HyperModern Shatranj

This game was originally described, along with Modern Shatranj, during the ChessVariants Tournament #2, in a discussion between Roberto Lavieri and Joe Joyce, but never as more than one idea among many. It was an offshoot of one of the many steps described in a re-written MS as falling between historic shatranj and today's Western chess. After MS came out as rules and preset, Christine Bagley-Jones contacted Joe and wound up doing a ZRF for it [Modern Shatranj]. About a year later, as both were designing shatranj variants, Christine contacted Joe and suggested a collaboration to design a series of shatranj variants. One of the games she suggested would use her Q-2-slider and modern castling and pawn movement rules, for which she liked the name "HyperModern Shatranj". Joe then re-read the MS rules and found the same game there. So, since Roberto, Christine and Joe had all liked the idea, it immediately went into the package "The ShortRange Project", before anyone else designed it. Its description was posted along with 4 other variants at the end of the article 'The ShortRange Project', on 10/20/06. On 11/05/06, Tony Mez posted Combo Modern Day Chess, which duplicates the game except that Tony uses bishops instead of modern elephants [alfil + ferz].

This game is intermediate between Modern Shatranj and modern FIDE chess. It is one of the first games to be put out in the ShortRange Project. The ZRF for this game can be found at the Zillions of Games site, under 'The ShortRange Project', by Christine Bagley-Jones and Joe Joyce.

Setup

Pieces

King: the king moves 1 square in any direction, reaching 8 squares.

Sliding General: this piece is a linear slider, moving 1 or 2 squares orthogonally or diagonally, and reaching 16 squares.

Rook: this piece is a linear slider, moving orthogonally across as many empty squares as desired. It reaches 14 squares.

Elephant: this piece steps 1 or jumps 2 squares diagonally. It is colorbound and reaches 8 squares.

Knight: the knight jumps 2 squares, moving 1 square orthogonally, then 1 more square diagonally outwards. It reaches 8 squares.

Pawn: pawns move 1 square orthogonally forward, toward the opponent's back rank. They capture, by replacement, 1 square diagonally forward.

Rules

Victory is by checkmating the opponent's king. Any other result is a draw.

Capture is by replacement.

Castling is allowed.

All pawns get an initial double-step move.

En passant capture is allowed.

Pawns promote on the opponent's back rank to any piece in the game except for the king.

Notes

This game is more open and faster-paced than Modern Shatranj. The use of modern promotion, castling, and pawn movement rules tends to encourage the use of modern openings, but the elephant and general pieces give this game a character different than FIDE chess. Courtesy of the modern elements, the rooks in this game are freer than in Shatranj.

Game design by Christine Bagley-Jones, and Joe Joyce and Roberto Lavieri.