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Here is a list of resources for you to study and peruse in your own time. If you find any resources out there related to 4PC, make a comment as such and I will add it to the list. If you routinely write blogs about 4PC or are a regular streamer, say so as well and I will add a link to your blog/stream/channel here too. General - Official 4 player chess club - Official 4PC Custom Games Club - 4 player chess wikibook - How to play 4 player chess FFA & Solo - Beginner tips and fundamentals - Your best friend, backstabber and worst enemy - 10 Basic Strategic Tips How to Play 4 Player Chess - Solo-Play strategy guide - 1|15 FFA 2000+ tutorial: Balance in the 3 player stage - (FFA / Solo) List of 'named' opening theories and game' principles - Elaboration on FFA tutorial: detailed but crucial factors to take into consideration - Claim Win / Autoclaim / Autoresign - Free for All in 4PC: Ideas in the Early Four-Player Phase - 4 player chess tips for being in 1700+ Teams - Strategy tips for teams - 4PC Teams - Why coordination is important for winning

Openings Here is a list of Openings. Position and names are generally the same for the various gamemodes (FFA, solo, teams), although the underlying theory behind them may be different. Following the link for each opening to be taken to a page where the opening is discussed. The Classical - 1. h3 c7 g12 l8 Tom's Opening - 1. h3 c7 j11 Superatos' Opening - 1. h3 c7 Nd12 The Skywalker - 1. h3 c7 h11 The Sicilian - 1. h3 d6 The Caro - 1. h3 c6 The English - 1. f4

Here is a list of checkmates unique to 4PC and their respective definitions. Virtually all checkmate positions from classical chess may still apply in 4PC games. For a list of classical checkmate positions, please click here. Double Checkmate A double checkmate is a position in which a players King is in checkmate via means of being in double check without any squares in which to escape to. A player whose King is in double check must move the King on their turn as neither check can be legitamately blocked nor can the checking pieces be captured by the checked players own pieces other than by his King if the checking pieces are unprotected. The following is a list of possible double checkmate classes; though highly unlikely to actually occur, the double checkmates involving pawns have been included. Two Queens Double Checkmate Two Rooks Double Checkmate Two Bishops Double Checkmate Two Knights Double Checkmate Two pawns Double Checkmate Queen-Rook Double Checkmate Queen-Bishop Double Checkmate Queen-Knight Double Checkmate Queen-pawn Double Checkmate Rook-Bishop Double Checkmate Rook-Knight Double Checkmate Rook-pawn Double Checkmate Bishop-Knight Double Checkmate Bishop-pawn Double Checkmate Knight-pawn Double Checkmate Supported Double Checkmate A "supported" double checkmate (or assist-mate) is a double checkmate in which at least one of the checking pieces is defended by the other checking piece; this ensures that it cannot be captured by the checked players King. Two Queens Assist-mateA Two Queens Double Checkmate where the Queens support each other such that they are directly adjacent to that King and cannot be captured by the King due to the protection they place on each other. This can occur in one of three ways: The Queens are directly next to each other on adjacent squares. The Queens are on the same rank or file as each other with a vacant square in between them. The Queens sit with the enemy King in between them and they support each other via x-ray. Two Rooks Assist-mateA double checkmate in which two Rooks, on the same rank or file, place an enemy King in check where at least one of the Rooks is protected from being captured via x-ray protection. Two Bishops Assist-mateA double checkmate in which two Bishops on the same diagonal place an enemy King in check where at least one of the Bishops is protected from being captured via x-ray protection. Queen-Knight Assist-mateA Queen-Knight double checkmate such that the Queen is directly adjacent to the enemy King and is supported from being captured via the Knights protection. Single Minor Piece CheckmateIn 4PC it is possible to gain checkmate even when the only (non-King) piece on the board is a Knight or a Bishop. This is because of the multiplicity of Kings that can enable the blocking of squares that a checkmated King would otherwise be able to escape to. As such, there must be at least 3 Kings on the board for this kind of checkmate to play out. Single Bishop CheckmateA checkmate in which a singular Bishop is used to check the King whilst the Kings escape squares are blocked by the opponent Kings and edges of the board. Single Knight CheckmateA checkmate in which a singular Knight is used to check the King whilst the Kings escape squares are blocked by the opponent Kings and edges of the board. Teams 4PC Fool's mateIf Red, Yellow and Green all open with their Kings pawn and Blue does not intervene by providing a check on Yellow, then Green becomes checkmated via the fastest possible checkmate possible in 4PC. Red will capture Green's Queen with 2. Qxn8+, and Yellow will then defend Red's queen with 2. -- Bm7#. There are 3568 different combinations of Fool's mate characterised by the moves: 1. (h3, h4) ~ (g12, g11) (l7, k7)2. QxQn8+ (/Qg13, Qh14, Bh13) Bm7 # 4PC Scholar's mateRed opens with his Kings pawn, Yellow moves his Queen pawn two steps to h11 and Green also opens with his Kings pawn. Red then captures Greens Queen with 2. Qxn8+, Yellow plays Qh12 and Green must capture the Queen on n8 with his King. Provided Blue does not intervene by checking Yellow at any point or blocking the path of Yellow's Queen on the third move, Yellow can now deliver Scholar's mate with 3. -- Qxn6#. 1. (h3, h4) ~ h11 (l7, k7)2. QxQn8+ (/Qg13, Bh13) Qh12 KxQn83. ~ (/Qxg13, Bh13, QxQh12, Qi11, Qj10, Qk9, Ql8) QxBn6 # King move mateA checkmate in which the player right of the checkmated need only move his King in order for the next player to be checkmated. FFA & Solo [Contributions needed].

Welcome to 4PCU, we hope you enjoy your stay.Here you can study, analyse, debate and vote on giving names to 4PC related concepts.Please follow the rules and guidelines.For a explanation on the notation and terminology used in this forum, please use the following links:- Terminology- Notation We highly reccomend you join the official 4 player chess club, the vast majority of topics related to 4PC will be found there. This club is dedicated specifically for study and naming conventions. In this forum the pronouns he/she/his/her are used interchangably due to the linguistic limitations of the English language and bear no significant importance unless stated otherwise. Rules All rules applicable to chess.com apply here. No Flame-wars. Keep criticism constructive. If you disagree with something, give reasons. Title all your forum posts appropriately according to the forum guidelines. Guidelines Forum Post Tags We've developed a system to make searching through posts on particular topics simpler and easier for those wishing to research or get into particular areas of study. If you have a subject you are interested in or wanting to write about, consider searching for it first in the forums. Please title all your posts with the following prefix tags as appropriate and follow the rules and conventions associated with each one. Please use as many tags as are appropriate and preferably with the variant tag first if applicable. [FFA] - For posts related to 4PC Free-for-all. [SOLO] - For posts related to 4PC Solo. [TEAMS] - For posts related to 4PC Teams. [OPENINGS] - For posts related to openings. If the opening you are studying has a name, please attach it in the post title. If it does not, consider submitting it for naming with the "[NAME]" tag. [TACTICS] - For posts related to tactics, tricks and traps. If it doesn't have a name, consider submitting it for name reviewing. [STRATEGY] - For posts related to strategies. [END GAME] - For posts related to end game theory. [ANALYSIS] - Game Analysis. [NAME] - For when you have something that needs a name attached to it, use this tag to submit it for review. Describe the move sequence or provide your own suggested name in the title. Use these posts to suggest your own names for concepts and give feedback on other peoples suggestions. [SUGGESTION] - If you have a suggestion that's related to this forum, 4PC theory or 4PC convention, then please use this tag; otherwise, please go to the official 4PC club to make your suggestion. [DEBATE] - Have a point of debate thats related to study or 4PC convention? Use this tag. [HELP] - Need help? [OTHER] - Anything else not covered here. [OFF-TOPIC] - For anything not related to 4PC study or naming conventions [VOTE] - ADMINS ONLY: This tag is for the reserved use of admins to call in a community vote. In vote posts you will be asked to vote on a particular matter or convention. This will then become a standard and written up in blogs, posts and the 4 player chess wikibook. - Naming Guide When suggesting a name for a thing, keep it clean and appropriate, tell us why you think this name would be good for this concept. - Voting Guide When enough attention is brought to a NAME, SUGGESTION or DEBATE tagged post, an admin may call in a vote with a pinned VOTE post. The most popular names or ideas within the post will be selected for the community to then vote on via the medium of an online poll. Unless stated otherwise, a week will generally be given for votes to be cast.

I don't mean to bore you, but I think I've found a new opening. it starts like any normal game, except the game continues diffrently. Here is an example, how that would look like. It is a strategy for team games and there are three scenarios. Hope you like it first game 1. h2-h3 .. b7-c7 .. i13-i12 .. m8-l82. Bi1-g3 .. b9-c9 .. g13-g12 .. m11-k113. Qg1xm7+ .. Ba6-c8 .. Qh14xk11 .. Qn7xQm74. Bg3xl8 .. Qa8xf13+ .. Kg14xQf13 .. Qm7xBl85. Nj1-i3 .. Na5-c6 .. Qk11xRn11 .. Ql8-j6 second game 1. h2-h3 .. b7-c7 .. i13-i12 .. m8-l82. Bi1-g3 .. b9-c9 .. g13-g12 .. m11-k113. Qg1xm7+ .. Ba6-c8 .. Qh14xk11 .. Kn8xQm74. Bg3-h2+ .. Na5-c6 .. Qk11xm9+ .. Km7-l75. k2-k4 .. b10-d10 .. Qm9-j9+ .. Kl7-m86. k4-k5 .. b4-d4 .. Qj9-k10+ .. Km8-n87. k5-k6+ .. Na10-c11 .. Qk10-k8 .. Kn8-m98. k6-k7 .. Bc8-b9 .. Qk8-j9+ .. Km9-l109. k7xl8 .. Bb9xf13+ .. Kg14-h14 .. Bn6xl810. Rk1-k10+ .. Nc11xd13 .. Bf14xBl8 .. Kl10-m1111. Rk10-k11+ .. Bf13xNe14 .. Bl8-k9+ .. # third game 1. h2-h3 .. b7-c7 .. i13-i12 .. m8-l82. Bi1-g3 .. b9-c9 .. g13-g12 .. m11-k113. Qg1xm7+ .. Qa8xf13+ .. Kg14xQf13 .. Kn8xQm7

It seems to me that the strategy in both games is very similar. In the 4 player stage you want to eliminate one player in both. Even though in Solo this doesn't guarantee you won't lose points, however it does make it more likely you will win vs. 2 others as opposed to 3. In the 3 players stage (above 2000 rating) in both FFA and Solo there is no difference (almost none in FFA) whether you are 2nd or 3rd. Therefore the only reasonable strategy is to do whatever increases your chances for first place!

As I'm sure you know, there are many openings that can appear in 4 player chess. There are still many openings yet to be discovered in all variants as well. Here I propose to you two questions. Answer as honestly and critiquely as you like, but keep things constructive. If you have an opinion on something, give us your reasons! Convince the rest of us... The theme of this debate: How do we name new openings? 1. Should 4PC openings be named after openings found in regular chess?- Should they have their own names unique to 4 player chess? Should they be some combination of both? 2. Should the 4PC variants have different names for identical positions? - i.e, should an opening in Teams be given the same name as an opening in FFA? Should openings in Teams and FFA have seperate names even if they have identical positions?

Hey, so some of you might know that I am building an Openings Explorer. At present I have installed approximately 400 positions (all of them being within the first moves of Red and Blue so that each of these positions can be discussed whether good or bad). In time I will be adding more lines but this is where I am currently at. I am also going to be extremely busy over the next month whilst I finish my dissertation so thank you for your patience. Here I ask for your input and suggestions for whilst I'm building the Explorer and also if anyone would like to volunteer with the project, either by way of inputting entries or suggesting openings that may be undocumented. Current Progress: As it stands I have made the following choices and decisions: - Each position within the explorer will follow a set format which will include it's notation in simplified "Algebracket" notation, a PGN4 of the position, the person/s credited with first playing an opening and when it was first played, an image of the position using the colourblind palette as given from the 4pc server, main continuations, main traplines and an indication of possible moves as directed from the Opening Explorer (Although most of these will not lead onto fully written pages due to the volume and likelyhood of weak positions).

You may have seen my recent post on 4PC Numerical Notation; the main impetus for this being correspondance games between international fellows who may be acustomed to different symbols representing different concepts (henseforth a Universal notation to avoid all confusion). It brings up the question of how we should canonize Zombie King movement, or what should we do with a players King if in the correspondance (FFA or Solo) game they should resign? I'm talking very specifically about scenarios when we do not have available an engine to make the moves for us, for example, a correspondance game conducted via letter or email. Is a Zombie King even tenable? Feel free to discuss your ideas and solutions here. After enough time and/or discussion we'll define a standard for correspondance games (both 1pt queen and QRBN).

I've devised 4PC notational system that can be used in international correspondance should anyone have a need for it. It is modelled on the ICCF numeric notation. 4PC numeric notation is not meant for prevalent use but is there in case there is a need for it. Like the ICCF numeric notation, 4PC numeric notation does away completely with the problems of language bias. The notation itself is based upon the conventionally accepted hexadecimal number system - this has been done to simplify the numerical strings that would have occurred using base 10. Each rank and file of the board is assigned a number (1-E) from Red's perspective. The squares of the board are thus assigned unique coordinates like so: A move is defined by pairing two of these two-digit coordinates together to make a string of 4 digits. For example, the move 1. h3 (1 r. h3) in algebraic notation would be written as 1. 8283 in 4PC numeric notation. Indicating which player is to move follows the conventions of the Numerical-position indication method... So 1. - c7 (1 b. c7) would be written as 1. - 2737. Similarly, Yellow's placement is represented by two hyphens and Green by 3. Neither the type of moving piece nor the piece captured are specifically marked in 4PC numerical notation - all moves except for pawn promotion and resignation consist of 4 digits. In pawn promotion a fifth digit must be added: "1" for Queen (or 1 point Queen), "2" for Rook, "3" for Bishop, "4" for Knight. For castling the King starting and end position are recorded: Red Kingside - 81A1Red Queenside - 8161Blue Kingside - 181ABlue Queenside - 1816Yellow Kingside - 7E5EYellow Queenside - 7E9EGreen Kingside - E7E5Green Queenside - E7E9 When a player resigns, the move is record simply with the number F.

I wrote about this initially in the main club forums. I have amended what I have written there to bring into discussion here. If you would like to see the original post (which will also contain more examples) then please click here. Use this thread to comment on what I put forward, but please do come up with your own suggestions and don't be afraid to provide constructive criticism. The main point of this thread is to come up with methods that can be used to simplify the communication and notation of 4PC game activity - princapally with analysis and theory in mind. This will not be canonized in the wikibook unless a significant number of people suggest their approval. Ideally we will go through a number of iterations before we can consider it finalized. Positional Indication When indicating who makes the following notated move, the primary convention is to indicate the player using a lowercase letter representing their colour (r=red, b=blue, y=yellow, g=green). The Positional indication method indicates a player based upon where they sit on the board using hyphens as "place-markers" to indicate where a previous player during that move would have been, similar to the elipsis (...) in 2 player chess to indicate that it is Black to move. The move itself here is not important, so for the sake of argument, lets assume it is the 6th ply/round and we see a bunch of Queen exchanges on the h8 square... If Red captures a piece on this square it can be written without a hyphen as such:6. Qxh8 To indicate that the player moving is Blue, we would use one hyphen:6. - Qxh8 Yellow is indicated by 2 hyphens:6. -- Qxh8 Green is indicated by 3 hyphens:6. --- Qxh8 Positional indication is not meant to be as a replacement for the colour indication method but as a potential alternative. Any Move ~ The tilde (~) is used to represent that essentially "Any move" can be made by this player because the inevitable outcome is the same. For example, when analysing a checkmate sequence on Green, one can use the tilde to describe Blue's movement in such a position because essentially it doesn't matter what they play... checkmate on Green is still coming. Any Move Except (/XX, XX) Works the same as the "Any Move" notation but with the added condition that the bracketed moves are not played in this particular scenario. Any-Move-Except brackets are opened with the symbol (/ and closed with the symbol ). Each move within the bracket is seperated by a comma ( , ). This or That Move (XX, XX) Brackets used to indicate many moves that could be made by the player in this position, usually because the outcome (in analysis for example) is essentially the same. Conditional Brackets Conditional Brackets are an aspect of notation that still need a little work so please do come up with ideas because if we can crack this then we can simplify the writing of a huge number of moves. This is what I have come up with so far: [XX, XX] The move that is played within these brackets is dependent on what was played within the previous regular brackets (in allignment order). Conditional brackets can play a role in the formulation of plans as well as in the description of trivial responses that don't particularly change an inevitable outcome. Capture Brackets Px(XX, XX) When a Piece captures brackets, this means that when a previous player has been given This-or-That-Move brackets then a player can capture "whatever piece happened to be played" - usually because in the description of a sequence, the outcome is the same. The idea is that this can help save writing out many variations that essentially lead to the same thing. Similar to Conditional brackets, this is an aspect that needs some work in order to fully define and clarify how it will operate. Checks Symbol Name Meaning + Check Check {+2} Double Check The checked King is now checked twice {+3} Triple Check The checked King is now checked thrice {+4} Quadruple Check ++ Doscheck Checking two seperate Kings +++ Trescheck Checking three seperate Kings +{+2} - First King is checked, second is double checked If needing to desribe a situation where more than one opponent King is checked, but it so happens that at least one of them is in double, triple, quadruple (or more) check, then the order in which to notate this goes: {+Red}{+Blue}{+Yellow}{+Green}. Let me know if you think the order would be better going clockwise from the player that delivered the check. Here is an example of "Fools Mate" written using some of the notation mentioned above: 1. (h3, h4) ~ (g12, g11) (l7, k7)2. QxQn8+ (/Qg13, Qh14, Bh13) Bm7 # In words this is to says that if Red, Yellow and Green all open with their Kings pawn and Blue does not intervene by providing a check on Yellow (on the second move), then Green becomes checkmated when Red captures Green's Queen with 2. Qxn8+, and Yellow defends Red's queen with 2. -- Bm7#.