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Seirawan Chess A game information page

. invented by GM Yasser Seirawan, a conservative drop chess (zrf available).[All Comments] [Add Comment or Rating]

Mark Thompson wrote on Sun, Apr 15, 2007 07:27 PM UTC:

I rather doubt that we're going to address the problem of the future of chess. It will either evolve into something new and worthy without anyone's planning it, or it will go softly into the night as checkers and bridge seem to be doing.

The chief problem chess faces, in my opinion, is Scrabblization. By this I mean that chess has become a game like Scrabble, in which an enormous amount of rote memorization has become almost as important, or perhaps even more important, as strategic and tactical intuition -- and this is especially so for one making the move from casual amateur to serious tournament player. Like lovers of checkers and bridge, experts who have invested that effort are emphatic that they're glad they did. But that doesn't attract others to follow after when there are plenty of other strategy games without so much 'book' where they can hope to excel just by having a knack.

This is just my partly-informed opinion based on remarks I've heard from better players, so I readily admit I could be completely off-base -- I'm no expert at chess. But if I'm right, then chess has gone so far down the road toward Scrabble that, at this point, I'm suspicious that those who are experts have acquired a distorted view of the game during their years of study. Reading whole books devoted to variations on a single line of play, memorizing openings out to twenty moves, is certainly not what the inventor of Chess had in mind.

This is why I think something like the random-array or (better still) the player-selected-army variants are the likeliest future for chess, if it's to have one at all.

📝M Winther wrote on Sun, Apr 15, 2007 02:56 PM UTC:

So how can we address this problem of the future of chess? Not all players are attracted by Fischer Random, either, although it's a good training variant. Firstly, the standard position has a great advantage. White's position is slightly better so that he can develop an initiative. It is simply the most harmonious and best position of all 960. Secondly, an important part of chess is to prepare your own variants, and to acquire specialist knowledge of certain variants. This is all gone with Chess960.

Nevertheless, even if the problem only concerns professionals, it's necessary for us to address the problem. We can't allow the professionals to dictate the future of chess because then chess will become overly technical, like the examples of Chess960 and Seirawan Chess. This is obvious also among the grandmasters who want a shortening of the time limits, something that will also increase the technical aspect of chess.

Probably most chessplayers want a standard position to start from, and not too much anarchy. We must question whether it's possible, then, to improve Seirawan's suggestion, and introduce pieces that are less tactical than those super-knights. The Swedish Cannon is an interesting piece that introduces new tactical themes (there are, of course, many alternatives). Its value seems to correspond to a bishop. To simply introduce a single external piece by way of pawn-relocation could be a way of vitalizing chess. Between the rounds one can alternate between standard chess and the new variant: Swedish Cannon Chess
/Mats

📝M Winther wrote on Sat, Apr 14, 2007 03:59 PM UTC:

The problem with the Elephant (Chancellor) and the Hawk (Cardinal), which are known from Capablanca's Chess, and hundreds of other variants, is their tactical intricacy. They are super-knights, and in this capacity they can create a maximum of new threats: eleven enemy pieces can be exposed to new threats in one single move. A knight can threaten seven pieces (not counting the square from which it came). A queen can create six threats (not counting two on the diagonal/orthogonal from which it came). A bishop, and a rook, can create two. A Korean or Swedish Cannon can create three.

We know that amateurs have great problems with the knights, because of their notorious capacity of making double-threats. So how will they fare with eight knights on the board, four of which are super-knights? The Elephant and Hawk are ideal for professionals because they can make use of their tactical superiority, instead of having to slowly grind down their weaker opponents in long positional games. But will such a game really be attractive to amateurs? In practical endgames, especially, these pieces are practically unforeseeable for the weak player. I'd wish they had opted for pieces with positional qualities. Although these pieces are attractive, their intricacy make them inaccessible to the amateur. For this reason I am surprised to see how many variants exist that employ these pieces.
/Mats

📝M Winther wrote on Sat, Apr 14, 2007 05:53 AM UTC:

Perhaps it's about the same piece density, then, because Seirawan Chess has two pieces more. A Tutti Frutti zrf can be downloaded from the Zillions site, here. As Seirawan Chess is defined it's not particularly good, because the bishops gets removed too easily. These two variants are probably better. But one thing amazes me, namely the immense popularity of the Archbishop and Chancellor. Seirawan Chess has a co-author, namely Bruce Harper. Video clips of the Seirawan Chess simul recently held is here. They plan to create Seirawan Chess tournaments. What's so strange is that they cannot see the variant's obvious flaw. /Mats

charlesfort wrote on Fri, Apr 13, 2007 05:53 PM UTC:

Ralph Betza's Tutti-Frutti Chess(1978) and Karakus' Perfect Chess(2000) are also in the subset of those putting RN and BN on small 8x8 with all the other pieces, and they even add familiar Amazon(RNB) by just dropping one R, N and B. That's a lot of power density, whereas Seirawan Chess goes for higher piece density after a few moves, a slight tilt away from those two.

📝M Winther wrote on Wed, Apr 11, 2007 08:04 PM UTC:

It has to do with physical pieces: the elephant and hawk are
sculptural. They are depicted here. /Mats

Abdul-Rahman Sibahi wrote on Wed, Apr 11, 2007 07:05 PM UTC:

My only objection to this game is the names of the pieces. Why not choose the universally known names (Archbishop and Chancellor) and settle with it ?

Joe Joyce wrote on Wed, Apr 11, 2007 01:22 PM UTC:

The problem of patenting the unpatentable is unlikely to go away any time soon. We have the perfect example in a Carrera/Bird/Capablanca variant that has been patented in the US. To anyone who has a bit of knowledge of chess variants and history, the patentee's claims are patently false and absurd. Unfortunately, good lawyers and bad law support this ridiculous position, and you could get badly hurt and certainly seriously harrassed for having an unauthorized Zillions implementation. I feel a proper response is to utterly boycott such products and encourage others to do the same. The only other useful response would be to mount a serious legal challenge to the ability to patent games, but this is impractical and undoubtedly Quixotic. 
Thank you for the information. I, for one, will never play this game unless and until it becomes freely available.

📝M Winther wrote on Wed, Apr 11, 2007 05:50 AM UTC:

Yasser let me know that the intellectual  rights of Seirawan Chess are “pending” as patents and trademark issues are worked out.  If  the intellectual rights are approved the game will be “commercialized”, including a book and program.  Right now they are getting the physical pieces produced. It wouldn't be correct of me to publish my Zillions program, then. But it is a little curious since everything about the variant is traditional. /Mats

📝M Winther wrote on Mon, Apr 9, 2007 03:08 PM UTC:

I have now implemented a variant which doesn't allow piece entry when the bishop moves. This is done in order to make it more difficult to exchange bishops. /Mats

📝M Winther wrote on Mon, Apr 9, 2007 02:37 PM UTC:

I am sceptical of this variant because the bishops will tend to get exchanged too easily (by moving one's bishop from the initial square, offering exchange, while simultaneously guarding one's bishop with a hawk. As the bishop (especially when fianchettoed) is the positional piece par excellence, I think this game will be lacking in many positional qualities, especially since the Elephant (N+R) and Hawk (N+B) are such tactical pieces. Something that will help to remedy the problem is to restrict the entry squares of the Hawks. My suggestion is that the Hawk should not be able to enter on the bishop files, and, perhaps, the Elephant should not be able to enter on the knight files. In other words, the external pieces should only be able to enter when king, rook, or queen moves. (Trenholme implemented the same pieces on the Gustavian board. Perhaps it's better.)
/Mats

Abdul-Rahman Sibahi wrote on Mon, Apr 9, 2007 12:52 PM UTC:

Excellent concept. Sounds interesting.

(I wonder when where Seirawan first published this variant.)

📝M Winther wrote on Mon, Apr 9, 2007 06:56 AM UTC:

This variant employs a new(?) way of introducing extra pieces on the standard board. It is also described here. My Zillions implementation plays it well. This method can also be used in other variants. Seirawan advances it as a possible way of playing chess in the future. What do you think of it?
/Mats

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