Fantastic XIII
Who said that a chess-variant board should have even dimensions?
Tamerlane II uses a 11 x 11 board. Why not going a step further with the odd number 13? This is the starting idea governing this chess-variant.
An odd game should be different. That is its nature. Then, the army at fight in this game presents men which have not or seldom been used in my other games, despite they have a familiar style which make them easy to familiarize for the new players.
As it might be expected, there are 13 types of pieces in this game. Several of them have a long three-square distance effect which is perturbing. The atmosphere at play is weird. It is just fantastic.
Setup
The board is odd with 169 squares, made by 13 rows and 13 columns.
There are 30 pieces in each side: 1 King, 2 Ships, 2 Hawks, 2 Cheetahs, 2 Snakes, 2 Squirrels, 2 Mammoths, all of them on the 1st row of each player; 2 Trolls and 1 Prince on the 2nd row, another single Troll on the 3rd row and 13 Pawns forming a complete line on the 4th row.
That sums to 10 types of piece in the setup. But three types of men may appear by “elevation”: Saber-tooth, Eagle, and Rhinoceros. In total, they are 13 different types of pieces.
Initial Setup:
Pieces
Squirrel: also a compound piece that jumps as a Knight or jumps at 2 squares, diagonally (like an Alfil) or orthogonally (like a Dabbaba).
Troll: it makes a 3-step orthogonal or diagonal jump, no matter what any intermediate square contains. In addition, it moves 1 step forward and captures 1 step diagonally forward (like a Pawn). This permits the Troll to reach any square on the board. It can promote only when it moves like a Pawn, never by jumping 3 squares.
Pawn: can move straight forward one or two squares from any position on the board, without capturing. It captures one square diagonally forward. Identical to Metamachy.
Rules
The goal is to checkmate the opposing King. White side plays first.
Notes
Description to be completed
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By Jean-Louis Cazaux.
Last revised by Jean-Louis Cazaux.
Web page created: 2022-01-08. Web page last updated: 2022-11-29