New chess variant: The ol' ball & chain
7I know you people are super excited about my various chess posts, so here’s another.
I was daydreaming the other day (it’s all I ever do, TBH) and it came to me in a flash: A version of chess where the Queen and King have to stay close to each other all game; more formally, there can be only one square (empty or occupied by a piece) between the Q and K at all times.
All other rules of chess still apply.
So, for example, the Queen can check the enemy king all the way across the board, but can’t take any pieces that aren’t within a 5x5 box surrounding the King.
Now…who’s the ol’ ball and chain? It’s either the King or Queen, really. They are lashed to each other like, uh…Pericles at the mast or some shit.
Here’s an example of me and a guy from my chess league giving it a try:
https://lichess.org/85RBvHm2/black
Interesting twists in this game:
- On move 10, I could confidently leave my Knight on g4 since the white Q isn’t allowed to capture it – she’d get too far from her spouse!
- On move 28, I was able to move my Rook to h2, knowing the King couldn’t capture it! In this way, I was threatening to take the pawn on g2. White decided to trade the Rook on d3 for my bishop.
- Finally, on move 32, I thought I was being clever by playing Rh4+. I figured the King had to move away or capture my Rook, thus letting me capture the White Queen. But behold! White did take my Rook, and my Queen couldn’t capture back…too far away to move!
This variant lessens the power of the Queen…she’s still a force to be reckoned with, but she’s most perilous when you’re close to her. I compared her to a heavy bouncer…she can’t chase you down, but don’t get too close! 
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I still don’t understand. How can the queen check a king all the way across the board if she’s not actually allowed to move all the way across the board?
Or is the caveat simply that the queen is tied to the king with the single exception of killing the opposing king?
Tangentially, have you ever tried Shogi?
@Limewater I’ve never tried Shogi…there are so many board games out there I’m ignorant of. I was reading the rules of Chinese chess the other day…wow, that sounds tough.
Yeah, the idea is that she still radiates power across the board…so the enemy King can’t move into a square she’s attacking, even if it’s too far away for her to actually go there.
In this position, the Kings aren’t allowed to move onto the circled squares, because that would be moving into check:
@Limewater God DAMN I am dumb… the Black king couldn’t move to those circled squares anyway, because it would be moving more than one space away from the Black Queen. UGH WHY IS MY BRAIN MADE OF RAW POTATO.
@UncleVinny Maybe it just needs a little baking.
This post reminds me of a story…
I swiped right on a girl without a picture, and we matched.
So after a brief chat i went to go pick her up. I wasn’t expecting much, probably 300 lbs with bad skin, but hey, I was so desperate it was this or join an incel chatroom.
I walked up to the door and lo and behold, 5’2", baby blue eyes, strawberry blonde hair, all the right curves in all the right places. I couldn’t believe my luck.
I asked her what she did for a living. She said she taught Sunday school. Now I never had me a Christian girl, but I’m open minded so I took her to dinner.
On the way, I lit a joint and asked her if she puffs.
“Oh heaven’s no, what would I tell my Sunday school children.”
I said okay, weed’s 50/50 some people do some people don’t. And I took her to the best restaurant I knew. I ordered the steak, she ordered the lobster. I asked for the second most expensive bottle of wine on the menu. When the waitress came to pour, She said she didn’t drink.
I said “you don’t drink?!?”
“Oh heaven’s no, what would I tell my Sunday school children.”
Excellent food, sparkling conversation but i’m bummed out, I don’t know what to do with a girl like this.
So I’m driving her home and pass a cheap motel, I figure, what have I got to lose. So i ask:
“wanna get a room and knock boots?”
She says: I thought you’d never ask!
I say: Really? What are you gonna tell your Sunday school children?
She says: The same thing I tell them every week. You don’t have to drink and do drugs to have a good time!
@therealjrn now that’s a variant!
@therealjrn So was this just a story or a true episode from your experiences?
As long as she didn’t mind when you indulged…
Do you mind if I ask- was she enthusiastic and relatively uninhibited [as one would expect from the “thought you’d never…”], or pretty straight-laced [as you might expect from a Sunday school teacher]?
Not that it really matters in the scope of things…
@PhysAssist A Gentleman never tells sir!
@therealjrn True that!
@PhysAssist (but it was just a story)
@therealjrn That makes me think of the caption on the UFO poster next to Fox Mulder’s desk- “I want to believe”.