Capablanca Chess

Capablanca Chess is played on a 10x8 board, with two new pieces added:

• A piece that can move like either a Knight or a Bishop. This piece was called an Archbishop by Capablanca, but it has other names: Cardinal, Princess, Hawk, Centaur, etc. I call it an Archbishop on this page, and it has the letter “A”, looking like a combined Bishop and Knight.
• A piece that can move like either a Rook or a Knight. While Capablanca called this piece the “Chancellor”, I prefer to use the word Marshal for this piece (using the letter “M”). Like the Archbishop, this piece also has other names, such as Empress, Elephant, Champion, etc.

The opening setup

The next 10x8 setup with these pieces I know of comes from Chess Master Henry Bird, who in 1874 proposed a different opening setup for the game.

The next go at 10x8 Chess with these two new pieces was from Capablanca, who actually proposed not one but two different 8x10 setups.

Ed Trice was the next person to have a go at 10x8 Chess, around 2002. He felt that Capablanca’s final proposed setup gave White too much of an advantage, so he proposed and even patented another setup which, indeed is noticably more balanced (Fairy Stockfish with a 21-ply evaluation shows Capa’s final setup with a 36 centipawn advantage to White, compared to the 27 centipawn advantage Trice’s setup has).

Since Trice patented his setup and demanded that people either pay licensing fees or remove files using his setup with some of the people using it, the Chess Variant community, including myself, responded by making a number of different patent-free setups over the first 2000s decade.

Here is a list of post-Trice 10x8 setup proposals which I made back in 2008:

• Finesse
• Nalls
• Univers
• Notebook
• Blackbook
• Schoolbook
• Grotesque
• Landorean
• Embassy
• Teutonic
• Narcotic
• Consulate

Capa36

• The rooks are in the corners
• The king is in the middle
• The knights and bishops are symmetrical

• RNABMKBQNR (Finesse)
• RMBNQKNBAR
• RNMBQKBANR (Nalls)
• RBNAQKMNBR
• RBANMKNQBR (Grotesque)
• RABNQKNBMR
• RBMNAKNQBR (Landorean)
• RQBNMKNBAR
• RNQBMKBANR (Blackbook)
• RNBQMKABNR (Trice; formerly patented)
• RMBNAKNBQR
• RABNMKNBQR
• RNMBAKBQNR
• RBNMAKQNBR
• RBNMQKANBR (Univers)
• RANBMKBNQR (Narcotic)
• RBNQAKMNBR
• RANBQKBNMR (Carrera)
• RBQNAKNMBR
• RQBNAKNBMR
• RBNAMKQNBR
• RBMNQKNABR
• RBANQKNMBR
• RNBMQKABNR (Bird)
• RNABQKBMNR (Capa 2)
• RNQBAKBMNR
• RBNQMKANBR
• RQNBAKBNMR (Schoolbook)
• RNBAMKQBNR (Embassy)
• RMNBAKBNQR (Notebook)
• RMNBQKBNAR (Murray-Carrera)
• RNBAQKMBNR (Capa 1)
• RBQNMKNABR
• RNBQAKMBNR (Teutonic)
• RNBMAKQBNR (Consulate)
• RQNBMKBNAR

As a point of comparison, Chess960 only has two setups which meet the above criteria (namely, RNBQKBNR and RBNQKNBR)

Capa720

• Rooks in the corner
• King on the “f” file
• Bishops on opposite colors

I have had my computer spend some three days performing 21-ply evaluations of every single one of these 720 Capa setups, and have sorted each and every one of those setups by the advantage White has, with the setup where White has the smallest advantage listed first.

For each position, I show White’s best move(s), along with other good moves for White. In addition, since it’s popular to have “pie rule” with other abstract games, where one person chooses White’s first move and the other person gets to choose whether they are Black or White, I also show moves, for each position, that are as balanced as possible for White and Black.

Below are all 720 Capa720 positions.

As an aside, there are 84,000 Capa 10x8 positions with the Chess960 restrictions (King between rooks, bishops on opposite colors), and 7,056,000,000 setups (!!) of “Double Capa Random Chess”, where White and Black can have different Capa84000 opening setups.