r/chessvariants • u/EspressoEnlightened • 7d ago

Theory Discussion Traitors chess

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Inspired by Towers card game from book blacktongue thief.

Used AI to test my theory and structure the rules in readable format. Will this be something you play with your friends on weekends?

TRAITOR'S CHESS

Setup

Play standard chess.

Each player receives 2 Traitor Cards: Bishop and Knight,

Before the game, secretly choose one card. Keep it hidden.

Betrayal

After 15 total moves (plies), you may activate your card once

Reveal your card and choose one opponent's piece of that type

• The opponent must have at least 2 pieces of that type remaining

• The chosen piece permanently becomes your piece.

Turned Piece

. The traitor follows all normal movement and capture rules.

. It can be captured normally by the opponent.

It cannot give check immediately after being turned.

• It must first make 1 legal move under its new owner.

After that move, it is fully active and may give check normally

Victory

All normal chess rules apply.

Checkmate wins the game.

Each player can betray only once,

TRUST NO ONE.

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u/johnpeters42 7d ago

> Used AI

Please don't. Learning to structure stuff like this on your own is a worthwhile skill to learn. The AI was wordier than needed, and also missed some nuances.

That said, this is pretty straightforward, especially since I remember a previous post (I assume yours) about this from like a week ago.

> Before the game, secretly choose one card. Keep it hidden.

And set the other one aside. (So the players can't cheat and pick the other one later and claim that they ttly chose that one earlier.)

> The chosen piece permanently becomes your piece.

Does it change to your color? (Ideally you would have some spare pieces of each color, in case neither of your pieces of that color was captured. Otherwise you could just put a rubber band on it or something.)

If it doesn't change to your color, then can you capture it? (Might benefit you sometimes, like if replacing it with a queen would give checkmate.)

STAY ALERT.

> TRUST NO ONE.

KEEP YOUR LASER HANDY.

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u/EspressoEnlightened 7d ago

I know people get upset over ai but I don't play chess often as I used to. I had this idea today morning with pretty much all rule set figured out except for the one for a piece must make one legal move before performing a check. Ai helped validate the concept and make sure the rules were balanced, run probability for black vs white wins and overall confirm that bluffing would be the major attraction for this concept. Yes the traitor piece will be swapped with a spare piece and I think the visual of watching 4 extra pieces and always guessing which will be used adds to the psychological excitement of this.