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General Comments Page. Page for making general comments.[All Comments] [Add Comment or Rating]
📝David Howe wrote on Fri, Apr 26, 2002 03:05 AM UTC:Links added. Thanks for the suggestion.
David Howe wrote on Fri, Apr 26, 2002 04:38 PM UTC:I have an idea for self-captured pieces: a self-captured piece cannot be dropped to a square which is threatened by a friendly piece. This should alleviate the use of self-captured pieces to checkmate or block checks.
General Comments Page. Page for making general comments.[All Comments] [Add Comment or Rating]David Howe wrote on Sat, Apr 27, 2002 12:09 PM UTC:It would be nice to have a full, comprehensive article on Chess Handicapping. Anyone out there want to volunteer?
3D Chess, a Different Way of Looking at It. A scheme for a geometric translation of 2d piece moves into 3d.[All Comments] [Add Comment or Rating]David Howe wrote on Wed, May 1, 2002 09:02 PM UTC:Good ★★★★This is an interesting idea. Here's a logical extension of it:
<p>In 2d chess (thinking in the abstract), pieces are 0 dimensional (ie. points) that move in a line (1 dimensional movement).
<p>Perhaps in 3d chess, pieces could be 1 dimensional (ie. line segments) that move (as suggested) in a 2 dimensional plane. Their direction of movement would be constant, it would simply be their area of movement that would cover a two dimensions.
<p>In the diagram below, the 3d Rook piece at [a1,d1] could move to [a2,d2] or [a3,d3]. It would be blocked by the 3d Bishop piece at [c4,d4]. It could, however move to [a1,d1] on the next level up, assuming no friendly pieces are blocking it. However for the 3d Rook to move to the other half of the board (ie. files e-h) it might have to rotate. Or then again, perhaps in that direction it only covers a single rank instead of a plane.
<pre>
+---+---+---+---+
| | | | | 6
+---+---+---+---+
| | | | | 5
+---+---+---+---+
| | |---B---| 4
+---+---+---+---+
| | | | | 3
+---+---+---+---+
| | | | | 2
+---+---+---+---+
|-------R-------| 1
+---+---+---+---+
a b c d
</pre>
David Howe wrote on Thu, May 2, 2002 06:25 PM UTC:I was thinking of a setup such as:
<p>Each piece is a vertical line of length 4. The leftmost white Rook (for example) would initially occupy a1 on levels 3 though 6. The leftmost white Knight would occupy b1 on levels 3 through 6. Etc. Black pieces would occupy similar positions on levels 3 through 6.
<p>Rotation would be allowed, but only allowing pivot points on the ends of the lines. Rotation would require an entire move and capture by rotation would not be allowed. For white pawns that have been rotated to be horizontal, forward is up. For black pawns, forward would be down. Pawn promotion would still only occur on the last rank (and not the last level).
Jupiter. Huge chess variant on 16 by 16 board. (16x16, Cells: 256) [All Comments] [Add Comment or Rating]David Howe wrote on Mon, May 6, 2002 01:29 PM UTC:Adrian should be getting email whenever a comment is made on one of his pages. I can also forward email to Adrian if anyone wishes to contact him.
Rules of Chess FAQ. Frequently asked chess questions.[All Comments] [Add Comment or Rating]David Howe wrote on Mon, May 6, 2002 02:23 PM UTC:'can a king switch places with a pawn when in check?'
<p>The answer is no. A king may never switch places with a pawn, whether in check or not.
David Howe wrote on Sat, May 11, 2002 06:41 PM UTC:Here's another thought: Why not take HJR Murray's 'A Brief History of Chess', and Project-Gutenberg-ize it? That would be phase 1. Phase 2: Take HJR's 'History of Chess' and Guten-ize it (ie. produce an ebook version).
Of course, phase 2 would be a huge job. Anyone know if these two books are public domain yet? HoC was published in the early 1900's. If anyone else is interested in doing this, I could check with the folks at PG.
<p>Thinking smaller... perhaps a timeline page or chess geneology page. With links of course. Perhaps this would be a good job for Hans or JL Cazaux?
David Howe wrote on Mon, May 13, 2002 05:11 PM UTC:Project Gutenburg, while they concentrate on 'plain vanilla texts', also produces some works that are (or contain) non-textual information. Also, they are no averse to producing HTML products, as long as there is a plain text version available.
<p>FFEN is one option, but we could also use GIF's. Or even plain old ugly ascii diagrams. The book would definitely have to be broken up into chapters, as the full book in one file would be too huge.
<p>I'll send a request to PG to see if they feel the book (Hoc) is public domain.
84 Spaces Contest. 84 Spaces Contest begins![All Comments] [Add Comment or Rating]David Howe wrote on Tue, May 21, 2002 02:58 PM UTC:Sorry about the lack of response. I have unlisted the one existing entry. Hopefully Fergus will publish the submitted entries in the near future.
Palindromic Chess. Play until the position on the board is the reversed of the starting postion. (8x8, Cells: 64) [All Comments] [Add Comment or Rating]💡📝David Howe wrote on Mon, May 27, 2002 02:59 PM UTC:Thanks for the feedback Tomas. I wouldn't bother trying to play this game -- it is not very playable. A game that's like this one, but more playable is <a href='../diffobjective.dir/interchange.html'>Interchange Chess</a>.
<p>I used left- and right-handed rooks in the game to guarantee it would be quaranteed to end in a certain number of moves. Using such rooks is not strictly necessary though.
<p>You're right about spotting illegal moves -- they're usually discovered 2 or 3 moves down the line. Too annoying. Anyway, this game was more of an exercise in applying an abstract idea to chess than of creating a playable game.
Shatranj 
. Version with fancy graphics.[All Comments] [Add Comment or Rating]📝David Howe wrote on Thu, Jun 20, 2002 12:32 PM UTC:Tony, I've updated them to offer a plain background (as a variant). I must admit, the plain background looks much cleaner. I'll have to think about a new graphic for the shah.
<p>By the way, the elephant and counselor graphics are based on a new font I'm having created. The work is being done by Tom Buhrman (of ItsYourTurn fame). I'll be posting a page soon that shows a preview of this font.
<p>I did the chariot graphic myself! Thanks for the kind words.
Chaturanga . Version with fancy graphics.[All Comments] [Add Comment or Rating]📝David Howe wrote on Thu, Jun 20, 2002 12:34 PM UTC:Thanks Peter. Although I must admit, I didn't design the elephant graphic. It's part of a new font I'm having designed, so Tom Buhrman gets the credit for that.
InterGrid Chess. Pieces on corners and on centers of squares of 8 by 8 board. (8x8, Cells: 145) [All Comments] [Add Comment or Rating]💡📝David Howe wrote on Thu, Jun 20, 2002 12:38 PM UTC:Thanks! It's nice to know these older variants are getting looked at. Hopefully they'll spawn some new ideas or inspire new variants.
84 Spaces Contest. 84 Spaces Contest begins![All Comments] [Add Comment or Rating]David Howe wrote on Mon, Jul 1, 2002 02:16 PM UTC:I have emailed Fergus. Please be patient and we'll see what the situation is in a week or two. Thanks.
Feeble Chess to Weakest Chess. Some Chess variants with weaker pieces. (8x8, Cells: 64) [All Comments] [Add Comment or Rating]David Howe wrote on Fri, Jul 5, 2002 04:38 PM UTC:'Pawns reaching their 8th rank are promoted to any non-Royal piece that was on the board at the start of the game.' Perhaps the answer is obvious, but I'll ask the question anyways: when a pawn is promoted, is there any limitation on the orientation of the promoted piece? I would assume that the promoted piece can be in any orientation that is legal for that piece (eg. a pawn promoted to a Feeble Rook could not be oriented at 45 degrees), but the rules aren't explicit. Requiring the piece to be oriented 'North' would make safe promotion a bit more difficult, but might be more interesting.
Feeble Los Alamos Chess. Los Alamos Chess using Feeble pieces. (6x6, Cells: 36) [All Comments] [Add Comment or Rating]💡📝David Howe wrote on Fri, Jul 5, 2002 04:59 PM UTC:Hmmmm... I never really considered Progressive Feeble Chess. But now that you mention it, it seems as if such a game would work quite well. Perhaps it would even play better than regular progressive chess. In my opinion, progressive chess progresses a bit too quickly, so perhaps *gradual* progressive feeble chess would be more to my liking. Gradual progressive uses a progression that grows more slowly: instead of 1 2 3 4 5... it uses 1 1 1 2 2 2 3 3 3 4 4 4 5 5 5... A bit harder to keep track of, but perhaps it tones down the game a little bit. I'd try it with the Italian progressive rules. A 5x5 version would be possible, although I think it might start getting cramped at that point. Honestly, I chose Los Alamos mostly out of laziness.
Xiangqi: Chinese Chess. Links and rules for Xiangqi (Chinese Chess). (9x10, Cells: 90) (Recognized!)[All Comments] [Add Comment or Rating]David Howe wrote on Sat, Jul 6, 2002 05:58 PM UTC:Sam, please provide references when you make a claim that our information is incorrect. I will be deleting comments which are offhand, unsupported statements of disagreement. Thanks!
Feeble Chess to Weakest Chess. Some Chess variants with weaker pieces. (8x8, Cells: 64) [All Comments] [Add Comment or Rating]David Howe wrote on Sun, Jul 7, 2002 05:48 PM UTC:I have finished the Zillions implementation for Weakest Chess. Zillions plays it quite badly (even at 3 minutes per move), so this implementation is probably only good for experimenting or over-the-net play with another human. I think Ralph has (perhaps unintentionally) invented a game that lies in the region between FIDE chess and Go. That is, the game tree for Weakest is less broad but lengthier than chess, but more broad and shallower (I imagine) than Go. It is similar to Go in that many small changes acrete over time to form either winning or losing patterns. As with Go, computers would have a difficult time playing the game well (as Zillions has). It is my suspicion that Go players would like Weakest Chess very much. Chess disc pieces with markers on each side to indicate capturing and non-capturing could be used as an 'over-the-board' way of playing this game. I encourage people to try this game out. I believe it has great potential.
Progressive Chess. Several variants where white moves one time, black twice, white three times, etc. (8x8, Cells: 64) (Recognized!)[All Comments] [Add Comment or Rating]David Howe wrote on Tue, Jul 9, 2002 09:50 PM UTC:Thanks for the corrections Tony. I've made the appropriate modifications to the English Progressive Chess section.
84 Spaces Contest. 84 Spaces Contest begins![All Comments] [Add Comment or Rating]David Howe wrote on Wed, Jul 17, 2002 12:08 AM UTC:I have contacted Fergus. He indicates he will resume working on the contest in July sometime. So it should be two weeks from now (at most).
David Howe wrote on Tue, Jul 23, 2002 04:21 PM UTC:I have been adding board measurements for each game to our indexing database. Do people see a need for an index which cross-references games and pieces? This would enable listing all games which use a particular piece, or listing all pieces used in a particular game.
<p>If so, would the pieces be identified based on their movement or on the name of the piece? We could cross reference piececlopedia items with game items, or simply associate a list of piece names with each game. Keep in mind that building a cross reference would be a significant amount of work.
David Howe wrote on Tue, Jul 23, 2002 05:59 PM UTC:Quite often we get requests for information about a game that (for instance) is played on a large board and there was a piece called a 'Royal'. Now searching all chessvariant.com pages for the word 'Royal' turns up too many hits. So cross referencing can be useful when looking for games where piece names are commonly used words in other contexts.
<p>Not that I want to do all this work of course, but if there is enough demand for it, perhaps it would be worth it.
Chaturanga. The first known variant of chess. (8x8, Cells: 64) [All Comments] [Add Comment or Rating]David Howe wrote on Sat, Jul 27, 2002 12:48 PM UTC:I have added more historical and background information in the form of a sidebar.
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