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Huge variants[Subject Thread] [Add Response]
H. G. Muller wrote on Wed, May 17, 2023 02:29 PM UTC:

The idea to give the Ram a large speed without giving it a large value by giving it Grasshopper-like non-captures can be applied to more-valuable pieces as well. In particular the short-range leapers would benefit from it. When the Elephant gets an extra diagonal hop (FAmgB), and the War Machine an extra orthogonal hop (WDmgR), they can get quickly deployed to distant locations. I will call this 'air lifting'. The Prince could get this instead of the forward double step (KmgR).

With an adjacent blocker the air lift would coincide with the A or D jump the piece would have anyway, so on average this gives not many extra moves. So it won't drive up the value too much. An alternative would be to only give the pieces cA an cD, so that the mgB or mgR air lift replace the mA and mD part of the piece.

In a similar spirit, the Prince could get its non-capture K moves replaced by the move to the most-distant square on a Q trajectory. (Like in All-the-Way Chess, cKyafpoabQ). Perhaps stopping just before the obstacle is also more natural for the other minors than landing immediately behind it.