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Dragonchess. A three-dimensional fantasy variant. (3x(12x8), Cells: 288) (Recognized!)[All Comments] [Add Comment or Rating]

Victor Amuro wrote on Tue, Jun 10, 2003 02:06 PM UTC:Good ★★★★

About 16 years back I played this chessvariant with a friend. He came
across the rules in a Dragonmagazine. For some unclear reason we only
played it several times although we liked the game very much. From that
time on I always had in my mind to make my own boards an carve my own
wooden pieces. 
It seems to me that the character of the game is more different from
normall chess then you can tell on first sight. The more powerfull pieces
are played much earlier than in normall chess. It's risky to move you
queen in an first stage of the opening in normall chess, not so here. This
is maybe at the same time one of the weaker points of dragonchess. I got
the feeling (but I'm not be able to prove cause I played not enough games
to be sure)that the game is a little unbalanced. The first player
(gold)has a big advantage to move first, more than in normal chess. No
only can he/she take on his first move a piece for free (Rx1a7 with the
threat Rx2a8 by CAF) but forces scarlet to take defencive steps with R1d4.
Maybe a really strong Dchess computerprogram will never loose with gold
and the best thing the scarlet player can hope for is to play for a draw
and make the best of some weaker moves of his opponent to win the game.
But this didn't stop me to finaly fullfill a promise. Two months back I
started to make my first wooden dragonchesspieces. It will take some time
to finish a complete set and I reckon it will take about a year to become
a proud owner of a complete game (at the moment I got 28 pieces).
Hopefully at that time there are still players around who are willing to
play the game (by mail).

Regards Victor Amuro