Randomised armies — you might get three queens, your opponent might get five knights.
Both sides get randomly generated armies of the same total value, placed on the back two ranks. Kings and pawns are normal. Everything else is chance.
Really Bad Chess separates two skills that normally travel together: knowing chess, and knowing your opening. Here nobody knows the position, so the player who evaluates faster wins. It is the fastest way to find out whether you understand piece coordination or just remember it.
Count what each side has. Three knights and no bishops is a completely different game from two bishops and a rook.
Knights want a closed position with outposts. Bishops want it open. Rooks want files. Decide what your army is, then create that position.
With unequal armies there is usually one dominant piece on each side. Removing theirs is worth more than developing yours.
Five knights can beat two queens if the position is closed. Evaluate the position, not the material chart.
There is no opening theory here and standard developing moves may be actively bad given your army.
A bishop starting on b1 attacks squares no bishop normally can. Check the diagonals before you move.
The standard piece values assume a standard army. With five knights, knights are worth less; with one, more.
No theory, no familiar structures, just an army and a board. It isolates the single skill that separates strong players from prepared ones: looking at an unfamiliar position and working out what matters.
That is the argument for variants generally, and it is worth stating plainly: a variant removes part of chess so that what remains gets your full attention. Played casually they are a pleasant break. Played deliberately — naming the skill first, then going back to a standard game and finding the same idea — they are the most efficient training available, because you are practising one thing at a time instead of everything at once.
Improving players who want to find out how much of their rating is understanding and how much is memorisation.
You can play it right now on any device, in a browser, against a full engine — no download and no account. If you have never tried a variant before, give it three games rather than one: the first is spent learning the rules, and the second is where it starts being chess.
In the browser, against a real engine, no sign-up. One of twenty variants in the Grandmaster Gains Academy.
♔ Play Really Bad ChessBoth sides get randomly generated armies of the same total value, placed on the back two ranks. Kings and pawns are normal. Everything else is chance.
The rules take about two minutes. Improving players who want to find out how much of their rating is understanding and how much is memorisation.
Inventory both armies before move one. Count what each side has. Three knights and no bishops is a completely different game from two bishops and a rook.
Grandmaster Gains has Really Bad Chess playable in the browser against a full engine, free and with no sign-up, alongside nineteen other variants.
Evaluating a position from nothing. No theory, no familiar structures, just an army and a board. It isolates the single skill that separates strong players from prepared ones: looking at an unfamiliar position and working out what matters.
Do not develop on autopilot. There is no opening theory here and standard developing moves may be actively bad given your army.
Each variant isolates one skill and drills it harder than any exercise. The coach's guide to variants covers which one to use for what, or see the trainer classroom.