Crown

NEW CHESS GAME CROWN

There are very much variants of chess game in our time. But practically all of them have one mutual feature: each player has no secrets from his/her opponent (except plans in his/her head). If all information about pieces and their positions of both partners is fully open, a corresponding game can be called game with (fully) open information. But a chess game (and any game at all) should reflect, or better to say, imitate real conflict situations, which very rarely take place without secrets. Therefore it is reasonable to try to invent or to search chess games with a deficiency of information.
There is a huge class of games with hidden information - card games. As for chess games, the author knows only two games of such class - Japanese game gunjin shogi (military shogi) and European game stratego, but these games are mostly hazardous. Basic principles of proposed here new chess game - a game with not fully open information - are described below:
1. In the beginning of the game no player has full information about all pieces of his/her opponent.
2. Each player during all the game has full information about his/her pieces.
3. Shortage of information about opponent's pieces can be eliminated during the game by moves of own pieces.
4. The hidden information is determined by players only and does not depend from chance, for example from throwing dice.
5. The game must be like usual (European, international) chess as much as possible (this point is included in order to make the new game more popular and easy to learn).
6. In spite of shortage of information the game must be logical and not become purely chance and hazardous.

Taking into consideration all above said the following game is being proposed.

The game can be played with usual chess pieces on a usual board. Initial position is also the same as in usual chess game. All pieces make their moves in usual way with exception of queen - this piece moves as king.
In all chess games until now the main purpose is to take a before known main piece (king). In the game described here the main purpose is to take a piece having the crown, and your opponent does not know from the beginning of the game which your piece has crown. Only two pieces can have the crown: either king or queen. Each player before the game must decide to which piece to give the crown, write down his/her decision and put a paper with the written note on such place, where an opponent could not read it. Of course the note cannot be changed during the game. The name of the game is "crown", because one of main pieces has crown.
But why to make queen to move as king? Why not to let it to move as in usual chess? In the game "crown" king and queen must be absolutely equal in moves in order your opponent has difficulty guessing which of your two monarchs has crown. Let us suppose that queen moves in usual way and has crown. It would be very risky to attack with a crowned queen! But if you abstain from attacks with your most powerful piece, it is very suspiciously. On the other hand it is not reasonable if both king and queen in this new game would move as queen in usual chess, because to beat two such powerful pieces is not an easy task and game might be very long.
King and queen in crown must be considered as usual pieces, i.e. you may place them under an attack, because one of them is really a usual one, but your opponent should not know which one. When one monarch is taken, the player who took it reads a note of his/her opponent. If the taken monarch has crown, the game is over, of course the winner is the player who took crowned monarch. If non-crowned monarch is taken the game continues.

The rules of the new game have following differences from usual chess.

1. Both king and queen can castle, because they both are equal, and making castling they can go through and stand on beaten fields, because they are considered as usual pieces (see above).
2. Stalemate is defeat on the same reason as in point 1, i.e. victory in crown is possible either by checkmate, or by stalemate, or, more precisely, there is no difference in crown between checkmate and stalemate.
3. In chess any pawn on last horizontal turns (promotes) into queen or any other piece except king. In crown a pawn on last horizontal can turns into any piece including non-crowned monarch, but also can become new (for this game) piece, which moves as queen in chess. In crown we call it "generalissimo".

The deficiency of information, inserted into the game "crown", is not much, so the game does not lose logical nature, but becomes very emotional and thrilling. Uncertainty, inherent to crown, equals possibilities of players of different power.
All piece symbols in crown are the same as in chess, with exclusion of generalissimo's symbol. On diagrams generalissimo is represented with a star having 8 long rays, because generallissimo moves in eight directions on any distance, and in texts this piece is represented with a letter "G".

In order to illustrate all written above let's consider an example of the game. Whites: king is crowned; blacks: queen is crowned. In case of castling we show which piece made castling.

1. e4 e5
2. Nf3 Nc6
3. Be2 Nf6
4. d3 Bc5
5. K0-0 K0-0
6. Nc3 Nd4
7. N:d4 B:d4
8. Bg5 h6
9. B:f6 gf
10. D0-0 d6
11. Nd5 Kg7
12. с3 Bb6
13. N:b6 cb
14. f4 Be6
15. Rf2 D0-0
16. Rcf1 f5
17. ef B:f5
18. fe Be6
19. ed Rcd8
20. a3 R:d6
21. Dc2 Dc7
22. Bh5 Rd5
23. g4 f5
24. gf B:f5
25. Bf3 B:d3
26. B:d5 B:c2
27. R:f8 K:f8
28. R:f8
Whites won.

By author's opinion to read records of crown games is more interesting than records of other chess games, because the reader knows what players didn't know: where opponent had hidden his/her crown. It is as if you became like an inhabitant of Olympus, who could see secrets unknown to ordinary mortals.

Problems in crown have special feature, if the side to be checkmated has both king and queen. In a problem, as well in a real game, it must be unknown who has crown - king or queen. Therefore in any solution we must suppose a most unfavorable variant - remained monarch has crown. Below is a simple example.

Whites: K e1, N h4, R a6, R b7, blacks: K h8, Q f8. Whites begin and win in 4 moves.
Solution: Ng6 (fork on both monarchs). If one black monarch moves along eighth horizontal, knight beats other monarch and then whites can win by move Ra8 (if black monarch remains on eighth horizontal). If blacks in answer to the knight's fork move one monarch to seventh horizontal, the knight beats unmoved monarch, and rooks beat monarch which moved. Blacks can maximally delay the game if they in answer to 1. Ng6 make for example move 1. ... Kg8. Then 2. Nxf8 Kh8 3. Ra8 Kg8 4. Ne6 (or Ng6), and whites won.

Specially for English speaking (and especially English-minded) people I would like to propose a change of two main pieces names: let king be lion and queen - unicorn, because all English children know nursery rhyme "The lion and the unicorn had battle for the crown". The king becomes lion, not unicorn, because lion is king of animals. If this proposal will be accepted, the game itself may be renamed from "crown" to "lion and unicorn" (or "lion or unicorn?").
It is very interesting that National State Emblems (coats of arms) of Great Britain and Canada have following elements: crown, lion and unicorn. Therefore a thought arose to create such emblem or symbol of the game: on the left and on the right a lion and a unicorn stand, between them we see a chessboard, and above it – a crown. Here below is an explanation of concrete shapes selected for elements of the symbol.

First of all let’s remember that lion and unicorn together can be seen not only on the British and Canadian State Emblems. On the ancient gate of Babylon lions and unicorns are depicted. We can meet this couple (lion and unicorn) in Jewish art (especially as religious decorations). Russians also used this motif.

This game was born in Moscow, so I took images of lion and unicorn I saw on facade of one Moscow building. Crown on the game’s symbol must not resemble images for king and queen on chess diagrams. I selected for it a crown in shape of three-tower castle. It has especial chess sense, because castling exists in chess.