Single Comment

> Please note that I did not take into account the 'newcomer vs. veteran'
criteria when I made the above groupings ....
 
Excellent.  That is, I feel, how it should be.
 
I feel that each entry should be judged on the entry itself, with
absolutely no facet of the assessment process being based on whether the
author is an experienced author of chess variant games or is a newcomer.

It may, however, be that the experience of people who will be acting as
judges should be taken into account in assigning judges to each of the
various groups of games.  That, however, is not at all the same as
assigning a game based upon its author's experience.
 
I seem to remember that the first rules of the 84 Spaces Contest seemed to
imply that each entrant was required to participate in the judging.  That
then went when the rules were changed.  Now that the rules have
effectively been changed again so as to involve entrants in the judging,
could there please be, for the avoidance of doubt, a clear statement as to
whether an entrant is once again now required to participate in the
judging or if participating in the judging is optional.

I hope that the chess variants pages do not slip into that awful practice
of the news media and some magazines of referring to a person by just his
or her surname rather than stating either a first name or a formal style
in front of the surname.