Forchess

Four player chess variant

ForchessPlayers| 4

|

Setup time| 2 minutes
Playing time| 30-90 minutes
Chance| None
Age range| any
Skills| Chess strategy

Forchess is a four-player chess variant developed by T. K. Rogers, an American engineer. It uses one standard chessboard and two sets of standard pieces.

## History and motivation

[edit]

Forchess was developed around the year 1975. Its inventor T. K. Rogers wanted to create a pure strategy game with the social dynamic of card games like Bridge. Rogers believed in the educational merits of chess and felt that making the game a more popular social activity would benefit society.

Rogers wanted the game to use only standard pieces and a standard board so that everything necessary to play would be readily available. He also did not want to severely limit the number of pieces each player had.

In 1992, Rogers published the instruction set as a 64-page booklet Forchess: The Ultimate Social Game, designed to fit in a shirt pocket. The booklet also contained strategies for playing the game and a new technique invented by Rogers for analyzing both chess and Forchess games. He called it influence indicator.

In 1996, Rogers posted a free instruction set on the then newly founded Intuitor website. He simultaneously began distributing thousands of free instruction brochures to schools and colleges.

## Overview of the game

[edit]

Initial Forchess Board Layout | a | b | c | d | e | f | g | h

|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|

8  |  K |  R |  N |  P |  P |  B |  R |  K | 8
7  |  R |  Q |  B |  P |  P |  N |  Q |  R | 7
6  |  B |  N |  |  P |  P |  |  B |  N | 6
5  |  P |  P |  P |  P |  P |  P |  P |  P | 5
4  |  P |  P |  P |  P |  P |  P |  P |  P | 4
3  |  N |  B |  |  P |  P |  |  N |  B | 3
2  |  R |  Q |  N |  P |  P |  B |  Q |  R | 2
1  |  K |  R |  B |  P |  P |  N |  R |  K | 1
| a | b | c | d | e | f | g | h

The game is played by four people in teams of two. At the outset, each player controls an entire quadrant of the board with a full set of chess pieces (minus one pawn). Partners occupy quadrants diagonally across from each other. The diagram at right shows the initial layout of the Forchess board (K=King, Q=Queen, R=Rook, B=Bishop, N=Knight, and P=Pawn). Four squares are initially unoccupied.

All the pieces move and capture in the same manner as conventional chess, except the pawn, which moves diagonally and captures laterally. A pawn may not move two squares at a time, and there is no en passant capture. There are no checkmates and no stalemates: kings are captured like all other pieces. When a player is in check and has no legal moves to escape check, he may make a "token move" every turn until his king is actually captured. When a player loses his king, his remaining pieces subsequently become the captor's. The game ends when one team has lost both kings or chooses to concede.

Partners typically coordinate their moves as part of a single strategy. Thus, communication of that strategy becomes a requirement of the game. Clandestine forms of communication such as code words, furtive gestures, or secret notes are not allowed, except in special variants. All strategizing between partners must be done openly in front of their opponents. This rule lends Forchess much of its social character.

## Cutthroat Forchess

[edit]

Forchess has a variant called Cutthroat, in which there are no partners and only one player wins by defeating all three opponents. Successful strategy in Cutthroat Forchess can differ greatly from "regular" Forchess, as fluid alliances may spark a game of psychological manipulation. In this respect, Cutthroat shares strategy elements with the board game Risk.

## References

[edit]

* Pritchard, D. B. (2007). "Forchess". The Classified Encyclopedia of Chess Variants. John Beasley. p. 314\. ISBN 978-0-9555168-0-1.
* Pritchard, D. B. (1994). "Forchess". The Encyclopedia of Chess Variants. Games & Puzzles Publications. p. 111\. ISBN 0-9524142-0-1.

## External links

[edit]

* Chess portal

* The official Forchess homepage
* Forchess discussion forum

* v
* t
* e

Chess variants (list)

Orthodox rules|

| Different starting position|

* Fischer random chess
* Displacement chess
* Transcendental chess

|

Different number of pieces|

* Dunsany's chess
* Handicap

Unorthodox board|

* Balbo's game
* Circular chess
* Cylinder chess
* Double chess
* Grid chess
* Hexagonal chess (Cross chess, Masonic chess)
* Infinite chess
* Millennium 3D chess
* Minichess (Los Alamos chess)
* Rhombic chess
* Spherical chess
* Three-dimensional chess
* Triangular chess

Unorthodox
rules with
traditional
pieces|

| Standard
8×8 board|

* Andernach chess
* Atomic chess
* Beirut chess
* Checkless chess
* Chessplus
* Circe chess
* Crazyhouse
* Cubic chess
* Dynamo chess
* Extinction chess
* Hostage chess
* Knight relay chess
* Legan chess
* Losing chess
* Madrasi chess
* Monochromatic chess
* Patrol chess
* PlunderChess
* Portal chess
* Progressive chess
* Three-check chess
* Way of the Knight

|

Multimove variants|

* Avalanche chess
* Kung-Fu Chess
* Marseillais chess
* Monster chess
* Progressive chess

Elements of chance|

* Dark chess
* Dice chess
* Knightmare Chess
* Kriegspiel
* Penultima

Unorthodox rules on
an unorthodox board|

* Alice chess
* Apocalypse
* Chad
* Chessence
* Congo
* Diplomat chess
* Dragonfly
* Jeson Mor
* Parallel worlds chess
* Rollerball
* 5D Chess with Multiverse Time Travel

Unorthodox
rules using
non-traditional
pieces|

| Standard 8×8 board|

* Baroque
* Berolina
* Chakra
* Chess with different armies
* Duell
* Falcon–hunter chess
* Grasshopper chess
* Musketeer chess
* Pocket mutation chess
* Cheskers

|

Compound pieces|

* Almost chess
* Capablanca chess
* Capablanca random chess
* Chancellor chess
* Embassy chess
* Grand Chess
* Janus Chess
* Maharajah and the Sepoys
* Modern chess
* Seirawan chess
* Tutti-frutti chess

Unorthodox
boards and pieces|

* Chesquerque
* Chess on a really big board
* Courier-Spiel
* Dragonchess
* Gess
* Omega Chess
* Stratomic
* Dekle's triangular chess
* 2000 A.D.
* Wildebeest chess
* Wolf chess

Multiplayer|

* Bosworth
* Bughouse chess
* Business chess
* Djambi
* Duchess
* Enochian chess
* Forchess
* Fortress chess
* Four Fronts
* Four-player chess
* Gala
* Hand and brain
* Quatrochess
* Three-man chess
* Three-player chess
* Tri-chess

Inspired games|

* Arimaa
* Jetan
* Martian chess
* Navia Dratp
* The Duke

Chess-related
games|

| Historical|

* Chadarangam
* Chaturaji
* Chaturanga
* Courier chess
* Grant Acedrex
* Shatranj
* Short assize
* Tamerlane chess

|

Regional|

* Janggi
* variants
* Makruk
* Senterej
* Shatar
* Shogi
* Chu shogi
* Dai shogi
* Other variants
* Sittuyin
* Xiangqi
* Jungle
* Banqi
* Manchu chess
* Game of the Three Kingdoms
* Game of the Three Friends
* Game of the Seven Kingdoms
* Other variants

Software|

* ChessV
* Fairy-Max
* XBoard
* Zillions of Games

Related|

* Correspondence chess
* Fairy chess
* Fairy chess piece
* Fairy Chess Review
* The Chess Variant Pages

*[v]: View this template
*[t]: Discuss this template
*[e]: Edit this template