Chess with different armies (or Betza's Chess or Equal Armies) is a chess variant invented by

Ralph Betza Ralph Betza (born 1945) is a FIDE Master and inventor of chess variants such as Chess with different armies, Avalanche chess, and Way of the Knight. Invented chess variants * Multiplayer Chess (date unknown) * High-Low Chess (1968) * Strang ...

in 1979. Two sides use different sets of

fairy pieces A fairy chess piece, variant chess piece, unorthodox chess piece, or heterodox chess piece is a chess piece not used in conventional chess but incorporated into certain chess variants and some chess problems. Compared to conventional pieces, fair ...

. There are several armies of equal strength to choose from, including the standard FIDE army. In all armies, kings and pawns are the same as in FIDE

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 ...

, but the four other pieces are different.

Rules and armies

Before the game players choose their armies in a certain way, predefined by tournament rules. This can be done either randomly or secretly by both players. Each player has a choice of 4 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

for all armies. Pawns can only promote to pieces of either army on the board at the start. Castling is done as in standard

with the exception of the case when the

rook 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 ...

replacement is

colorbound This glossary of chess explains commonly used terms in chess, in alphabetical order. Some of these terms have their own pages, like ''fork'' and ''pin''. For a list of unorthodox chess pieces, see Fairy chess piece; for a list of terms specific t ...

, like in the ''Colorbound Clobberers'' army. In the latter case, the

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 ...

, when castling long, moves to b1, and the

replacement to c1. This is so that colorbound pieces do not change square color. Many pieces in the following armies are combinations of standard

pieces and 4 fairy pieces: ''

ferz The ferz or fers is a fairy chess piece that may move one square diagonally.Piececlopedia: Ferz
at ''< ...

'', ''

alfil The alfil, alpil, or elephant is a fairy chess piece that can jump two squares diagonally. It first appeared in shatranj. It is used in many historical and regional chess variants. It was used in standard chess before being replaced by the bish ...

'', '' wazir'' and '' dabbaba'' (see their movement diagrams above). The game can be played with standard

pieces, and the following move diagrams use standard pieces as well (except

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 ...

Colorbound Clobberers

In this army, rooks, knights, bishops, and queen are replaced by the following pieces: As mentioned, when using this army and castling queenside, the king moves ''three'' squares (from e1 to b1) and the bede moves from a1 to c1.

Nutty Knights

This army includes a lot of leapers, but most of them have asymmetrical move patterns, with backward moves being restricted.

Remarkable Rookies

The rooks, knights, bishops, and queen are replaced by the following pieces:

Unofficial armies

The four armies described above were playtested by Ralph Betza and selected as the most balanced ones. There are other armies, invented by Betza and other people, some of which are presented here. In the initial version of the game, there were 8 armies and, in these armies, the

moved differently from the

in the standard

. Instead of normal pawns, fairy pawns could be selected – for example, Berolina pawns. However, later Betza abandoned the idea of using fairy pieces for

and pawns and reduced the number of armies to four.

All-Around Allstars (Ralph Betza)

This army is made of one piece from each of the main armies. Out of the 12 eligible combinations, as the FAD from the Colorbound Clobberers is considered too strong for a Bishop equivalent and the Cardinal from the same army too weak for a Queen equivalent, Ralph Betza considers the following to be the "official" all-star team. The rooks, knights, and queen are replaced by the following pieces:

Amazon Army (Ralph Betza)

In this army, rooks and queen are replaced by the following pieces:

Cylindrical Cinders (Ralph Betza)

The rooks, knights, bishops, and queen are replaced by the following pieces:

Fighting Fizzies (Peter Aronson)

In this army, the left rook, the right rook, knights, bishops, and queen are replaced by the following pieces:

Avian Airforce (Ralph Betza)

In this army, the rooks, knights, bishops, and queen are replaced by the following pieces:

Spacious Cannoneers (Ralph Betza)

In this army, the rooks, knights, bishops, and queen are replaced by the following pieces:

Forward FIDEs (Ralph Betza)

The rooks, knights, bishops, and queen are replaced by the following pieces:

Pizza Kings (John Lawson)

The rooks, knights, bishops, and queen are replaced by the following pieces:

Meticulous Mashers (Ralph Betza)

The rooks, knights, bishops, and queen are replaced by the following pieces:

Seeping Switchers (Jörg Knappen)

The rooks, knights, bishops, and queen are replaced by the following pieces:

Daring Dragons (H. G. Muller)

The rooks, knights, bishops, and queen are replaced by the following pieces:

Bent Bozos (H. G. Muller)

The left and right rooks, left and right knights, left and right bishops, and queen are replaced by the following pieces:

References

{{Chess variants Chess variants