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Crooked Board Chess. Variant on a board of standard size but odd shape. (8x12, Cells: 64) [All Comments] [Add Comment or Rating]

George Duke wrote on Thu, Aug 27, 2015 03:52 PM UTC:Excellent ★★★★★

I just deliberately overrated a Good CV as excellent.  Charles, this C. B. should be kept on board so to speak since it's quite different from Zig Zag, and will look at some others you mention.  What does "super-square" mean? I knew in my first comment here, and have to recheck it to answer the question.  There has been already some detailed editing, for example no longer prohibiting d6xe7.  Why does it say 4 Pawns when there appear to be 8 Pawns?  "One foot in the grave" is actually good description I did not appreciate the first time through the Rules.  There are interesting features: 75% of the Pawns, that is 3 of 4, starting in back of their own file can promote in 3 moves. Things like that, and the lesson that Crooked Bishop itself really needs a strict four-sided board, or that pieces are both inhibited and enhanced by inside corners d4-style.  Also, is there then a chance by one Pawn to promote in 2 moves?

 In Orthodox circles there were two books about Morley's new shape mid-20th C., http://www.chessvariants.org/shape.dir/morley.html, and unusual boards are probably the underutilized sector of 21st C. CVs.  Gilman has many unusual shapes but the smaller the better such as 64-square C.B.


Finally, "not for want of terminology from playing"? That addition to (one of) the rewrite(s)  poses the following question(s). Did you play it and how does it play?

💡📝Charles Gilman wrote on Fri, Feb 11, 2011 06:42 AM UTC:

Thank you for a well-thought-out critique of this variant. A rewrite based more closely on cell references is on the way.

George Duke wrote on Wed, Feb 9, 2011 07:25 PM UTC:

For something different for a change, generate a random Gilman cv. 9.Feb.2011 is 40th day. Under his name Gilman 'A' has 16 cvs, 'B' 12 cvs, and this is the 12th 'C'. No one has commented or ever looked here. Start a Gilman from the piece-type section and then work up and down. Simplistic here: R,N,B,Q,K,P. The ''super-square'' here is c5-to-f5-to-f8-to-c8. It helps to say so explicitly. Parody of cvs in general, ''91.5 Trillion...'' would just state something like ''Boards with concavities and crookedness are possible,'' and dispense with both Intrusive and Crooked Board. Different styles. Now this Crooked Board is interesting enough. Pawns have different lengths to promote, either 5 or else 7 steps. Gilman's move-descriptions can reveal his being non-player in such as ''...pieces moving between supersquares with only a corner in common must pass through a cell....'' That is in the first sentence of the ''Rules'' and it is a substantial off-putter. It is like those indecipherable assembly descriptions that work perfectly by just throwing away the instructions and following the pictures 2-d to 3-d. Seriously just start with piece-type section, and each Gilman tends to fall into place quickly enough. Really Crooked Board has no ambiguities once understood. Crooked Board is below average of Gilman's 250 cvs and slightly above average for all 5000 cvpage cvs, for example, in the worthwhile prior links respecting others'. He should have added Zig Zag chess,
http://www.chessvariants.org/shape.dir/zigzag.html, but not now invalidating this sentence.
Also Romanchenko's, http://www.chessvariants.org/shape.dir/romanch.html.
Detail: 'd6xe7' prohibited?
There can be a million million of these can't there, crooked alone?

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