How To Play Fun Family Chess

The Rules

All normal chess rules apply with the following variations:

1. Board set out as per normal board except pieces are set in the additional rows and the far right hand pawn of each set is removed

2. Each pawn can move two squares at any time. En passant rules apply any time a pawn is moved two squares.

3. All pieces on the board can be double attacked except the King. A double attack is when a piece is trapped by two or more players. Legitimate double attacks include one player putting a person in check (or discovered check) and another player taking a different piece.

4. In order to allow younger players of 10 years old or less to develop a love for Chess - any player 25 years younger than the oldest player, can leave the game and return at any time. They cannot be checkmated while they are absent, though pieces can be taken by pawns.

5. Special note needs to be taken, of the normal chess rule, that a player has to move out of check - only if the attacking player has said "check" at the time.

6. It is acceptable for players to team up for all or part of a game.

7. Games Supervisor - parent - has right to vary all rules esp 4 as appropriate

The Board

Other Rules (Normal Chess Rules)

Each chess piece has its own style of moving. Moves are made to vacant squares except when capturing an opponent's piece.

With the exception of the knight, pieces cannot jump over each other. When a piece is captured (or taken), the attacking piece replaces the enemy piece on its square (en passant being the only exception). The captured piece is thus removed from the game and may not be returned to play for the remainder of the game.[1] The king can be put in check but cannot be captured (see below).

• The king can move exactly one square horizontally, vertically, or diagonally. At most once in every game, each king is allowed to make a special move, known as castling (see below).
• The rook moves any number of vacant squares vertically or horizontally. It also is moved while castling.
• The bishop moves any number of vacant squares in any diagonal direction.
• The queen can move any number of vacant squares diagonally, horizontally, or vertically.
• The knight moves to the nearest square not on the same rank, file, or diagonal. In other words, the knight moves two squares like the rook and then one square perpendicular to that. Its move is not blocked by other pieces, i.e. it leaps to the new square. The knight moves in an "L" or "7" shape (or either shape inverted) with two steps one direction, a 90° turn, and one step in the new direction.

Pawns have the most complex rules of movement:

• A pawn can move forward one square, if that square is unoccupied. If it has not yet moved, the pawn has the option of moving two squares forward provided both squares in front of the pawn are unoccupied. A pawn cannot move backward.
• Pawns are the only pieces that capture differently from how they move. They can capture an enemy piece on either of the two spaces adjacent to the space in front of them (i.e., the two squares diagonally in front of them) but cannot move to these spaces if they are vacant.

The pawn is also involved in the two special moves en passant and promotion (Schiller 2003:17–19). 

 Referrence: Images and Normal Rules from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rules_of_chess#Play_of_the_game

Castling

Castling consists of moving the king two squares towards a rook, then placing the rook on the other side of the king, adjacent to it.[2] Castling is only permissible if all of the following conditions hold:

1. The king and rook involved in castling must not have previously moved;
2. There must be no pieces between the king and the rook;
3. The king may not currently be in check, nor may the king pass through or end up in a square that is under attack by an enemy piece (though the rook is permitted to be under attack and to pass over an attacked square);
4. The king and the rook must be on the same rank (Schiller 2003:19).[3]

en passant

If player A's pawn moves forward two squares and player B has a pawn on the fifth rank and on an adjacent file, B's pawn can capture A's pawn as if A's pawn had only moved one square. This capture can only be made on the immediately subsequent move. In this example, an en passant capture would remove the black pawn and the white pawn would move to the f6 square, marked by an "x" (Schiller 2003:18).

Pawn promotion

If a pawn advances to its eighth rank, it is then promoted (converted) to a queen, rook, bishop, or knight of the same color, the choice being at the discretion of its player (a queen is usually chosen). The choice is not limited to previously captured pieces. Hence it is theoretically possible for a player to have up to nine queens or up to ten rooks, bishops, or knights if all of their pawns are promoted. If the desired piece is not available, the player should call the arbiter to provide the piece (Schiller 2003:17–19).[4]

Check

When a player makes a move that threatens the opposing king with capture (not necessarily by the piece that was moved), the king is said to be in check. The definition of check is that one or more opposing pieces could theoretically capture the king on the next move (although the king is never actually captured). If a player's king is in check then the player must make a move that eliminates the threat(s) of capture; a player may never leave their king in check at the end of their move. The possible ways to remove the threat of capture are:

• Move the king to a square where it is not threatened.
• Capture the threatening piece (possibly with the king, if doing so does not put the king in check).
• Place a piece between the king and the opponent's threatening piece. This is impossible if the threatening piece is a knight or pawn, or if a checking queen, rook or bishop is adjacent to the checked king.

In the case of double check, when there are two pieces attacking the king, only a king move will get out of check; the king may capture an enemy piece.

In informal games, it is customary to announce check when making a move that puts the opponent's king in check. However, in formal competitions check is rarely announced (Just & Burg 2003:28).

A player may not make any move which places or leaves their king in check, even if the checking piece cannot move due to a pin, i.e. moving it would expose their own king to check. This also means that a player cannot place his king on any square adjacent to the enemy king, because doing so would leave their king able to be taken by the enemy king and therefore in check.

End of Game - Checkmate

If a player's king is placed in check and there is no legal move that player can make to escape check, then the king is said to be checkmated, the game ends, and that player loses (Schiller 2003:20–21). Unlike other pieces, the king is never actually captured or removed from the board because checkmate ends the game (Burgess 2000:457).

The diagram to the right shows a typical checkmate position. The white king is threatened by the black queen; every square to which the king could move is also threatened; it cannot capture the queen, because it would then be threatened by the rook.

Resigning

Either player may resign at any time and their opponent wins the game. This normally happens when the player believes he or she is very likely to lose the game. A player may resign by saying it verbally or by indicating it on their scoresheet in any of three ways: (1) by writing "resigns", (2) by circling the result of the game, or (3) by writing "1–0" if Black resigns or "0–1" if White resigns (Schiller 2003:21). Tipping over the king also indicates resignation, but it is not frequently used. Stopping both clocks is not an indication of resigning, since clocks can be stopped to call the arbiter. An offer of a handshake is not necessarily a resignation either, since one player could think they are agreeing to a draw (Just & Burg 2003:29).

Draws

The game ends in a draw if any of these conditions occur:

• The game is automatically a draw if the player to move is not in check but has no legal move. This situation is called a stalemate. An example of such a position is shown in the diagram to the right.
• No possible sequence of legal moves leads to checkmate. Usually this is because there is insufficient material, for example if one player has a king and a bishop or knight and the other only a king.
• Both players agree to a draw after one of the players makes such an offer.

The player having the move may claim a draw by declaring that one of the following conditions exists, or by declaring an intention to make a move which will bring about one of these conditions:

• Fifty moves have been played by each player without any capture or a pawn being moved.
• The same board position has occurred three times, with the same player to move and all pieces having the same rights to move, including the right to castle or capture en passant.

If the claim is proven true, the game is drawn (Schiller 2003:21,26–28).

At one time, if a player was able to check the opposing king continually (perpetual check) and the player indicated their intention to do so, the game was drawn. This rule is no longer in effect; however, players will usually agree to a draw in such a situation, since either the threefold repetition rule or the fifty-move rule will eventually be applicable (Staunton 1847:21–22), (Reinfeld 1954:175).