Chad is a chess variant for two players created by

Christian Freeling Christian Freeling (born 1 February 1947, in Enschede, Netherlands) is a Dutch game designer and inventor of abstract strategy games, notably Dameo, Grand Chess, Havannah, and Hexdame. Freeling's designs cover a range of game types. Several o ...

in 1979. It is played on an uncheckered 12×12 gameboard with one

king King is the title given to a male monarch in a variety of contexts. The female equivalent is queen, which title is also given to the consort of a king. *In the context of prehistory, antiquity and contemporary indigenous peoples, the tit ...

and eight

rooks Rook (''Corvus frugilegus'') is a bird of the corvid family. Rook or rooks may also refer to: Games *Rook (chess), a piece in chess *Rook (card game), a trick-taking card game Military *Sukhoi Su-25 or Rook, a close air support aircraft * USS ...

per side, where rooks are able to promote to

queens Queens is a borough of New York City, coextensive with Queens County, in the U.S. state of New York. Located on Long Island, it is the largest New York City borough by area. It is bordered by the borough of Brooklyn at the western tip of Long ...

. The inventor's aim was "to create a game of tactical and strategical depth that was both simple and elegant to express the concept of ''mate''—the 'pure' chess game". The game was played for many years at the Fanaat games club in the Netherlands and was featured in the periodical ''The Gamer'' in May–June 1982.

Game rules

Each player owns a ''castle'' consisting of 3×3 squares surrounded by a ''wall'' of 12 squares. A king may not leave its 3×3 castle, but the other pieces are free to move unimpeded by castles or walls. * The king can move and capture like a

chess Chess is a board game for two players, called White and Black, each controlling an army of chess pieces in their color, with the objective to checkmate the opponent's king. It is sometimes called international chess or Western chess to dist ...

king or a chess

knight A knight is a person granted an honorary title of knighthood by a head of state (including the Pope) or representative for service to the monarch, the church or the country, especially in a military capacity. Knighthood finds origins in the Gr ...

. It can only capture pieces inside the 3×3 castle and cannot capture pieces on the wall. * A rook moves like a rook in chess, and is unimpeded by castles or walls. If its move ends on a square in the enemy castle, it automatically promotes to a queen. * A queen moves like a queen in chess and is unimpeded by castles or walls. * Captures are limited: a capture can happen between a rook or queen and an enemy rook or queen only when one of the pieces is on the opponent's wall and the other piece is in its castle. ** In other situations, rooks and queens cannot capture and simply block one another's movement. Only a king can capture an enemy piece inside its castle. * A king is in

check Check or cheque, may refer to: Places * Check, Virginia Arts, entertainment, and media * ''Check'' (film), a 2021 Indian Telugu-language film * ''The Checks'' (episode), a 1996 TV episode of ''Seinfeld'' Games and sports * Check (chess), a thr ...

whenever it is in the path of an enemy rook or queen. Castle walls do not block checks. As regular in chess,

White White is the lightest color and is achromatic (having no hue). It is the color of objects such as snow, chalk, and milk, and is the opposite of black. White objects fully reflect and scatter all the visible wavelengths of light. White o ...

moves first, a capturing piece replaces the piece captured, and checkmate wins the game.

References

Bibliography * *

External links

Official website
MindSports.nl

by Hans L. Bodlaender, ''

The Chess Variant Pages ''The Chess Variant Pages'' is a non-commercial website devoted to chess variants. It was created by Hans Bodlaender in 1995. The site is "run by hobbyists for hobbyists" and is "the most wide-ranging and authoritative web site on chess variants" ...

''
Fanaat
games club (the Netherlands)

a simple program by Ed Friedlander (

Java Java (; id, Jawa, ; jv, ꦗꦮ; su, ) is one of the Greater Sunda Islands in Indonesia. It is bordered by the Indian Ocean to the south and the Java Sea to the north. With a population of 151.6 million people, Java is the world's mos ...

) {{Chess variants, state=collapsed Chess variants 1979 in chess Board games introduced in 1979