Chess
Chess960
The back rank is shuffled at random before the game, so opening theory is useless and both players have to think from move one.
What is different here
The pawns stand where they always do, but the eight pieces behind them are drawn at random from the 960 legal arrangements. Both players get the same arrangement, mirrored, so the game is still symmetrical and still fair.
Everything else is ordinary chess, with one adjustment. Castling still ends with the king on g or c and the rook on f or d, wherever the two of them happened to start, which can look strange the first few times.
The variant is usually credited to the former world champion Bobby Fischer, who proposed it in 1996, and is also known as Fischer random chess.
- One of the 960 legal arrays is drawn when the game is created, using a secure random number generator.
- The two bishops always start on opposite colours, and the king always starts somewhere between the two rooks.
- Both sides get the same array, so neither is handed an advantage.
- Castling still lands the king on g or c and the rook on f or d.
- To castle, move the king to its destination square, or onto its own rook.