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Comments by GeorgeDuke
Hadean Chess. 
Expanded chess with short-range linear jumpers, augmented knights and zebras and more dynamic pawns. (12x12, Cells: 144) [All Comments] [Add Comment or Rating]Misleading is not documenting priorities. Hadean Chess is Poor for being overworked and omitting citations. Look at three-part Flying War Machine. Case closed. When others have presented tri-compounds, they do so somewhat facetiously within a gestalt of their making. Daniel's output has no coherent sense and, in all, appears the worst of the recent prolificists. Eventually, he may be deterred to the extent of at least finding precedents for most of his not-really-new pieces, deriving as they do especially from Wayne Schmittberger's and T.R. Dawson's.
The reminder should be from David Pritchard's 'ECV' section ''Designing a Variant'' to the effect that complexifying Rules unnecessarily usually worsens. The benefit should come from ramifications of the Rules (of movement) not more Rules for their own sake. There is another unwarranted tri-compound mover here Flying Elephant, nickname ''Dumbo'' one supposes.
Europan Chess. A 14x14 board with extra pieces. (14x14, Cells: 196) [All Comments] [Add Comment or Rating]Contrasting mediocrity of Daniel, Mark Hedden presents tri-compound SuperComputer somewhat facetiously, referring to ''solemn duty to make this game.'' At related Ganymede, Hedden credits Centennial for Spearman, Betza for ''Chess Really Big Board,'' historic Grand Acedrex. and Adrian King's Typhoon for various other compounds and bent riders.
Hadean Chess. Expanded chess with short-range linear jumpers, augmented knights and zebras and more dynamic pawns. (12x12, Cells: 144) [All Comments] [Add Comment or Rating]Daniel, please use my name directly, George Duke. Daniel is evidently and awkwardly in his inherent lack of facility with language, taking hint from Joyce's thoughtful manners thread to speak somewhat indirectly when opposing camps disagree. There are different nuanced ways to do so. But Editors can be expected to withdraw commenting privilege altogether for direct name-calling. I do not see the joke Daniel alludes to in just ''Flying Elephant.'' ''Dumbo'' is comedic satiric Walt Disney character of a flying elephant, a clever recollection. // Daniel says he had no idea Thomas Raynor Dawson even existed. Dawson is the premier variantist with Boyer and Betza. Really sorry that anyone is unaware of Dawson, and CVPage shares in the blame within its recent narrow sphere of thoughtless proliferation. Of course, Gary Against the World or whatever emerges would be giant leap in the right direction. I'll do this Daniel the courtesy of dissecting and prioritizing (meaning finding the antecedents) his two and more Flying pieces another time.
I vote for Individual vs. World approach, matching that extravaganza in 1999. Irina Krush and Etienne Bacrat were the most vocal recommenders, as Gifford describes them, and kept the World's play high. The player should pick the game, his best game, but weigh that the World, many outsiders, will be judging Chess Variants by the choice. Later could come obvious individual matches by challenges. You should rule out only 8x8 CVs in Gary Gifford's or other's choice of the game to play. For slight precedent on miniature scale, we had Open Kibitz games December 2003 in new Game Courier. I played Tony Quintanilla Rococo, and two others played Berolina I think. There were ongoing comments about moves before and after the fact.
[Tom, Tom the Piper's son learned to play when he was young, / But the only tune that he could play was ''Over the Hills and Far Away.''] Where do so-called ''Chess Grandmasters'' get their credentials? From good play at OrthoChess 8x8 with all its rote practice. Their ELO is a probabilistic system in application. Even ELO 2200 will defeat ELO 2600 certain expected percentage of the time. We are talking about one particular Rules set and one specific narrow time control. How would skill within those parameters translate to other board games? Problematically not automatically. As Joyce discloses, games with movements exclusively Night-, Bishop-, and Rook-like will benefit those experts exclusively used to RNB. As Gifford shows, shorter time controls will help the specialist in FIDE. That is why they always advocate Carrera variants from Bird to Seirawan. Suppose instead their ELOs were based on 80 years (FIDE was founded 80 years ago) of Los Alamos 6x6 (actually developed 1950's). Hey a thought experiment! Isn't that where Chess started in the first place, with thinking? Anyway, it is clear ELO2700 at little Los Alamos would not mean much at all. Likewise, high rating at standard-rules 8x8 does not mean all that much anymore in world of prolificism. Probably there will be lot of scatter in transferring skill from small 8x8 to 9x9 (Shogi), 9x10 (Xiangqi), or 10x10 (Centennial). Some will do better than others. Many in CVPage, used to 9x9, 9x10 and 10x10, could already win over the OrthoChess specialists all the way to the top, Kramnik, whoever, at personal games on larger boards with enough time available, as Joyce and others elucidate.
All the King's Men. Page describing variant chess pieces.[All Comments] [Add Comment or Rating]Let's move on to the 'B's'. Jelliss talks of an update. My favourite B's would include two by Betza. Black Ghost, the teleporting piece that cannot capture. Basilisk, which seeing any piece immediately petrifies it ''thrown into paroxism of torment.'' Here Banshee is Bishop + Nightrider. Banshees figure in Clifford Simak's science fiction 'Goblin Reservation', and Dragon in Simak is lone holdover surviving the immediately-prior Universe. Edmund Hebermann's 1920's Berolina Pawn is still about the best anyone can do in 8x8 revision. Winther's later 30 types of bifurcation pieces should be adapted to 8x10, 9x10, and 10x10 more than the few already on larger than 8x8. First functional use of 'Bison' compound leaper, stuck and lost like Simak's 'Way Station' within one or two problems for twenty years, is precisely Falcon in 1992, generalizing it for compatibility with RNB. (My multi-path article enunciates that multiple paths are the norm: even Rook's pathway is not automatic until defined and explained. For example, Sissa goes to the Rook's same [(0,1), (0,2), (0,3)...] by two pathways different from Rook's particular one pathway.) Modern Bishop appeared only around time of 13th-century Courier Chess, because it was hard to visualize all-length diagonal pathways on unchequered boards earlier. So, 'A' Alfil had exclusive life as solo diagonal piece beyond one square for over 500 years.
Okay 'C's. ''Caissa'' is Chess poem by William James in 18th century, the time of Philidor and Kempelen's chess-playing Turk, copying techniques of medieaval chess moralities by Vida and others. 1930's book by Dawson is 'Caissa's Wild Roses'. Probably Bishop preceded Camel by a century. Dawson's column was in mainstream British Chess Magazine until death in 1951. Cannon is Pao, Xiangqi Knight is Mao, Knight going one diagonal one orthogonal instead is Moa. Notice the name J.P. Boyer under ''Circean piece'': Boyer and Betza have the most games in Pritchard's 1994 'ECV'. ''Clockwork Mouse'' is not fully explained but would be related to Fourriere's Windmill in Pocket Polypiece, invented by Alexandre Muniz for 'Royal Standard' in 1997 here. Contra-hopper will come up under 'H' about all the Hoppers. Gilman follows earlier names Commuter(4,4), Tripper(3,3) etc. so far as I have noticed, motivated to respect his countryman's catalogue. CVPage uses ''compound'' more for synonymous combination piece. Cylindrical Chess is one of top ten played at Brainking.
Circe Chess. Captured pieces return to their original square. (8x8, Cells: 64) [All Comments] [Add Comment or Rating]Jeliss lists Circean piece, and Trenholme's list of games compiled Circe Chess in 1995. Bodlaender calls Circe Chess ''rather slow.'' Why? Because, the only ways to lose a piece are if, once ''captured,'' it has no legal return square or if that would result in check. The rule for RNB eliminates having to keep track of the exact originating square. Instead, the capturee is to be put back to the different-colour array square of its piece-type. Trenholme says same-colour, but either way it shrinks to one empty square only for the piece to stay on board. Like Alice Chess, where the original form is largely left alone, we have also uncharacterically been spared the umpteen variants possible of Circe, with nod to the progressive mutators to speed things up.
Chessma 84. Game with elements of Chess and Ultima on a board with two levels with special corner squares. (2x(10x10), Cells: 84) [All Comments] [Add Comment or Rating]''A Siamese-Twin mixture,'' Chessma 84 strategy is complex not least because most, but not all, squares are common to both boards. There are 84 unique spaces to move for the 14 piece-types. Chessma is described as Ultima-OrthoChess hybrid. Pusher is forerunner of later Witch in Jacks & Witches. Pusher is also related to but different from Ultima alternate piece Repeller (Repeller captures), which comes from Robert Abbott himself. The Chessma Encloser may teleport to capture like in Go, completing the surrounding of the victim. Swapper was taken earlier in 2002 from Rococo, and Rococo uses Swapper to replace Ultima Coordinator. Swapper is V.R. Parton's Ximaera or Chimaerine. (Rococo does invent chiefly the Cannon Pawn itself and border-square mechanism.) Antoine Fourriere is still rated at top of general category in Game Courier. (ABCLargeCV)
Jacks and Witches 84. Variant on 84 squares with special pieces and special squares. (12x8, Cells: 84) [All Comments] [Add Comment or Rating]Only one Comment (Jeremy Good's) in over 3 years. Teleporting here is not too wild through only four transporter cells. All Orthodox pieces present except Queen give anyone foothold of familiarity right away. Xiangqi Cannon can convert to Canon: for professionals that's Pao and Vao. Jack needs to be strengthened because its one-stepping serves mostly as blocker. Movement out of the ''Eye,'' when opened, the symmetric square along rank, has to be unique. (JKLLargeCV)
Gridlock. Large, wargame inspired variant. (10x10, Cells: 100) [All Comments] [Add Comment or Rating]Paul Leno indicates in Comment three years ago ''We've been playing the game since 1997 when the Ruins was created and soon others will be too.'' I ask again, when using a Thief in the Night, does it transfer the Field of Influence on all levels, or only take pieces out of Medusa's range? And can Tonk's Chamber be pivoted without flanking Crystal? (GHILargeCV)
Beau Monde Chess. Large variant where pieces move with variations of the Queen move. (11x10, Cells: 100) [All Comments] [Add Comment or Rating]Prolificist Sergey Sirotkin with over 30 CVs is in top-ten for productivity. Unusual way to get 100 squares. Contrast Sirotkin's large ones with concise 7x7 Herd. There is a theme here, Queen movements variform, not acknowleged in the Comment four years ago. Presumably both Pawns and Berolina Pawns promote to Beauty, Ba, Co, Du, Pr, Q, Empress. (ABCLargeCV)
Falcon Chess. Game on an 8x10 board with a new piece: The Falcon. (10x8, Cells: 80) [All Comments] [Add Comment or Rating]Communicating e-mails to Greg Strong fall 2006, I had Falcon declining in value already then, based on how many pieces on board to 5.0, equality with Rook, only by 15 pieces/Pawns remaining(the programming criterion I suggested), more or less evenly between both sides. So Mueller and I would be in some agreement from our heuristics. I'll get the exact table soon that I sent to Strong, no longer considered trade secret, since Muller or others no doubt will eventually refine them further, the slight gradual decline in value of Falcon from all 40 pieces on board. Thanks for presentations on Falcon-Bison. Rightly M/ points out Falcon-Bison equivalence once 3, or usually 4 and 5 in most positions, units remain. Think of irony that ancient games like Timur's, Courier, Gala, will have their endgames solved by 2020, 500 or 700 years later, while new ones Centennial, Jacks & Witches, Falcon, and a hundred others, we can have full set of end-game tables way before any understanding of openings. The exact reverse of cases.
Many Worlds Chess. Large variant, inspired by the many worlds interpretation of quantum mechanics.[All Comments] [Add Comment or Rating]Many worlds and Chess. Calvinball would not be far afield. All possible universes, from one of which the Dragon carries over, in reading Clifford Simak's 'Way Station'(?). Dragon and all the Dragon's resonances East and West. We consider fashionable extremely strong anthropic principle. Mere strong anthropic points to the observable being as it is fully in order precisely for us to observe it. Weak anthropic addresses conscious life, numerical constants, the gravitational constant. If Earth is 10% closer, or Sol 10% cooler, or proton 10% heavier, no Life and all that that entails. Stronger, we get to all possible worlds, and where else intelligence can be. (Skeptics leave out ''else,'' questioning Earthly intelligence.) Strong anthropic posits different fundamental constants and laws of Physics in different universes. Extremely strong anthropic would hold that a universe came about in order to embody narrow agenda, like works of Shakespeare, or forms and moves of Chess, or some other preferred spiritual zealotry. Adrian King begins 'Scirocco' with H.J.R. Murray in 'A History of Chess': ''Of the making of these games there need be no end, and I have no doubt that many other varieties have been proposed and perhaps played, of which we have been spared the knowledge.'' -- 1912, anticipating Capablanca Chess, Cavalry Chess, and some others.
Gridlock Chapter 2. Missing description[All Comments] [Add Comment or Rating]Gridlock II brings in the Freedom Pawn General's cannon as power piece. ''All Gridlock pieces are surrounded by an invisible cubicle space.'' Sho Gun holding a Star, Lil Medusa casting a spell, the Pawn of a different colour, the smallest of the Rooks called the Forrest Rook -- they are all here like some frozen wax museum (There's a lot of freezing, cancelling, and shutting down fields in Gridlock, but they get new life, just read the Rules).
Scirocco (old). On ten by ten board with over thirty different pieces. (10x10, Cells: 100) [All Comments] [Add Comment or Rating]Notice Scirocco had lot of discussion in 2005. I recently commented on both 1999 Jupiter and 1999 Typhoon of Adrian King. Rich Hutnik is right my sidetracking Comment on Many Worlds does not do justice to Calvinball Chess either. Sorry, I was distracted by further look at one of my favourites Gridlock II and the Murray quotation King uses here at Scirocco, where King describes his design philosophy, insofar as it can be taken seriously. There are 36 different piece-types in Scirocco, only few non-standard being long-range, such as Scirocco and Spider. Later Typhoon has at least 75 piece-types all well-defined. King deliberately flouts Pritchard's ''Designing a Variant'' admonition, that elegant game combine minimum rules with maximum strategy, as he states in the third section. Hey, what is Art history (or that of aesthetics) but often history of revolt against the prevailing Zeitgeist?
Falcon Chess. Game on an 8x10 board with a new piece: The Falcon. (10x8, Cells: 80) [All Comments] [Add Comment or Rating]In the standard model, the symmetry of the six quarks was established at CERN, Geneva, with finding of the top quark in 1998. Table of Quarks(Joyce, Finnegan's Wake 1929). The glue that holds Bishop, Knight, and Rook together, beyond mnemonics the reason why section two is so long, most skimming it still do not move Falcon correctly in application. The article itself thoroughly panned by the now-conventional free-expression artistic community here, but in the long run thoroughly necessary rudiments, even upon taking any act overseas. SYMBOL NAME CHARGE FALCON MOVE O = Orthogonal U Up 2/3 Orth-Orth-Diagonal D Down -1/3 Diag-Diag-Orthogonal C Charm 2/3 Diag-Orth-Orthogonal S Strange -1/3 Orth-Diag-Diagonal T Top 2/3 Orth-Diag-Orthogonal B Bottom -1/3 Diag-Orth-Diagonal Top and bottom, the more charming ones called split block and split diagonal. The point would be that these are the movements, period, not ''Camel away'' or ''Zebra away.'' Pawn 1 e4 d5 2 e4xd5 is common enough opening (imagine FRC), but we do not say Pawn moves to Camel square in two moves, or Pawn Camel away. Knight reaches Camel square in two, or Zebra square in three, but talking that way is secondary. (to be continued) [For WB_F and F-M, my usual provider has chosen this week for major upgrade, so will contact easily next week conveniently the implementations. However, please have Scharnagl or other circles try it before I do right away, no problem.]
Gridlock Chapter 3. Missing description[All Comments] [Add Comment or Rating]Knights of the Grid, the Hollow Horse, Jungle Warfare, and a Thief in the Knight. The Earth Star. ''Can't Whistle for a Colt. Colts only load Riders through the Knights' Footprints.'' ''Can you see the strategic advantage of being able to rotate the riding pieces over the Ground Level?'' You can whistle for Peg but not the Colts. What is the winning condition? When getting used to a new game, ask what that criterion is at least. Possessing the Crystal of course here before reaching the Outer Limits. Simple as that. Elimination pieces need not stand in the way, nor even the Shield of Faith, if, and that's a big if, Crystal on the winning side.
All the King's Men. Page describing variant chess pieces.[All Comments] [Add Comment or Rating]D's. Dabbabah can reach only 1/4 the squares on boards sizes n x m, where n and m even integers >2. Dame is Queen in more than three languages. Darter is better tag for Falcon than uncomplimentary lame; saying essentially nothing, lame is not descriptive enough, or at all, for multiple paths unspecified. Darter tells not the whole story either, but Falcon can better be called three-path darter, or with some redundancy now, three-path-minimal-distance darter of fixed length. Darter is the far older, established term, and we should eliminate lame that Betza began promulgating after 2000. Jeliss' first example is Alfil Darter, that from e1 cannot go to g3 if f2 occupied. Also, the Knights Mao and Moa that if either e2 or f2 occupied, one or the other cannot get to f3. Betza plays with many like these in an article. Directed pieces would include Falcon and Hunter of Falcon-Hunter (Karl Schultz 1943) the example of Jeliss, Centennial Chess(1997) Spearman, Outback Chess (2003) Platypus.
Fatally flawed. This thread Joe Joyce and I had fun with for a month 2007. I give five demonstrations that Marshall and Cardinal are fatally flawed. Joyce concentrates on short-range substitutes like his (20.8.07) ''combination Dabbabah-Wazir.''
We can circumscribe our understanding of all leapers by looking at Tim Conway's Angel from 1970's. Here 27.July.2007 explains more fully that Angel jumps to any square that can be reached in n King moves. That means always every other square on board having both dimensions < (n+1). What is value of Angel on 8x8 n=7? Any convenient value > 1.0 but 60 is promising for comparisons. How could Angel possibly be strengthened? By not being able to be captured. (A complete Rules-set would have provisions for King escape.) Rook has been implemented as compound leaper to (0,1), (0,2), (0,3)...all the ''Rook squares.'' (Chatham or Paulowich may remember where.) Call that piece Rook-all. Then our standard Rook is lame Rookall or Rookall darter same difference, a complete definition because it is understood we are interested in only one pathway. The most useful divisions for piece-types are actually Multi-path, Rider and Leaper, but there are even some unclassifiable there.
Darts chess. Darts are thrown to decide with which piece to move.[All Comments] [Add Comment or Rating]The artistic community is always that one step ahead.
Dart Chess. Chess on a 6x6 board with a new piece: the Dart. (6x6, Cells: 36) [All Comments] [Add Comment or Rating]Izzard's other Philosophers Chess is on our list of top-10 under CVPage auspices.
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