Games of Kings and Soldiers

AMAZONS

Copyright (c)1988 Walter Zamkauskas

Amazons is played on a 10x10 board, with the following setup:

MOVES - White moves first, and turns alternate. Each turn consists of two parts, and both parts are mandatory.

The player first moves one of his amazons. Amazons move as a chess queen. Amazons may not jump over or land on other pieces or arrows.

Next, the Amazon which just moved "fires an arrow" from its new location. Arrows can be show in any direction, the same as a chess queen, and may not jump over or land on other pieces or arrows. Once an arrow lands, it acts as an immovable barrier to all arrows and amazons.

GOAL - The first player that cannot finish his turn, loses.

An example
White moves 1. g1-b6,c7. The arrow landed on c7, so neither player can cross that intersection.

There is a ZRF to play Amazons with Zillions.

There is also a variant Killer Amazons where it's possible to capture any Amazon of either color.

Another variant from Chris Huntoon, Cowboys , uses Knights on a 8x8 chess board (with no capture):

In r.g.a there was a proposal for a Pencil & Paper variant:

It's the same as regular Amazons, except that the square from which your Amazon moved automatically becomes an arrow square after the Amazon moves away from it, but before it shoots its new arrow. This means that you can play it with X's and O's for the Amazons, and color in the arrow squares, or use a superimposed X and O together for all arrow squares. The game is faster, since each move uses up two empty squares instead of one, and tactics are different, since it becomes much harder to get back into a region once you move out of it. There's even a little more subtlety to figuring out how many endgame moves a given territory will produce.

Bill Taylor and João Pedro Neto proposed, in 2004, a much more dynamic variant: 134* Amazons, where within a turn, all moves must be from different pieces, and the player loses the match if he cannot make all his moves.

Here's a game by the authors:

AMAZONS 134* (João starts)

a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1
. . . o . . . x . . . o . . . 2
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3
. x . . . . . . . . . . . x . 4
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7
. o . . . . . . . . . . . o . 8
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 10
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11
. x . . . . . . . . . . . x . 12
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 13
. . . o . . . x . . . o . . . 14
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 15

1. n4-d4/e3
2. d2-f2/d2     l14-l10/n10  d14-f12/m12
3. h2-h5/d1     d4-g4/e2     h14-h12/a5   n12-m11/m10
4. f2-g3/f3     l2-k3/h3     n8-m7/k5     l10-i10/i4
5. h12-g13/i11  h5-h7/h12    m11-j11/j10  b12-c13/f13
6. m7-k7/k11    i10-k8/k10   k3-i5/i6     g3-h4/g3
7. g4-g11/e11   g13-g12/f11  j11-l13/g13  c13-e13/e12
8. k7-i9/i7     k8-e8/h11    i5-l8/l12    h4-i5/h4
9. l13-o13/l10  b4-b5/h5     h7-g7/e5     e13-b13/e13
10 l8-i8/g10    e8-e7/h10    b8-c7/f10    i5-o10/i5
11 g7-g8/i10    o13-o11/n11  b13-b8/c9    b5-c5/b6
12 i8-c2/c4     i9-i8/g6     e7-e9/i9     c7-d8/c8
13 c5-a3/d3     g8-e6/d6     b8-b10/d10   o11-l14/o11
14 d7-f7/f5     e9-e8/e7     i8-g8/b13    c2-b3/b2
15 a3-b4/a3     e6-f6/e6     b10-b11/d9   l14-d14/d11
16 e8-d8/e8     g8-h7/e10    f7-g7/f7     b3-b5/b3
17 a4-b4/a4     b11-b7/d5    f6-g5/f6     d14-a11/a6
18 b5-c5/b5     h7-h6/h9     d8-c7/a9     g7-f8/o8
19 g5-f4/d4     b7-b8/b7     g12-h13/k11  g11-g12/g11
20 h6-g5/g4     c7-e9/g9     f8-n8/o9     c5-c7/c5
21 resigns  0-1

a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o
. . . # . . . . . . . . . . .   1
. # . # # . . . . . . . . . .   2
. # . # # # # # . . . . . . .   3
# x # # . x # # # . . . . . .   4
# # # # # # o # # . # . . . .   5
# # . # # # # . # . . . . . .   6
. # o # # # . . # . . . . . .   7
. x # . # . . . . . . . . o #   8
# . # # o . # # # . . . . . #   9
. . . # # # # # # # # # # # o  10
x . . # # # # # # # # . . # #  11
. . . . # o x # . . . # # . .  12
. # . . # # # x . . . . . . .  13
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . .  14
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . .  15