H. G. Muller wrote on Fri, Jun 23, 2023 06:04 PM UTC:
I was running out of ideas for how to speed up such large games. And for the variants I had in mind (14x14 and 16x16) the ideas I already discussed seemed sufficient for making those playable. A fundamental issue is that it takes at least as many moves as you have pieces to move all your pieces. And it sems silly to have pieces you would never get to moving. I suppose that this would not be so bad if there was such a large variety in strategies that you would use different subsets of the pieces in different games, so that in the long run all pieces get used equall often.
I guess another way would be to incorporate aggressive multicapture, which initially would quickly destroy the majority of the pieces before they moved. So that depending on how the opponent would use them you would be left with different subsets of the initial pieces, small enough to use them all without making the game unduly long. E.g. a piece that would capture as in Atomic Chess, destroying itself in the process. Players would be under pressure to use these pieces quickly, while the population density is still large and the strongest pieces have not yet been traded, to cause the most destruction.
I don't like leapers with very long leap. There is basically no defense against those; they can attack you with forks from within a safe location that you cannot reach. If you make them lame leapers, they get too easily blocked.
I was running out of ideas for how to speed up such large games. And for the variants I had in mind (14x14 and 16x16) the ideas I already discussed seemed sufficient for making those playable. A fundamental issue is that it takes at least as many moves as you have pieces to move all your pieces. And it sems silly to have pieces you would never get to moving. I suppose that this would not be so bad if there was such a large variety in strategies that you would use different subsets of the pieces in different games, so that in the long run all pieces get used equall often.
I guess another way would be to incorporate aggressive multicapture, which initially would quickly destroy the majority of the pieces before they moved. So that depending on how the opponent would use them you would be left with different subsets of the initial pieces, small enough to use them all without making the game unduly long. E.g. a piece that would capture as in Atomic Chess, destroying itself in the process. Players would be under pressure to use these pieces quickly, while the population density is still large and the strongest pieces have not yet been traded, to cause the most destruction.
I don't like leapers with very long leap. There is basically no defense against those; they can attack you with forks from within a safe location that you cannot reach. If you make them lame leapers, they get too easily blocked.