Baroque chess is a chess variant for two players, invented in 1962 by Robert Abbott and also known as Ultima, the name he adopted in 1963 at his publisher's suggestion. It is played on a standard eight by eight chessboard with an ordinary chess set, but only the king moves and captures as in chess. The pawns move like rooks and capture by sandwiching an enemy piece against a friendly piece, the queen becomes the Withdrawer that captures by moving directly away from a piece, the knights become Long-leapers that jump their victims, one rook becomes the Coordinator, the other rook is turned upside down as the Immobilizer that freezes adjacent enemy pieces, and the bishops become Imitators that copy the capture method of the piece they attack. The aim is to capture the opposing king. Abbott later thought the design flawed and proposed amendments, but players have mostly kept the 1962 rules, and regional variants such as one popular with Cambridge University students in 1974 have since developed.
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1. Baroque chess (Wikipedia)
Lead paragraph
invented in 1962 by Robert Abbott
Description, symmetry
After these two kinds of symmetries are determined, White moves first.
Description
Baroque chess is usually played on a standard 8×8 chessboard
Derived From: Chess, Lead paragraph [derived-from]
Baroque chess is a chess variant
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