September 5, 2011

Jihadi Chess

Chess has been around for like forever. The earliest form of Chess that resembles modern Chess was found during the Gupta period. Like most things in history, the Persians picked it up from us, then the Moors kicked some Persian ass and learned Chess from them. The Moors then kicked the Spaniards and taught them Chess. And like that it spread across all civilizations.

The Sanskrit word for Chess “Chaturanga” represents the four major divisions of the ancient and medieval armies -- Elephants, Chariots, Horsemen and Foot Soldiers. The problem with Chess is, our armies are nothing like that. We have come a long way from slaying people with a sword while riding on a horse. That time has passed.

Most big Armies today along with the Navy and the Air Force are ready and capable to fight a two ocean war with a major power. But which two major countries are on the brink of a two ocean war? Iceland and Ivory Coast? That time has passed too. It’s over. The mechanism for world domination has changed and with that, the nature of war too. 

The war of the future is terrorism. It is and it will be a small group of dissidents who, perhaps, unbeknownst to their own governments plot to bomb public places, kill innocent civilians and hurt the country’s economy to make a political point. As an Indian whose ancestors have invented the game of Chess, I feel it is my duty to post modernize the beautiful intellectual game to reflect the current war scenario.


Highlights from a few games...

Over the last two months, I have managed to convince three or four people (it's really hard) to play a few games of Jihadi Chess with me and I have seen some interesting variations in strategy. The beginning of the game was quite normal. The fun begins when a player loses the queen. 

On most occasions, the players who lost the queen tended to use the rooks quite recklessly (may be because of the eagerness to wage Jihad) and players who still had the queen tended to become a little paranoid and often went on killing pawns  as if they were cockroaches meant to be squashed with a high heeled shoe putting more important pieces at great risk in the process. There was also one instant where a player sacrificed his rook just to prevent the other player from waging Jihad. 

One obvious rule not explicitly written down is that blowing up the pawn should not result in a check for the Jihadi side. This is not that easy to pull off especially after your King has seen some action. The most interesting development in this format is that the winning player is forced to think twice about getting his pieces forward during the endgame which turned out to be a huge advantage for the losing side. (which is good for me since I usually am on the losing side!) 

If you have nothing to do (which is evident from the fact that you're reading this) and if you have Chess board, I urge you to try Jihadi Chess. If you do, do not forget to leave some highlights/insights on this version so that we can make it better. Also if anyone is interested in collaborating with me to make a simple flash application so that people can play online, mail me at this address and we'll try to build something :)

Whatever you do, do not write off Jihadi Chess like you have written off 300 Chess!

Image taken from www.pichaus.com 

22 comments:

  1. lol. impressiv technique. d strategy sure luks uhh a littl ahead of its time. but hey dats wat geniuses do rite? :P

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  2. hehe.. thanks but why ahead of its time? :) 

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  3. Ha. Ha.. That was fun reading.. Need to include another rule to abuse those people taking the white side as racists.

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  4. This is totally epic! Awesome stuff, Mr. G2!

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  5. Brilliant Mr. G2. This is innovative to say the least. Will probably add some excitement and pace to the traditional game of Chess.

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  6. lol..awesome..dude u really have some crazy ideas! :D

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  7. Kartikay S Thanks :)

    Anant Jain Yes, let's hope it catches up ;)

    keerthana ak well... what can I do? I am like that :)

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  8. This is pure awesomeness! You are crazy. Proud of you!

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  9. Yayy....new game! Let's play Jihad-Jihad :D

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  10. this is stellar stuff ... the illustrations are beautiful (while ripped off ) :P

    next stage :  have one corrupt queen who is trying to become the king (like Tantri, The Mantri), the gay bishop and a self-destructive knight and an aphrodiasacal rook ...

    also, we should have a variation of the FBI's gay-bomb (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gay_bomb) where two adjacent pieces of the opposition must spend sometime off the board and can be back after 5 moves.

    oh!!! so much of drama can happen ... but glad to have gtoosphere back ...

     

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  11. Yes, "you and me for some Jihad over dinner?" could be a pick up line! 

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  12. This is stellar
    stuff … excellent illustrations ...


     


    On the other hand,
    we should have a conniving queen like tantri, the mantri who is trying to
    become the king in which they shall merely exchange their positions … or a
    celibate bishop, self-destructive knight and a aphrodisiacal rook … may be we
    can have a FBI's gay bomb variation, where any two adjacent pieces must spend
    time away from the board for 3 moves and can return back  


     


    Welcome back,
    gtoosphere … :)

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  13. crack!!! maja aa gaya!!! lets play sometime!!! kaha hai aajkal??

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  14. yeah sure.. I'm Bangalore. job and all :) 

    You back from Germany?

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  15. "Jihad cannot be used when either king is around" 
    Two meaning that I could derive ( correct me if I am wrong )
    1] Opposite King : Targeted killings not allowed :P
    2] Own King : "unbeknownst to their own governments". If king is already there then he cannot claim to be unaware of the attacks. But I disagree with the assertion that majority of the times, such groups operate on their own without any military or state support.

    US Chess is far ahead of this Jihadi Chess. They have strategic interventions. This situation can be modeled as "Black Rook" (or pieces) makes itself available to the White player only once or some of the black pieces will freeze for the next movement so that Black player has less piece to work with for that step.

    http://open.salon.com/blog/simoleonsense/2011/05/05/the_total_information_war-_the_psychology_of_propaganda_influence_in_modern_warfare

    This article provides an overview of the role of social influence in modern U.S.
    military affairs. Many military strategists are now convinced that modern warfare
    is centered on a battle for public opinion, rather than a battle for physical terrain.

    As a result, new military periodic literature, texts, doctrine, and initiatives are
    increasingly likely to place social influence at the core of military operations.
    Unfortunately, this literature and doctrine is developing in a conversation that is

    almost completely independent of civilian university-based scholarly considera-
    tion. The goal of this civilian “primer” is to help bridge the gap between civilian
    and military scholarship by providing (1) an introduction to competing concep-

    tions of the role of influence in modern war, (2) a brief description of current
    military initiatives using information operations, and (3) examples of influence
    tactics employed in recent U.S. military action. The article concludes by con-

    sidering questions that modern military information operations raise about the
    intersection of social science, democracy, and war

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  16. what are the advantages of being in Jihadi mode?

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  17. It becomes much more difficult to win... the losing player has a greater chance to force a stalemate or something! 

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  18. haha freaking mindblowing G2.... alternately, we can have a 'nuclear missile' mode for a pawn which wipes out all the pieces in a straight line in front of the pawn starting with the pawn in any of the four directions parallel to the sides of the chess board (with all rules of jihad the same)....

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  19. LMAO, what post. Jihadi chess needs to be introduced as an international format, soon, now. Or, wait, isn't it already around? :P

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don't be lazy