Forward Chess Rules

These are the rules of Forward Chess, which I have developed with my friends:

• Pieces may only move forward or sideways
• Checks from behind do not exist (see diagram)

Here, neither king is in check (as that would mean checking backwards). The white rook on a7 and the black rook on a8 can still capture each other, because that would be forward for both. The white knight cannot capture the black rook because that would be moving back. The white king can capture the black knight because that is moving sideways.

• Once a piece reaches the back rank, it can move normally (both forwards and backwards) for the rest of the game. That includes promoted pawns (see diagram).

Here, the black rook is checking the white king. It is considered check because although it is backwards, the black rook has reached the back rank and so can now move normally. The white king, on the other hand, cannot capture the black rook (assuming he hasn't reached his back rank), as that would be moving backwards. Had white not been in check, they could have played Rd7#.

An interesting position:

If the white king has already reached his back rank but the black king hasn't, this position might occur where the white king checks the black king, but the black king can't check back and has to move. Checkmate isn't possible, though, because as soon as the end of the board is reached, the black king will be able to move normally.

I would like this to be another one of the forum chess variants played on chess.com. It can be modded by anyone, using just a chess.com analysis board. Please tell me your thoughts and any problems in the rules you may have found, as well as possible piece values before and after reaching the back rank.

Thanks!

Nice, one small problem to tackle here:

If I have two Knights, one has reached the back rank in some previous move, the other hasn't. The position does not show which Knight has and which Knight hasn't. There should be a visualization for this.

A Knight which can only move forward is basically a different - weaker - piece, which promotes to a normal Knight by reaching the back rank.

It's an interesting concept. It's a bit similar to my event Move Forward in event chess, although there are also some pretty big differences (the event still allows pieces to move 1 square backwards).

https://www.chess.com/blog/Martin0/event-8-move-forward

agreed

if played irl, you just need to remember

if played here, you can know by looking back to the move when the knight "promoted"

that's true

although i didn't think of your event when i came up with the idea of this 

I'll give red trangles to indicate when a piece still cannot move backwards. I'll remove the red triangle once a piece has been on the back rank.

I tried backward chess but it was drawish

lol 

that's a good idea but then we can't use a regular board...

i guess the players can chose themselves (like i said you can go back to the promoting move to see which piece it is)