Four-player chess for themselves. As with regular chess, four-player chess begins with fortifications and the of pieces, but opportunities for capturing pieces (and gaining points) come about at large as each of the three opponents likewise do attacks and make threats of capture. Therefore picking friends and enemies has a political quality; ultimately the impromptu teammates will have to combat each other as only one can win. The Cox-Forbes theory of the origin of chess, though debunked, asserts that a four-player version was the earliest form of the game. A description of a four-player chess game is found in an Indian text
Chess with different armies armies: the "Fabulous FIDEs", which are the standard chess pieces, the "Colorbound Clobberers", the "Nutty Knights", and the "Remarkable Rookies". All armies are designed to be equal in strength, but have significantly different properties. Kings and pawns move the same as in chess for all armies. Pawns can only promote to pieces of either army on the board at the start. Castling is done as in standard chess with the exception of the case when the rook replacement is colorbound, like in the "Colorbound Clobberers" army. In the latter case the king when castling long moves to b1 and the