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First move advantage in Western Chess - why does it exist?[Subject Thread] [Add Response]

Joe Joyce wrote on Sat, Aug 11, 2012 03:09 PM UTC:

Charles, you're right, the stepwise moo is a better representation of the
N move for 1-square. The difficulty with using it in a board game is that
the move of the piece is dependent not on the current state of the board,
but on the previous state of the piece. If someone were to implement a
massive computer analysis of the game to see if mobility is the key or any
factor in first-turn ad, that rules set or something very like it should be
used, to simulate FIDE as closely as possible. 

The parity check, while violating the letter of the law for N moves, tries
to keep the spirit of the law, admittedly somewhat poorly as it mandates
whether or not the knight switches, does have the advantage that it is only
dependent on the current state of the board. Computer implementation of the
"moo rule" would be all but necessary if players wanted to use it instead
of a parity check. Changing icons for the knight would be more than just
useful. Heh, if this turkey ever gets written up, you got the first
optional rule.