Comments/Ratings for a Single Item

Make your pages have a 'printer option!' That way I could take your data
home with me and actually use it!! Also, put a 'home' buttin at the
bottom
of each page, it would make site navigation easier... Thanks, Daniel

Another variant could be, and this probably exists under some name, to
start with two boards and two sets of pieces each. Except that there would
be no King on the second board.

Just a thought.

The game is very fun to play however.

Tomas

The starting setup of graphics version is wrong.
Bishops in 1b/8b should be in 1c/8c respectively.
Knignts in 1c/8c should be in 1b/8b respectively.

The game is wonderful but too complex to play for me.

Thanks.

Masashi Yamazaki

When you're implementing the rules of a game, you have to pay closer
attention to the consequences of the rules than you would have to just to
learn the game. This page omits an important detail I had to discover on
my own. En passant is possible only for a Pawn on the second board. When a
Pawn makes a double move, it moves to the second board. If it had moved
only one space, it would have still moved to the second board, and only a
Pawn on that board would have been able to capture it. Since en passant is
supposed to allow a Pawn to capture an enemy Pawn it would have been able
to capture if it had moved only one space, it follows that en passant is
for the Pawn waiting on the second board, not for any Pawn on the first
board.

Furthermore, I have deduced that a Pawn can be properly situated for
making an en passant capture only if it has never made a double move. To
be properly situated, a Pawn must be on a player's fifth rank. To get to
the fifth rank, a Pawn may make three single space moves or a double space
move and a single space move. With three single space moves, the Pawn will
be on the second board. But if it makes a double move and a single move,
its two moves will return it to the first board, and it will be unable to
capture anything by en passant.

could someone check out my game with Laila and advise on the situation - my
interpretation is that a move made on the mirror board will send you back
to the original board.  laila thinks opposite, that once on the mirror
board you stay there.

i have already misunderstood this game once, so i am probably wrong
again.

There is a Shogi form called Curiosity-Alice-Shogi.  I don't know who was
the developer.

It appears to play the same as Alice Chess.  Drops are allowed to re-enter
on either board.

In the Kibbitizing section of an ongoing Alice Chess game, I entered a
question about an ambiguity in the rules. If you have any expertise on
Alice Chess, please look at my question, which concerns the specific
position in that game, and help me resolve the ambiguity I'm concerned
about. The game can be found here:

http://play.chessvariants.com/pbm/play.php?game=Alice+Chess&log=quux-cvgameroom-2004-136-987

Moving Rook b1-b4 will block the attack from that Bishop.

Why not try King e1-d2?  The standard rules state that a King cannot be 
left in check, the move is legal for the King.  The only standard rule 
which states that a King cannot moved through an attacked position is 
while castling.

In standard Chess a King may not move to an attacked cell, but d2 is 
not attacked by the Bishop since it will be empty.  The King will not 
be present to be captured by the Bishop on the next move.

And I know that the rules in 'Curiouser and Curiouser' state:

'For example, the King may never move to a checked square on his board,
even though the transfer to the other board immediately afterwards might
actually move the King to a safe square...'

I've always used these stated rules but never really understood the logic
of them.  But hey, it is V.R. Parton's Alice Chess and he had the right
to establish its conditions.  But I've always wondered why.

First, let me mention that the ambiguity I wondered about is now resolved.

Turning to Larry's puzzlement over the logic behind Parton's rules, I
think the logic lies in what makes for best gameplay. There are two
extremes that each seem more consistent than Parton's choice. One extreme
is to count check only on the completion of a move, and the other is to
never allow any move that leaves a King in check before the transfer of a
piece to the other board. In contrast to these two internally-consistent
options, Parton chose to count check only when a move puts a King in check
before the transfer is made, and to not count check when the King is
already in check and the pre-transfer move does not eliminate the check. I
think Parton made the right choice, and here's why I agree with it. The
first option I described, of counting check only when a move is completed,
would make it too easy for a King to escape check. The second option, of
always counting check before the transfer, would make it too difficult to
escape check. In fact, it would remove all possibility of blocking a
check. Any move that blocked a check before the transer was complete would
fail to actually block the check, because it would be transferred to the
other board, where it no longer blocked the check. To make it neither too
hard nor too easy to escape check, the right choice is to not allow any
move that puts one's own previously unchecked King into check, while
allowing moves that merely postpone the elimination of a pre-existing
check until the end of the full move.

I agree that Parton's restriction does make the checkmate much more
easier.  But without it, there really is not a reduction in the potential
of checkmate.

Dropping this restriction actually brings the Kings themselves into the
end-game formulae.  With the ability to pin the opposing King with a King
on the other field.  There is also an increase possibility of stalemate,
if the player is not aware of this particular position against a lone
opposing King.

Now, I'm not advocating elimination of this restriction.  But variant
play might include the lifting of this restriction.

Yay Polgar! (Sorry I just had to...)

My question is that I don't get all those B-colors, N-colors and
P-colors
and how this gives eight. Can someone explain this to me again? Thanks.

At both Chess and Alice Chess, the Bishops are restricted to one half of
the squares. But at Alice Chess, this holds true also for the Knights, and
for the Pawns once they've completed their first move.

So you can paint the squares in eight different colors, each color
meaning:
This square will not accept:
1) the dark-square Bishops (OR the light-square Bishops)
2) the Knights which started on a dark square (OR the Knights which
started on a light square)
3) the white Pawns whose first advance was of two squares and the black
Pawns whose first advance was of one square (OR the white Pawns whose
first advance was of one square and the black Pawns whose first advance
was of two squares)

This amounts to eight different square types.
Something like:

   1 2 1 2 1 2 1 2    3 4 3 4 3 4 3 4
   5 6 5 6 5 6 5 6    7 8 7 8 7 8 7 8
   1 2 1 2 1 2 1 2    3 4 3 4 3 4 3 4
   5 6 5 6 5 6 5 6    7 8 7 8 7 8 7 8
   1 2 1 2 1 2 1 2    3 4 3 4 3 4 3 4
   5 6 5 6 5 6 5 6    7 8 7 8 7 8 7 8
   1 2 1 2 1 2 1 2    3 4 3 4 3 4 3 4
   5 6 5 6 5 6 5 6    7 8 7 8 7 8 7 8

Or you can have three ways of painting the squares:
light and dark as usual, in two colors I'm referring to as B-colors, to
separate the Bishops in two classes (1368 vs 2457)
reversing the colors of one chessboard, in two N-colors, to separate the
Knights in two classes (1467 vs 2358)
even-numbered rows of one chessboard and odd-numbered rows of the other
chessboard, and vice versa, in two P-colors, to separate the Pawns in two
classes (1278 vs 3456)
However, a Bishop can be captured only by a Bishop of the same B-color,
while a Knight can be captured only by a Knight of the other N-color and a
Pawn only by a Pawn of the other P-color.