Comments by A. M. DeWitt

I think the more important question is whether (some of the) power pieces should be subject to some anti-trading. In original Dai this was not the case, but that could be one of the reasons it was replaced by Chu in terms of popularity. Tenjiku Shogi also has no anti-trading rules. But I actually played that, and even after trading away the Fire Demons and neutralizing the danger of the jumping generals it remains an enormously tense game, because you can get back a Fire Demon through promotion. Which creates an immediately winning imbalance. The Water Buffalo's themselves are only average pieces (by Tenjuku standards), and are not easily traded. So equiping some less important pieces with decisive promotions might be an alternative to anti-trading for keeping a large game exciting.

I think I will go down the Tenjiku path with Reiwa Dai Shogi, but include moves that reference all the moves found in the historical large variants in some way (including Ko and Taikyoku Shogi), but perhaps in more modest amounts. Here are some of my ideas for the new moves:

• Half-Hook Move (RyasRyasW or ByasByasF), a more workable version of the normal Hook Move.
• Jumping Igui (cabS, cabD, cabA, cabN), referencing Ko Shogi's shooting pieces
• Burn (spellZone = F or W)
• Some sort of sliding jump to reference Tenjiku Shogi's jumping sliders
• Some sort of area move to reference Tenjiku Shogi's area move

I discovered one last bug. The highlights of the crosses for the royal pieces and anti-trading rules are no longer being displayed correctly.

Bug Example shown below. To replicate, simply move the Lions close to each other or the King close to an enemy piece.

Tenjiku Shogi also has no anti-trading rules. But I actually played that, and even after trading away the Fire Demons and neutralizing the danger of the jumping generals it remains an enormously tense game, because you can get back a Fire Demon through promotion. Which creates an immediately winning imbalance. The Water Buffalo's themselves are only average pieces (by Tenjuku standards), and are not easily traded. So equiping some less important pieces with decisive promotions might be an alternative to anti-trading for keeping a large game exciting.

It also helps that both the Fire Demon and Water Buffalo come in pairs, and are both sliders.

Since there are several bugs at once, I'll leave you be.

I might post new diagrams of my ideas in the future, for which you can weigh in as you see fit.

My only reservation is that introducing any form of burning makes it more a Tenjiku-Shogi variant than a Dai-Shogi variant. If it was up to me I would prefer to only use moves of a type that are already in Dai Shogi. A quite strong piece without solo-mating capability could be made by enhancing a Queen with linear two-leg moves like exist on the Horned Falcon and Soaring Eagle.

This logic kind of falls flat, since Tengu Dai Shogi does the same thing with hook moves and Lion Dog moves and is still considered a Dai Shogi variant. Queen+Lion could work for the power piece though (I'm no longer concerned about avoiding lone mating as long as there is still some difficulty in doing so).

I also found another bug where a piece that promotes to a burner doesn't show in the promotion options and then promotes to a white burner if the moving piece was black. Take for example the Chess Knight in the diagram in my last comment.

[Edit]: Pieces that promote to burners upon being asked for promotion choice (at least for Shogi-style promotion) will also burn pieces regardless of whether promotion is accepted or deferred, even if the original piece does not burn.

Thanks.

I was thinking about having a short-range burning piece, which burns diagonally adjacent pieces, like what the Fire Dragon does in Minjiku Shogi. This creates the desired power gap while still allowing adequete defense against the power piece, even without jumping sliders. An example is shown below.

Also, I noticed a weird bug where for burning pieces the diagram would stop generating moves early on normal board with no holes if the burning piece gets close enough to the board edge. For an example, go to the Tenjiku Shogi page move one of Sente's Fire Demon towards the top board edge. With enough messing around you should see the highlight generation fritz out when a Fire Demon is highlighted.

I intend to keep all pieces that appear in Chu as they appear in that game, with the exception that the Lion-trading rules would be applied to the new power piece (PP for short). I was considering including a Lion Dog and Hook Movers. The 2-out-1-in move can be pretty easily defended against by placing a ranging piece behind the victim. But since that piece is pretty similar to the Lion and Tengu Dai Shogi already had that, I wanted something new.

I was initially thinking about doing some sort of short-range Ko Shogi-like rifle capture where the normal move cannot capture and the capturing move is an igui move, but also allowing both to be done once per move in any order. This creates the desired power gap between the Lion and the PP (power piece) when the non-capturing move is mKmNmAmD (Full Betza: KmNmScafmFcaba(mpa)1mK(mpa)1mpacabmK).

However, that raises a question: For locust movers that capture only once, do you need a bridge-capture-threshold exception like the Lion does in Chu Shogi?

Thanks.

All that would be left to do is figure out how to change the color of the SVGs. but I can always use tools in the code to do that.

I'm sorry, but I cannot get these links to work at all.

I have decided to make my email address public, so you can send the files via an email to me.

Well, I did use your pieces for a Western set for the Chu Shogi Applet (via fen2.php) using single icons, so if I decide to include pictogram SVGs, I think I'm covered there.

Actually, I think it may be best if I do use your SVGs for a Chu set, if that's okay with you.

Nothing on my end. Just says that it could not be found.

@Bob Greenwade,

What program do you use to make those SVG graphics of yours?

I'm trying to figure out the solution to this Chu Tsumeshogi (MSM B45) so I can include it in my Chu Shogi Applet. Any help would be greatly appreciated.

FEN: 12/5+P6/1m5g3r/3+v+B1s1t+M2/1N4k5/m2etP3p2/7p+T3/2Px8/+p+A1+o7+M/1T2P+i2+p1n1/4+r7/12 w - 0 1

I am assuming that the grey Pawn is there.

There is a solution on the MSM Errata B page, but it leaves out the first 10 moves per player:

11... K-9k (11... K-8j 12. +BT-8h K-7k 13. Lnx9i K-6l 14. +SM-11l K-5k 15. Ln-7i K-4k 16. Ln-5i mate) 12. Lnx9i K-8l 13. Ln-10j K-7l 14. +BTx7j +Rx7j 15. Ln-9l K-6k 16. +SM-10k K-6j 17. Ln-8l K-6i 18. +SMx12i K-6h 19. Lnx7j K-6g 20. +SM-8i K-6f 21. Ln-6h K-7e 22. Lnx5g-5f K-8d 23. Ln-6f K-8c 24. +SM-5f K-9c 25. Ln-7d K-10d 26. +SMx8f K-11e 27. Lnx9d K-12f 28. Ln-10d K-12g 29. +SM-7g DE-9g 30. Ln-10e K-12h 31. +SM-10j K-11h 32. Ln-9g K-12i 33. Ln-10i mate

[Edit] I managed to find one that got the Gote King to 9k in 9 moves: 1. +Bg7 Kxg7 2. +Mxd4 Xxd4= 3. +Tih7 Kxf7 4. +Tg6 Ke6 5. +Tf5 Kd5 6. +Ab7 Mxb7 7. Tc4 Kxc4 8. Na6 Kd3 9. Nb5 Kd2