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Comments by RobertoLavieri
Maxima. Play Maxima, an interesting and exiting variant of Ultima, with new elements that make Maxima more clear and dynamic.[All Comments] [Add Comment or Rating]Interesting game with some random elements. I have to see what is the relevance of the probability in this game, but at first I think that the strategic reasoning should be at least 75% of the things that are needed for a good game.
Jared proposal is very imaginative. I don´t still know how good or playable it is, I have to test it, but at the moment I have not a Scrabble set in my hands. Well, this Contest is unofficial, but I have had fun reading many of the very good ideas around this topic, that I considered difficult, but I have seen that people can give good things regardless the difficulty degree of this 'contest'. I must admit that I have not had satisfactory ideas, at least from my point of view, and other ideas of the people that made the attempt to do something are superior to my two thought games with the stablished rules, my ideas were somewhat frustrating, and my games are not very playable.
Straights. Chess-like Naval Battle game from the end of the 19th Century. (9x11, Cells: 81) [All Comments] [Add Comment or Rating]This is an interesting game, and ends are far from trivial. The observation I can see is that a draw may be the most possible result in almost all the games, if both teams play the game more or less decently, it is not so easy a win in many ends.
Nahbi Chess. Variant on 10 by 10 board with equator, Nahbi's and Archers. (10x10, Cells: 100) [All Comments] [Add Comment or Rating]I have played a test game against Zillions, and I liked it. Enjoyable, although the game was a little extense, around 120 moves. I´ll test it again soon.
Unicorn Chess. 10x10 variant with a new piece that moves as a Bishop or a Nightrider. (10x10, Cells: 100) [All Comments] [Add Comment or Rating]Unicorn Great Chess is excellent. I think the table of value conversions given by Moussambani is, gross speaking, correct. Unicorn value is a bit less than that of a Queen, and in a 10x10 Board the Queen value is more or less the same of two Rooks or three minor pieces. Lion value is approximately the same of the Bishop value, and it is higher than the Knight value.
Eurasian Chess. Synthesis of European and Asian forms of Chess. (10x10, Cells: 100) [All Comments] [Add Comment or Rating]It is not easy stablish the value of pieces in this nice game, because it depends strongly in position and in the total amount of pieces in the game. Cannon and Vao are very powerful pieces when there are many pieces in the game, but its value diminishes a lot once the game is becoming sparse. Queens are not very powerful in the initial moves, in fact, it is an uncomfortable piece when there is a high density of pieces in the game, but its value increases progressively when the game is going to simplified stages. This is a game with an initial high density of power, because Cannons and Vaos are very powerful at the beginnings. Kings are vulnerable enough, and many pieces can be tactically attacked soon, and by this reason material advantages are not as important than positional advantages. I am not going to give a table of values for this game, I think it would be of little help as orientation, the value of pieces is a function of position and the pieces in play in any moment. This criterium applies to some other games like Chess in a Larger Board with no so Few Pieces Added and Symmetron!112, between many others.
Symmetron! 112. Large version of Symmetron!, with a third modifier. (11x10, Cells: 112) [All Comments] [Add Comment or Rating]I have not tested this game yet playing against another human, I have played it three times against Zillions (Program: 30 seconds for each move, at the maximum level), and I can say that Zillions is not a very strong player, in fact, in some moments the program seems to be unclear in what is going on, the modifier pieces are not well understood by Zillions. This interesting game seems not very easy to play well, it is very positional, there are three modifiers that make the game deep and complex, and Kings are extremely vulverable, so material is much less important in this game than in FIDE-Chess. I am extending an open invitation to try this game. I´m a novice, and my possible contendor surely is going to be novice too, so I can´t expect high quality in the game play in this first test, but I´m encouraged to try this difficult game in a first encounter human-human.
Orthographic correction: Change 'vulverable' by 'vulnerable', when I´m speaking about the Kings in this game. My English is not perfect, but I think that it is the need of make the correction in this case.
TAG Chess needs some rules avoiding 'cities' protecting the untagged pieces, if not, the game may not end. Separate the Childs Chess looks very nice, but it mau be thought another initial setup, making the tactics more interesting, I think it is possible. Bifocal Chess and Dice-Mate Chess seems very good games too, I am going to try these games on a physical board with the help of my son, but I´m so impressed with Jared´s original proposal (Chebble looks fine!) that I told a friend of my son for a Scrabble set (well, it is in Spanish, but it is more or less the same) and I´ll see this weekend how well it works, I expect I´m going to test all the proposals on Saturday, I´ll be free to do that. To the others interested in the theme: all of you can give me a hand with your opinions and 'votes?'.
Tag four species seems to be enough. The game evolves in a good manner, and it is interesting.
I have received BIFOCAL ZRF. I have not open it yet, may be I am going to do it today. Thank you, Antoine!. All the entries are interesting and more or less playable, perhaps with very little details. I have to decide a winner (unfortunatelly, I´m the only member of the jury), but my preferences may not coincide with others, so it is possible I´m going to send the 'prize' (well, I´m not sure this is the correct qualificative, it depends on what good are the games to others), a ZRF of an unpublished and, at least, collectable game (I´m the author, of course, and I have three BETAS in hand to decide, but I have not games on the theme of the contest) to all the participants.
Bifocal Chess ZRF has some bugs, and it is not working properly... Please revise it, Antoine, when you have some time to do that. On the other hand, the game is good!.
ChessV
. Program for playing numerous Chess variants against your PC.[All Comments] [Add Comment or Rating]How difficult should be the implementation of Grand Chess as a variant in CHESS V -?. This variant is widely played around the world (The number of fans is not very large, of course, but it is not so little, I can say it is perhaps the most played large variant of Chess, apart from some classic regional variants).
Ultima and variants!, that should be great!. I think Ultima must be the first of the family to be implemented, and progressively it would be much more easy the insertion of excellent variants like Rococo, Maxima and Fugue. I think I´m not an expert, but I´m an (more or less) experienced Ultima player, and I can give you a hand about evaluations, openings and tactics (well, I repeat, I´m not an expert, but some things about that is better than nothing). I suppose you are going to need some time for making the skeleton of the game, when ready, you can e-mail me or add a comment, and I´m going to give you a hand on it.
You have permission to add any of my games and graphics!
Ultima. Game where each type of piece has a different capturing ability. Also called Baroque. (8x8, Cells: 64) (Recognized!)[All Comments] [Add Comment or Rating]Those values are close to the subjective values I have stimated, although evaluation of positions in Ultima is more complex. Immobilized pieces values are significatively reduced, but it depends also on the vulnerability of the Immobilizer that is freezing the pieces, and in the fact that the Immobilizer is also immobilized or not, or it CAN be threatened to be immobilized. Pince-Pawn values strongly depends on the whole set of the own Pincers and other pieces, if there are more squares where Pincers can take enemies after hypothetic moves, higher is the Pincer value, and in some situations the value of a Pincer can be as high as the value of some major pieces, if the mobility of enemy pieces is reduced enough. Ultima tendence is to be a very defensive game, so this must be considered in the evaluation of positions. Long-Leaper value is high if the position is sparse, without many clusters of pieces, but it is low if there are massive clusters and/or the enemy pieces are positioned on squares of the edges, usually Long-Leaper value is high when Pincer values are high. Coordinator value depend strongly on the position of the King, if there are many enemy pieces on the orthogonals of the King, the Coordinator value increases a lot, regardless the imminence of a capture. Chameleon value increases if the Chameleon can attack positions where enemy pieces can go if that can hurt a lot after the hypothetic move, also if Chameleon can Immobilize the Immobilizer, and this value can be increase or decrease depending on the vulnerability of Chameleon. The Chameleon value is high if he can threaten the enemy King safely. This is a game not very easy for position evaluations, but I can suggest that good defensive moves must add something, and risky moves that allows counter-attacks or augment the enemy mobility must substract points.
I have mentioned some basic conditions that can add or substract points in evaluation of positions, and sliding values of pieces based on positions and conditions may be important in this game, if you want a very strong program. How can slide these values up or down?. You can begin using gross estimators of adds and substracts based on the stablished conditions/positions, and then the values can be tunned by essay-and-error, running a few game tests (I´ll be happy offering part of my time doing it). Deep Blue?, I don´t think so, but it is possible the construction of a REALLY strong Ultima player, expert level, if CHESS-V supports sliding values of pieces and global evaluations based on positions/conditions. How good can be?. At least, it should be easy the construction of a program that can beat Zillions without difficulty (Zillions plays some variants superb, -if you don´t think so, try one of my games, DENEB-, and others very poorly, if you don´t think so, make the attempt of implementing Amazons... Zillions ULTIMA or ROCOCO level of play is not that of a novice, but I can say is not very strong playing these games, although it plays MAXIMA and FUGUE clearly better, in my game MAXIMA the piece values were artificially adjusted, but I´m not sure about all the reasons)
One of the problems with the game play level of some Zillions files is just that you don´t have tools for adjust evaluations, adding or substracting points based on positions/ conditions, probably, the program does that, but it is a closed evaluation made by a general-purpose game program, and it is a black box for the programmer. Zillions plays some games better than others, and it is not easy seeing why. By example, Zillions plays Grand-Chess clearly better than Eurasian, and Shogi original ZRF plays like a novice (Fergus improved a lot the Shogi game play using Zillions, but he have had to tune some values and drops, and it was not easy). I expect the next version of Zillions can add new tools to help the programmer work, it is a need for some games implementation, like Amazons and others. The idea is not a Deep Blue, I don´t like extremely strong computer opponents because it can cause some frustration many times, but if you want play a particular game, at least you expect it can offer a good challange. ChessV is fine, it plays really well the most of the variants, but it is not unbeatable. For me, it is an excellent challenger, regardless I have to lose not so few games, I can draw sometimes and once in a while I can beat it!.
Why Zillions plays well Deneb?. I´m not sure, but I think one of the reasons is because in the ends are many 'royal' pieces, and the program can visualize in a good manner complex tactics in which more than one 'royal' piece is attacked after some moves, but the characteristics of the game may also help. No, I don´t think so any basic program can play this game well, Zillions A.I. seems to be, coincidentially, well adapted to this game.
Achernar?. Yes, George, I coincide with you, any basic program plays this game as bad as me or any other not very experienced player, this is a very complex game in which I have medited in the last times, it is nice, but I´m convinced it needs some important reforms, because I don´t want this game for people that have to spend years training with it, I want the game for happy people that wants have fun once in a while trying it. I´ll work on it in the next future.
Bifocal Chess. A game without capture : win by checkmate with a neutral piece! (9x9, Cells: 81) [All Comments] [Add Comment or Rating]This game is very interesting and certainly playable. It is not easy construct a game without captures, without promotions or demotions wich can be a good game, and this is!. Enjoyable inspiration of Antoine!. Zillions is not a strong player, if you are tempted to try the ZRF implementation.
Contest to design a chess variant on 44 squares. Our annual N-squares chess variant design competition.[All Comments] [Add Comment or Rating]The voting dates must be updated. Are the first results available?. When starts the second voting round? (it seems it is not August 15, as previously stablished). If there are some news, it is not available yet, though. Please clarify.
ChessV. Program for playing numerous Chess variants against your PC.[All Comments] [Add Comment or Rating]This excellent program is growing fast, I have tested Grand Chess and Chess with Ultima and Rococo pieces, 10 seconds of time for the computer (Advancer Chess, Long Leaper Chess) yesterday night, and I enjoyed it a lot. I have lost my two Chess-With-Ultima games, but I won in my Grand-Chess game, in a very nice and difficult end of game. Congratulations, Gregory!, this is a great program!. I want to see how it plays Ultima, when ready, I expect soon!. For a while, it plays Chess-with-Ultima and Rococo pieces very well, at least for me, perhaps I´m not very strong playing these variants, the computer won without great effort, regardless I used the 'take-back' trick a few times, after clearly weak moves I made. This afternoon I am going to test some other new variant added. I like ChessV !.
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