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Joe Joyce wrote on Sat, Sep 10, 2016 01:56 AM UTC:

Kevin, I keep the slide rule I used in college under an abacus on my encyclopedia bookshelves. I don't program. All my presets are bare bones board and pieces. I am a dinosaur. Gronk! ;) Seriously, I am perfectly happy with a board and pieces, it's all you need. And most games here don't have a preset, which I see meaning 1 of 2 things, they're dinosaurs like me or they aren't serious game designers. Maybe it's just because they don't believe enough in their games, but if you don't make a preset, nobody will play your game. So what you're offering is an idea, not actually a game. You are still participating in the conversation, but at a lower level, and are much less likely to get your say.

The question of how FIDE chess skills transfer is an interesting one, and is related to the value of variants in playing better FIDE. To an extent, I think it depends on how flexible as a person one is. It's been my experience that the skills can transfer well and transfer better the closer to FIDE a game is. Grin, if you want to try an experiment, play Grand Chess, Modern Shatranj, Xiang Qi, Shogi, and Jetan, and see what you think. I believe experience helps, and the broader the experience, the more help it can provide. I learned more about pawns in designing and developing Hyperchess and playing Grand Shatranj than I ever did playing and studying FIDE. (Well, and Texas Two-Step...) Until then, I didn't even realize that there was more to learn about pawns. So I am definitely in the camp that says the more diferent kinds of chess you play, the better you will play all of them.

I believe you're right about the splits in variantists' preferred games - there are many. Some games, like Bughouse or Grand Chess, have their dedicated adherents. I've also noticed designer styles generally reflect the kinds of games they like playing. But that's not only an obvious but a very blurry observation because variants are so varied. Currently there are some 5000 or so variants listed, and roughly 1000 have presets. Logistically, most people are forced to "specialize". But many who do play variants, play only 1 or 2 exclusively. I don't see that as much different than only playing FIDE.


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