing is mutated to the same piece but without capturing capabilities. This new piece is called a Ready-piece. The Ready-piece may be mutated back to its original piece by using a turn without moving the Ready-piece.

Playing Tips

From playing Zillions, the game and strategy appear to be similar to standard Chess. The tactics, obviously, will change somewhat. However, you may find that there will usually not be a lot of Ready-pieces on the board, perhaps 3 or 4 at the most.

Notes

Again, I look at this idea as one that can be applied to other games. 

Equipment

Standard Chess equipment can be used. For the Ready-pieces, some means of designating the change is needed. If you have different color pieces, such as a 4-player set, these can be used. Alternatively, you can use something like a coin to differentiate the pieces.

Credits

The piece images were made using David Howe's Alfaerie image set.