Monday 3 October 2011

Odd suggestions

I'm quite a keen collector of strange chess rules. Often these rules are just simple misinterpretations, passed on by a more 'knowledgeable' source. An example of this would be 'pawns can't capture on their first moves', which was what I was taught my a school friend at the age of 7.
On the other hand, their are some rule suggestions that are deliberate attempts to change the nature of the game. As a member of the FIDE Rules and Tournament Regulation I get to see these proposals more than most players. Honour bound as we are to consider these suggestions, the issue is often how long we should consider them for!
Two recent suggestions, from the same source, are: Removing the En-Pas capture from the game (or at least that is what was being proposed, although the letter is a little hard to understand), and allowing castling out of check.
Not sure I see the merit of either proposal, but they will of course be discussed at some point.

3 comments:

Alana Chibnall said...

One of the schools tournaments I ran had a few players thinking there was a rule that was if you have only a King and a Pawn left and your opponent had heaps of pieces if you lasted 20 moves you won the game. Apparently it's a rule down at some coast tournaments and the teachers and students were both shocked to hear it wasn't actually a rule...

Anonymous said...

You are allowed to castle out of check, don't you. It's just a kings move.

Denis Jessop said...

I can see no point in the prohibition on castling out of check. If the King is allowed to move out of check, as he is, and castling is "counting as a single move of the King" (Laws 3.8.a.) why, logically, should the King not be allowed to castle out of check?

DJ