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Comments by GeorgeDuke
The Heavy Brigade. Naming of leaping pieces.[All Comments] [Add Comment or Rating]In spirit of TREBUCHET, Underwood in 1877 US Patent #186,181 calls the orthogonal three-square leaper 'Cavalry', and Michael King in 1995 US Patent #5484157 calls it 'Large Tank'. This article fails to name 'Knight-Trebuchet' compound. That one should be the most useful, being colour-changing for counterbalance with colour-bound CAMERZ(Camel+Ferz).
'Wizard' of Omega Chess is the (Camel+Ferz=CAMERZ,for one coinage)and goes logically for design with yet unnamed(TREBUCHET+Knight). In Encyclopaedia Chess Variants (1994) p. 227 under 'Pieces', the seven-by-seven schematic leaves only (0,3) and (3,3) squares unnamed. For (0,3) not strictly never named (since 1877 US Patent 186181 calls it Cavalry) Trebuchet is fittingly military to go with more recent use of Large Tank in 1994 USP 5484157.
Multipath Chess Pieces. Suggests adding "multi-path" pieces to leapers and riders classification of pieces.[All Comments] [Add Comment or Rating]CVP has Billiards Progressive Chess link that shows Gilman is right that, as Queen can be double-pathed off one bounce (to certain squares), both Bishop and Q qualify off two or three reflections as dual-pathed. For Betza's Rose too, I think however return all the way to departure square after full circuit is better dis-allowed, though not a null move since they may be blocked. Thanks for suggestion of Crooked Bishop for follow-up, 'Multipath' being more general category than 'Leaper' or 'Rider' and having countless examples. http://www.thegamesjournal.com/articles/DefiningtheAbstract.shtml http://www.chessvariants.org/index/msdisplay.php?itemid=MSpartnershipcha
Recognized Chess Variants. Index page listing the variants we feel are most significant. (Recognized!)[All Comments] [Add Comment or Rating]I am the one who points out orthodox 'e4' creates the dread undefended pawn, as last time my comment 04-08-04 under Grander Chess. (Like Fergus Duniho's Grotesque's form of castling originating with Falcon Chess claims in the dark ages before CVP existed) And I also discuss how each of 2000 games within CVP can establish random openings creating millions not to say (facetiously?) a googol different games to play-test.
Unfortunately, as already indicated by intervening comment, a different philosophy governs CVP that I for one disagree with. It's devil-may-care, anything goes, Fergus Duniho somewhere likens it to '007' (James-Bond-style), no holds barred. Immediately, look alphabetically under 'Interview with Hans Bodlaender', and David Howe's question early on, relating to Duniho's Enneagram applied to Chess. They think one game(permutation) is about as good as another. In the interview, all concurring in Category '5' there, whose believers think 'Chess is like a box of Legos or Tinker Toys, mixing and matching various rules, pieces and boards to try out various possibilities. While 'Fives' may employ standards in creating their games,...' [and on and on] Fundamentally there are unconcern about quality, comtempt for anyone who does not profess to be or conform to described '5'; and anyway analysis, playtesting too much work the forms being myriad.
Robert Fischer's interesting last comment might be partially parsed or summarized as follows: a so-called 'prolific game inventor' is often someone who did not get it right in the first place and so designs, designs, designs -- eventually not even knowing whether prioritizing quantity OR quality. Maybe each designer should specify his/her one contribution to Chess, a single own recognized (self-created)variant, one permutation, to save everyone else time and trouble. Or, Roberto Lavieri's idea is better solution to the problem of 'bad game pollution': a top 50 (I would make it 20 or 10). If only 5 CVs are given close scrutiny for a month(s), to near exclusion of other CVs, (maybe in a special section for the period) then some filtering of a different sort occurs than your Game Courier popularity. Game analyses would then have to be made. Standards would emerge for both play and design. The simpleminded set heard from less frequently, the easy bromide assaulted by the rigour of precedent, the prima donna banished to the fringes, more serious abstractions could take hold; and none of Fischer's prospective dread lowest common denominator.
I think he might be Bobby Fischer. He talks like Bobby Fischer. 'Let a thousand flowers bloom and one hundred schools of thought contend' applied to CVs sounds fine, so long as not cover-up for totalitarianism or a great purge. Fergus, I appreciate reminder of your reference Juan-Romeo-Bond that I could not locate, a nice metaphor. Needless to say, having written 700 lines of Chess poetry, I think of Chess as more than one-dimensionally writing up game rules.
Two telling sentences in Fischer's last comment: 'A randomization of
quality does not approach an average. Instead it approaches the lowest
possible value since the definable nature of quality involves order and
structure.' How low? Probably low enough for Fischer to be considered a
'1' or '3' in Enneagram terms. (See Recg.ChVs. comments) Moreover,
there may be one Ultima-like ideal CV from an infinity of those, and also
one from the Carrera-Capablanca family, and so on, the ones actually
adding up to many games. A chemical analogy might be to trans-uranium
elements, having islands of stability, or simply isotopes, finite numbers
of ('semi-ideal') forms(species). By what standards for CVs? Many still
to be revealed or discovered, but one would be a full second row pawn rank,
at least as probabilistically more aesthetically satisfactory and more likely to be
associated with quality, if one will.To your comment on intelligent selection, Roberto, I like a quote by scientist George Wald: 'Several years ago a thought struck that at first seemed so aberrant as to embarrass me. That was that mind, rather being a late product of evolution, had been there from the start; and that this became a life-breeding universe because the constant and pervasive presence of mind had guided it in that direction.' I think Fischer's chess-driven comments too intelligent to be from anyone else; if he does not simply say he is not the grandmaster within a day or two, I assume about 50-50 he is.
Thanks to Robert Fischer for coining the phrase 'bad game pollution'. I address that problem a year ago under 'Slide-Shuffle' ( a type of Fischer-Random-Chess game). I think Fischer states the case better cutting as he does across several chess-related disciplines. His figure of 10,000 games is realistic, my projection of 10 to the 100th (googol) permutations an obvious over-dramatization. Yet of 2000 CVP games how many are examined thoroughly for playability? Not more than 5 or 10 have been analyzed for strategy, tactics, openings, end games except superficially. Over 1900 games are less advanced than 'mad Queen' (present 'FIDE') Chess in Andre Danican Philidor's day 225 years ago. Incidentally, how many CVs were widely known in 1750's, the time of Philidor's early playing career? 1750 is chosen conveniently as near halfway from 1475, the earliest date Chess may have acquired its now orthodox embodiment, to the present. Author of 'Analyze du Jeu des Echecs', actually Philidor was an experimentalist too, known to give knight odds and play multiple blindfold games simultaneously.
Because of 'bad game pollution' and volume (2000 games mostly unknown to most viewers), I think you need something like this. Focus on a couple games as being played, with kibbitzing, would be a start. I kibbitzed a couple GC games, but the players themselves stayed walled off without comment. No one followed your Tournament #1, not a single game in progress, just published declared winners. So you can make umpteen game rules, what else can you do?
Greg is already strong at Switching, so he would catch on to Rococo immediately. Those are my votes.
This could be from the same group who posted last April 1,2004, under 'Sue
D. Nym': 'Today 04-01-2004 the United Nations declared the game of Chess
against international law etc.' Or else Paul Leno of 'Gridlock' has
changed his style of writing considerably. Hopefully CVP will publish Leno's 3-D version promised after 'Gridlock'game within CVP.
I'm finishing my fourth win at Rococo now in GC; one against Lavieri is not recording. I think one annotated game played would be worth 10 stupid variations such as adding rifle piece to a perfectly-designed game like Rococo. That is Robert Fischer's main point in comments under Recognized Chess Variants and I take the same offense he does at designers derelict in their duties. Switching Chess, Strong and I are 1-1, so it would be tie-breaker. I'll save comments for the games you start. A tournament you would not want concurrent Kibbitz for players to see, but as I see it this is to explicate rather unknown games.
The Open Kibbitz games are under way in Game Courier and participants are free to use computer analysis. Tony Quintanilla suggested the idea in Dec.1 Comment where his last sentence refers to 'what I believe Kasparov suggested for human-computer competition after being crushed by Deep Blue (in 1997)'.It entails using computer advice throughout game and match, and they call Kasparov's idea 'Advanced Chess'. There were yearly tournaments of Advanced Chess in Spain, but I am not sure they held one in 2004.
Jetan. Martian Chess, coming from the book The Chessmen of Mars. (10x10, Cells: 100) [All Comments] [Add Comment or Rating]I somehow never work Jean-Louis Cazaux's article into text of my recent 'Multipath Chess Pieces'. Cazaux's Jetan description provides the rules I am most familiar with. Larry Smith's Jetan article is more difficult confronting as it does contradictions in interpreting the rules. However, I use a Smith version for Thoat, as non-jumping, both for being more effective implementation of the piece and for convenience to explore 'Multipath' topic. That way keeps fully six multipath piece-types from Jetan.
Novo Chess. War game chess variant from the Netherlands, 1937. (12x8, Cells: 96) [All Comments] [Add Comment or Rating]1937's Novo Chess' central idea is predecessor to Greg Strong's 2004 Chess With Terrain. CWT's Mountain squares really just holes in the board (like Jacks & Witches'), CWT has River and Forest squares causing restrictions. Novo has Water and Railroad squares only certain pieces traverse. Novo's Land pieces are mostly restricted from Water squares, but most land pieces use the railroad tracks. This game has 13 piece-types on 96, CWT 10 piece-types on 201 squares not counting the 24 Mountain squares.
Maxima. Maxima is an interesting and exiting variant of Ultima, with new elements that make Maxima more clear and dynamic. (Cells: 76) [All Comments] [Add Comment or Rating]A better embodiment than Ultima, to whose family Maxima belongs. Yet does Maxima have one or two too many features(rules), such as its multiple winning conditions? Or maybe it has one more piece-type than optimum for natural play.
Achernar. ACHERNAR is a mix of the game ALTAIR and Western Chess. (9x9, Cells: 81) [All Comments] [Add Comment or Rating]Achernar's pieces can conditionally switch to squares in a different rank at option, in lieu of a move. Would not that kernel of an idea be better embodied in a 3-D version? Relying on adjacency, variously defined, 3-D Chesses more or less try to extend 2-D notions(motions) to 3-D. Instead, think of a piece's moving to, say, the perimeter of a 2-D board, then being able to 'advance' to overlaying or underlying game board(s) (3-D levels) to a number of squares a la Achernar. Achernar certainly has unrealized potential if the too-numerous piece enhancements were scaled back. Hypothetical three-dimensional Chesses, relying on positional as opposed to motional criteria, would retroactively broadly include the fifty-year-old Alice Chess (though not 100-year-old Kriegspiel)too as notionally 3-D.
Vyrémorn Chess. Large variant on two overlapping square boards. (Cells: 132) [All Comments] [Add Comment or Rating]Is there not a GC preset for Vyremorn yet? It seems balanced with 14 piece-types on 132 squares, close to what is theorized for an ideal form (8-12%) most likely to be playable?
Altair. Altair is a modern game with an oriental flavor. (9x9, Cells: 81) [All Comments] [Add Comment or Rating]Altair, Roberto Lavieri points out, is precursor to Achernar. With ten piece-types on 81 squares, this may be where Reducer originates. Or does Reducer come from still another game? I notice that Mage re-appears in Maxima but not in Achernar. Why does a 'triple rank switch' work best in Altair and Achernar both? And why call them 'files' when standard terminology is 'ranks'? It seems to me this maneuver, inherently more powerful than say castling or pawn promotion, if only because allowed repeatedly, calls for an actual 3-D embodiment, as Lavieri suggests. Altair's piece-types are less familiar than Maxima's, which largely come from Ultima. The cannibal provision seems to be attempt to counteract the extreme piece mobility.
I would play Altair if you make preset, while thinking about 3-D. One of Mage, or Gryphon, movements is Falcon-like. (See Falcon Chess) There is slight overlap between Gryphon and Falcon in patterns and squares they reach. Since Rook and Bishop are long-range, Gryphon does not add anything, but in fact detracts from the various pieces' mutual effectiveness. In games with standard Rook, Knight, Bishop, the Falcon in my view is the natural complement, as it is the mathematical complement, making four standard pieces. In general, you would not want to utilize Gryphon, Lavieri's Mage, with Rook and Bishop. And Lavieri figuring out the same thing leaves it out of Achernar.
Kramnik defended his title 7-7 by winning the last game against Leko. December 4,2004, at ChessBase English site Kasparov discusses Fischer Random Chess: Because of 'volume of opening theory', 'several million games', Kasparov cites the 'possibility of playing not all 960 position but to downsize them in number to 20-30 positions. Simply pick a position and play it for a year. Next year a different position. In actual fact from the 960 positions 95% of them, frankly speaking, are poison to your eyes.' Pritchard's 1994 Encyclopedia of CVs, page 10: 'John Warbis, chess editor of 'The Statesman' proposed that a governing body should announce a new array on the first day of each year which would operate for the next twelve months(Chess Amateur 1928).' That suggestion was made 75 years ago.
Altair. Altair is a modern game with an oriental flavor. (9x9, Cells: 81) [All Comments] [Add Comment or Rating]The CHANGE is in the nature of a liberal drop, always available for Lion, Overtaker, Diamond, and Grand-Bishop. No licentious drop as in Shogi, and in fact no promotees at all, just the 8 piece-types on 81 squares. The HORIZONTAL is a more restricted drop applying to Pawns also. The Mage is 800-year-old Gryphon. I don't expect to use the bizarre cannibal provision. Three long-range D,M,B; and five one- or two-step K,U,E,P,L. In comparison, Achernar, having standard pieces, is weak sister.
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