Single Comment

Rook behaviour on the Old Squares does look odd at first, but it is
consistent with Bishops - although on that basis a variant where Queens
leave those squares as Alibabas would also have some validity. The King
swap helps by unbinding Bishops and also explains how Red Pawns could
theoretically end up on cells a6-9 - although it would still be unlikely!
Incidentally does 'adjacent' here mean just orthogonally or does it
include diagonally?
A version with bidding would certainly be an interesting development,
particularly as ten-piece armies could be represented by subsets of card
suits (though with different correspondences to my Pawnless Fivequarters -
see http://www.chessvariants.com/multiplayer.dir/fivequarters.html). King
and Queen are obvious but Jack=Rook, Ten=Bishop, Nine=Knight would have a
kind of double logic. Jack and Rook both end in K, Nine and Knight sound
alike except at the end, and because the Jack is also called a Knave the
Ten has often been nicknamed Fool - literal translation of the Bishop's
French name.