Turning chess into a roguelike via design first principles

It’s also pretty easy to come up with all kinds of fun variants for them, such as:

- Kings are strong, charismatic leaders and can persuade enemy units to join their side.

- Rooks are defensive units and can boost the defenses of adjacent pieces, or they’re strong enough to shift allies by literally pushing them in a direction as part of their turn.

- Bishops are men of the cloth and can heal the wounded. Pieces that are resurrected are vulnerable to being “turned” by bishops.

The difficult part is playtesting the everloving sh## out of it, since it’s a bit like coming up with new mechanics or cards for MTG: easy to do, but hard to balance.

I haven't played either yet, but I assumed this was about Gambonanza when I read the title. (https://store.steampowered.com/app/3509230/Gambonanza/)

I just might have to give both a shot.

Adding health points to chess gives you a lot more options for balancing and abilities.