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Viking Chess Set. Game board and pieces in search of rules. (Cells: 37) [All Comments] [Add Comment or Rating]

📝Michael Ireland wrote on Fri, Jan 20, 2023 05:27 PM UTC:

Update to the Rules I posted in 2020 after receiving more feedback on the Internet about this game. Almost complete except for the question of promotion. The game, I am informed, is called The Windrose Game (Danish Viking Chess).

The goal of the game is to checkmate your opponent's king as in regular chess.

Board: The board is made up of "rings" linking "crosses" (the spaces).

There is a centre space, the “star”, in the middle.

Pieces: There is a king, 2 rooks (flat tops), 2 bishops (spikes) and 4 thralls per side.

All pieces start off the board.

On their first turn (white goes first) each player places their king on the edge of the board.

In the second and subsequent turns, each player can EITHER bring a piece onto the board edge OR move an existing piece on the board.

The different pieces move as follows:

Thrall moves one space in any direction
Rook moves up to 3 spaces up or down, or one space to the side
Bishop moves up to 3 spaces around one of the rings, or one space up or down.
King moves up to 3 spaces in any direction up or down Once placed on the board a piece can enter the centre space or move through it.

A player takes an opponent's piece by moving a piece into their opponent's piece's space. Once a piece is removed from the board it cannot return.

When a King is mated the game is over.

Note: One commenter thought that a Thrall could be promoted to a Rook or Bishop if it reached the centre star space but this cannot be confirmed. This could be played as an optional rule.

The game was available for sale in Copenhagen (where my parents bought it) and also at Modern Designs in Ithaca NY (no longer in business?).

Jean-Louis Cazaux wrote on Fri, Jan 20, 2023 06:40 PM UTC in reply to Michael Ireland from 05:27 PM:

I would suggest that you update the page with these elements, if you have the rights to edit it. Nice finding that should be kept for memory here.

📝Michael Ireland wrote on Thu, Apr 4 06:10 PM UTC in reply to Jean-Louis Cazaux from Fri Jan 20 2023 06:40 PM:

Would love to update the page but I am unable. The original account I setup in the early 2000s is locked and I can't get back in. I have the UserID but the password is no good. When I try to change the password I get the following error: "Cannot continue, because no row in the Person table could be identified."