Spherical chess

Chess variants played on spherical boards

Spherical chess is any of several chess variants played on boards composed of fields arranged on the surface of a sphere.

## Miller's spherical chess

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A variant described by Don Miller in 1965[1] and later modified by Leo Nadvorney. The fields of the board form eight rings around the sphere each consisting of eight squares and with the fields touching the poles degenerated into spherical triangles.[2]

## Murali's spherical chess

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This variant is played on a board obtained by drawing two sets of circles with orthogonal axes of rotation on the sphere. Both players pieces are initially arranged on opposite hemispheres. Each player has a standard set of king, queen, bishop, knight and rook arranged in a square pattern surrounding a central empty square. These pieces are surrounded by 16 pawns in another square layer. Pawns move one field orthogonally away from their initial position with the exception of the four pawns at the four corners of the setup, which have two possible directions. They all capture one field diagonally forward. The other pieces have the moves from standard chess adapted to the spherical geometry. For example, the rook can move any number of fields orthogonally up to one of the "poles" of the grid and continue on the other side of the sphere, except that a "null move" is not allowed. This rule regarding "null move" also applies to the bishop and the queen. Pawns promote when reaching the fields where the opponents pieces other than pawns are initially placed.[3]

## Tuveson and Saul's spherical chess

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A variant developed by Jared Tuveson and Lukas Saul. The board has differently shaped fields, some of them being triangles and others squares. Special rules govern the moves of the pieces on the triangular fields.[4]

## References

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1. ^ Pritchard, D. B. (2007). The Classified Encyclopedia of Chess Variants (PDF). England: John Beasley. pp. 223–224\. ISBN 978-0-9555168-0-1.
2. ^ Castelli, Alessandro. "Spherical chess". The Chess Variant Pages. Retrieved 6 January 2020.
3. ^ Murali, Alavoor Venkatavaradhan (2011). Chess Variants and Games. Mumbai, India: Leadstart Publishing Pvt Ltd. ISBN 978-93-81115-74-9.
4. ^ US application 20030020236A1, Jared Mathew Tuveson & Lukas Amadeo Saul, "Spherical Chess Board", published 30 January 2003

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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|

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

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|

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

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