Comments by nelk114

Giving the opponent two moves, knowing that he has those, is too costly, though. In the opening you might get away with it, but in a typical middle-game position the opponent would use those to make a hit-and-run capture.

To be fair, Fergus' solution to that issue is quite elegant imo, and even just restricting two consecutive moves by a single piece alleviates hit‐and‐runs per se. It may be getting away from the intended point of this variant to introduce a whole nother idea but it seems like a usable way of introducing multi‐moves into a mostly‐single‐move game without breaking things too much

Ski‐ is a nice prefix for general use (though compared to Grant Acedrex's Ski‑manticore, the Tiger Chess astrologer is perhaps less obvious as a ski‐ piece since it arguably jumps over two squares — in the same way the osprey is arguably a ski‑‘2.manticore’, to use Aurelian's term for lack of anything better), but it does make sense imo to have separate words for the simplest ski‐ pieces; Bicycle/‐reme/‐plane are nice enough in that they extrapolate easily for longer initial leaps (tricycle, pentareme, ⁊c., practical utility aside).

Fwiw, I tend to agree with Gilman's conflation of jumping ski‐bishop with Tamerlane's non‐jumping Talia/Vanguard/Scout/Picket (he selects the latter term), on the grounds that they reach the same squares, like leaping and non‐leaping elephants; the leaping is then distinguished by a prefixed word (that said, I would tend to similiarly conflate normal and contra‐gryphons and Renn cavaliers for the same reason, so I suppose that can be taken with a pinch of salt given general tastes here). Fwiw he also has an ‘‐on’ suffix for extending a radial leap into a subsequent slide (such that ski‐bishop/picket ≡ ‘elephon’, ‘trilbon’ ≡ notional ‘tri‐plane’, and things like Sowons (per Long‐Nosed Generals) are possible) — though he doesn't touch oblique‐starting pieces.

As regards atomic names, his ski‐queen ≡ Fagin avoids clashing initials, albeit being a bit of a specific reference; Picket and Pocket (≡ ski‐bishop/‐rook) have no such luck, though Picket is always substitutable as above (and both T and V are relatively uncommon initials for CV pieces) (and also, Bat does in fact have a prior usage, as does Quetzal)

The obvious remaining reason to favour static images over the interactive diagram is that the latter only works with Javascript enabled. I suppose the obvious(?) way around that would be to also have the design wizard generate a link to a Diagram‐Designer‐ or Scalable‐Diagram‐Editor‐generated (if the latter gets installed?) image and wrap it in <noscript> tags?

P.S. There is something very strange with the title of your posting, which is not equal to the title of the subject thread.

The same is true for the first two comments to be moved to this thread, when viewed through the main comments page (EDIT: and apparently this comment too; the comment editing form has the following warning above it: The ItemID 836609b4fd3c40eb no longer matches any item in the Item table.)

At the maximum

If we're extrapolating already, why stop there? You could always get the 3rd and 6th ranks involved too, maybe even the 2nd and 7th if you don't mind the pawns starting on switches…

And/or you could have some more switches of the Chess 69 variety along the top and bottom if that's not enough strange topological shenanigans.

Perhaps points accumulate from one turn to the next?

A potentially interesting idea, though I haven't had the chance to play it

But the first example is misanalysed: Bf3 is not Stalemate, but rather illegal as it equalises the number of pieces on the e file, allowing the black queen to move and give check to white.

The assertion about the e file wrt the f4 pawn is presumably a typo.

It's ‘outward’ in the same sense that the Shōgi Knight moves ‘forward’; only the most outward of the directions counts.

Arguably could be specified more clearly, but the diagram does imo clarify sufficiently which sense is meant

Fergus asked some time ago whether a piece covering the same squares as a zB but alternating between the move's arms (for which he suggested the name ‘Helical Bishop’ on account of the path's resemblance to a DNA‐style Double Helix) had already been invented. It seems we can now answer that in the affirmative: it's mentioned twice on this page, as the Zigzag Bishop. Betza also posits what Gilman would go on to call a Bruegel (t[Wzt[FAA]]; for which I initially mistook Fergus' description), as well as a piece (the t[FzDD]) ‘dual’ (in the Gilman sense) to the Harvestman of Seenschach which seems to go curiously unnamed in M&B.

He [i.e. the king] is royal, but can't be captured by displacement, he simply must avoid check.

Presumably this precludes Qe8; as I understand it, the proposed defense thus prevent capture of the defending piece on e7 (which could also be a knight) by having the square after it not be vacant (it's occupied by the king) whilst blocking the check (which is “as in chess”) as a Chess rook would be unable to capture the king.

Iow one can't ‘displacement‐capture the king’ (for the purposes of calculating Check) and capture anything else in the same move (except with a knight).

This whole checking‐differently‐from‐capture business is rather confusing

The ‘castling out of check’ case suggests to me another definition again: if we consider the restriction on castling out of check to be an extension of the restriction on moving through check — in effect that the K can be captured en‐passant on its starting square, upon having decided to move — then check for castling purposes would always be calculated with an effetive K move for the joker. Iow the move of the J, and whether it gives check, is defined at ‘touch move’ time.

For the case of determining checkmate or stalemate, that would mean that the J would give check with the intersection of the moves of all pieces able to move pseudo‐legally. As such KJK would still lead to checkmate, but with most other combinations of material the J would not give passive check at all. But in e.g. KJKQ the J would give passive check as a K. With more complex pieces (esp. those that can be blocked — particularly the Vulture of the large Apothecary games) this would potentially be position dependent. (And I think it's a little subtler yet in the hypothetical case of a game with both a joker and two royals with disjoint movesets)

Ofc this is probably horribly inefficient to program, provided it's even deemed to make sense (I like it for castling‐out‐of‐check restrictions, but I'm ambivalent between it and Option 2 (by Greg's numbering) for check‐/stalemate — it avoids the surprising(?) behaviour of HG's example where the J checks as a piece that's no longer on‐board, in exchange for arguably slightly greater opaciity of definition), so take it or leave it :‌)

This is very true, though a bit out of scope for M&B; while 3D boards seemingly fascinated him, Gilman apparently had no interest whatsoëver in 4D games as they are too far removed from human experience

Fwiw it's not only the Rumbaba (and ofc the Dicorn, Rumchick, extra Generals, ⁊c) that turns up on a Tesseract‐cell board: some of the (in 2‐ and 3D) hex‐specific leapers like the (1,1,1,2) Sennight (or perhaps it's a Foal? here with 64 directions) do too, though I think the likes of the (1,1,2,2) leaper might've needed a new name

The KAD goes back at least as far as the Pasha of Paulovits' game, and also appears as a Mastodon in Mats Winter's games and as Joe Joyce's Jumping General (How's that for alliteration?(!) )

The Queen burns like a Fire Demon here

Did you mean including passive burning as well? Only active burning is working for me (though Adam's Tenjiku diagram seems to implement passive burning too so clearly it's implementable as you described)

Playing about with this diagram I did seem to have run into some strange bugs:

• Passive burning works correctly, but not when the promotion dialogue turns up. E.g. Rook General g4xg13 from the opening setup survives even though it lands next to the Fire Demon. If I promote it then move it next to the FD again it's burned as expected
• Under certain conditions (it seems to be contingent on whether it's a piece's first move), promotion seems to become corrupted: it gives me the promotion dialogue, but doesn't promote it regardless of which option I select. Subsequent moves allowing promotion (into/within/out of the promo zone) likewise ask but don't react, and the move seems to permute surrounding pieces in an unpredictable way, often with the same highlighting as for burn victims, though sometimes on squares with pieces still (or newly) on them. I think this is contingent on whether it's a piece's first move:
  • 1. RGg4xg13=GG works (besides the above bug allowing it to survive)
  • 1. Pg5–4 Pg12–g11 2. RGg4xg13 similarly works
  • 1. Pg5–4 Pg12–g11 2. RGg4–g5 Pg11–g10 3. RGg4xg13 triggers the bug

The two bugs together also mean that a piece subject to the second bug can never be passively burned within the promotion zone

the knights cannot reach the centermost square

Afaict the second part of the N's move is optional here, so it may make one‐step orthogonal moves and thus access the central square if needed. So it's more a Rhino than a traditional Knight

Replacement capture should work normally

Can confirm that it does for most pieces, and indeed FD's burn after most captures, but FDxFD seems to suppress burning fsr

The same idea was also recently posted to the CV subreddit, where it recieved a bit of discussion; in particular it was noted that the game is practically guaranteed to reach the endgame

A minor(?) bug in the board‐size pseudo‐tags: the numbers are interpreted in two different orders. To wit:

• The Capablanca Chess page has a pseudo‐tag for a “10×8” Board; clicking this link leads to a query page for games with 10 ranks and 8 files
• Conversely, selecting any game in that list (e.g. the first of its Game Pages alphabetically, Gilman's Avon) shows that its board‐size pseudo‐tag is “8×10”, a link leading to the 8‐rank/10‐file query where e.g. Capa can be found

Minor at least in the sense of a presumably trivial fix ;‌)

While browsing I came across another couple of games with ski‐sliders: Quang Trung Chess has a ski‐rook from its third edition (except the fourth, where it's a ski‐queen); the comments on the 4th‐ed. page here also reveal Snark Hunt's Boojum, also a ski‐queen (and its Snark, which moves as either king or boojum but demotes to the latter when moving as such)

dozenal is a neologism in this context. On looking up the word, it describes numbers in base 12, which is not what is meant

‘Decimal’ is also often used to describe 10×10 variants, even though outwith chess‐variant circles it also seems to refer only to base‐10 numbers. Imo in this context the extension to ‘dozenal’ is reasonably clear

Speaking of neologisms, might it be worth crediting Charles Gilman for the names of the Gold/Silver Pashtuns? They are defined in Long‐Nosed Generals and used in Pashtun Shogi (Though the Silver pashtun predates those names as the Great Elephant of White Elephant Chess). The names of the Riders may or may not also be original to Gilman (M&B 4).

Idk about the other pieces; Marquis seems to be from King's Scirocco, and Caliph is common to both Gilman and John William Brown (in Meta‐Chess); The likes of Snaketongue and Wizard have credits given already

It's not clear, given the reference to Quadruple Besiege, whether you mean this to be played on the (twisted‐toroidal) QB board, or merely on a normal rectangular 8×16 one. Even saying ‘on two boards’ doesn't really clarify things in that respect. Obviously this has effects on e.g. the meaning of ‘forward’.

Have you tested this? The usual restrictions on double‐move games (stop on giving check, one move per piece per turn, ⁊c) are there to retain some of the clarity of the original game; w/o restrictions things like rifle capture and pieces which can reach anywhere on an empty board (or indeed one with relatively few pieces) in one move become possible, though since you mention the former that may be your intent? Probably it'll be a bit too tactical for most tastes

There can be some reverse variations […] the loser is the one who loses any last remaining piece type.

This seems like an interesting idea, though at first glance it seems you might have to do something to incentivise captures as otherwise both sides would just avoid capturing in order to stop any of their own pieces becoming royal. Perhaps as a Jeu Forcé (either total or limited to e.g. pawns)? Either that or have slightly‐different armies so that there are some royal pieces from the beginning

To contribute (hopefully clarifying, but at risk of doing the opposite) to the discussion of the pieces:

It is established that a triangular‐celled board is isomorphic to a hex‐cell board with one hex‐‘bishop’ binding inaccessible. On such a board, the usual triangular ‘rook’ — the same rook present here — becomes a crooked rook making 60° turns between steps (known to Gilman as a Longgirlhexer). The usual colourbound piece, moving in a straight line on triangles of the same colour to every second ‘rook’ cell is then equivalent to the hex ‘bishop’, while the usual ‘third’ rider, moving in a straight line alternating steps through the sides and across the corners, is a normal hex rook that can jump over the gaps (or, equivalently, a straight wazir–dabbaba alternator which I haven't seen named)

This game's bishop analogue is then equivalent to the crooked hex ‘bishop’ (Gilman's Longrangehexer), hence bearing the same relation to the rook analogue as the usual hex ‘bishop’ to the hex rook

The knight analogue here is equivalent to a hex dabbaba + hex ‘knight’; the pawn analogue is more unusual

Sorry if my comment has caused offence; this was not my intent. Nor was I recommending this not be published (as Ben notes, I'm not an editor so it's not my place to do so), merely noting some things that I found unclear.

In particular wrt the geometry of the board, your comment confirms what I thought; I just wasn't completely sure that's what you meant: your opening sentence simply says the game is inspired by QB w/o further qualifying what aspect of it, and whilst the beginning of your note refers (as does your response) to ‘changing geometry in space’, note that QB's shape doesn't change during the game — it's unusual but constant — so I thought it better to clarify which board you meant that to risk incorrectly assuming the wrong one. Iow your article (as you note) never mentions unusual geometry, but doesn't (to my admittedly conservative reading) deny it explicitly enough for me to be confident it's not assumed. And in any case it's a moot point as Ben (an actual editor) is happy to leave that aspect as is and you've answered my question here.

As for the question about testing, that's cool that you do! It's not unusual that people don't, which for some games can work OK (especially if it's intended more as ‘artwork’ or theoretical exploration than actual play, as some of us are more inclined to), but for stuff like this that's more unusual can be risky. I'd be interested to see some games, maybe even with some analysis, though idk about participating in a tournament — correspondence play is not really my thing; I'm more of an over‐the‐board player (and also I don't understand Russian, so I would have difficulty navigating the linked website).

As to alleged prejudice, I apologise if I've come across that way; the comments were not aimed at you in particular, merely at the page as I saw it. And I'd've expected, of all places, that a forum devoted to chess variants would be among the likeliest places to get these kinds of questions. Nothing personal.

@Editorship: it was briefly a thing for us non‐editors to explicitly disclaim editorship when commenting on unpublished articles; would it be preferred to continue doing so? Or (@Fergus I suppose) might it be worth somehow marking Editors specially in the Comments?; there is currently no indication of who is or isn't an editor w/o going to one of the special pages, and since People Don't Read Documentation…

Is anyone actually using this 'Alfaerie Animals' representation?

As far as I'm aware, not for Ultima itself (even the GC preset lacks it as an option), though some of its offshoots (Rococo, Fugue) and other games using its pieces (Carlos Cetina's Universal Chesses) use its Chameleon, Long Leaper, and Immobiliser quite consistently. Those games use a different image for the Withdrawer though (An ox, whereas the one here is used by David Howe for his Chess on a Longer Board with a few Pieces Added) and don't feature the Coördinator at all

Whether use in other games qualifies the piece set to be used on this page too is another question of course (though one could certainly argue for at least the GC preset to include them as an option)

The thing with the Piececlopedia is that the articles are primarily supposed to be about the pieces, not the names — so a page about “the Lancer” isn't really well‐defined in the sense you mean.

Some of the ‘Lancer’s you mentioned do have some history of their own: you've noted that the Lancers Chess turning piece has uses in a few games (albeit all by the same author); the (4,2) leaper, though rare due to its severe binding, has been used by problemists (as the Stag), as well as in a couple of games by Charles Gilman (as the Charolais); the Wild Jokers piece is more commonly known as an Alibaba, which already has a page; TigerChess' lancers are also well‐attested (most commonly as Modern Dabbaba/Elephant) though without pages; and the Pawn Shōgi and Starbound Sliders pieces are (apparently one‐off) enhancements of Shōgi's Lance. It might also be noted that there was a proposal to rename Betza's Fibnif (which also has a page) to ‘Lancer’

Of those that don't have pages already, the ‘Modern’ 2‐square leapers and the (4,2) probably deserve articles, assuming anyone is up for writing them; the one from Lancers Chess might as well (it's an interesting piece and the only one herewhich doesn't exist under any other name) but the fact that only one person has used it might disqualify it (though standards have varied in the past)

As for Falcons, George Duke's piece has seen enough use (not to mention an independent reïnvention) that it probably deserves a page; the fBbR Hunter counterpart (a.k.a. Hawker) might do too though a comprhensive overview is probably more difficult as it's very easily independently devised

@Aurelian

The pieces you're proposing, with, as you say, less emphasis on centralisation in exchange for greater power at range, remind me a little of a more organic way to achieve what Big Outer Chess was going for. I wouldn't worry a priori about a ‘lack of personality’ from being part‐leaper and part‐rider; even things like the Archbishop have plenty of character, and there's certainly a distinctiveness to such a dispersed pattern of movement

As for partial bent riders, if not the chiral ones what about Ships/Snaketongues or their sideways or (as yet unattested afaik) crabwise counterparts?

The compound cannon would indeed probably deserve careful handling

@Jean‐Louis

Your Godzilla is not particularly less new than your Simurgh/Qilin: Gilman gives the latter two as respectively Metropolitan and Ancress — and even uses them in Four‐Linepiece Fusion — though ofc it makes sense that you minght prefer to stick with the monster theme for the names.

That said, whilst duplication of ‘Simurgh’ is fine (Gilman uses it for the viceroy‐then‐bishop viceroy‐then‐rook which only exists in 3D (or hex)), it seems odd to me that you'd choose to duplicate Qilin, which is just the Chinese version of Japanese Kirin, i.e. the familiar FD

There was a little bit of discussion regarding the (4,2) leaper's names in this thread a couple years ago

As far as 3D (or in general non‐square) Betza extensions/analogues go, the only real problem is the different kinds of direction which don't necessarily correspond to the square‐board ones. But at least for Atoms that shouldn't be too big a problem: there's still plenty of capital letters left to go around; probably even enough to cover outlandish things like hex‐prism geometry if necessary

Directional modifiers (extending f, b, l, r, s, v, and the like) are more of a problem given the paucity of lower‐case letters left over

The ‘Zebrose’ exists already in theory as Charles Gilman's ‘Bezra’ (derived from a slightly tenuous pun on Horse/Rose). It doesn't seem to have been used in any games yet though (understandably since the rose itself is already awkward enough)

This one seems at a cursory glance to more‐or‐less match what you guys are describing? (The comments section demonstrates that you've both seen it at any rate)

Since the Knight “moves” two squares and “jumps over” one, I'd go with the first interpretation: a Tape Chess Knight is a single‐leap TC Bishop. Iow they are Dabbabas/Dabbabariders

And what will be, if we stick a tape together as a Moebius Ring?

(per the page)

Since the ring basically is 1D (no ‘almost’ about it) and Möbius strips are a 2D idea (albeit realisable physically only bygoing into 2D/3D repectively) nothing special would happen; it'd be the same game

Alas, Charles hasn't been seen here since 2016; I don't think anyone knows what's become of him

It's not the first time someone has suggested doing an editing pass on M&B; I've considered doing one myself and probably will in time

I wonder, though, if a Friend can pass on moves to another Friend....

Per the page, the rule for this is the same as the rule for the Orphan: a Friend defending another friend passes on all the moves of its own defenders

The interesting question (raised by Charles wrt the Orphan and Joker) regards interaction of distinct mimics: what happens if an Orphan defends a friend? Does it pass on its attackers' powers or (my preferred option but more obscure, especially if applied recursively) does it lets the friend move as an orphan (and thus as any of its own attackers)?

In any case, whilst interesting, this page is a bit of an anomaly: afaict it's the only piece in the piececlopedia never (yet — pending your idea) to have been used in anything, game or even problem

FyaqfF achieves the same effect much more parsimoniously, using the extended senses of z and q that H.G. introduced

Fwiw, if you're already referring to M&B, it might as well be noted that the AFX is already named there as a Gingaroo (extrapolated from Kangaroo as per Diverse Directions), though ofc that's a nonsense word so tastes may differ as to whether it's suitable.

I'd also be lightly surprised if it's been used anywhere before

BNNY

Very Betzan thinking :‌)

Gilman did end up proposing, a few years later, Rabbit as a Baronwise (i.e. 3D‐exclusive) Chu‐shogi Lion relative; Bunny was tabled later in the same thread for its forward‐only counterpart. They (and the Dukewise — and thus available in Hex — Bull) never made it into Man and Beast though.

The same would go for things like [D-fQ] or [F-fQ].

Oh that's neat; gives a nice shorthand way of describing the likes of Tripunch pieces.

Though it's perhaps not 100% clear (which might be what H.G. was getting at?) how this interacts with e.g. `[K-fsQ] for the gorgon (gryphon/manticore compound)

Gilman (in Diverse Directions) names those pieces Mara and Capybara, the largest of the rodents (to go with the established Squirrel and his Beaver for Silverman's/Cazaux's Cheetah)

While thinking this I came up with a compound leaper where the (m,n) pair is any irreducible fraction

Iirc this is the Problemists' Wizard, also found in one of the later Man and Beasts. Indeed, its rider the Witch (as explained by H.G.) has only nonintersecting rides.

I haven't read this in detail, and I'll admit I find long(‐ish) lists of pieces in alphabetical order difficult to make sense of (I've long held alphabetical order is horrible for everything other than dictionaries and list numbering) so I'll definitely have missed some things. A couple of cursory reactions though:

The double promotion thing is rare but neat, and having different pieces promote in different ways (even if to the limited extent it is here) likewise. I wonder a little bit about the memorability of some of the promotions, but then part of that will be lack of familiarity with the pieces themselves, and anyways the large Shōgis have it several times worse

Is the Bodyguard's Hia power even possible in the Interactive Diagrams?

Unless H.G. adds it as a Spell (I don't think he has already?) I expect not without effectively doing the same yourself

I admittedly am only about 98% sure I got his intention right on how [the Satrap] moves

I think I'm with the 2%; Gilman gives the Satrap as Steward+Steamer, the latter of which is mDcA (giving his “Wazbaba[…] capturing as a Fearful”), rather than what you seem to have taken to be mFcD which is the Stevedore. What you describe (fmWcD) is a nonroyal version of the Echidna (from Outback Chess), or Pawned Prince (using M&B terms), which lacks an atomic name.

Ofc it's up to you whether you want to keep the name and switch the piece, or keep (assuming you don't deem it too out of place — fwiw it seems fine to me) the piece and (presumably, to avoid confusion — even if with a nigh‐impenetrable source) adjust the name

Will move diagrams be needed, or are the text descriptions enough?

With the large number of unfamiliar pieces, it's probably worth at least putting each piece's image next to its name in the Pieces section; probably the moves themselves are mostly simple enough to get away w/o full diagrammes, especially since the long limited‐range moves would leave some of them arguably a bit unwieldy.

I would tend to suggest, though (as alluded to above), to order the pieces in some way more meaningful than alphabetical order; just grouping counterparts together would do a lot to give the piece list more structure and make it easier to follow imo

I personally like the second one better, but I rather expect that most people will prefer the first

Fwiw even for those who like the second figurine better, the first is not w/o its uses: it's a practically perfect match for the Orphan

Contravention seems like a much more playable relative of Parton's Contramatic (from Curiouser and Curiouser) with an orthodox set, if less conceptually pure. Ought to be worth a shot

Just got a chance to read through this; some things I noticed:

Melek is Arabic for "king,"

Which dialect is that? I can only find مَلِك (malik) — or, perhaps closer, Hebrew מֶלֶךְ (melech)

[The Emir] is borrowed from Robert Shimmin's game Scheherezade

Afaict it looks like this piece, as well as most of the other Scheherazade [sic] ‘Queens’, was not actually named by Shimmin; H.G. needed names for the ID. Not really sure how best to cite such a thing though

I'm actually not sure where the Snake originated

Betza's Bent Riders article. The shortening to ‘Snake’ is due either to Jean‐Louis or to Eric Silverman, first attested on these pages here

The Satrap moves [as mFmAcWcD]

I assume it's an oversight that you've switched the capturing and non‐capturing moves — Gilman's Satrap operates in pawn/steward directions. Not a big deal ofc; you can trivially swap the Satrap's and Ayatollah's names

the earliest place where I can find [the Arabic/Arabian Spear] is in Hans Bodlander's game Pick-the-Team Chess

Note that in that game, the Arabic Spear is divergent in pawn directions (i.e. it's a mfRcfB or ‘Pawnrider’). The nondivergent piece you describe I remember only as the Princess of several Gilman games, but I'd be surprised if a piece w/ that move wasn't in the larger Shōgis too

As noted in the Piececlopedia, the word "pawn" has its origin in the Sanskrit word "padati"

Pedantically speaking, the word itself only goes back as far as Late Latin pedōnem (pedestrian or footsoldier), albeit as an indirect calque (in French) going back to the Sanskrit term

The emphasis on Camel leaps is certainly striking!

pending someone pointing out that those moves are already in a game somewhere under some other name

Other names, sure: Gilman has Giselle; the unpublished Mirodoly calls it a Sagittarius; and Aurelian's Grand Apothecaries have closely‐related (albeit Duke‐Falcon‐style lame and augmented) Vultures. Use in other games, not so much: only the Apothecary Vultures, and those are the most tenuous. But in any case I imagine none of those (nor Gilman's Lookout or Hovercraft for your Aurochs and Impala — names which he ofc uses elsewhere for hex‐specific (and in the latter case also 3D) pieces) are much to your taste ;‌)

Since you more‐or‐less explicitly requested a comment on this from me… :‌p

It's certainly an interesting take on Random setups, quite different from the in some ways superficially similar Universal Chess due to Carlos Cetina. The main potential weakness compared to sth with a bit more player agency such as Pick‐the‐Team is that you're relying on statistics to yield a more‐or‐less balanced setup; sometimes it'll work, sometimes it really won't. And ofc especially with Different Pawns and Kings it's probably hard for any but the most experienced(!) players to tell in advaance how balanced a given piece selection will be. Obviously the usual strategies (two games, switching armies; optional Pie rule, ⁊c.) can help w/ this to an extent, but it's sth to bear in mind.

I'm not totally sure the ‘Introductory Rule’ is likely to be much help; defending against unfamiliar pieces is at least as difficult as handling them oneself (as I learned playing Metamachy)

Is the Arrow Pawn described as intended? As written it's a superset (which I recognise from JWB's Meta‐Chess, though idr the name and I don't have the PDF to hand) of the steward (which is not denoted as a pawn — though it's of comparable strength to — indeed in some cases perhaps weaker than — some of the other pawns)

Ngl upon reading ‘Gold Pawn’ and ‘Silver Pawn’ I was half‐expecting the Gilman pieces :‌p Also I like the Zombie Pawn — it's contageon as in Maka Dai Dai (and H.G.'s several spinoffs) but for the opposite purpose

Is there a special rule for castling with a colourbound corner piece, à la CwDA?

It's a small detail, but whilst I'm not normally a fan of the promotion‐only‐to‐captured‐pieces rule, the way it's done here is a nice touch :‌)

The idea of expansions is pleasant, and perhaps with physical sets (and to a degree with software) even makes sense, but in practice is there any reason not just to pick pieces from e.g. one of the existing Cetina UC lists? At least for regular pieces, since the Royal and Pawn lists for those games are perhaps a little anæmic (though again, one could simply merge the lists). Especially since the main point of this (in common with UC, and arguably Pick‐the‐Piece, among others) is afaict less the actual set of available pieces and more the way they're employed (although ofc the obvious counterargument regarding trying to compile a Canonical List of Pieces is always a thing)

While Brown found the Friend uninteresting from a chess-problem standpoint, I think it has great potential

It seems to me that, especially in these larger numbers, the friend may work much better in games than problems for the same reason that the Orphan and Joker are perhaps more suited to problems: they lack the interplay between the sides, and thus the owner has actual control over their deployment. Orphans and especially Jokers would need enough sufficiently mobile pieces on the board that it's hard to avoid granting them power (somehow not unlike Contramatic Chess. Hmmm…)

Any sliding piece — Archer, Caliph, Lady in Waiting, Mtawala, or Sniper, as well as a Friend trying to use their moves

…or fellow Bodyguard?

A Friend only gets the special initial moves of a Pawn if neither the Pawn granting the ability nor the Friend has moved yet (meaning it can only be done with the help of another Friend).

But how would that other friend get there? Surely if it got there on its own volition it would be considered to have moved, meaning can't have and therefore can't transmit the initial Pawn moves?

Does a Squirrel Displacement not count as movement for the piece being displaced? That would solve this, though it'd also make it possible (indeed necessary for the chain) for a Friend to gain the initial moves directly

the Friend can also receive […] the Displacer Squirrel's ability

So to be clear (purely for my benefit, as I was thrown the first time I read it), the Squirrel can still capture enemy pieces normally?

the Friend can also receive […] the Poison's poison

Iow a Friend captured whilst under the guard of a Poison annihilates its attacker? Is this optional (in the rare case, such as blocking check(mate) that waiving it would be desirable)?

Similarly, are rifle‐capture and/or withdrawal optional, if the friend is also borrowing from a piece that can make the same move w/o the special power? And (if only for completeness) what about Hia power?

gain[ing] moves and abilities from another Friend […] isn't necessarily reciprocal

This is a nice detail, which I'd missed in mỹ own thoughts about this piece. It'll be hell to keep track of though, especially if the false guard is by a third or fourth friend

Any piece adjacent to a Jellyfish cannot move, including leaps, slides, and rifle captures. However, unlike the case with the Bodyguard, this does not affect pieces merely moving past the Jellyfish

I've been meaning to put together mỹ own showcasse game for the (in my case catch‐only) Bodyguard (it's a really nice piece) and was likewise going to include a traditional immobiliser — I find the duality between a piece that impedes long range movement but allows escape and one that completely traps things but allows passers‐by quite pleasing :‌)

Normally, the Friend doesn't gain any of a piece's "special moves" at all, and under Mr. Brown's rules presumably wouldn't gain any special abilities from other pieces either. I've altered that rule for this game; pieces like the Bodyguard, the Displacer Squirrel, and the Jellyfish are here specifically to explore the possibilities.

Strictly speaking, having gone hitherto entirely unused, there's no precedent at all here, and I wouldn't be surprised if Brown's Orphan problems also lack other pieces with special abilities, leaving no precedent there either. And even the Joker, while more popular, tends (I can't recall any exceptions offhand) to be paired only with relatively orthodox pieces…

Of course the interaction of special powers with Orphans and esp. Jokers is substantially more complicated (what does it mean for a joker to imitate Hia power? Not that I don't have mỹ own interpretation…). We'll have to leave that for a notional ‘Grand Imitator Chess’ — I'll certainly give that a go eventually

I have to say I like this a lot. It's a shame it looks like a nightmare to programme; looks like playing it would be a fascinating experience :‌)

Does anyone know of any still‐extant copies of this?

can anyone think of a better adjective than "shoving"?

Depends; why ‘Flash’ for the bishop? Perhaps there's sth matching for that etymology

Are there any "forced movement" tricks that I missed?

A small plenty ;‌)

Slightly fewer tbf if you consider the various pushing pieces (such as Gilman's Shepherding pieces, Jupiter's Tanks, or the Ox of Ben Good's Elevator), and perhaps even Mats Winther's Catapults, redundant w/ the Rook(/Bishop/Queen).

But even so Jupiter also features a Doubler, allowing pieces in its range to move twice (albeit less forced mov't than augmentation cf. the Relay Knight — see also its Relay pieces and the (original) teleporter); Eight‐Piece Chess has, alongside its immobilising Jailer, a Sentry which temporarily takes control of an enemy piece in lieu of capturing it; and of course (among other Betzas) Nemoroth, with its Ghasts, Go Aways (which gain a Come Here counterpart in Jupiter), and Ichor, is built around ‘compulsion’ (i.e. Zwang). To say nothing of the (presumably out oof scope) Tardis and other perhaps less fantastical vehicles

Incidentally the etymology of the surname is quite the fun anecdote :‌) (and to be completely pedantic, Zwang is the noun; ‘to compel’ is zwingen)

Panda is reasonably well‐established already as a term for the slip‐rook, i.e. the piece which can stop on odd‐numbered squares on the rook's path (t[WDD])

There's one main thing left to fix, though it's probably Charles' error: The diagram for the Primate (WB, top right in the last block of diagrams) has a spurious sideways rook move, of a kind which isn't introduced until Alternative Fronts. Idk whether we consider that within the editors' remit though, esp. with Charles gone

Incidentally, the thing with the mathematical expressions (which you note here and also affects this page's degree signs ⟨°⟩) is the same problem as affected this page, among many others across the site. In principle worth fixing though it may be more difficult to do thoroughly, especially if people have edited affected pages in the interim

Per the description as an FO Fearful, the Fearless should have no retreating moves at all. I'd imagine it's a copy‐paste oversight or the like

For me, the tall knight is the only one of these that both suggests its piece (clearly the long leaper, starting where the Orthochess knight does — though I agree with Bob that it has wider applicability) and would fit in with a Staunton‐style set; I kind of guessed the last one (of the original comment) correctly from its mild rookishness but I wouldn't be confident about it; I find the 3rd and 5th almost indistinguishable w/o direct comparison (presumably the scale would help irl)

The king is nice enough for a very ornate set, provided it had suitably ornate companions to match; the chameleon is kinda pushing it tbh (and doesn't even resemble ebony)

The visual pun is quite funny ngl; I wouldn't have said either it or its replacement is terribly suggestive though

I'm presuming Mr. Gilman was using Metropolitan to describe a woman who does the opposite: living among the people in a city, being around them as much as possible.

Per M&B13, Metropolitan is apparently “a rank in many episcopal churches”, presumably the same as described here on Wikipedia; the connection is thus with the Bishop component in the same way that he uses feminine forms to indicate Rook components.

If you can somehow muster a Pallium that'd probably be about as on point as you can get; failing that, perhaps sth cathedral‐like? (Idr whether you've done a cathedral yet; my usual browser setup is reluctant to show the pictures and in any case seventy‐odd pieces is a lot to remember!)

Re Qilin vs Kirin

Fertile Queen is currently hidden as ‘unprocessed’, pending answers (which probably aren't coming, since it's been 3 years) to detail questions

I swear I've seen the moose pawn used, but I am at a loss as to where; I'll definitely keep an eye out.

I did accidentally (on a tangent after looking in vain at Universal Chess as the obvious candidate) find the Hydra though, in Mutatis Mutandis. It just moves as a knight here though (albeit one that transfoms into a variety of NN's); there may well be a more prototypical use.

I may or may not recognise the Shield Archer — certainly UC uses its components for the Fugue pieces; I'm about 50% on the Winged Cardinal (again no idea where though — maybe Charles Daniel??), and I don't recognise tha rest at all

EDIT: Raptor Chess's eponymous piece has an icon similar enough to the WC that I wouldn't want to play a game with both if it could be avoided, even if the different shape of the cross might be considered graphemic

It's an interesting board, but I'm not 100% sure how you're intending the pieces to move. Whilst I can sort of guess, I think diagrams would be really helpful here

Continued from another thread:

Wrt the favouriting threshold, I wonder whether it might be an idea for favourites to be weighted? Such that people with less discriminating tastes who have many ‘favourites’ are weighted less than those who make very selective choices? Seems to me that would incentivise keeping your list short while still allowing the flexibility to show appreciation for many games for those who need(?) it (to which ofc the counterpoint is ꝥ that's what Ratings are for, though those are completely lacking in discoverability and are vulnerable to the same issues). Ofc how to determine the right weighting (obviously(?) it can't just be inverse‐linear) is a potentially subtle question.

the situation where childish inventors would create a massive number of garbage variants just to create voting power

I'd imagine that's what the Editors are there to avoid?

But in general I agree that favouriting your own games is something that really ought to be earned; I'd be tempted to propose that could be factored in to a weighting algorithm too, though at that point it starts becoming really quite complicated

EDIT: looking at this comment thread I see that some form of more complex system has been proposed but at least Ben would prefer it to be a separate system; I'd note two things wrt this suggestion: firstly it would be more complicated, but only on the back end — the user experience (selecting whether or not a game is a ‘favourite’) remains identical; secondly, it seems a little odd to be proliferating systems like this — the Featured Games programme is kinda already on that threshold for me tbh, which is why I haven't really engaged with it (otherwise I probably would have been happy to second Metamachy, f.ex., though I don't disagree with H.G.'s assessment about diversity). Just because it might take a little more than 10s to invent a new discoverability system…

W‐then‐zB turns up as the Harvestman of Seenschach, used as such also in X Chess and Universal Chess as well as mentioned in M&B13, though Gilman never used it himself.

‘Crooked rhino’ seems (to the extent that the rhino itself isn't already crooked) to more closely describe what Gilman called Switchback

Strictly speaking of the names Bob's proposed for the Bt[WzB], only Disciple is not also given to a piece in M&B; the Apostle is a (cubic) qB (moving in rings of 6 steps like the hex Finch whose dual it is) and the Evangelist is another cubic piece combining Picket (cf. Tamerlane) and Eunuch (2 steps nonstandard‐diagonally, i.e. unicornwise).

Only the Apostle has actually seen use though, and it could be argued that unlike the Metropolitan (a name I was surprised to see again tbh) whose move is available on the usual board, these are less important anyway, being 3D‐specific. And Evangelist certainly suits this piece well

I could've sworn I've never seen some of those Utrecht pieces before: the winged pawn, animals with riders, bow and arrow, birds on hind legs, ⁊c are totally new to me fsr… and perhaps even more oddly the Boat (possibly among others) seems to be missing. I'm very curious where these came from

I have to agree about the original Cazaux graphics; while some of them are maybe not quite up to modern standards I've long had a soft spot for them. I'm really fond of the King, the pawn's slightly exaggerated design is rather neat, the Ferz/Wazir/Prince are indeed really nice, as is the Duke; and whilst individually I'm not sure any of the others stand out as particularly appealing (esp. compared to some of the other sets around) the overall æsthetic of the old diagrams that use them I find to be quite pleasing.

That said, I'm excited to see the updated set. And 400 icons (is that 400 or only 200) would seem to me to put it second only to Alfaerie!

Would Propagandist be too on the nose?

Agronomist is (sort of) Gilmanese for the 8:5 leaper (XBetza GXY). Though whether that piece is much use (arguably even in compounds) is a good question

And yeah the Reapman is probably pretty useless; a one‐square difference from what's already a much less interesting piece than the Boyscout.

The Harvestman also features in Cetina's larger Universal Chess (UC–170–13)

Methinks you've misassigned the ‘aanca’ graphic: in post‐Betza usage ‘aanca’ almost always refers to what we now call a manticore or rhinoceros — hence the four bishops in the icon; there's a corresponding four‐rook icon for the gryphon you seem to have missed.

Only one move apiece comes to mind for the Bat and the Panda: the former is a root‐65 leaper (8:1 or 7:4) (I'll concede it's mostly limited to Savard and Gilman due to its long leap, and the name is used for a few other pieces, but most of those are games far enough outside the usual (things like Halloween Knight Court and Capt. Spalding) that they almost don't count for this; which basically leaves H.G.'s large games, where it's as much a neologism as Raven is for its piece), whilst the latter is a slip‐rook (much better attested, with apparently only Onitama being an exception there; it's one of the pieces that might merit a Piececlopedia entry imo)

Of the PD images only the whales (particularly the second) and maybe the second ibis appeal to me; the others are either too detailed (a problem shared with some of alfaerie's arthropods, f.ex.) or a bit cartoonish to fit in with the rest

And I really like some of the new Cazaux icons; fsr I'm particularly drawn to the Tapir :‌)

I'd want to see them actually on a board, but at first glance going through them in isolation (and at a very inflated size) some of these are rather nice :‌)

I only just noticed it reading the card, but it's true of the page as well: you seem to have the Gryffon and Rhino the opposite way round from the conventional usage

See also Gilman's Fiancé(e) (and ofc the matching Widow(er) and Comedian/‐ienne); same logic, slightly further along in the relationship (presumably to avoid his slightly more narrowly‐defined boy‐/girl‐ prefixes)

I think this makes the first time I've seen Gilman's Caddied Pawn (your Axeman) in actual use :‌)

This would ofc be equally interesting with more different pawns on a larger variant

(and as for the name, I don't necessarily disagree about the ‘aka’, but either suggested name is fine afaict — and it's less verbose than some of the other games on these pages)

It is indeed a nice page, and about time we had an accurate description here without having to dig through comments!

I was wondering about the decision to keep the literal translations of the Spanish piece names rather than going with the animals (real or mythical) that they actually meant (not only per the illustrations but also per the textual descriptions), as per the translation notes on your own page. I.e. Aanca ≡ Roc, Cocatriz ≡ Crocodile, and Unicorn ≡ Rhino.

Also actual modern Spanish would have ‘Gran Ajedrez’, not ‘Grande’; it's one of a handful of apocopic forms used when preceding a noun.

Congratulations indeed!

I agree with Ben here; especially given that we have Tags for making the finer distinctions, it'd make sense to keep categories boader.

Your Diff-PieceRules suggestion would cover all of these adequately imo. And if we deem it useful we can always have Promotion:DiffPawns; Promotion:ByCapture; ⁊c tags (or Rules:[such]). Indeed we already have Fusion, Fission, and a couple of Promotion‐related tags

ranks and files will sometimes border each other along a common edge.

This is common among non‐flat spaces; most multiplayer square‐cell boards have the same property (indeed some are effectively on cube surfaces, giving exactly the same effect seen here), as does the board of my Spherical Corner Chess.

However, [the Astra's] shining debut is still not happened...

Well, the piece itself has turned up before, in a couple of minor Gilmans; it's the Newt there, following Problemist usage (extrapolating Frog)

To every second space (read more attentively)

‘Every other space’ means the same thing in English

There’re many hippogonal movers, pieces that ride orthogonally or diagonally; what if there’ll be pieces who ride hexagonally?

It's certainly an interesting way of describing the Hexmaster (previously described by Gilman as the admittedly uninspiringly‐named Short‐Switchback Rhino [EDIT: actually it's not quite the same piece; this one lacks the main‐orthogonal W step]), if geometrically a strange one.

[the Hexmaster's] trajectory is really like DNA chain

In a very different way from the Helical Bishop aka Zigzag Bishop (as named by Fergus and Betza respectively). I don't think anyone's ever combined the two ideas, though at that point we start reaching the limit of reasonable move complexity (and a full cycle needs a Really Big Board)

Axeman (also Halberd) is Charles Gilman’s Caddied Pawn

Strictly speaking Gilman's Caddied Pawn can only make the forwardmost captures (per his usual definition of FO). I suppose this'd be a Supercaddied pawn? It's not really clear given that the super‐ prefix normally affects the noncapturing pawn component too

Also whilst I apprectiate the attempt, using the name Aanca for the t[FR], while historically more accurate, turns out to be a bit confusing after it was associated with the t[WB] for so long. I'm all for avoiding it in the latter context, but in that case it's probably better to just avoid it altogether imo.

This was in fact the basis of an earlier Gilman name for the Newt/Astra: since it was in the centre of the Rose's circle, he called it a Rosette (and correspondingly he had names for the centres of other oblique roses).

Fwiw he calls the q[FD] (not valid XBetza, but valid original Betza as per one of the Really Big Board pages) a (curved) Alpaca.

The authentic arabic plural of dabbāba is apparently dabbābāt. But English doesn't usually bother preserving Arabic plurals so Dabbabas is perfectly fine and will be more widely understood