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The camel or long knight is a fairy chess piece with an elongated knight move. [1] It can jump three squares horizontally and one square vertically or three squares vertically and one square horizontally, regardless of intervening pieces. Therefore, it is a (1,3)-leaper. [1]
The camel is a very old chess piece, appearing in some early chess variants, such as Tamerlane chess. It also appears in some modern variants, such as wildebeest chess. [1]
The camel by itself is worth about two pawns (appreciably less than a knight) because of its colorboundedness and lack of sufficient freedom of movement on an 8×8 board. However, a king, a bishop, and a camel can force checkmate on a bare king, assuming that the bishop and the camel are not on the same square color; [2] a king, a knight, and a camel can usually force checkmate on a bare king, but not easily, and there are thirteen types of fortress draws; [2] lastly, a king, a camel, and a wazir can sometimes force checkmate on a bare king, but it can take up to 77 moves. [2] A king and two camels cannot checkmate a lone king, even if the camels are on different square colors. [2] While the rook versus camel endgame is usually a draw, more winning positions exist than there are in rook versus knight and rook versus bishop endgames; the longest win takes 35 moves. [2] (All endgame statistics mentioned are for the 8×8 board.) [2]
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As a component of other pieces, the camel has about the same value as a knight (both pieces can move to at most eight squares). The camel plus ferz compound is used in Omega Chess, where it is called a wizard , [3] [4] and the camel plus king compound is used in Paulovits's Game, where it is called a general.
Its long move carries the danger of unstoppable attacks in the opening and of capturing winning large amounts of material. [5] For example, if a camel plus wazir compound (LW in Betza's funny notation) replaces White's queenside rook, then White can immediately win material with 1.(LW)b4, threatening 2.(LW)e5 to win the black queen and 2.(LW)b5 to win the black rook on a8; the threats cannot both be parried. [5]
The king is the most important piece in the game of chess. It may move to any adjoining square; it may also perform, in tandem with the rook, a special move called castling. If a player's king is threatened with capture, it is said to be in check, and the player must remove the threat of capture immediately. If this cannot be done, the king is said to be in checkmate, resulting in a loss for that player. A player cannot make any move that places their own king in check. Despite this, the king can become a strong offensive piece in the endgame or, rarely, the middlegame.
The queen is the most powerful piece in the game of chess. It can move any number of squares vertically, horizontally or diagonally, combining the powers of the rook and bishop. Each player starts the game with one queen, placed in the middle of the first rank next to the king. Because the queen is the strongest piece, a pawn is promoted to a queen in the vast majority of cases.
The endgame is the final stage of a chess game which occurs after the middlegame. It begins when few pieces are left on the board.
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, fairy pieces vary mostly in the way they move, but they may also follow special rules for capturing, promotions, etc. Because of the distributed and uncoordinated nature of unorthodox chess development, the same piece can have different names, and different pieces can have the same name in various contexts as it can be noted in the list of fairy chess pieces.
In chess, a relative value is a standard value conventionally assigned to each piece. Piece valuations have no role in the rules of chess but are useful as an aid to assessing a position.
Tamerlane chess is a medieval chess variant. Like modern chess, it is derived from shatranj. It was developed in Central Asia during the reign of Emperor Timur, and its invention is also attributed to him. Because Tamerlane chess is a larger variant of chaturanga, it is also called Shatranj Al-Kabir, as opposed to Shatranj as-saghir. Although the game is similar to modern chess, it is distinctive in that there are varieties of pawn, each of which promotes in its own way.
The empress is a fairy chess piece that can move like a rook or a knight. It cannot jump over other pieces when moving as a rook but may do so when moving as a knight. The piece has acquired many names and is frequently called a chancellor or a marshal.
The princess is a fairy chess piece that can move like a bishop or a knight. It cannot jump over other pieces when moving as a bishop but may do so when moving as a knight. The piece has acquired many names and is frequently called an archbishop or a cardinal; it may also simply be called the bishop+knight compound.
Chess with different armies is a chess variant invented by Ralph Betza in 1979. Two sides use different sets of fairy pieces. 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, but the four other pieces are different.
A pawnless chess endgame is a chess endgame in which only a few pieces remain, and no pawns. The basic checkmates are types of pawnless endgames. Endgames without pawns do not occur very often in practice except for the basic checkmates of king and queen versus king, king and rook versus king, and queen versus rook. Other cases that occur occasionally are (1) a rook and minor piece versus a rook and (2) a rook versus a minor piece, especially if the minor piece is a bishop.
Omega Chess is a commercial chess variant designed and released in 1992 by Daniel MacDonald. The game is played on a 10×10 board with four extra squares, each added diagonally adjacent to the corner squares. The game is laid out like standard chess with the addition of a champion in each corner of the 10×10 board and a wizard in each new added corner square.
The following outline is provided as an overview of and topical guide to chess:
The amazon, also known as the queen+knight compound or the dragon, is a fairy chess piece that can move like a queen or a knight. It may thus be considered the sum of all orthodox chess pieces other than the king and the pawn. The amazon can force checkmate on an enemy king without the help of any other friendly piece.
The wazir or vazir is a fairy chess piece that may move a single square vertically or horizontally. In notation, it is given the symbol W. In this article, the wazir is represented by an inverted rook.
The ferz or fers is a fairy chess piece that may move one square diagonally. It was used in orthodox chess and in Shatranj form of chess before being replaced by the queen.
Quatrochess is a chess variant for four players invented by George R. Dekle Sr. in 1986. It is played on a square 14×14 board that excludes the four central squares. Each player controls a standard set of sixteen chess pieces, and additionally nine fairy pieces. The game can be played in partnership or all-versus-all.
The zebra is a fairy chess piece that moves like a stretched knight. It jumps three squares horizontally and two squares vertically or three squares vertically and two squares horizontally, regardless of intervening pieces; thus, it is a (2,3)-leaper. A lame zebra, which moves one step orthogonally and then two steps diagonally outwards and can be blocked by intervening pieces, appears as the elephant in janggi.
Chess on a really big board is a large chess variant invented by Ralph Betza around 1996. It is played on a 16×16 chessboard with 16 pieces and 16 pawns per player. Since such a board can be constructed by pushing together four standard 8×8 boards, Betza also gave this variant the alternative names of four-board chess or chess on four boards.
Grant Acedrex is a medieval chess variant dating back to the time of King Alfonso X of Castile. It appears in the Libro de los Juegos of 1283.