I am about to begin a tournament of AMOEBA on Richard's Play By Email
Server. AMOEBA is very similar to EIGHT-STONE CHESS except for the fact
that
some of the stone swapping rules have been extended beyond creator 
Jim Aikin's original intent.

 in AMOEBA, the following moves would be legal:

    +---------------+
    |- - O O O O - -|   Stone on C can be moved to G,
    +---------------+   Stone on F can be moved to B.
     a b c d e f g h    This complies with standard ESC rules.

But, now:

    +---------------+
    |- n O O O O - -|   Knight on B can move to G
    +---------------+
     a b c d e f g h

Also, note that in the first diagram, the stone on D or E could also move
to G, or the stones on D or E could also move to B, and likewise in the
second diagram, the knight could swap places with the stones on D, E or F
(as well as C) too. 


I am going to be running a 7-man section, single round robin.
You play 6 games, one against each of the other 6 players in the
section, three games with the white pieces and three games with the
black pieces. The '-promote' option is being used to ensure that pawns
can only promote in the very last row of the board. Without it,
a pawn on the 7th rank being blocked from moving to the 8th rank 
by a stone would instantly promote.

If you would like to play in this event, you must have a userid and
password on Richard's Play By Email server. If you do not already have
one, go to 

http://www.gamerz.net/pbmserv/tutorial.html

to learn how to sign up for a free userid and password, and to

http://www.gamerz.net/pbmserv/commands.html

to familiarize yourself with the commands used for playing games
on the server. The key thing to remember about play on the server
is that moves are transmitted in the subject line of the email,
while the body of the email is used for sending comments to your 
opponent.

If you would like to play in the Amoeba tournament, please email
me your PBM userid at pbm4dc@hotmail.com

Please hurry because as of this writing I actually only have two
openings remaining before the section is filled, so hurry! First
come first serve! There are no prizes for the event, but it's free
to enter, all games will be rated (all games on the PBM server
use their own rating system) and a broadcast will be made by me on
the server and here at the completion of the tournament to announce
the winner. 

This is your chance to play a very exciting chess variant against
other enthusiasts of this game!  Sign up now!!