Comments/Ratings for a Single Item

How about a quarterly Recognized Variant Cup on a random draw with direct
elimination, in which the contestants would play the latest Recognized
Variant, beginning with Alice Chess or with the next RV? (A draw would
qualify Black, and some players might have to play an extra match. But the
interest would be less to pick a winner than to get several hard-fought
games of the latest RV.)

I like this: once paired the contendors, they must play simultaneously
three recognized variants (perhaps with a few games added to the list, say
three or four), the games to play are selected by commitee in each round,
or by the contendors. One victory means three points with white, and four
points with black, a draw 1.5 points with white, and 2 with black , and
the player with more points pass to the next round. If equal, the players
must play one game more, selected previously, or by the contendors, taken
from the list of games.
The final round may ba all around, with three or four players...

I'm all for tournaments using Game Courier. I haven't brought it up
before, because Glenn has been inactive on this site. Apparently, Glenn
has been very busy. In a recent email he sent to the editors, he mentions
that he is still swamped.

I think something like what was done the last time would be a good idea.
Someone could elicit a list of games people are interested in playing in a
tournament, then base the tournament around the most popular games in the
list.

Is there any precedent in the Chess world for giving Black more points for
a win or draw? Unless there is a really good reason for it, I would not
favor this practice. Instead, I would favor giving out the same number of
points for a win or draw no matter which side a player plays.

Also, as was done in the last tournament, I'm in favor of not limiting a
tournament to official recognized variants. A tournament can be a good
vehicle for giving greater recognition to good variants that have not yet
become officially recognized.

I don´t know if there are precedents of tournements where the Black win or
Draw is overvalued, but it was only an idea trying to take fast decisions
about what player goes to the next round, without extra games. In Chess,
there are statistical reasons for suspect that White has a very little
advantage over black, seen the results of G.M. games in tournements. In
many variants it is possible that the little advantage is diluted, but in
other variants that may not be the case. I think that in some little board
sized variants, the White has advantage, but I don´t want to qualify it,
neither mention the possible variants I have in mind, because I have not
enough elements to judge. Well, if there are another good ideas for the
Tournements, welcome. But it may be good avoid a lot of extra games in
each round.

Yes, other variants than recognized ones may enter the tornements. in fact,
you can organize any kind of tournements, I agree that other competitions
where the variants are not fixed previously have been a success, but it
does not invalidate the possibilty of a tournement of recognized variants.
Then point is what kind of tournement we want as the first game Courier
Tournement, and that of recognized variants is a reasonable idea, but it
can be too a Tournement of variants elected by voting, each player
mentions ten variants, and they are punctuated depending on position in
the list. After the count of punctuations, the variants of the tournement
are elected from the lists, the variants with more sum of points. Why
not?. This idea is not a bad one, neither it is the idea of a recognized
variants competition, an Oriental variants Tournement, a Hexagonal
variants Tournement, a 3D variants tournement, or many some other natural
or interesting ideas. What is the first?. Why?.

If it's to be specifically a Game Courier tournament, then I recommend
that the pool of games people select from should be those games that have
had Game Courier presets made for them. Anyone who wanted to add games to
this pool could make new presets.

Any kind of multi-variant tournament or single-variant tournament would be
of interest to me. More than one could feasibly be in play at once. Game
courrier tends to encourage fast play, so this opens more options.


For scoring, there is no way to determine a fair score differential for
Black.  FIDE is the only variant where a deecnt guess of the size of
White's advantage is available, and even that no doubt varies by rating.

Not all variants even favor the player who moves first--my own Pocket
Mutation Chess slightly favors Black under the current rules.

I've created a page for starting a multi-variant Game Courier tournament.
Details are given on the page, and we can continue discussion of this
subject there.

Why wait for the end of the First Game Courier Tournement to offer new
Tournements?. I have seen that the traffic of Shogi-like games is high in
TCVP, so I suggest ask the community if there is interest in a
Shogi-and-Variants Tournement, and I suggest free fee and the prizes be
honorific mentions or another kind of non-monetary prizes, By diverse
reasons, and I have not nothing in favor or against it, sometimes some
people may dislike a little the idea of mixing games with money. The games
to play have been mentioned before, but other games may be added to the
preliminary list, and then the choice may be performed by votation. Why
not other experimental Tournements?, by example, a Tournement with games
in little boards?. It would be nice, interesting, and I expect not very
expensive in the time to finish!. If anyone has comments on this topic, I
want hear about it.