Morph Card Chess

Six students at the local high school are taking part in an outdoor exercise for their elective class in shapeshifting. The goal: to turn themselves into bees, snakes, and cats in an attempt to chase each other down for points. Both teams will try to win, but what's most important to the teachers is that each individual student demonstrates their shapeshifting skill.

In Morph Card Chess, the goal is to help the students - the red, green, and blue pieces - capture more pieces than the opponents' students do, but you must also make sure that each of your students get at least one capture before the cards run out.

Setup

The game is laid out on a standard chess board. Each player gets four pieces, placed on the second rank, and each corresponds to a suit: hearts on the c-file, clubs on the d-file, diamonds on the e-file, and spades on the f-file. (The last piece, the spade, represents the teacher.) These pieces start as unpromoted "humans" who can move to adjacent squares (horizontally or vertically, but not diagonally like the king).

Each piece must have a unique color, to show which player the piece belongs to and which suit of cards the piece corresponds with. This can be accomplished with:

During the game, any piece can change to a "bee" (knight), "snake" (bishop), or "cat" (rook), or back to a "human". The spade pieces (which represent the teachers) may not move often, since spade cards can be used to move any piece and captures by spade pieces don't count towards your score. (However, capturing the other player's spade piece with one of your color pieces does count, the same as any other.)

The game is played with a pinochle deck (the six cards from 9 through ace in each of the four suits, twice each, for 48 cards total). Each player starts the game with 3 cards in their hand. The player with the dark pieces (represented by characters wearing dark-colored clothing) will go first.

Gameplay

Humans move to adjacent squares. Bees jump two squares in one direction and another square in a perpendicular direction, like the knight. Snakes move any number of squares diagonally, like the bishop. Cats move any number of squares vertically or horizontally, like the rook. Capturing is always done by moving to a piece occupied by an opponent's piece.

When you capture an opponent's piece with your heart, club, or diamond piece, record the capture as an additional point for that piece of yours. Captures by spade pieces do not affect the score.

The game is over once there are no more cards left in either player's hand. Scoring is as follows:

Characters

Alicia

A
smiling dark-skinned girl wearing red with hair in a bun Always a conscientious student, but rarely one to get excited; everyone was surprised by her enthusiasm for this particular subject.

Did you know? Everyone else is just doing it to follow the rules, but Alicia keeps her look when she transforms - instead of adopting a more "realistic" animal appearance - because the way she presents herself is an important part of her identity.

Zach

A
smiling light-skinned boy with long black hair wearing
green He's a goofball but also a very skilled athlete and a member of the school's track and field team. He's in this for the opportunity to run faster and fly higher in all sorts of new ways. (He applied to the U, and if they don't have a swim team where people turn into fish, he intends to start one.)

Did you know? Humans can throw a ball faster than any other creature on the planet.

James K.

A
dark-skinned boy with braided hair wearing a blue winter
hat Lives with his mom and dad, who were turned into snakes by a magical spell, and his still-human grandmother. He just wants to get closer to his parents.

Did you know? James was the only one of these kids who checked the weather forecast this morning.

Mr. Wilson

A gray-haired man with tan skin wearing a white shirt
and headband The physical education teacher who came up with the exercise. He never even attempted magic until this year, when his son showed an interest in it; he worries a lot and wants to be able to provide his kid with support and advice.

Favorite animal to turn into: A cat, but mostly because his wife thinks it's adorable.

Skye

A
light-skinned kid wearing glasses and a pink shirt looking
unsettled A natural talent, they taught themselves to turn into animals back in sixth grade, but this is the first year they've shared that part of themselves in a public setting.

Favorite animal to turn into: A shark. Skye loves swimming.

Olivia

A
smiling girl with medium skin tone and curly brown hair
wearing light green Secretly comes from a family of magical bee-people, and is using this class as an excuse to spend time in her true form while maintaining her "human high-schooler" alibi.

Favorite animal to turn into: See above.

James W.

An eager-looking light-skinned boy with dark gray hair
and a blue baseball cap Loves the feeling of being in a different form, with a unique skeletal structure and method of locomotion. He thinks it's just the neatest thing.

Did you know? Mr. Wilson is his dad!

Ms. Ellis

A dark-skinned woman with a bowl cut wearing a white
wizard's hat and holding a playing card Teaches shapeshifting and telekinesis classes at the high school. In her spare time, she's working on a way to become a ghost and possess her computer so she can type of emails faster.

Did you know? The Minneapolis Public School District doesn't have a rule against teaching class in the form of a giant snake.

Cards

Morph Card Chess uses a deck of 24 movement cards. Also included are 32 character cards - one for each combination of character and species - ranked from 1 through 8. These cards can be added to the deck to play other card games (the 1s can be set aside, replace the aces, or you can use two of them as jokers).