Almost Chess chess pieces, which culminated in the development of Chess with different armies. Almost Chess Almost Chess is a chess variant invented by Ralph Betza in 1977. The game is played using a standard chessboard and pieces, except the players' queens are replaced by chancellors, which combine the moves of a rook and a knight. Almost Chess was featured in NOST magazine "Nost-algia", beginning with issue 205. Other than the replacement of queens by chancellors (notated "C"), the game follows all the rules and conventions of standard chess. The Fool's mate in Almost Chess begins 1.Cc3. Replacing queens with chancellors imparts
Cylinder chess The solution is to put Black in zugzwang by playing 1.Rh4-h4. Now, after any move by Black, White has a mate. The move 1.Rg4 doesn't work because of 1...Ka5 threatening to capture the rook on h6. In Cylinder chess, the traditional hierarchy of queen, rook, knight/bishop, pawn, is altered, with the bishop becoming more versatile and therefore more deadly than the rook, thereby switching the positions of the bishop and rook. Also, the traditional important center squares, and the common moves of pawn e4, d4, e5, d5, become very vulnerable moves in Cylinder chess, due to the fact that it