A Game Courier Preset for Modern Shatranj

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Modern Shatranj

Uncoded. No rules enforced. No legal moves displayed.

Welcome to Game Courier, where you can play Modern Shatranj and many other Chess variants through online correspondence.

Modern Shatranj  

by Joe Joyce

Pieces

King	Moves as in Shatranj or FIDE chess
Rook	Moves as in Shatranj or FIDE chess
Knight	Moves as in Shatranj or FIDE chess
Pawn	Moves as in Shatranj or FIDE chess
General	Moves as the King, to the first orthogonal or diagonal square.
Elephant	Moves to the first diagonal square or leaps to the second diagonal square.

Rules

"Modern" Shatranj is intermediate between Shatranj and Orthodox Chess. Perhaps the quickest way to learn "Modern" Shatranj is to understand how it differs from the Orthodox:

• The board is not checkered.
• Elephants replace the Orthodox Bishops.
• Generals replace the Orthodox Queen.
• There is no initial two-step Pawn move.
• There is no en passant capture option.
• There is no castling option.
• Promotion is to General, or a lost piece. If a pawn promotes to a lost piece, these are the restrictions:
  • At most, only 3 lost pieces may be regained: 1 rook, 1 knight, and 1 elephant, even if the player has lost both of any type.
  • If promotion is to an elephant, it may not be the same "color" (occupy the same squares) as the promoting player's remaining elephant. If both elephants are lost, a pawn may promote to either.
• Stalemate counts as a win.
• Bare King counts as a win, provided that your King cannot be bared on the very next move. (See below.)
• Two bare Kings (see above) count as a draw.

  How to Move Pieces

  Full Algebraic Notation

  Algebraic notation identifies each space by a coordinate that begins with its file label and ends with its rank label. On the Chess board, files go up and down from one player to the other, and ranks go from left to right. In most games, files are represented by letters, and ranks are represented by numbers, but there is no fixed rule requiring this for all games, and some games, such as Shogi, reverse this convention. If you look at the diagram, you will usually see the file labels going from left to right and the file labels going up and down. And if you hover your mouse over a space, you will normally see the name of the coordinate appear in a tooltip.

  It is not uncommon to see algebraic notation being used for Chess, but it is often in an abbreviated format that requires you to know both the rules of the game and the current position to know exactly which piece moves where. For example, the notation "Ne6" indicates that a Knight is moving to e6, but it doesn't indicate which Knight, and it doesn't specify where the Knight is coming from. To figure this out, you need to know how a Knight moves and which Knight on the board can make a legal move to e6.

  Although rules may be programmed for individual games, Game Courier itself does not know the rules of any game, and it is unable to parse abbreviated algebraic notation. Therefore, it relies on full algebraic notation, which completely specifies the move without requiring any knowledge of the game's rules or the current position. The most usual type of full algebraic notation indicates the piece that is moving by its label, the space it is moving from, and the space it moving to. In Chess, a typical first move might be written as "P e2-e4". When you hover your mouse over a piece, you will normally see the piece label followed by the coordinate for the space, and when you hover it over an empty space, you will normally see the coordinate label. Including the piece label in your notation allows Game Courier to check that the piece you're moving is the right one, and it makes game notation easier to follow, but it is not mandatory.

  You may promote a piece by including a promotion move after your regular move. A promotion move has a piece go directly to a coordinate. Here is an example: "p e7-e8; q-e8".

  You may remove a piece from a space by adding an @ to the space or by omitting the destination coordinate. For example, both "@-e4" and "e4-" would remove the piece on "e4". This is useful for en passant when you are playing a game that does not handle this automatically. For example, "P d5-e6; e5-" removes the Pawn on e5 after a Pawn moves from d5 to e6.

  You will not need to remove spaces for most games, but if you should need to, you can do this by omitting the first coordinate in a move. For example, "-e4" would remove e4 from the board. To add or return a space to the board, you may add an @ or any other piece to it.

  Available Pieces

  Pieces are represented by labels, usually using uppercase letters for White and lowercase letter for Black. When you enter a move or specify the starting position for a game, you should remember that piece labels are case-sensitive. Many piece sets are available for use with Game Courier, and this table shows you which pieces belong to the piece set you are currently using.

  The inclusion of a piece does not indicate that it is used in the game you are playing. But if your game uses pieces not included here, you should choose a different piece set.

  

  

  

  

  

  

  

  

  

  

  

  

  

  

  

  

  

  

  

  

  

  

  

  

  

  

  

  

  

  

  

  

  

  

  

  

  

  

  

  

  

  

  

  

  

  

  

  

  

  

  

  

  Credits

  This preset uses the Modern_Shatranj settings file for Modern Shatranj, which was made by Joe Joyce.

  Game Courier was created, programmed and written by Fergus Duniho.

  Game Courier, Copyright © Fergus Duniho, 2001-2017

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  WWW Page Created: 15 August 2001