Raumschach 3D

How Raumschach is played

Raumschach is chess in a cube of 5 × 5 × 5 cells, invented by Ferdinand Maack in 1907. The cube is drawn as five boards of 5 × 5, from level A at the bottom to level E at the top; a cell is named by its level, file and rank, from Aa1 to Ee5.

The cube and the start

White starts at the bottom: rooks, knights and king on rank 1 of level A, bishops, unicorns and queen on rank 1 of level B, and a row of five pawns in front of each. Black stands the same way at the top, on levels E and D, mirrored through the centre. Level C is empty.

The pieces

Each piece moves as in chess, but in three dimensions. The rook goes straight through the faces of the cells, also straight up and down; the bishop goes diagonally through their edges, in any of the three planes; the new unicorn goes through their corners, changing level, file and rank at every step. The queen combines all three and so has 26 directions; the king takes one step in any of them. The knight leaps one cell along one line and two along another.

Pawns

A pawn steps one cell forward or one level towards the enemy: White’s go up, Black’s go down. It takes one step diagonally: forward at an angle on its level, or one level towards the enemy, straight ahead or to the side. There is no double step, no en passant and no castling. A pawn promotes on the far rank of the far level (rank 5 of level E for White, rank 1 of level A for Black) to a queen, rook, bishop, knight or unicorn.

Winning and draws

Checkmate wins. Stalemate, the same position three times, and fifty moves each without a capture or a pawn move are draws, as is a king with at most one bishop, knight or unicorn against a bare king. A king and a queen always mate a lone king; a king and a rook cannot force it.

The story

Germany · Ferdinand Maack’s game of 1907

When and where

Raumschach (“space chess”) was invented in March 1907 by Ferdinand Maack, a doctor in Hamburg. He showed it at the Carlsbad tournament the same year and described it in the Deutsches Wochenschach and in booklets of 1908, 1913 and 1919.

How it changed

Maack began with eight boards of 8 × 8 one above the other, tried smaller cubes and settled on 5 × 5 × 5: five boards of 5 × 5. The rook goes through the faces of the cells, the bishop through their edges, and Maack added the unicorn, which goes through their corners. The pawns were argued over longest: in 1919 Maack published four ways for them to move, and the one the Hamburg club adopted is the one played today. Today’s start, with ten pawns a side, is one of the set-ups he listed. Before 1919 every game was played from his start A, five pawns a side on the middle level above the pieces, with a pawn that could also step down; he still recommended it to beginners, though he wrote that White, moving first, should win it with correct play.

Today

Maack’s Hamburg Raumschach club, founded about 1909, met until the Second World War; its members included the problem composers Hans Klüver and Willibald Roese. T. R. Dawson composed Raumschach problems from 1915 and wrote about it in 1926, and it is still regarded as the classic three-dimensional chess.

Did you know?

A king and a queen always mate a lone king, Maack wrote, but a king and a rook never can: the lone king has up to 26 squares to flee to. In a game played in the club in May 1919 under the new rules, the first check came only on move 26.

Sources: F. Maack, Raumschach (1919) · R. Binnewirtz (2023) · Wikipedia

More games

Chess and variants

• Chess · Classic chess, or Chess960 with a shuffled back rank.
• Chess960 · Fischer random chess: the back rank starts in one of 960 setups.
• Antichess · Losing chess: give away all your pieces, captures are compulsory.
• Atomic chess · Every capture is an explosion that clears the pieces around it.
• Crazyhouse · Captured pieces change sides and can be dropped back onto the board.
• Hostage chess · Captured men become hostages and come back by exchange or from the airfield.
• Three-check · Chess where the third check wins, so every check counts.
• King of the Hill · Chess where a king that reaches the centre wins at once.
• Jeson Mor · Mongolia’s nine horses: take the centre and hold it for a move.
• Racing Kings · No pawns, no checks: the first king on the far rank wins.
• Horde · 36 white pawns storm a full black army.
• Dunsany’s chess · Lord Dunsany’s game of 1942: 32 pawns against a full army.
• Los Alamos chess · Chess on 6 × 6 without bishops, the first game a computer played (1956).
• Duck chess · After every move you move the duck, which blocks everyone. No check.
• Marseillais chess · Two moves a turn, with one piece or two; White starts with one.
• Progressive chess · One move, then two, then three: each turn is one move longer.
• Fog of War · You only see where your pieces can move. Capture the king to win.
• Kriegspiel · Only your own pieces in sight; an umpire judges every move.
• Alice chess · Two boards: every piece that moves passes through to the other one.
• Old Raumschach · Maack’s cube as played before 1919: five pawns above the pieces.
• Friendly Chess · Nothing is captured: pieces unite and set off chain reactions.
• Ultima · Every piece captures its own way, and the immobilizer freezes.
• Gliński’s hexagonal chess · Chess on 91 hexagons: three bishops, rooks in six directions.
• McCooey’s hexagonal chess · Hexagonal chess closer to chess: seven pawns that take diagonally.
• Shafran’s hexagonal chess · Hexagonal chess on 70 cells, with castling and pawns that step three.
• Spartan chess · Persians against Spartans: chess’ army against two kings and new pieces.
• Legan chess · The armies in opposite corners; pawns step diagonally towards the far one.

Big chess

• Complete chess · The Arabic chess of the 9th century on 10 × 10, with two dabbābas a side.
• Courier chess · Medieval Germany’s chess on a 12 × 8 board, with the courier, the man and the schleich.
• Grande Acedrex · Alfonso X’s great chess on a 12 × 12 board, with lions, giraffes and a roc.
• Tamerlane chess · Timur’s great chess on an 11 × 10 board, with giraffes, camels and citadels.
• Carrera’s chess · The first chess on ten files, from a Sicilian priest’s book of 1617.
• Duke of Rutland’s chess · Fourteen files, with the concubine and two crowned rooks a side.
• Bird’s chess · Henry Bird’s ten-file chess of 1874, with the guard and the equerry.
• Capablanca chess · Ten files and two new pieces: the archbishop and the chancellor.
• Gothic chess · Ed Trice’s setup of 2000, today called Trice’s Chess.
• Capablanca Random · Capablanca chess from one of 12,118 shuffled starts.
• Embassy chess · Grand chess’ row of pieces on a 10 × 8 board.
• Janus chess · Two januses a side, each moving as a bishop or a knight.
• Grand chess · Christian Freeling’s 10 × 10 game: pawns promote only to lost pieces.
• S-chess · Chess with a hawk and an elephant in hand, placed as the back rank leaves.

The chess family

• Chaturanga · India’s ancient chess, the root of the family: take the king to win.
• Shatranj · The medieval ancestor of chess, with a weak ferz and a jumping alfil.
• Byzantine chess · Shatranj on a round board: the rook circles, pawns never promote.
• Medieval chess · Europe’s chess before 1475: the ferz and the king may leap on their first move.
• Senterej · Ethiopian chess: no turns until the first capture, then Shatranj.
• Shatar · Mongolian chess: the bers, the camel, and a mate that needs a shak.
• Makruk · Thai chess: a slow, strategic game with a counting rule.
• Ouk Chatrang · Cambodian chess: Makruk with a leap for the king and the met.
• Sittuyin · Burmese chess: set up your pieces, then promote on the diagonals.
• Kar Ouk · Ouk Chatrang where the first check wins: guard your king.
• Malay chess · Chess of the Malay world: the king leaps, a crowned pawn walks back.
• Xiangqi · Chinese chess: a river, palaces and a cannon that jumps to capture.
• Minixiangqi · Xiangqi on 7 × 7 points: no river, no advisors, no elephants.
• Manchu chess · Red’s lone chariot moves as horse and cannon too, against a full army.
• Jieqi · Xiangqi with the pieces face down: each is revealed by its first move.
• Banqi · Xiangqi’s pieces face down on half a board: turn them up, take by rank.
• Janggi · Korean chess: no river, palace diagonals and a cannon that always jumps.
• Shogi · Japanese chess: captured pieces return to the board on your side.
• Minishogi · Shogi on a 5 × 5 board: six pieces a side, short and sharp games.
• Chu shogi · Japan’s great shogi on 12 × 12: no drops, and a lion that moves twice.
• Tori shogi · Bird shogi on 7 × 7: a phoenix, quails and swallows, with drops.

More players

• Chaturaji · India’s four-handed chess: kings can be captured, captures score.
• Four Seasons Chess · Alfonso X’s chess for four from 1283: four seasons, the last king wins.
• Three-player chess · Three armies on a hexagonal board: you against two bots.
• Four-player chess · Four armies on a cross-shaped board: in teams or all against all.
• Bughouse · Two boards, two teams: what you capture goes to your partner's hand.
• Eight-player chess · Eight armies on a board of 516 squares: all against all, in pairs or four against four.
• Verney’s four-handed chess · Verney’s game of 1881: two against two, mate both enemy kings.
• Verney’s eight-handed chess · Verney’s game for eight of 1884: four against four on 448 squares.