Schness

Play Schness

Move a piece or deploy one from your reserve. Captured pieces return.

The complete game

How to play Schness

1. Your army

The board is a 4 × 4 grid.
Each player owns one king, one rook, one bishop, and one knight.
The board begins completely empty.

2. Place the kings

White places their king first, anywhere on White’s home row.
Black then places their king anywhere on Black’s home row.

3. Take a turn

Either move one of your pieces already on the board, using normal chess movement, or deploy one piece from your reserve.
A reserve piece may be deployed on any empty square.
A deployment may never immediately check the opposing king.
You must always answer check and may never leave your own king in check.

4. Capture and reuse

Capture pieces as in chess.
A captured piece returns to its original owner’s reserve.
Its owner may deploy it again on a later turn.

5. End the game

Checkmate wins the game.
Stalemate is a draw.
Repeating the same position three times is a draw.