Game Reviews by PeterAronson

You know, I can't see any reason (aside from restraint) why stepping pieces couldn't take advantage of chatter even if they can't create it (sort of like a low-power line mixed in with higher-power lines). Then, if a stepper could move to a square containing a rider's line, it could ride away on it! In that case, castling and Pawn-double-step could definitely generate chatter lines (and we'd have to distinguish between capturing and non-capturing chatter lines). Of course, chasing down a King supported by a Bishop could be rather difficult . . . <p> The above would probably result in a fairly crazy game, but it would also come closer to working with different armies. <p> And for the list of possibly unplayable games, I'd like to add <u><a href='../d.betza/chessvar/confu01.html'>Confusion 1b</a> Chatter Chess</u>.

This looks like fun! I particularly like that once you overprotect a Pawn by two (easy enough -- just take an unattacked Pawn and give it two supporters), suddenly it captures forward and to the side. <p> I find myself wondering if overprotection is calculated recursively. That is, when determining overprotection, is overprotection taken into account? <p> Consider the following: <blockquote> White Pawns at <b>a3</b>, <b>b4</b> and <b>c3</b>; <p> Black Pawns at <b>a6</b>, <b>b5</b> and <b>c6</b>. </blockquote> Assume white's move. Can the white Pawn on <b>b4</b> capture the black Pawn on <b>b5</b>? If you apply white's Wazir capture first, then it can (since it is overprotected by two, black not having a Wazir capture as it is only overprotected by one), if you apply black's Wazir capture first, it can not (since then the white Pawn will only be overprotected by one). Curious, no?

This is something new in a way, or at least something not often done. It is a game where the two sides, while having the same movement, have different board topologies to deal with in the opening and midgame, and I think it an interesting idea. Now, if there was just some way to determine if it was balanced . . .

Here's an amusing possible solution to the problems with this variant: combine it with <a href='../other.dir/alice.html'>Alice Chess</a>. <p> Here's how it might go. You add a second board, like in Alice Chess, except the 2nd board has reversed checkering: a1 is white, not black. When a piece's move would otherwise cause it to move to a square of a different color, it instead lands on the equivalent square of the other board. Thus Knights always switch boards when they move, and Bishops never switch boards. <p> There are a number of ways to handle switching boards: <p> <ul> <li>Alice Chess-style. The move on the board on which the piece starts must be legal as in orthochess, and the square on the other board must be empty.</li> <p> <li>The Plunge. A piece moving to another color may only to move to a square that is empty on their current board, then they plunge through the board to the equivalent square on the other board, capturing any opposing pieces they land on, except for Pawns who may not plunge to occupied squares.</li> <p> <li>The Switch-a-roo. A piece makes a normal orthochess move on the board on which it starts, and then, if the destination square is of a different color than the piece's starting square, it moves to an equivalent position on the other board. If the space on the other board is occupied, then the piece occupying that space is moved to the space just landed on on the board that the moving piece started on. This version actually allows Bishops on the 2nd board.</li> <p> <li>The Last Square. The piece's move is as normal, except that if the piece would land on a color of square different from which it started, the last square of its move is the equivalent space on the other board, and the move does not pass through what would be the final square of its move in orthochess. The last square on the board on which the board-changing piece moved from may be occupied by a friendly or opposing piece -- it doesn't matter as the moving piece does not pass through it. </ul> <p> I don't know which would be best.

I would have to agree that the Cavalier (Gryphon + Aanca) is a kind of extreme piece, but if you look at Ralph Betza's note on the value of such <a href='../piececlopedia.dir/bent-riders.html'>Bent Riders</a>, you will see that he rates such a piece as being worth slightly less than an Amazon (Queen + Knight) on an 8x8 board [Although honestly requires me to add that Ralph himself is not entirely convinced of his piece evaluation system, although in my experiance it is at least approximately right most of the time]. On a 10x10 board the Cavalier gains some additional value, while the Amazon would probably break even (Queen components gain in value, Knight components lose in value) -- so call the Cavalier a rough equivalent of an Amazon. <p> Now, would two Amazons be too strong for a 10x10 board? It comes down to a matter of taste I suppose, but I have to suspect that as Tony Paletta noted in a comment on <a href='../large.dir/full-double-chess.html'>Full Double Chess</a>, their presence would tend to reduce the minor pieces to cannon fodder (although there is fun to be had with weak pieces). <p> In any case, I rather like your idea of substituting Cooked Bishops -- the world needs more games with Crooked Bishops (and where, you may ask are <em>your</em> games with Crooked Bishops, Mr. Aronson? Err, well, the <a href='../dpieces.dir/fighting-fizzies.html'>Fighting Fizzies</a> have a WzFF as a Queen, and otherwise, they're all in the future . . .) <hr> I'm commenting on your comment here, rather than by e-mail as you suggested as that way other people can join in the discussion and have fun.

A very clean design with lots of tactical interest.

It's nice to see a game of different armies on a large canvas. It's hard to tell if it is balanced or not, but I wonder if balance is as important at this scale: both sides possibly having more material than they can effectively use. Or is 11x11 with 22 pieces a side too small for that sort of effect?

I would recommend safety goggles and a digital camera (to record board positions) as useful equipment for this game.

I could see times when you might send a piece up or down the elevator just to clear an attack lane.

<blockquote> 'The only other rule I can think of is that if it's your move and the other player is already in check, you cannot capture the King but you can play any other legal move you choose' </blockquote> This also deals with the discovered check problem in multiplayer variants: that is, when player A moves a piece that was blocking player B's piece, so now player B's piece attacks player C's King, and the turn sequence is A-B-C so player C never gets a chance to move out of check before being captured.

This does look like fun! It's an interesting question if it is better to play your Rhino and Headless Rhinos early, or to keep them safe in the box. Elephants and Great Elephants of course should come out and play as soon as possible. <p>As for Lint to Dust Bunny to Dust Demon -- you may have found another great train of evolution to rival Paperclip to Coathanger to Bicycle. <p>As for the credits, your stuff has long and often had a light-hearted (and erudite) touch -- you didn't really get it from me.

Honestly! See Jean-Louis Cazaux's page on the relative ages of 2-handed and 4-handed Chaturanga. It can be found at: <ul> <li><a href='http://www.chez.com/cazaux/chaturanga.htm'>http://www.chez.com/cazaux/chaturanga.htm</a> </ul> Neither Forbes nor Cullen are considered exactly up-to-date sources, you know.

You could have a version of Castlingmost Chess with captures -- when castling with a friendly piece not separated from the castling piece by friendly pieces, any opposing pieces between them are captured. You may still castle with opposing pieces, just not capture in those cases.

This is a nice idea, but the pieces you call Hobbits have been around for a while. For example, John Williams Brown called them Stewards, and used them in <a href='../large.dir/contest/cenchess.html'>Centennial Chess</a>; however, this is a nice use of them. <p> As for the 9x9 game, I notice that all four Bishops are on White. Now, some people like it like that -- consider Gabriel Maura's game of <a href='../large.dir/modern.html'>Modern Chess</a> which also has four Bishops on the same color -- but you still might want to consider something like Carlos Cetina's <a href='../varvar.dir/bcr.html'>Bishop's Conversion Rule</a>, when one Bishop has to change color on its first move.

I do like to see a good Chess variant with dice once in a while. So many variant designers and players have an attitude about anything with a random element which I suspect stems from delusions about the predictablity of the real world.

Nicely fluidly weird. Normally leapers greater than maybe (3,0) or (2,1) don't work on a board this size, but with <strong>everything</strong> but the King/General and Pawns/Sergeants leaping, this isn't the usual problem. <p> One thing I noticed is that it is very common for Pegasi to be exchanged, which is unfortunate as they are interesting pieces. It might be nice to treat them as like Lions in Chu Shogi (or Golems in Golem Chess, which borrowed the idea from Chu Shogi) and not let them be exchanged easily.

After playing around with this game a bit, it seems to me that the Great Pajamas are somewhat disadvantaged: the Box can pull out unlimited Bats, as long as the one per column rule is followed, and the Pajamas can keep pulling out Elephants, as long as there is only one of your color on the board at a time, but once the Great Pajamas have pulled out the Great Elephant, all they can do is generate Dust Bunnies and Dust Demons. It doesn't seem fair. <p> Perhaps the Great Pajamas should also be able to pull out an Investigator and/or a Cook. Cooks, as we know from Cheskers, are Camels (Long Knights). An Investigator would be a Nemesis -- a piece that moves like a King, but only towards the opposing Royal piece. Now, in Captain Spalding Chess that would be too powerful, so perhaps it could have a Nemesis that moves like a Wazir, but can only makes moves that would leave it closer to the opposing Box. If an Investigator is captured, it may be pulled out by the Great Pajamas again.

Actually, this game can be found in the standard Chess ZRF that comes with Zillions.

A neat concept for light game! A few questions: <p><ul><li> Is it allowed for a wormhole to form such that it causes a stalemate? </li><p><li> Assume a white Pawn on a7, and a wormhole on a8 -- if the white Pawn moves forward, does it end up on a1 without promoting? If so, can it doublemove from a1? What if it moves to a2? </li><p><li> Can a wormhole be <em>removed</em> in such a way as to put a King in check? </li></ul>

This is a neat idea! I particularly like the care that was taken to avoid allowing indirect checks by double-moves. (IE, the King being in check by a combination of both the opposing player's moves.) <p> I'll note pedantically that while this game might have been inspired by Alice Chess, it doesn't have the defining (to me) characteristic of Alice Chess that moving forces a change between boards. I would describe this more as a two level 3D Chess variant. <p> Chancellor and Marshall are both common names for Rook+Knight. The common name for Bishop+Knight is Cardinal, although Archbishop and Princess are used in a fair number of games as well (although Archbishop is also used for other Bishop variants). <p> A game with 6x7 square boards, double-moves and swapping pieces? This game vaguely resemble a distant cousin of <a href='..//42.dir/mulligan-stew.html'>Mulligan Stew Chess</a>.

Now that I've played this (Tony Quintanilla and I recently finished an e-mail game), I can say that it plays very nicely, but that the movement of the pieces takes some getting used to. This is not helped by the abstract design of the pieces, but I like the way they look so much that I'd rather not trade them for more helpful ones.

This looks interesting, but there's one point of the rules I find confusing: you talk both about the King being checkmated -- which is generally used to mean an inescapable threat to capture but not actual capture -- and being captured. Which is it?