Fly-over xiangqi

Many people have thought of 4-player versions of Western chess, and it's no surprise this has also happened for xiangqi. One of these 4-player xiangqi versions is fly-over xiangqi, and I thought it would be fun to make a board for that. 

For pieces, I got two magnetic travel sets (you'll see soon why I needed the pieces to be magnetic). I left one set red and black, and painted the other set white and green.

For the board, the idea was to 'raise' the playing area of the board, and so emphasise the 'fly-over' aspect. So I got myself some plywood, a bag of nails, and some metal wire.

The nails were only hammered into the plywood a bit, and were to form the 'points' on which the pieces sit and move. See why I needed them to be magnetic? 

The plywood was then painted black, which had the effect of making the tops of the nail almost appear to float above the board.

And then I used the wire to connect the nails, thereby creating the lines along which the pieces could move from their home part of the board to the other three parts.

The nails heads and wires were then painted yellow, whereas the nail heads and wires in the four palaces painted red, black, green and white, respectively. 

So this is what the completed board looks like; the yellow-painted wire strengthens the illusion of the playing area 'floating'.

Final step, as always, is to add pieces to the board!

Star Wars Episode 1 set

There are several Star Wars chess sets on the market, and I already have one of these in the collection. Another one I was keen to add is an Episode 1 set. Now this set is listed on eBay quite regularly, but there often is one problem: one or more of the light sabres are often broken or missing. As I didn't want an incomplete set like that, it was a matter of just biding my time .....

And good things come to those who wait!

All light sabres present, and none broken!

The board is the usual cardboard fold-up board, and like in the other Star Wars set I have, a8/h1 are black.

On the dark side, we see Darth Sidious, Darth Maul, Nute Gunray, Rune Haako, and Destroyer and Battle Droids.

And on the light side, we have Qui-Gon Jinn, Queen Amidala, Obi-Wan Kenobi, Anakin Skywalker, Jar Jar Binks and R2-D2.

And here's the proof, if you still need it, that all light sabres are present and accounted for!

Bone 'barleycorn' set

I've always felt that there was a bit of a gap in my small collection of vintage chess sets: a late 19th century bone 'barleycorn' set. But there's one problem with that ... They're listed on eBay regularly, but always go for prices I just can't justify .... Until I came across one listing which just said 'chess set in old box', without any mention that it was a bone set. The pictures clearly showed it to be a bone 'barleycorn' set. Very likely it flew under the radar of people specifically looking for bone chess sets, but their loss is my gain, and I got it for way less than what these sets normally go for.

The set was complete, and without any major damage to any of the pieces (apart from the wear and tear you'd expect from a set of that age). So here's my vintage bone 'barleycorn' set on a modern chess board!

I thought I'd also put it on the much more elaborate board that came with my Egyptian set, and it doesn't look bad on that board either.

So what do you think? Does it look better on the modern wooden board or on the more elaborate mother-of-pearl board?

Either way, I'm very pleased I now have a bone 'barleycorn' set in my collection. From doing a bit of research on the internet, I reckon this set may well be over a century old ...