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Check out Chess with Different Armies, our featured variant for July, 2024.
Check out Chess with Different Armies, our featured variant for July, 2024.
There is no game-theoretical advantage from choosing btween a number of symmetric, and therefore mostly equivalent start position. The only way black can derive any advantage from this is by having very extensive opening knowledge for the setup he is going to choose. Only white would have to prepare for all openings, if he has no clue what black is going to choose. (Which presumably is hopeless, due to the large number.) Black, however, only has to prepare for one, and can use that one in every game he plays as black. (And even if it is commonly known what he will pick, it is not much help to the white player if he has to play a variety of opponents.)
So I think that rather than doing away with the burden of opening theory, your rules compell the players to study opening theory for black, in order to neutralize the first-move advantage.