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Speaking of interesting chess variants

If we can only change the win condition, some of the following ideas might be interesting:
- Swamp chess: you lose when one of your pieces moves onto d4, d5, e4, or e5 (a bigger swamp is also possible and maybe even a swamp which moves).
- Win chess: Each of the moves that would normally make the game a draw now makes the game a win for the player who makes that move. Examples: a stalemate and a repetition of moves.
- Take everything: You can't check or checkmate, you can only win by taking all of your opponents pieces.
#19 I think it is compatible probably moves can be replayed using pgn but wont be understood by engines. right? as i know that shatranj moves can be replayed using pgn4web viewer without any problem in pgn format including few jumping pieces like 'ferz' which is illegal in regular chess.

extended format like BPGN is available specifically for babaschess interface for FICS where crazyhouse and bughouse variants can be replayed using BPGN format.
My suggestions, I have played a lot of these fun variants:

-You can win by checkmate or by bringing any piece to the opponent's first row (I used to call it "touchdown chess", but there is another chess variant by that name)

-You can win by checkmate or capturing any piece, pawn capture does not win

Great ideas moralintentions!

I think swamp chess would be more fun if you lose any piece that enters the swamp, but you only lose the game when your king enters there. The king can be checked but not checkmated- if he has no squares he doesn't have to move. There's definitely some potential there for a great game.
I had my own idea for a chess variant that I thought was pretty good, but I'm kinda lazy to elaborate on it now.
Wouldn't it be possible to define just every possible "variation" of starting positions, moves, rules etc. by a "regex" - like string. And give it a hash number. (PGN restrictions applied) So everybody could just setup a personlized version, test it against some engines - and if found palatble, look for opponents to play with?
That would be awesome steger. Like Use Map Settings for chess ^^
@stevieblues: With 'Use Map' Do you mean something like
<img src="planets.gif" width="145" height="126" alt="Planets" usemap="#planetmap">

<map name="planetmap">
<area shape="rect" coords="0,0,82,126" href="sun.htm" alt="Sun">
<area shape="circle" coords="90,58,3" href="mercur.htm" alt="Mercury">
<area shape="circle" coords="124,58,8" href="venus.htm" alt="Venus">
</map>
?
UMS was from Starcraft 1, not sure exactly what you're referencing.
Hi, interesting discussion. I thought of a chess variant on a 12x12 board. I have no idea how it would work out in practice, but basically it involves adding two minor pieces called "shuttlers".
These four pieces would have the ability to exit the 10x10 board and utilize the surrounding frame of 44 squares as a "transit system". Upon a player's turn and if that player has a shuttler next to the edge it will be allowed to exit the 10x10 grid and enter the transit area.

I haven't thought much more about it, so if you have any ideas to further elaborate on this idea of pieces exiting and entering the board into a special zone, feel free to comment. It's probable that someone has thought of something similar already.

Cheers!

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