Cameron, I'm glad to play the game out for our own purposes, just as Joe Joyce and I hope to play out our games too, but without any bearings on Cameron's well-earned victory in this tournament. Thank you, Cameron, for exhibiting such tremendously great sportsmanship.

Your lavish praise of me earlier is much appreciated and made me feel already like a real winner long before our two games concluded. Thank you for that!

It really was part of my strategy to use as much time as I was allowed but I don't say it was a particularly good or ethical strategy. It may have created an aura of self-consciousness that wouldn't have been there otherwise and this may have detracted from the quality of some of the games, I'm not sure. But regardless, I, for one, learned a lot from playing in this tournament.

Thank you, Carlos, for organizing the tournament. I richly enjoyed it and look forward to the next one. I hope there will be another one in 2015 (I hope to talk with you about this, Carlos as I have some ideas about it; you mentioned wanting to organize other tournaments as well; let's discuss). I enjoyed the lucky games I played against you quite a bit too.

I would also like to come back and annotate each of the games played in this tournament. Perhaps a few of us can collaborate on that.

The tournament helped lure me back to the site and created a really positive turning point in focus, perhaps not just for me. I'm tremendously grateful that I was invited and allowed to play in it.

I tried very hard to win this tournament but I hope to re-double my efforts in the next one. There were points at which I wish I'd played much better (despite taking much time, overlooking some perhaps obvious moves) and/or taken more time to examine my moves (I see these time management issues as an essential part of my learning curve though) and obviously many points at which I benefited from others' blunders. I have a deep and increasing personal, vested interest in improving as a chess/variants-player. For one thing, I enjoy the athletic and aesthetic aspects of competitive chess.

The game Cetran Chess 2, like Tutti Frutti but more so, should help people appreciate that games with all different pieces are certainly as sophisticated as games with twin pieces. Cetran Chess 2 encompasses a nice range of value, with maybe four, five or six levels.

1) Knight (in its own beloved category).

2) Rook and Dragon Horse,

3) In its own category: Cardinal/Archbishop (which in some ways was the star of this tournament with its great mobility and forking ability),

4) Marshall/Chancellor

5) Queen

6) Sissa.

One could also lump the latter three in the same category as it frequently makes sense to allow exchanges among them. The exchangeability of pieces in categories 2 and 4 - 6 is part of what makes Cetran Chess 2 so fascinating. I think you really hit it out of the park with this one, Carlos.

Although the Sissa has a much more limited range than I thought initially (until the endgame it is very hard for it to go more than three or four spaces orthogonally), its tremendous forking abilities give it an edge, in my opinion, over all the other pieces, one that grows as pieces are removed from the board. If you can, I suggest to hang on to your Sissa! Too bad I had to exchange it in my last game.

As with all fairy pieces, I'm still trying to get used to it and even overlooked completely two of its moves in my last game (the ones prior to my opponent enjoying a sizeable material advantage).

The more I play with the Sissa, the more I appreciate it as a piece. It provides a wonderful and vital way of re-envisioning orthogonal and hippogonal distances on the chessboard.

Playing in this tournament gave me a renewed appreciation for both the piece and the game. Thanks again to you and everyone who played with me, including Sagi (don't be discouraged; thank you for conceiving of the idea of this tournament) and Joe (who is always a great player, designer and friend).

As a designer, I am inspired by Cetran Chess 2 to think about creating more games filled with diverse pieces and multi-tiered values. The randomizing keeps it fresh, but I encourage people to play both sides of each new random setup to make things fair.

I think it's a fun exercise for chess variant inventors to develop their own CDAs, kind of like a poet to develop his/her own haiku or sonnet. Obviously, it's not essential for poets to adopt "accepted" (but also merely arbitrary and conventional) forms. I encourage cv inventors with time, energy and inclination to do what Aronson, Lawson, Joyce and several others have done and try to come up with their own unique blend of pieces to compete against the ortho-Eurocentric one, e.g., what CDA might employ a GW Duke Falcon? I would LOVE to see such a thing developed and I'm sure some very nice ones could be.

A fun variant design contest would be for CDAs.

I hope to see CDA developed for other variants besides the ortho-eurocentric one such as the Shatranj for Different Armies alluded to by such as Knappen and Joyce and Tripunch for Different Armies as Betza has alluded to (I have recently myself discovered a Tripunch CDA currently in Beta Testing). One hopes to see more classic, exotic, fancier CDAs developed such as those by Knappen, Maxson, Makov, I myself, others and older ones fine-tuned with the guidance of computers such as H.G. Muller has been delving into...

I can't disagree more strongly with such people as those who take the ultraconservative Book of Ecclesiastes approach to variants and life, that "there is nothing new under the sun" and that "all is vanity and vexation of the spirit." There is so much yet to be discovered, looming just before us. Just look at the advance of science, technology, math, even art, music, literature, cinema. There is no shortage of inspiration. We do not criticize science or math for proliferation of new discoveries, new inventions, new understandings and neither should we criticize variants qua variants or professional chessplayers who specialize in particular variants. There are, of course, almost innumerable amazing chess moves, variants and pieces yet to be discovered...almost (cvts maybe suggests otherwise!? Is infinity real?!). In elaborating this philosophy, I call myself a pupil of no school but rather a student of every serious academy of variants play.

*The* case in point, this variant of Carlos's:

I am truly astonished at all the work Carlos has put into developing this chess variant, which attempts to be an homage to all chess variant pieces and tribute to chess variants / "variants chess" / chess qua chess.

Fantastic work!

I would really encourage all chess variant inventors who have the time and energy to play as much Universal Chess as possible and not only that, but to work on developing Universal Chess variants. I myself have big plans for this realm. The energy you put into it will reward you richly - at least, I have found it so. Universal Chess has provided me with phenomenal growth in understanding and appreciation of variants and pieces.

Even some of the pieces I invented for some untried "prolific" variants (upon my most recent return to this world, I am attempting a more measured approach to publication, preferring to update in some cases) only really came to life for me once I started to play Universal Chess and this, in turn, inspired discovery of more astounding pieces and designs.

The inventor sees this game as a parade of pieces and chance for the pieces to be put on display on the grand venue of 8 x 8. He uses the metaphor "shadowboxing". I want to see and help develop this concept grow beyond that.

In my own personal experience, I've found work on this variant most beneficial if regarded as a serious arena for chess combat. That may just speak to my own general philosophy, perhaps like that of the great Em. Lasker (whose philosophical works about chess as struggle I would like to read one day - I don't think they've been translated into English).

I award this variant 6 out of 5 stars or 11 out of 10 stars. You broke the mold with this one, Carlos. Thank you, with sincerest gratitude, for developing this universal chess "chess utopian" work. BRAVO, BRAVO, BRAVO, BRAVO, BRAVO, BRAVO, bravo, bravo, bravo, bravo, bravo!!!!

Jörg, I very much enjoy the game and exploring these pieces. You are a very good variant designer and thinker about chess variant fairy pieces.

I also like Quinquereme and I'm very excited one day to try experimenting with your CwDA army, Sai Squad (as well as your other CwDA armies). 

I am trying to get an idea for an estimate of the strength of these Nachtmahr pieces - I believe the Rose is strongest, maybe followed (in order of strength) by straight wide crooked nightrider, quintessence, regular nightrider, diagonal wide crooked nightrider and diagonal narrow crooked nightrider. Any thoughts? Maybe after more experience, I will have a better theory - these are just vague guesses.

How might the Nachtmahr army fare against FIDE? It's commonly thought that a normal nightrider is worth as much as a rook on an 8 x 8 board. I suppose the Nachtmahr army would handily defeat the FIDE army...

http://play.chessvariants.org/pbm/play.php?game%3DNachtmahr+vs.+FIDE%26settings%3Djudgmentality

If you please, what are the names for pieces other than rose, nightrider (qua nightrider) and quintessence? In your notes, you mention a French and German name but you don't say which piece specifically these names apply to...

Also, Carlos and I are having a bit of discussion about the Quinquereme - he created a nice diagram which you can see here: 

http://www.chessvariants.org/index/listkibbitz.php

I have ideas about some other nightriders one might develop for fun and a sort of game design for a Nachtmahr 2 (which I might call something more akin to "a dream") introducing some of these other nightriders.


Please email me if you're interested in discussing or as a courtesy, I shall email you when I've come up with an actual variant. It too will be a "study game" but maybe playable as well...certainly I am having fun playing Nachtmahr right now and it's, at the very least, helping me to become more familiar with how these pieces move.

'FOR LONGER SHOTS, some other friendly piece must spot the target by being ADJACENT to it or TWO squares away in an unobstructed STRAIGHT LINE.'

By 'some other friendly piece' do you mean friendly to the target or the archer?

The rose pieces and rose compound pieces designed by Abdul-Rahman Sibahi are beautiful.

[I see in the rules, it says this: 'Or you can put all your pieces on the first rank.' I will change the official preset to reflect this second alternative for reasons above.]

How many variants can one describe as achingly beautiful? Maorider Chess is delightfully rich, an instant classic, a charming gem, a variant masterpiece. The openings have the feeling of formal ritual, like a Japanese tea ceremony. By the time one gets to the middle game, each move feels like a profound thought, worthy of intense concentration. Short range pieces require long range calculations.

The dynamic of the extraordinary recruiting king interacting with the rest of the simpler pieces lends the game a rewardingly edgy, chess-like feeling. Why? Because one is always in this game thinking seriously about the usually conflicting needs for king safety and aggressive offense play, as one does in the sort of risky, double-edged chess games that the most successful professional chess players have often played (such as Semi-Slav, Najdorf Sicilian, Ruy Lopez, King's Indian). One thinks also of the first World Champion Wilhelm Steinitz's Steinitz Gambit (from the Vienna Gambit) in this context. Not to mention the centuries long romantic tradition exemplified by the King's Gambit's domination in chess! Never has a royal piece felt so alive (as in Maorider Chess)!

So...play it 'once...twice...once again' - this one is great.

Anyone who wants to play it with me, I have some invites up... email me if you need help accepting an invite.

Updated to describe a little more why the king in this game gives it an 'edgy, chess-like' feel. It may have seemed like me using the word 'chess-like' was redundant, but in fact, many variants have a decidedly un-chess-like flavor for those of us whose grounding in chess is traditional.

Mats, I think you may be suffering from what Gary Gifford calls the 'green eggs and ham' syndrome. You haven't tried playing this game. I urge you to try playing a game or two of this and then I think you will see that it is in fact, very playable and it may even inspire you to create variants with boards of more diverse types than the ones you tend to favor. I realize that the format may seem overwhelming at first, the 12 x 16 board, but I really don't think that you can criticize something like this before trying it. The fact that larger shogi variants have achieved great success in past centuries gives us a clue as to what may be do-able in the universe of chess variants.

This is a very enjoyable variant, very cutting edge. It features a number of pieces whose relative value is very hard to determine on this long board so, as Greg Strong remarked to me, it turns into a Chess with Different Armies competition where you get to pick your own army depending on the type of exchanges your opponent is willing to allow. I've become very fond of this variant, though I think it may be helpful to use an alternate piece set at least until one is acclimated to seeing the one Greg Strong chose in the way he wishes them to be seen. I'd like to get this alternate piece set added at some point to the original preset so that players can choose which set of pieces they want to use (not sure how to do that right now).

Fergus Duniho comments below that 'grandmasters who had extensive knowledge of opening theory' were interested in adding marshall and cardinal to 8 x 10. Fergus is right that they were likely trying to escape their narrow professional circuit into new frontiers, but the marshall and cardinal had been around for hundreds of years and different size boards, such as Turkish / Indian Great Chess were created to explore these possibilities. We are still exploring them today.

On an 8 x 10 capablanca random board, a number of new asymmetries emerge, distancing it from FIDE Chess. The bishop becomes more powerful and the power of the marshall over the archbishop is great.

What is the Falcon piece? Simply put: One of the greatest innovations to come along in hundreds of years for a board with a length of 8 squares in particular. The Falcon family of pieces perfectly complements the linear sliders as you can tell from this wonderful diagram George Duke created to illustrate their range:

Q  D  D  D  D  Q  D  D  D  D  Q
D  Q  S  S  S  Q  S  S  S  Q  D
D  S  Q  F  F  Q  F  F  Q  S  D
D  S  F  Q  N  Q  N  Q  F  S  D
D  S  F  N  Q  Q  Q  N  F  S  D
Q  Q  Q  Q  Q  X  Q  Q  Q  Q  Q
D  S  F  N  Q  Q  Q  N  F  S  D
D  S  F  Q  N  Q  N  Q  F  S  D
D  S  Q  F  F  Q  F  F  Q  S  D
D  Q  S  S  S  Q  S  S  S  Q  D
Q  D  D  D  D  Q  D  D  D  D  Q

I consider this to be the most brilliant and thoughtful of all progressive variants, a creation of true chess genius.

I wonder whether a 'Conservative Moderate Progressive' variant would work, where the rules for checks also applied to captures, so that captures were limited to one per move, as with Leandro's Chess. [Correction: In Leandro's Chess, if one wishes to check or capture, that is the only move one is able to make.]

A brilliant game, one of my favorites.

Time Travel Chess can be very sharp.

I suspect time travel must be entered into only extremely sparingly and at very decisive moments. Time Travel can be very fatal or debilitating.

There are three rules you must constantly, constantly bear in mind (like guarding against nightrider forks, they require constant vigilance).

(1) One is that pieces are lost in time if compelled by check to play a different move. One problem with this is that if you time travel with a major piece, your opponent might be able to frivolously check you with a minor piece right before the major piece is destined to arrive, causing you to lose at least an exchange.

(2) A piece can not be lost in time if there is a possible move. That allows your opponent to snatch pieces and / or pawns right before your time traveling piece is destined to arrive. With no recourse.

(3) When time traveling into the past, you must remember that your entire game will become twice as vulnerable if you have two times as many royal pieces that can be checkmated. I think I may have discovered a possible loophole to this, but if so, that will be saved for a later comment. So time traveling into the past may save you from a losing position, but it's usually a desperate measure.

I think the rule of thumb when time traveling into the future is this: Try to make sure that what you are threatening with the returning piece is likely to be greater than what is going to be threatened right before your piece returns.

Knappen is one of the best variant designers, and his work is a huge
inspiration to me. Kudos for an ingenious game with an intriguing type of
nightrider that moves as a camel every other move.

Here is a curiousity I discovered in a game I just started: 

If White moves the f pawn on the first move, black's unprotected pawn at
j10 is threatened by the Pentere, also threatening a nasty double check,
which would force the king to flee. j10 is an unprotected pawn. 

The problem with unprotected pawns in opening positions is not that they
make a more inferior game than otherwise for the second player. That's a
common misconception. It is simply that variations can be forced, giving
the game an immediate tactical edge sometimes not allowing for the
flexibility many prefer to have in their opening choices. For a large
variant, I don't that's a bad thing. 

Please note: The forced moves will only happen if one of the players
decides it would be of advantage to force them, just as it is optional
whether to create the sort of pawn structure which leads to an open or
closed game.

One of the best variants, certainly and Michael Nelson, I think, is also one of the best variant designers.

I would like to see an expanded (more complete) list of pieces added to the classes.

Also, maybe an extension for some of the more powerful pieces, as with tripunch pieces and cylindrical / toroidal pieces? Would be fun to have classes 9 and even 10.

Abdul, can you please tell me what you mean by superknight and supernightrider?

Just want to know.