Procession

Procession by Daniel Solis. A casual strategy game for couples.
Each player has a bridal party trying to get their bride to the chapel. The bridal party clears a safe path for the bride to travel. The first bride to make it to her chapel wins! This is a casual strategy game for couples. It's inspired by flower girls spreading petals for a bride to walk on as she approaches the altar. I hope you enjoy it with your special someone.

Stuff You need
• 2 or 4 players.
• A chess board.
• Each player needs five pawns. These are called Maids.
• Each player needs a queen. This is called the Bride.


Setup
For a two-player game, arrange the pieces as shown above. In a four-player game, place the extra couple's pieces in the remaining corners.

How to Play
Each player takes turns moving one of their pieces. Each piece has special types of movement, but there are some common restrictions. A piece may not pass through any other pieces or land on an occupied space. There are no "captures."


Maids move like chess rooks. That is, horizontally or vertically any distance.

In the example above, you see White moving one of his Maids (left), Black then moving one of his Maids (center), and White moving another of his Maids (right). When you move a Maid her first time, she must leave the boundaries of the starting corner. Once leaving the starting corner, you may not move that Maid back into your starting corner.


Brides also move like chess rooks, horizontally or vertically in any direction. However, they may only move towards or away from one of their own Maids.

In the example (top left), neither Bride can move. White's Bride is blocked in by her own Maids. Black's Bride has a clear opening, but cannot move because she doesn't have a Maid to move towards. In the example (top center), Black moves a Maid down one square, creating a path for the bride to travel on (noted with a magenta line). In a later turn (top right), Black's bride takes that opportunity to move. Still later (bottom left), the White player moves a Maid to make a path for the Bride. In a later turn (bottom right), the Bride moves down that path.


Winning
The first player to move a Bride to the opposite corner wins.

In the example above, White moves his queen to the opposite corner, so he wins. Black was very close, but couldn't move to the left because there wasn't a Maid to open a path in that direction.

Notes
This is an update of an old game from the Luchacabra project. I post it here now because a team of programmers in Poland is presently creating a playable AI opponent for the game.

With Valentine's Day approaching, it also seemed a reasonable time to re-visit this old chestnut. Hope you enjoy the game with someone you love!

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