What Is Temporal Chess?
High school was a very creative time for me.
I wrote a lot of (really bad) fiction, read a lot, taught myself to program a computer, and created numerous rules for games. One of those games was temporal chess.
At its heart, temporal chess is normal chess with the addition that pieces can travel in time. A queen might disappear, to reappear in the future, or a knight might appear from the future in the nick of time to save the day.
I never had much luck getting anyone else to play the game, so I'm putting the rules up here in the hopes that someone else can make use of them.
You have my permission to use these rules for your own personal use and enjoyment, but not to use them in any commercial way or to redistribute them.
The Overview
That's the mechanism behind Temporal Chess.
Normal chess has two dimensions involved: forward/backward, and side-to-side. Pieces use these dimensions in some combination to make legal moves.
A knight, for example, must move two spaces in one dimension and one space in another dimension. A rook may move any number of spaces, but only one a single dimension.
In Temporal Chess, we add in a third dimension, that of time.
You can picture the past and future of the game to be a series of stacked boards, each representing the state of the board at that turn.
Pieces may use the temporal dimensions as one of their options when moving.
Chess Piece Movement
Pawns are simple, they move a single space forward across the board, and capture by moving diagonally forward. Since their basic movement is limited to only forward across the board, I don't consider time to be a legal dimension for pawns to use.
Rooks move any number of spaces in any single dimension. So a rook could move forward or backward in time any number of turns, but would arrive on the same spot.
Bishops move an equal number of spaces in two dimensions at the same time. So a bishop could move three spaces forward across the board, while at the same time moving three turns forward in time.
Knights move two spaces in one dimension, and one space in another dimensions. Either of these dimensions could be time.
Queens combine the movements of rooks and bishops, and so follow from those.
Kings may move one square in any direction. I take this to mean that the king may use any number of dimensions, and so could potentially move one square forward, to the side, and forward temporally, all at the same time.
Legal Forms of Temporal Movement
So for the purposes of Temporal Chess, we say that the past cannot be changed.
Pieces may move from the present (the current turn) into the future, or from the future into the present.
When a piece leaves the present for the future, the player must write the destination turn and location on a piece of paper. Similarly, when a player brings a piece in from the future, the starting turn and location must be written on a piece of paper.
These pieces of paper help keep track of the various temporal movements.
Paradox!
Having multiple instances of the same piece on the board is not paradox. For example, a skillful player could have three queens on the board.
Paradox is created when the player is unable to fulfill the temporal contract written on the pieces of paper that list the starting and destination turns and locations for time traveling pieces.
Let's say that a person brings a rook in from the future. They write on the piece of paper that the rook came from 4 turns in the future. By the time 4 turns have passed, that player must have a rook on that location ready to leave. When the rook leaves, the paper is discarded.
If a rook is not available, then paradox ends the game and the player forfeits.
It need not be the same rook, just a rook. This can lead to borrowing from the future to pay the past. When a player realizes they cannot get a rook into position, they can bring another rook from the future to send back to the past. This only delays the inevitable reckoning, though.
An opponent can also try to camp on a spot that you will need, to try and force a paradox.
Ending The Game
A player who wins, but also creates a paradox, actually loses.
At the end of the game, to avoid paradox, all the pieces of paper representing open temporal movements must have been resolved and discarded.
What Do You Think About Temporal Chess?
Want to play it? Think it's crazy? Let us know!
JayShaffstall wrote...
Pete, that's right, if you have unresolved temporal moves, you still lose even if you've checkmated the other player. The idea is that the entire time continuum of the game is between the beginning and end of the game.
You can win by checkmating any of the opponent's kings. Not only is that a checkmate, but you automatically force them into paradox if they have more than one on the board, since they won't have time to resolve that time jump.
Posted February 12, 2009
Pete wrote
Can you clarify "At the end of the game, to avoid paradox, all the pieces of paper representing open temporal movements must have been resolved and discarded"?
Does this mean you lose if you checkmate someone while you have a piece sent into the future, or are borrowing one from the future?
Also, if your opponent has more than one king on the board at one time, do you win by checkmating just one of them?
[in reply to JayShaffstall]
Posted February 11, 2009
JayShaffstall wrote...
I agree, forcing someone into a temporal paradox would be a key strategy. The King has pretty limited mobility, though, even in time, so I'd think you could force a checkmate with only a bit more work than normal. We'd need to define the conditions for temporal castling, though, since that'd be a nice escape route.
Posted February 11, 2009
Pete wrote
A great idea! At first glance, checkmate seems much harder to achieve. It seems that the overall strategy might shift from trying to checkmate your opponent to trying to force them into a temporal paradox. This also begs for a computer implementation, which could be done on top of xboard, for instance.
Posted February 10, 2009
JayShaffstall wrote...
Sean, the king's movement is a judgment call based on my interpretation of the rules, and could easily be done the other way (a king moves one space in one or two dimensions).
Pieces can move from future to present, appearing out of thin air. Paradox is close by, though, if you don't get that piece (or one of the same type) in the departure square on the right turn.
A king making a jump into the future could arrive in a check situation, and would immediately have to move to avoid it. We'd need some more sophisticated rules on what it means to move out of check, I think, to account for a king moving in time.
Playtesting is definitely needed!
Posted May 31, 2008
