Dragon Chess II: Game of Conquer (my own variation to an existing variant)

This is way outdated version of Dragon Chess: Game of Conquer.

Those who want the most current version of this game, please visit this link - 

https://www.chess.com/forum/view/chess-variants/new-variant-i-need-your-help

(As the diagrams are shrunken, so are the piece's symbols. For clarity, zooming is recommended. Press ctrl and = to zoom in, ctrl and - to zoom out.)

I learned of Dragon Chess from Vietson.com, a vietnamese site devoted to Xiangqi online play. As a simple variant, there's a piece, the Dragon (龍), that started in front of the "General"(Red Kingdon's King piece) and the "Marshall" (sometimes called the "Official") (Black Kingdon's King piece), and it moves like a western Orthodox King: in all 8 directions over a range of 1 square. 

The Dragon isn't like any other Xiangqi piece, because it's the only piece that can move and capture in all directions. That maybe an unoriginal concept in FIDE western chess, but it seems to serve a powerful purpose in Xiangqi, being the 1 piece that has this area attack, however limited. It inspired me to create my own extended variation of this Variant, because I saw so much great possibility in this one new invigorating piece.

Before I explain the variation, I should probably quickly teach how the original Xiangqi piece move. If you already know, you may skip the green text and forward to the section entitled "The Variation - Dragon Chess II: Game of Conquer". 

Original Xiangqi Game

(In Xiangqi, pieces move not along the squares but along the lines and are slotted on the intersecting points.)

Setup of board - 

將/帥 - General/Marshall - Moves and captures 1 square orthogonally; does not leave the "Castle" (the nine intersecting points within the large "x-box"), except to capture enemy General/Marshall in the "Flight" tactic: if the two King pieces are on the exact same file with no intersecting piece(s) in the same file to block them from "seeing" eachother, the King piece to move may move to the opponent's "Castle" to capture enemy King piece.

士/仕 - Scholar or Advisor - Moves and captures 1 square diagonally; does not leave the "Castle"  

象/相 - Elephant/Minister (on Elephant back?) - Moves and captures exactly 2 squares diagonally, never moving 1 square diagonally; if an intersecting piece is 1 square diagonally in the elephant's path, elephant remains blocked by the intersecting piece; (not true for the Dragon Chess variant!); piece does not leave its Kindgdom. (Kingdom border is defined by the "river", which is the center region with no visual columns present.) As such, it can move to a total of 7 points possible on the board.

馬/傌 - Horse/Horseman - Moves 1 square orthogonally and then 1 square in either of its two outward diagonal directions; unlike the western Knight piece, the Horse/Horseman does not have the ability to leap and is, therefore, able to be blocked by an intersecting piece 1 orthogonal square away from it. Consult diagram, for clarification.

車/俥 - Chariot/Chariot rider - Moves like the western Rook: forward, backwards or sideways over an unlimited range of intersecting points. 

砲/炮 - Catapult/Fire Cannon - Moving power is slightly different from capturing power: moves and captures like the rook, but capture is only valid if an intersecting piece, yours or your opponents, is obstructing the path between Catapult/Cannon and targeted enemy piece. Consult diagram. 

卒/兵 - foot soldier/private - unlike western pawn, the foot soldier/private moves and captures the same way: 1 square orthogonally forward, never retreating back squares; has the option to move 1 square sideways when having entered your opponent's Kingdom, but backwards move is still invalid; does not promote once final rank is reached.

The Variation - Dragon Chess II: Game of Conquer - 

Setup -

龍 - Dragon - Like the Western King piece, moves and captures 1 square in any of the 8 directions: orthogonally or diagonally; Once Dragon crosses the river into the opponent's Kingdom, two benefits are granted:

1 - Player with the successfully invading Dragon may, during his/her next turn, place an "Egg marker" anywhere in his/her home kingdom (but not in any points on the opponent's kingdom).

2 - Player with the successfully invading Dragon may, pending the beginning of his/her next turn, move Elephant pieces across the river and into the oponent Kingdom.

m - Egg - Is introduced into the game during any turn proceeding the Dragon having first entered enemy territory; placing the egg onto the board counts as one move: player may not move any other piece, and it is now the opponent's turn; may be placed anywhere in one's own Kingdom, but not anywhere in the enemy's; Egg is immobile and serves as a mere "blocking" piece, though, like any other piece, it can be captured by an enemy piece. However, if egg survives 2 enemy turns without being captured, the egg is immediately promoted to the Dragonfly piece upon the end of the opponent's 2nd turn; promotion is mandatory, not voluntary. 

蜻/蜓 - Dragonfly - Moves and captures 1 square diagonally, like the Advisor/Scholar; unlike Advisor/Scholar, Dragonfly may enter or exit player's "Castle". Once the Dragonfly has successfully made its fourth move and is not captured by an enemy piece during the opponent's following turn, player with the successful Dragonfly has the voluntary option to promote the Dragonfly to Dragon during the beginning of the player's next turn, allowing the player a possibility of two Dragons total on the board. From that point on, the option to promote the still-unpromoted Dragonfly to Dragon at the beginning of the player's turn is valid for the rest of the game. Player may move the piece as a Dragon after the promotion, since promoting doesn't count as a move.

象/相 - Elephant/Minister - As in original Xiangqi, it moves and capatures diagonally two squares, never moving only 1 square diagonally.

In the Game of Conquest variation, the Elephant/Minister piece may perform a tactic called "trample capture": while the Elephant/Minister may not move 1 square, if an obstructing enemy piece is blocking it from capturing another enemy piece, the Elephant/Minister may still capture the target enemy piece as well as the enemy piece that is in its way; thus, it is possible for it to capture a total of 2 pieces in one turn. Trample capturing is permitted only if there is a target enemy piece two diagonally points away for the Elephant/Minister to capture. If that point is unoccupied by an enemy piece, the Elephant/Minister will remain blocked by any enemy piece 1 diagonal point away, and that obstructing enemy piece is safe from capture by the Elephant/Minister. Please consult diagram for clarification.

This new tactic also introduces new roadblocks for the enemy General/Marshal: Since the Elephant/Minister can trample, it can prevent the General/Marshal or any other enemy piece from moving onto a point that would put the General/Marshal in check by the trampling. While the Elephant/Minister can never actually enter the opponent's Castle due to its prohibition of moving just 1 square (it always has to move exactly 2 squares diagonally), it can still threaten the enemy King piece with this tactic.

Once the Dragon piece has successfully enterred into the opponent's Kingdom, the Elephant/Minister too is permitted to enter the opponent's Kingdom, pending the player's following turn.This gives the Elephant/Minister the option of 5 more points to occupy, making a total of 12 possible points on the board.

Trample capturing is permitted regardless of whether or not Dragon has crossed into enemy territory.

Due to the 9x10 nature of the Xiangqi board and to the piece's diagonal movement, enemy Elephants/Ministers can never actually be a threat to one another, since the closest an Elephant/Minister can ever come to its enemy companion is landing on an adjacent orthogonal point directly below it. 

What y'all think? =)

edit - Here's a thought: what about privates and foot soldiers promoting, like the pawn in FIDE chess? In Xiangqi, privates and foot soldiers don't promote once they end up on the final rank. They are stuck moving left or right 1 square at a time for the remainder of the game, which is a bit of a sad destiny for these already insignificant pieces. I was thinking of adding a voluntary promotion to into the Chariot, Cannon/Catapult or the Horse/Horseman at the beginning of the player's following turn.

What do you think?

I want to start by saying that I love the idea of a unit that promotes other units by passing a certain "goal" and definitely feel it's worth experimenting with.

This is a personal preference for me, but I think chess (and variants) should be simple enough that knowing the layout of the board and whose turn is the only information needed to play after an indeterminate time away. Counting how long the egg/dragonflies have been around might lead to mistakes. Perhaps another "goal" could be achieved by the dragon to make the egg hatch, and another for the dragonfly to become a dragon. E.g. Dragonfly becomes dragon after a capture. (this assumes the figure is replaced or rotated to signify it's state)

What if a soldier on the final rank effectively rotated 180 degrees? Then it could move/attack/check left, right and down. Then if it moves down, it rotates again and acts normal.

These are some first impressions, so I'll try to add more later.

Thank you, Cortez. I appreciate your interest. 

I too like the "condition for promotion" model for a chess variant. One will see that my chess inventions tend to mainly follow it. In my first chess Variant, the Magician's death match, the Magician piece is promoted (to an upgraded version of herself that can move in 16 directions) when the condition of a pawn having reached the 6th rank is met. That first invention of mine actually partly influenced the idea of promoting the dragonfly to dragon in this Xiangqi variant as well.

I do want to respond to your alternative 'capture condition' to be met for promoting the dragonfly to dragon. It's a neat idea, and I have, in fact, entertained it myself. Originally, one of the extra conditions for promoting the Magician was having a pawn capture a major or minor piece.

Unfortunately, I came to learn that such a condition for promotion is too obnoxiously powerful, as it's a double punishment for the opponent. The oponent has already suffered a lost in a piece. He/she would then have to suffer again that same turn by now gaining an enemy piece that became more powerful. The oponent might as well resign, see? And so, I had to revise my variant and edit out this "capture condition" so that the Magician is promoted only by the pawn's met condition of reaching the 6th rank.

In Xiangqi, being the only piece that can move orthogonally and diagonally, the Dragon is a diabolical piece, because it can fork in 8 directions when enemy pieces are too close to it. The capture condition would sadly make it too powerful.

On the other hand, your point about counting how many turns has past is very true, and I hadn't thought about it before. It might indeed frustrate the ease of chessplay when players have to keep track of how many times what piece has moved.

I did come up with a new condition that might work:

 - The dragonfly comes into the "line-of-sight" of an enemy piece but that enemy fails to capture the threatened dragonfly during the opponent's following turn

The dragonfly player has to work for the promotion by protecting the dragonfly when it is deliberately entered into a position susceptible to capture.

What do you think about that?

As far as the egg being promoted to dragonfly goes, I don't think it's too much of a hassle to count two enemy turns to have it see promotion. At least it's not as much so as having to keep track of how many times the dragonfly has moved.

But again, I do greatly agree with your point about the original dragonfly to dragon condition being too much of a complication.

 It may not work for your variant, but you did get me thinking about a unit that would promote if you sacrificed one of your own to it. It would remove the "insult to injury" to your opponent, while making the choice to promote a tough one. Maybe it's better suited to one of the larger variants, such as Ace569er's suggestion on the forum.

I'm not really understanding. Can you please elaborate on why it might not work for my variant?

If you're thinking that it doesn't boost the likelihood of promotion, I do realize that, in my latter proposed condition,  the chance of a dragonfly promoting to Dragon are rather slim, since situations where a dragonfly becomes threaten by an opponent piece and then survives it aren't very common. This is fine, and it works towards the general trend of promotion. Most pawns do not actually promote at end game. Hell, one is lucky to get to the Dragonfly stage, since the Egg was primarily a piece used as a blocking piece to enhance the player's tactics slightly but will probably be captured soon after anyways. 1 Dragon on the board is enough; especially considering the fact that this variant also gave much more power to the Elephant/Minister pieces. 

With testing it could work out that self-sacrifice could work. However, Xiangqi doesn't have many fast/ranging units, and the ones that are in the game are quite valuable. The benefit of promoting a dragon might be hard to justify tactically when you have to arrange the slower pieces into position, etc. I fully admit that in practice it could work out way better than I imagine, especially since, as you said, the elephants have far more territory.

I'll admit to forgetting about the elephant range in my initial post :P

Well, as far as the Elephants/Marhsalls crossing the river go, they land on points that are less significant than they do in their own home turf. (the two points before those of the enemy Masrhalls'/Elephants' starting position aren't points that are really needed, for most pieces don't usually land there anyways.) Having said that, crossing the river merely gives them a slight benefit. Same with trample capturing. Despite these, they continue to be relatively weak pieces.

But anyways, my second condition for promotion may not be the most efficient method.

I was thinking about a 3rd: promotion happens by landing on a point adjacent to another Dragon, either allie or enemy; or both.

My 4th: promotion happens when the dragonfly threatens an enemy piece, promoting it to Dragon at the very end of the turn which threat upon an opponent piece is inflicted. In such a case, the dragonfly never actually captures as a dragonfly; it will always do so as a Dragon.

My 5th: One may have the option to flip 3 coins each turn his/her dragonfly is in play, and if he/she receive all heads, the dragonfly is promoted.

What do you think about these ideas?