Auction Chess

“Four Player Auction Chess” is a chess variant and is played with standard „four-handed chess“ rules, in single play (1 vs 1 vs 1 vs 1).

Classic four-handed chess rules (single play)

  • Players can only move their chess pieces on their turn.
  • If a player is placed in check, that player must wait until their designated turn before that player can respond to the threat.
  • Pawns move forward only, unless attacking in a diagonal forward manner.
  • In the event a pawn reaches the King’s row to the left, right or directly across, that pawn shall receive all the privileges of a pawn reaching King’s row during a traditional chess game (i.e. bringing back a queen (most commonly), a rook, a bishop, or a knight).
  • Each player can attack any of the other three players and vice versa.
  • Once a player is checkmated, the checkmated player removes his pieces from the board.
  • Play continues until only one player is left.

Trade/Auction mechanic

  • After every round (e.g. when the player has taken his turn) an auction can be started
    • f.e. player 1 wants to trade his captured queen, and starts an auction
    • The other players can now bid whatever pieces they have captured
    • Player 1 can now decide if he wishes to trade his queen for whatever another player has bidden
  • If a successful trade is made, the auctioned piece has to be placed right after the trade, horizontally/vertically one field from the current players pieces on the board
  • The placing of auctioned pieces takes place clockwise, starting at the player who moves first during normal game play
  • After the piece has been converted/placed, one has to wait till the next turn to use it

Anti-Hoard mechanic

  • If a piece is captured, it is viable for trade for three turns, marked by three tokens
  • After every turn, one token is taken away
  • After three turns, the captured piece must be placed on the inner 6×6 field
    • The position is decided by an 2d7 die roll
    • The first roll determines the x-axis, the second the y-axis, starting from the lower left corner of the starting direction of the current player
  • The placed piece is unable to make any move, until a player captures it with a piece of his own
  • If it is captured, it will be converted to the capturing players color
  • It must then be placed horizontally/vertically one field from the current players (capturing) piece
  • After the piece has been converted/placed, one has to wait till the next turn to use it