Comments by DavidPaulowich

Good news indeed!  Perhaps we will get to see a thousand year old chess set
on one of the shows.

Kasparov leaves us with an incredible legacy.  His five matches with Karpov
totaled 144 games.  We may never again see a champion play so many games at
the highest level.  Compare the career of one of his 'great
predecessors':

In 1927 Alexander Alekhine defeated World Chess Champion Jose Raul
Capablanca in a 34 game match (+6 =25 -3).  In 1929 he defeated FIDE World
Chess Champion Efim Bogoljubow in a 25 game 'unification match' (+11 =9
-5).   Again in 1934 he defeated Bogoljubow in a 26 game match (+8 =15
-3).  From 1928 to 1938 Alekhine played a total of eight games against
past and future world champions Botvinnik, Capablanca and Lasker.

Zurich 1934: 1 win (Lasker).

Nottingham 1936: 2 draws (Botvinnik and Lasker), 1 loss (Capablanca).

AVRO 1938: 1 win (Capablanca), 2 draws (Botvinnik and Capablanca), 1 loss
(Botvinnik).

Perhaps we should attempt a Sensitivity Scale from [1] Shatranj to [10]
Wormhole Chess - a variant where early checkmate is possible, if not
probable!  My 'Lions and Unicorns Chess' variant also contains some
opening traps leading to long forced lines - too long for Zillions to
calculate in advance.

A GOOGLE search of Newsgroup: rec.arts.drwho produced an Oct. 23 1995 post,
which confirms Fergus Duniho's list of pieces.  Here is a quote for the
Black army:

KING = the Master 
QUEEN = the Rani 
BISHOP = Draconian and Cyberman 
KNIGHT = Sea Devil and Ice Warrior 
ROOK = Sontarons 
PAWNS = the Daleks

I wish you all good luck in tracking down references. Sad to say, we have no record of the reasoning behind the rules of historical chess variants. For example, I read that in Chaturanga the player who stalemates his opponent loses the game. This might have resulted from a combination of the following two rules:

'A move that gives stalemate to the opponent is not allowed.' - Sittuyin (Burmese Chess)

'The game is finished if one player makes an illegal move; This player loses the game.' - my 2005-03-09 comment on Shogi (Japanese Chess)

(count-condition (total-piece-count 2)) ; is an old attempt to add an 'automatic draw rule' to Zillions. But I found that it can create problems in Zillions chess games, and decided not to implement it. Here is an example with 4 pieces set up on an empty board:

VariantName=Chess (Black Queen c1) (Black King a2) (White King b4) (White Rook d3)

1. Rook d3 - a3 
1. King a2 - b2
2. Rook a3 - b3
2. King b2 - a2
3. Rook b3 - a3
3. King a2 - b1
4. Rook a3 - b3

Apparently Zillions was worried about the sequence 1... Queen x Rook check 2. King x Queen 'automatic draw'. I have not seen Zillions actually play an illegal move when the count-condition line is added to a ZRF, but this example does show Zillions failing to win a game because it reacts to the apparent threat of a future illegal move. This lack of a command to automatically end a game of chess when only the two kings remain is a minor inconvenience. But there is a (MAJOR) problem with the 'bare king rule' in every Shatranj related ZRF that I have tested. See the Shatranj Page Comments for more details.

(loss-condition (White Black) (pieces-remaining 1) ) ; This 'bare king rule' creates problems for Zillions in Shatranj and other chess games. Here is an example with 5 pieces set up on an empty board:

VariantName=Shatranj (White Shah c1) (White Rukh b2) (White Baidaq h2) (Black Shah a1) (Black Rukh b8)

1. Shah c1 - c2 [a deliberate blunder in order to test Zillions]
1. Rukh b8 - c8
2. Shah c2 - b3
2. Rukh c8 - b8
3. Shah b3 - c2
3. Rukh b8 - c8

Apparently Zillions was worried about the sequence 1... Rukh x Rukh check 2. King x Rukh 'bare king victory'. I have not seen Zillions actually play an illegal move, but this example does show Zillions failing to win a game because it reacts to the apparent threat of a future illegal move. Another Problem: every Shatranj related ZRF that I have tested will record a 'bare king victory' without granting the player the opportunity for a final move resulting in a 'two bare kings draw'.

http://www.chessvariants.org/ratings/-large.dir-not-particularly-new.html

contains 'Ratings and Comments' from 2001, back when the subvariants were being developed.

[EDIT 2023] copied these messages in the Comment above, but the "end-of-line" feature does not work. Note: apparently you can still access the entire Ratings and Comments directory by pasting the web address below. This directory can be sorted by SIZE to locate those entries with lots of comments.

http://www.chessvariants.com/ratings/

bnpwcgh/ddddddd/7/7/7/DDDDDDD/HGCWPNB

where C = Grey Whale Calf, moving straight forward as a wazir, and diagonally backwards as a ferz. Pieces still do not promote in this game, apart from the special killer whale rule. Note that the Grey Whale (and Calf) have the same moves as the Multi General (and Dog) from Tenjiku Shogi.

 
   +---+---+---+---+---+---+---+
 7 | H | G | C | W | P | N | B |
   +---+---+---+---+---+---+---+
 6 | D | D | D | D | D | D | D |
   +---+---+---+---+---+---+---+
 5 |   |   |   |   |   |   |   |
   +---+---+---+---+---+---+---+
 4 |   |   |   |   |   |   |   | 
   +---+---+---+---+---+---+---+
 3 |   |   |   |   |   |   |   |
   +---+---+---+---+---+---+---+
 2 | d | d | d | d | d | d | d |
   +---+---+---+---+---+---+---+
 1 | b | n | p | w | c | g | h |
   +---+---+---+---+---+---+---+
     a   b   c   d   e   f   g