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Decimaka (revised). Game where pieces promote on making a capture. (10x10) [All Comments] [Add Comment or Rating]
💡📝H. G. Muller wrote on Sat, May 21, 2022 08:18 AM UTC:

I now also upgraded the general Diagram script to get more realistic piece values for this variant. It had a rather complex algorithm for determining the contribution of promotability to the piece value. Which would determine the ease of promotion based on counting the fraction of moves that would enter the promotion zone in (randomly generated) test positions, and assume the product of this ease and the promotion gain would determine the probability that this piece would indeed promote during the game. (Assuming that pieces with a less attractive promotion prospects would have to be traded away to clear the way for that.) This of course gave rather non-sensical results if there was no promotion zone at all. In that case the Diagram now assumes promotion on capture for promotable pieces (as specified by maxPromote). It then adds 50% of the promotion gain if this is positive, and subtracts 10% of the devaluation if it is a demotion (assuming there are ways to avoid it, but that this avoidance does make the piece less useful).


🕸Fergus Duniho wrote on Fri, May 20, 2022 04:32 PM UTC:

This is looking better now, and I have unhid it.


💡📝H. G. Muller wrote on Fri, May 20, 2022 08:13 AM UTC in reply to Daniel Zacharias from 07:51 AM:

The Pieces section is slightly awkward to read since the promoted forms sometimes show up before the unpromoted pieces and they aren't arranged in any obvious pattern.

OK, I cured this by sorting the piece descriptions from weak to strong, and by putting the promoted versions near the end. For each unpromoted piece it now also mentions what it promotes to.


Daniel Zacharias wrote on Fri, May 20, 2022 07:51 AM UTC in reply to H. G. Muller from 06:23 AM:

The rules are clear to me. The Pieces section is slightly awkward to read since the promoted forms sometimes show up before the unpromoted pieces and they aren't arranged in any obvious pattern.


💡📝H. G. Muller wrote on Fri, May 20, 2022 06:23 AM UTC in reply to Fergus Duniho from Thu May 19 11:01 PM:

It's not clear what the rules of promotion are in this game.

Since about three quarters of the article's text is devoted to explaining just that, this is a bit disappointing. The Rules section is almost entirely devoted to explaining when you must promote, and explains contageon; and both the Pieces and the Notes section both mention what promotes to what. So what exactly is not clear about them? Is it that it should be stated explicitly that there never is any choice what to promote to?


🕸Fergus Duniho wrote on Thu, May 19, 2022 11:01 PM UTC in reply to H. G. Muller from Wed May 4 08:38 PM:

It's not clear what the rules of promotion are in this game.


💡📝H. G. Muller wrote on Wed, May 4, 2022 08:38 PM UTC:

This article is ready to be published.


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