Hexagonal Chess - Other Hexagonal Variants

Other Hexagonal Variants

The first published hexagonal chess variant was the commercial game Hexagonia. It was invented in 1864 by John Jaques & Son. The board had 127 cells; each side had 1 king, 2 cannons, 4 knights and 8 pawns. The winning objective was not checkmate, but rather to safely bring one's king to the central board cell.

In 1998 Derick Peterson invented the Grand Hexachess. In this variant the board is placed horizontally, placing each player's pieces to opposite sides. Pawns then have two forward possible moves (forward left and forward right) and three diagonal capturing movements possible (one directly in front). Precisely this was the motivation for this design, considering the fact that usually hexagonal chess pawn is the only piece that does not increase their mobility.

C'escacs 2007 is a Grand Gliński chess of 169 hexes. It introduces a dragon (chancellor), two pegasi (cardinal, archbishop) and two almogavars to the Gliński's set. Pawn's moves are increased to allow forward 60° moves, and captures are the same way McCooey's chess. The scornful pawn capture additional rule counterbalances the excessive pawn mobility.