Comments by AdriandelaCampa

I wanted to keep this game as simple as possible, but an optional variant could be played with the addition of Pawn twins, capturable the same way as the other twins. Each Pawn would have its corresponding twin on the other board. Keeping track of the pairs would become difficult as Pawns make captures and shift across the board. Over the board, different color poker chips could distinguish these stray pairs. Playing on Game Courier would require unique Pawn images of some kind.

Two simple but interesting games that do not have presets are Blackjack Chess and Rotation Chess.

I played a couple games of this over the board, and it was quite fun. The zip file seems to be missing however.

I have been wondering about piece values in this game since there are some interesting exchanges possible (e.g. Bishop takes Knight via demotion to Knight). I made a ZRF, but the Zillions values seem way off. For example, the 'pretentious' Queen is valued at about 29,000 compared to a full-fledged Amazon at only 19,000. Does anyone have a better idea of what pretentious pieces are worth?

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What are the rules for this game? (There doesn't seem to be a rules page for it.)

[edit: nevermind, I found the link to the Java.]

Good questions. I have obviously not done my homework for this one. I have now addressed the answers in Rules 5 and 7. Thanks.

And if you (or anyone else) have any suggestions for improvement, please fire away.

I'm having trouble writing a ZRF for a game that I'd like to test. I need a piece to change types when landing on square that will be undefended. But using not-defended? doesn't work because the square is defended by the piece that could move there. So, is there an easy way to do this?

Here are game logs of Moderate Progressive Chess.

Interesting commentary Mr. Winther. I agree with you about FRC, but why do you say that FIDE chess is approaching a crisis? I don't see how extensive opening study is leading to a crisis.

I created two logs for Losing Chess, which don't work because I entered comments into one of the code fields by mistake. The problem is I can't delete them. If Fergus or another editor could delete them, I'd appreciate it.

has anyone experimented with different opening arrays for Losing Chess? The first thing I would try is moving the Bishops to the center to prevent the immediate giving away of the Bishops.

Fianchetto Chess was the unlikely inspiration for my Swapmate Chess, in which you can go from FIDE to Fianchetto in only four moves.

Castling didn't seem essential for this game since there are squares behind the King for him to move to. Also, if I remember correctly, I tested the game with castling, and play just seemed a bit less dynamic.

I am in full agreement with both Fergus' and Derek's comments.

lol...I have a confession to make: that original anonymous post was mine. After seeing what a funny thread it generated, I had to take the credit...or the blame ; )

I recently ran across the entry for Berkelian C in the ECV, which consists of one rule: When a piece is unobserved (i.e. not defended) it disappears from the board. I'm not sure this would result in much of a game. But here is my development of this. Any piece that is unobserved (except the King) becomes 'cloaked'. Cloaked pieces cannot capture or be captured. They can only make a non-capturing move. Then, if the piece becomes defended again it becomes a normal capturing piece. A further development: cloaked pieces' non-capturing moves are made secretly by the player moving them by writing down the square they have moved to. I don't think you could enforce this last rule via PBM however.

Thanks. The motivation for my inquiry was that I ran across the entry for Atlantis Chess, which made me recall the Game Log for Atlantean Barroom Shantraj and wondering what the results would be like if the two games were combined...

This gave me an idea for a variant I would like to playtest: White moves and chooses two possible moves to make on his following turn. Black moves and does the same. White then plays one of his possible moves, and so on. If only one of the moves is legal, then that move must be played. If neither of the chosen moves can be legally played, then that player loses. This might be called Psychic Chess.

Another more convoluted idea is that a player gives a certain number of possible moves, say four, but must pick one (secretly) that he must then play on his next turn. Obviously, there is some luck involved in this game. This may make for fun over-the-board play, and the game could be named Multiple Choice (or Multiple Guess?) Chess.

1. There is no rule against a Pawn swapping with a King on the first rank. As stated, the Pawn will only regain the double step when on the second rank. Maybe I'll try to make this more clear.

2. Because the King cannot swap when in check, he is not much more difficult to attack. A King swapping with a Pawn in the mid-game will likely be exposed to danger. Hence, I don't think the game is too drawish.

Thanks for the comments.

I just realized that the ZRF linked to here is an older version than the one described. I tried uploading the updated ZRF again but the link still gives me the old one.

Yes, I have tested the game with Zillions and because all the pieces have additional Knight moves and Pawns are promotable to Queen+Knight pieces, giving the King a Knight move as well does not make him much more difficult to mate. And in fact a lone Queen+Knight can still mate the Centaur-King.