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Ben Reiniger wrote on Mon, Oct 3, 2022 01:02 PM UTC:I've moved a couple of the last comments to a new thread: Setup graphics, piece sets
Here's a photo I took of a setup for Sac Chess. The board and Chess pieces are from Omega Chess. The squares are 1.75 inches. I covered up the edges to hide the corner spaces and coordinates that don't match Sac Chess, since within the 10x10 area, the Omega Chess board had a dark square in each player's right corner. The Amazons, Chancellors, and Archbishops are from the Musketeer Chess piece kits for those pieces. The Sailor (Dragon King), Missionary (Dragon Horse), and Judge (Centaur) are represented by the Rook, Bishop, and Knight from Peter Ganine's Superba set. These pieces have human faces, which seemed appropriate for pieces that can move one space in any direction like a man.
What do you think of this set of pieces to play Sac Chess (and Heavy Chess)?
Set of compound pieces for 3D printer: (from left to right) Centaur-Judge / Missionary / Marshall-Chancellor / Admiral-Sailor / Amazon / Cardinal-Archbishop
I cannot call this game “bad”, but I agree with the British chess master William Winter that the standard Marshall-Chancellor and Cardinal-Archbishop pieces added to Chess obviate the Knights and Bishops to a great extent when combined with the Queen already existing. The Amazon arguably also obviates the Rook in addition to people being skeptical of adding it to Chess without adjusting the rules so it doesn’t overpower the game. Have you tried playing with Fusion Chess or Assimilation Chess rules with Men?
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I like the abstract pieces a lot and I use them when playing Gross Chess. But the farther you go from the standard types, the less well I think it works. In this game, you have Dragon King, Dragon Horse, and Amazon, and I don't think the abstract pieces are particularly effective.
I am disappointed to hear that Fergus requested you to use his graphics. I think it's fair to say that, while they may be good, they are decidedly non-standard. I do not think it helps our cause, (encouraging Chess enthusiasts to explore Chess variants), to make things appear more alien. Personally, I consider the standard for this site to be the Alfaerie graphics. Each contributor can, of course, choose whatever they like to represent their game.
What I think would be nice is to have buttons over the graphic which switch all page graphics between the options. I think H.G. has done this on some of his pages, but I don't know how it works. If it is not hard to do, I may start updating pages. OTOH, an argument can be made that the main diagram should be one of his interactive diagrams. Personally, I prefer to put the interactive diagram down in the "Computer Play" section, as I have done here, But that may be because of my own biases. The way I have the "Setup" section on that page is how I like to do it, largely because that's how it has been done here for a very long time (although I added the Initial Setup FEN.)