Comments by MarkThompson

Strip off HP laserprinter headers? Sorry, no idea on that one--not even
sure I understand the question. Maybe someone else knows.

The 'drowning rule' in Congo is original and interesting, but it seems to
me that it makes it awfully difficult to get an attack going. If you push a
piece into the River, your opponent has the option of immediately making a
counterattacking move that needs an immediate defensive response, which
forces you to lose the piece in the River. It almost seems as though
you're better off waiting for the other player to attack and let him be
the one whose pieces drown. Does anyone know just how the good players
avoid this problem?

Someone once observed that one of the general problems in designing a good
strategy game is figuring out how to force the players to be aggressive,
since many games tend to favor passive play unless a mechanism is
introduced to force conflict. This makes me suspect that Congo might be a
better game if the drowning rule, which seems to discourage conflict, were
revised somehow: perhaps, a piece (or at least a Pawn) should be allowed to
stay in the River one turn without drowning? Any suggestions?

Hmm. Some of these rules will probably need to be spelled out more. For
instance, it's illegal to make a move that results in insufficient mating
material. Does that mean that when either player gets down to a set of
pieces that can't be reduced further and still be able to force mate, his
remaining pieces become uncapturable? But won't the conventional ideas of
how much material is sufficient to force mating have to be revised, in
light of this invulnerability rule? And the fact that no move is allowed
that would result in stalemate might also affect the issue, I think.

More fundamentally, is it allowed for one player to be reduced below the
level where he could force mate, as long as the other one is not?

Another question would be whether people with high IQs are smarter than
other people. 

Chess and other mentally taxing games are said to ward off Alzheimer's,
which is somewhat related to your topic. I would guess, though, that if
there is anyone who doesn't enjoy playing chess, but plays it anyway in
hope of becoming smarter, then it won't work for that person.

'I think in this instance and only in this instance should you add all the
points of pieces captured in order to determine the winner.' John, you
could make a case that the chess variant played that way would be better
than Chess, and certainly you and your opponent have the right to play
that way if you like. The only caution I would advise is that, since those
are not the standard rules of Chess, you'd better make sure you and your
opponent both agree to those rules before you start, or else someone might
end up with hard feelings after the game is over. (This reminds me of the
aftermath of the 2000 election ...)

What would be wrong with putting a length-limit on user ID's to prevent
this problem from recurring? Perhaps characters like at and slash should
be prohibited as well.

If the players are cooperating, why do you need two of them?

I don't think I've ever used the ratings on pages. When I see a game that
sounds interesting to me I read it, otherwise I don't. Do other people
search specifically for highly-rated games?

If no one pays any more attention to ratings than I do, it doesn't seem
worth getting upset over someone 'forging' a high rating for himself.

I think you could implement something in Zillions that would work like this
game. My plan would be, program 3 players: the computer has to play first,
then the user, then a 'neutral' player. The computer's moves would take
place on an invisible 'side' board, then the human player would make a
move (not having been able to see the computer's move: you'd have to
close the panel that shows the move notations), and then the 'neutral'
player would make his move, which would always be to transfer the
computer's moves from the invisible board to the visible one. If the
transfer caused conflicts the neutral player would have to do something
complicated to resolve them. 

You could never have the computer move second, or zillions would use the
information about the human player's move.

I've read that the USA has an extradition treaty with Iceland also.

One possible drawback to playing any CV with a wagering system based on
putting a price on each piece is that it seems it would make the game more
materialistic. One of the endearing features of Chess is that its focus on
the Kings makes spectacular sacrifices for the sake of achieving checkmate
worthwhile. But if the point of the game is to end with the greatest value
of pieces still on the board, I think this aspect will be lost. A player
who hopes to win would play conservatively, trying to keep his own pieces
on the board rather than let their value fall into the hands of his
opponent, while a player who fears losing would try to make exchanges,
thereby reducing the value of the ultimate prize for the winner.

For whatever it's worth, I proposed a variant called 'Contract Jetan'
in a letter to a 2001 issue of Abstract Games magazine, which went about
like this: In Contract Jetan, a player could propose in mid-game some rule
change that would make it more difficult for his opponent to win,
accompanied by a 'proffer' of some tokens that would be added to the
ante if the opponent accepts the dare. Such a proposal would probably be
made by the player in a weaker position. For example, 'You must win in
the next 15 moves or forfeit,' or 'My Thoat can only be captured by your
Warrior', etc. If the opponent accepts the rule change, the proffer is
added to the ante and the rule change is in effect. If the opponent
refuses, then the player who offered it has the option of 'buying out the
contract' as follows: from the proffer he removes a number of tokens equal
to the excess of value of the other player's army over his own, plus his
own Chief's value, and gives that to his opponent; then he adds the rest
of the proffer to the ante, and rotates the board half a turn. Then they
play on, but having reversed their roles, and with the proposed rule
change in effect.

This variant is played in an unpublished work that ERB left unfinished,
'Corporate Lawyers of Mars.'

Greg Strong wrote: 'When exact refutations to every single opening can be
calculated, and are published, then professional Chess will no longer be a
game of Chess skill, but rather just a game of memorization. Ok, you could
still try to substitute Chess skill, but a person with a fantastic memory
will probalby clean your clock.'

Indeed, I feel we have already witnessed the Scrabble-ization of Chess:
the step from amateur to tournament player already requires loads of rote
memorization. However, if we switch to Grand Chess the number of openings
will be far greater and hence harder to learn, for any human being
(without cyborg cortical implants); if we switch to any variant with a
large number of variable opening setups, I think it will be impossible. 

The objection someone made to Mercenary Chess that whatever makes the
'best' army and opening setup would be soon discovered misses one of the
points: the best army and opening setup for White would depend on the army
and opening setup Black is using, and vice versa; hence if they choose
them one piece at a time it would be unlikely that the same one would
always be used. Also, remember that there's a 'catalog' of pieces with
prices: I should have stipulated that the catalog offerings and prices
would continually be reviewed by the World Mercenary Chess Federation,
which would periodically raise the prices of pieces in the greatest demand
and lower the prices of pieces no one wants to hire. Also the WMCF might
introduce new pieces from time to time. Hence, I don't believe exhaustion
could ever happen.

Computers may play better than humans. But we're still a long way from
building a machine that can enjoy the game as much as we can.

Does anyone have any quantitative information about the advantage White has
over Black? The kind of thing I'd like to know is: supposing two
experienced, average rated players, with equal ratings, play many games
against each other until 100 games have ended decisively (not in draws),
how many should we expect to have been won by White? Is it 55-45, or
60-40, or what? Supposing our pair of equal players were more skilled than
average, does that make it closer or farther to 50-50?

Another thing that would be of interest: supposing we experiment with
matching many pairs of unequally-rated players, with the stronger player
playing Black, until we find pairs in which the White-win, Black-win ratio
is 50-50: will we find any consistency in the number of rating points that
separate the two players? Does playing White worth 20 points to your
rating? 40 points? 100 points??