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Comments by DavidHowe
David Howe wrote on Mon, Jan 20, 2003 06:15 PM UTC:David Howe wrote on Thu, Jan 23, 2003 04:43 PM UTC:We will be starting a
<a href='http://www.chessvariants.com/index/displaypolls.php'>poll</a>
to determine the next recognized variant. To vote in the poll, you must be a member of chessvariants.com. Please follow the link below to review which variants have been nominated. If you wish to nominate a variant for a future poll, please send the name of the variant and your reasons for nominating it to the editors.
<p><a href='http://www.chessvariants.com/index/displaypollstatus.php?pollid=2'>Poll for Next Recognized Variant</a>
David Howe wrote on Sat, Jan 25, 2003 03:53 PM UTC:All this discussion is great, but in the end, someone is going to have to make a decision. For a decision to be made that will be generally accepted by the CV community will require the decision be made by at least some of the current leading figures in the CV field (eg. David Pritchard, Ralph Betza, John William Brown, etc...). This is why I suggested a standards group be formed. The standards produced would be used mainly for describing, studying and analyzing the chess variant field, and not for trying to force their use by chess variant designers.
<p>By the way, John William Brown has attempted some of this type of work in his book Meta-Chess.
David Howe wrote on Mon, Feb 24, 2003 05:09 PM UTC:In the case of a tie, the entry that received the most votes from the editors will be selected. If there is a still a tie, then the entry that received the most votes from the chief editors will be selected. If there is still a tie, then both/all of the tied entries will be selected.
David Howe wrote on Tue, Feb 25, 2003 12:23 AM UTC:The poll is now closed. Since there was a 3-way tie between Tamerlane
Chess, Crazyhouse, and Marseillais Chess, the voting of the site editors
must be counted and is as follows:
Tamerlane Chess: 3 editor votes
Crazyhouse: 2 editor votes
Marseillais Chess: 3 editor votes
Since this results in a tie between Tamerlane Chess and Marseillais
Chess, the voting of the site's chief editors must be counted and is as
follows:
Tamerlane Chess: 1 chief editor votes
Marseillais Chess: 2 chief editor votes
Marseillais Chess is the next recognized variant. The next poll will be
between Tamerlane Chess, Crazyhouse and Hostage Chess.
Recognized Chess Variants. Index page listing the variants we feel are most significant. (Recognized!)[All Comments] [Add Comment or Rating]David Howe wrote on Thu, Mar 13, 2003 10:35 PM UTC:Fixed. It was listing as Baroque/Ultima instead of just Ultima. Thanks for pointing out the problem.
David Howe wrote on Sun, Mar 23, 2003 04:15 PM UTC:Doublechess will also appear in the next RV poll: 'Doublechess is one of the most popular CVs which can be played on Richard's Play By Email server. No other CV inventor has done more to supply sample games of his invention to your site than I have. I have been running Doublechess tournaments on Richard's PBM server almost since the day it was added. Take a look at the current published Doublechess Standings to see how many people have played it and how often they have played it. Doublechess' beauty lies in its simplicity. It contains no special pieces. Lay two standard chess boards side by side to create a 16 by 8 board. Use two chess sets and replace the second set of kings with a third set of queens. Lay the first army in the center and the second army out in the wings. Doublechess games are rich with tactics and have the 'feel' of orthodox chess.' -- David Short.
David Howe wrote on Sun, Mar 23, 2003 05:55 PM UTC:I have added DoubleChess to the poll because: 1. Lack of variants being nominated, 2. The inventor gave evidence that the game is being widely played, and 3. We now have a good way to ensure a fair vote. So, in essence, I have 'nominated' the game by placing it in the poll. If you still have objections, we can take it up in the CVP Editors group.
David Howe wrote on Mon, Mar 24, 2003 11:10 PM UTC:Extinction Chess is already a Recognized Variant, so I will not be including it in the poll. Drop Chess, while being a widely known variant, has been improved upon (IMHO) by Hostage Chess. Since the variants are so similar, my thought is to stick with Hostage Chess. Alice Chess is a good suggestion and I will add it to the poll. And I think 5 entries for the poll is a good number, so I will still accept nominations, but they will be held over for the next poll after this one.
David Howe wrote on Tue, Jun 3, 2003 04:42 PM UTC:Here are the results of the poll: Variant Votes Percentage Tamerlane Chess 8 35% Crazyhouse 3 13% Hostage Chess 4 17% DoubleChess 1 4% Alice Chess 7 30% Total voters: 23 Next poll will include Alice, Crazyhouse and Hostage Chess. Other nominations will be accepted. I plan to start the next poll on August 1, 2003.
David Howe wrote on Wed, Sep 3, 2003 02:15 PM UTC:The (under review) guy was just some text to indicate that the comment was under review. I have since removed this text so it will just show up blank until the comment is reviewed. Stay tuned -- I'll probably be making small changes here and there as people get comfortable with the semi-moderated system.
Omega chess 
. Commercial chess variant on board with 104 squares.[All Comments] [Add Comment or Rating]
Alice Chess Play-By-Mail game. Examine this game![All Comments] [Add Comment or Rating]David Howe wrote on Fri, Sep 12, 2003 01:29 AM UTC:Tony, your move 31... k b3-a2-A2 was illegal. It violates the rule: 'A move must be legal on the board where it is played'. The move was illegal because the king moved into check (even though after the move the king was transferred to a safe square on the other board).
Anti-King Chess. Each player has both a King and an Anti-King to protect. Play it![All Comments] [Add Comment or Rating]David Howe wrote on Sun, Sep 14, 2003 09:09 PM UTC:Excellent ★★★★★Just a test to make sure commenting on presets works, but also, I really do give this an excellent... :)
Patrol chess. In order to capture or give check, a piece [including kings] must be `observed' by another piece of the same player. (8x8, Cells: 64) [All Comments] [Add Comment or Rating]David Howe wrote on Sat, Oct 4, 2003 01:01 AM UTC:Thank you Lee, I have made the correction. Thanks for catching the error.
Contest to design a chess variant on 44 squares. Our annual N-squares chess variant design competition.[All Comments] [Add Comment or Rating]David Howe wrote on Tue, Nov 25, 2003 01:34 PM UTC:They'll get their prizes when I get off my lazy rear end and send them out! :)
Game Courier Tournament #1. A multi-variant tournament played on Game Courier.[All Comments] [Add Comment or Rating]David Howe wrote on Wed, Jan 21, 2004 02:07 AM UTC:I dropped the ball on that one. We have $25 from the entrance fees, and I'll pony up another $75. That makes $100 in prize money. Mike Howe, the 1st place winner will receive $70, John Lawson, the second place winner will receive $30. Both will receive award certificates. I apologize for dropping the ball on this. Hopefully my lack of action on this issue won't discourage others from joining in on other tournaments.
Fugue. Based on Ultima and Rococo this game has pieces that capture in unusual ways. (8x8, Cells: 64) [All Comments] [Add Comment or Rating]David Howe wrote on Thu, Mar 18, 2004 03:35 AM UTC:Excellent ★★★★★It's interesting to note that the Swapper is critical in this game -- without it, a player could form a perfect defensive position (using only 3 pawns, 1 immobilizer, 1 shield, 1 queen, and of course a king).
<p>Anyone care to take a stab at what one of the perfect defensive positions would look like? My solution is posted in this comment, but you'll have to 'view source' to see it.
<!--
<pre>
| . . . .
| p k i .
| . s p .
| . q p .
+--------
</pre>
-->
David Howe wrote on Thu, Mar 18, 2004 04:29 PM UTC:You're right Mike, I forgot to take into account the triple repetition rule. :( But other than that, it is (as far as I can see) a perfect defense, even against a stronger force. I can see the wisdom of having the triple repetition be a loss instead of a draw. Well, anyway, I really do like this game -- the limited archer which requires a spotter works really well and the pieces in general interact well with each other. I especially like that the immobilizer has been weakened by having more pieces which are effective against it.
David Howe wrote on Mon, Aug 30, 2004 04:48 PM UTC:We haved changed our web hosting service and decided it would be better to be able to run in parallel while the transition was taking place. Also -- we're not abandoning our .com address. We'll be setting that to use our new site in the near future also.
Piececlopedia: Rabbit. A doubly-bent rider, inspired by the Gryphon and Aanca.[All Comments] [Add Comment or Rating]David Howe wrote on Sun, Oct 3, 2004 12:49 AM UTC:Sorry about that -- I'll create an article page on Double-bent Riders instead.
Chess Eccentricities. An old book on Chess variants from 1885.[All Comments] [Add Comment or Rating]David Howe wrote on Fri, Nov 19, 2004 10:38 PM UTC:Hi Paul, I would think the book is fairly valuable. I would be willing to pay on the order of $200 for it, but you may be able to get much more than that depending on the book's condition.
Royal Queens Chess 
. Game with full board and all pieces are sliders or immobile and victory is by capture of all 8 opposing Queens.[All Comments] [Add Comment or Rating]David Howe wrote on Sun, Dec 19, 2004 03:27 PM UTC:Thank you for the information -- I have updated the page. When Zillions of Games changed their web site to use a database our links to pages on their site became invalid. We are working to update all our links, but it's a time-consuming job.
Nova Chess. Members-Only Played on an 8x8 or 10x10 board with a wide range of pieces.[All Comments] [Add Comment or Rating]Since this comment is for a page that has not been published yet, you must be signed in to read it.
Game Courier Tournament #2. Sign up for our 2nd multi-variant tournament to be played all on Game Courier.[All Comments] [Add Comment or Rating]David Howe wrote on Thu, Feb 3, 2005 07:14 PM UTC:Fergus, I did not send out the prize money (on Roberto's request). It is being held in trust for application as Roberto has specified.
David Howe wrote on Fri, Feb 4, 2005 04:25 PM UTC:To register by postal mail, please make the check out to David Howe, and mail it to our postal address, which is listed on our <a href='../feedback.html'>contact</a> page.
Pocket Mutation Chess. Take one of your pieces off the board, maybe change it, keep it in reserve, and drop it on the board later. (8x8, Cells: 64) (Recognized!)[All Comments] [Add Comment or Rating]David Howe wrote on Tue, Feb 22, 2005 11:37 PM UTC:That was part of the problem, but apparently not all of it. I cleaned out the crazy HTML code, but still, the text in the table is coming out larger than the rest of the text. I'm not sure why, but at least you can see all of the text now.
David Howe wrote on Thu, Feb 24, 2005 01:11 AM UTC:Fergus -- I've modifed the commenting system so that comments made on hidden or deleted items will not show up at all.
David Howe wrote on Thu, Feb 24, 2005 04:11 AM UTC:John Ayers -- you asked the question as to why we had two links to the same page on the What's New page. I messed up and created two items for the same page. That's fixed now. Thanks for pointing it out.
Chess Rules for Kids. An illustrated guide to the rules of chess for children.[All Comments] [Add Comment or Rating]📝David Howe wrote on Sat, Feb 26, 2005 08:50 PM UTC:The rule is this: ''The game is drawn when a player having the move claims a draw and demonstrates that at least 50 consecutive moves have been made by each side without the capture of any piece and without the movement of any pawn.'' -- From the FIDE Laws of Chess
<p>In other words, if no one has made a capture or moved a pawn within the last 50 moves (by each player), then the game is a stalemate.
<p>There is no rule with regard to one player having their King as their only remaining piece, although that is typically the situation in the above rule.
<p>I hope this answers your question. If not, please keep asking!
Chess Variant Pages Membership. Missing description[All Comments] [Add Comment or Rating]📝David Howe wrote on Fri, Mar 4, 2005 01:04 AM UTC:That works fine if you have a public email address. Mason has a private email address, and there's no way (right now) to change that through the 'edit person' form. I will work on adding this capability. For now -- just let me know what your new email address is and I'll update it.
David Howe wrote on Sun, Mar 6, 2005 02:01 AM UTC:Ok, I whipped something up. Try out this link:
<p><a href='http://www.chessvariants.org/index/listsubjects.php'>List Subjects</a>
Rococo. A clear, aggressive Ultima variant on a 10x10 ring board. (10x10, Cells: 100) (Recognized!)[All Comments] [Add Comment or Rating]💡David Howe wrote on Tue, Mar 29, 2005 02:40 AM UTC:Peter actually wrote the rules. After reading the following rule, my opinion is that the long leaper cannot capture the enemy piece on x2. Here's the rule (emphasis mine):
<blockquote>
These marked squares on the edge of the board are edge squares, and a move may only end on an edge square if necessary for a capture. Or in other words, a piece may only end up on an edge square by making a capturing move that would not be possible without landing on <u><b>the</b></u> edge square. This includes moves that start on edge squares. The Swapper's swap move is considered a capture for purposes of edge squares.
</blockquote>
<p>My interpretation of this rule is that a piece may not move on to edge square x, unless it would not be possible to make a capture by <b>not</b> landing on edge square x.
<p>Since in this case, it is possible to make the capture by not landing on x1, and it is also possible to make the capture by not landing on x0, <b>neither</b> x1 and x0 can be landed on by the long leaper. If the enemy piece were on x1, then x0 would be a legal landing square.
<p>This is my opinion -- Peter may have another...
Mulligan Stew Chess. 42-Square Swapping-Mage Teleporting-Assassin Dual-Color-Bound-King Limited-Double-Move Leaping-Pawn Chess. (6x7, Cells: 42) [All Comments] [Add Comment or Rating]David Howe wrote on Sun, Apr 10, 2005 08:48 PM UTC:Fixed! Some time ago I removed all hardcoded email address from our site (or tried to the best I could). Unfortunately, in this case, my script removed actual sample game moves. So I went back to an older version of the page and put the sample game back to the way it was. Sorry about that!
Contest to design a 10-chess variant. Cebrating 10 years of Chess Variant Pages with a contest to design a chess variant.[All Comments] [Add Comment or Rating]David Howe wrote on Mon, Apr 25, 2005 03:58 PM UTC:I've fixed the commenting problem (I think).
<p>Hans is running the contest, so in theory, he should be posting the contest entries. However, I suspect he hasn't the time to do this. I and the other editors will be working on these entries in the near future, so stay tuned and sorry for the delays.
David Howe wrote on Tue, Apr 26, 2005 02:31 AM UTC:Actually, I like Greg's idea -- it's along the same lines as something I was considering. Registered CVP members would be allowed to create game pages, which would then be reviewed by an editor, possibly edited to match the look and feel of our site, indexed, and then released to the site (ie. made visible).
<p>Perhaps this is worth trying!
David Howe wrote on Thu, Apr 28, 2005 06:05 PM UTC:I'm almost ready with an initial version of user posted pages. This capability will appear probably in another day or two. It will be very simple at first, and then I'll add capabilities as the system is used and suggestions are made. So just keep in mind -- it's a work in progress.
David Howe wrote on Fri, Apr 29, 2005 02:34 AM UTC:Ok, if anyone would like to try it out, the page to post new submissions is <a href='../index/membersubmission.php'>here</a>. Let me know if you have any problems or questions. Thanks!
Dave's Silly Example Game. This is Dave Howe's example of a user-posted game. (2x2, Cells: 4) [All Comments] [Add Comment or Rating]💡📝David Howe wrote on Fri, Apr 29, 2005 01:54 PM UTC:John, use the Editor's Page, there's a link there right at the top. Reviewing new submissions will be restricted to the editorial staff for now, so I won't put it on the minimal new page at this time.
Contest to design a 10-chess variant. Cebrating 10 years of Chess Variant Pages with a contest to design a chess variant.[All Comments] [Add Comment or Rating]David Howe wrote on Fri, Apr 29, 2005 08:33 PM UTC:Dave, try sending the email from http://www.chessvariants.org/contests/10/index.html Our .com address is older and not used as much any more.
Dave's Silly Example Game. This is Dave Howe's example of a user-posted game. (2x2, Cells: 4) [All Comments] [Add Comment or Rating]💡📝David Howe wrote on Sun, May 1, 2005 05:38 PM UTC:Mark, just check the 'Using HTML tags in the text below' checkbox at the top of the page for editing the description of your submission. But be sure to add paragraph and pre tags where appropriate in your textual descriptions. When the 'Using HTML tags in the text below' checkbox is unchecked, I add PRE tags around each text section, and chop the text up into reasonably short lines (so they don't run off the right side of the page).
Contest to design a 10-chess variant. Cebrating 10 years of Chess Variant Pages with a contest to design a chess variant.[All Comments] [Add Comment or Rating]David Howe wrote on Mon, May 2, 2005 03:39 PM UTC:I've added a 'Lock' feature, which should prevent a particular page from being edited. All member submitted pages that are in the 10 contest are now locked in this way. Clarifications or corrections to a page can be added as comments.
David Howe wrote on Mon, May 2, 2005 04:21 PM UTC:Let me clarify Fergus' clarification. Our <i>email</i> .com addresses have ceased to exist. Our web page .com address (except for the .play subdomain) do continue to exist.
David Howe wrote on Tue, May 3, 2005 02:27 AM UTC:Fergus, there's a link to review member submitted pages on the Editors' Page.
Game Courier Tournament #2. Sign up for our 2nd multi-variant tournament to be played all on Game Courier.[All Comments] [Add Comment or Rating]David Howe wrote on Tue, May 3, 2005 06:07 PM UTC:Greg, you might want to try a 'Refresh' or a 'Ctrl-Refresh' (assuming you are running on a PC) -- I suspect you are looking at a cached page.
Royal Chess. Variant on ten by eight board. (10x8, Cells: 80) [All Comments] [Add Comment or Rating]David Howe wrote on Mon, May 9, 2005 08:04 PM UTC:Will, I've added your site to our links. You may include a link to our site on your site if you wish.
Shikaar. Missing description (9x9, Cells: 79) [All Comments] [Add Comment or Rating]David Howe wrote on Thu, May 12, 2005 05:25 PM UTC:Tony, I locked the page because I 'unregistered' Dhruv (at Dhruv's request). And no, I don't know why the request was made.
Game Courier. PHP script for playing Chess variants online.[All Comments] [Add Comment or Rating]David Howe wrote on Sun, May 22, 2005 07:14 PM UTC:We are currently experiencing some site issues, which hopefully will be resolved soon. Please be patient. Thanks!
Feedback to the Chess Variant Pages - How to contactus. Including information on editors and associate authors of the website.[All Comments] [Add Comment or Rating]David Howe wrote on Thu, Jun 16, 2005 05:17 PM UTC:X., please try again. I made a slight typo in the code.
Carpenter. compound of Knight and Dabbaba.[All Comments] [Add Comment or Rating]David Howe wrote on Sat, Jun 25, 2005 05:15 PM UTC:Charles, To create multiple links to the same page, just view the page in question, and at the bottom/left of the page should be a set of links that look like this: [info] [edit] [link] Click on the rightmost one (ie. [link]). This will being up a form which will allow you to add more links to that page. Let me know if you have any questions.
David Howe wrote on Fri, Aug 19, 2005 01:27 PM UTC:The site is back up, although not everything is working. Please be patient with us over the next week or so as we fix up our site-move related problems. Thanks!
David Howe wrote on Tue, Aug 23, 2005 01:48 PM UTC:Also, game pages don't seem to have the comment section at the bottom
anymore.
Yes, I have, for the time being, removed the code that gets executed at the bottom of each page, so comments and 'see also' sections will not be displayed. You can use the 'More Information' link at the top of the page to see comments and 'see also' information. I will be bringing back this functionality gradually, so that we can control our resource usage on our host server.
Gridlock. Large, wargame inspired variant. (10x10, Cells: 100) [All Comments] [Add Comment or Rating]David Howe wrote on Fri, Sep 30, 2005 03:12 PM UTC:Message from Paul Leno:
I wanted to let everyone know the developemnt of the series has been delayed due to the death of my 17 year old son in aug. 2004, he was in an automobile accident. He was helping me write the series (we had come up with over seventy different battlefields at that time). His death was a shock to me and those I was working with at Strategy First, we were under the gun for a november 2004 deadline on a third party developent aggreement, I'm sorry for those who were waiting, I couldn't cocentrate, I now plan on developing the games myself and dedicating the series to the memory of my son Philip. I'm looking for programmers and artist as well as a ai program. Christine, your comments attracted my atention please email me at [the email address specified on my information page].
David Howe wrote on Tue, Oct 4, 2005 08:49 PM UTC:Matthew, please go to our registration page and register as a user. This will allow you to get a user id and password with which to post immediate comments, as well as use the Game Courier.
David Howe wrote on Wed, Oct 5, 2005 12:18 AM UTC:There is no need to log in. You are prompted for your user id and/or password when they are required. Since you already have a user id and password, I think you're all set. We do not employ any 'IP verification'. Your user id and password are prompted for each time you try to do something that requires verification of your identity. I hope this helps you to understand how our system works. If not, please do ask more questions. Thanks.
David Howe wrote on Wed, Oct 5, 2005 01:55 PM UTC:Matthew, just go to the following link and press the 'Finalize Registration' button.
http://www.chessvariants.org/index/displayperson.php?personid=matthew_montchal
Nova Chess 100. Missing description (10x10, Cells: 100) [All Comments] [Add Comment or Rating]David Howe wrote on Sat, Oct 15, 2005 10:08 PM UTC:Michael, Just go to the 'upload files' link on your page, and upload your graphic. After your graphic is uploaded, you will be shown some html code to add to your page to make your graphic show up. Let me know if you run into any problems. Upload file link for your page: http://www.chessvariants.org/index/memberupload.php?itemid=MSnovachess100
David Howe wrote on Tue, Oct 18, 2005 10:00 PM UTC:There was a bug that prevented files from being uploaded for user submitted items. That bug should now be fixed. Please let me know if you have any more problems. Thanks!
EEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEX! Chess. A game designed to be as different to chess as possible while still being the same as chess. (1x72, Cells: 72) [All Comments] [Add Comment or Rating]David Howe wrote on Wed, Nov 16, 2005 04:02 PM UTC:Apparently at some point, our database was restored to an earlier state, which means we lost some comments. I apologise for that -- I have no idea why the database would have been restored to two days earlier, unless our server had some sort of crash and the site had to be restored.
As far as letting other people use my code for the commenting system -- I certainly have no objection. I shall work on packaging the code and documenting how to use it. Perhaps I shall even clean it up and make it more generic. However, that is all in my spare time, of which, I seem to have less and less these days.
My apologies to all the people I haven't gotten back to. Believe me, I still intend to get back to you all. Perhaps over the holidays! ;-)
David Howe wrote on Wed, Nov 16, 2005 04:04 PM UTC:Apparently at some point, our database was restored to an earlier state, which means we lost some comments. I apologise for that -- I have no idea why the database would have been restored to two days earlier, unless our server had some sort of crash and the site had to be restored.
As far as letting other people use my code for the commenting system -- I certainly have no objection. I shall work on packaging the code and documenting how to use it. Perhaps I shall even clean it up and make it more generic. However, that is all in my spare time, of which, I seem to have less and less these days.
My apologies to all the people I haven't gotten back to. Believe me, I still intend to get back to you all. Perhaps over the holidays! ;-)
The Disguised King. Unknown pawn becomes royal piece. (8x8, Cells: 64) [All Comments] [Add Comment or Rating]David Howe wrote on Sun, Nov 27, 2005 05:12 PM UTC:Excellent ★★★★★Sorry you feel that way. It is true that we are not the most responsive website in the world. That's certainly been one of my biggest issues of the past couple of years is responding to email and keeping up with things on the site.
In any case, it seems obvious to me that you feel slighted, and that's unfortunate. Please have patience with we mere mortals. We do try...
Nova Chess 100. Missing description (10x10, Cells: 100) [All Comments] [Add Comment or Rating]David Howe wrote on Sat, Dec 17, 2005 07:49 PM UTC:Michael,
You can reference the file you uploaded using the following URL:
../membergraphics/MSnovachess100/NovaChess100Release.zip
The other option is to create your own Zillions page for Nova Chess 100, and then we can link the two pages (the game page and the zillions page) together using the indexing system.
David Howe wrote on Sun, Dec 18, 2005 01:21 AM UTC:I have added a link. I put it at the end of the Notes section. You can go take a look at what I added to see how that works (for future reference). Feel free to modify the text as you see fit.
Regenbogen. Unusual spectrum-based game with Wizards, Clerics and Spirits. (Cells: 44) [All Comments] [Add Comment or Rating]David Howe wrote on Tue, Dec 20, 2005 03:31 AM UTC:Hi Jared, you can create a page and I'll copy and paste your existing page into it. Then I'll delete the old page.
David Pritchard. Death notice.[All Comments] [Add Comment or Rating]David Howe wrote on Sun, Jan 1, 2006 08:37 PM UTC:He was in the process of publishing the next edition of Encyclopedia of Chess Variants. I am not sure how close he was to actual publication, but hopefully, it will still be published.
I never met him personally, but we corresponded via postal mail while he was in the process of compiling new entries for the next version of the ECV.
Perhaps it makes sense for our site to have recognized people in addition to variants? If so, David Pritchard would certainly be on that list.
Index page of The Chess Variant Pages. Our main index page.[All Comments] [Add Comment or Rating]David Howe wrote on Tue, Mar 21, 2006 02:20 PM UTC:Thanks Charles, I will update those pages. I am sure there are probably more that I missed, but I think I got the majority of them.
David Howe wrote on Tue, Mar 21, 2006 09:14 PM UTC:Subject-based comments were not being blocked. However they should be now.
Chess Variant Pages Rating System. Missing description[All Comments] [Add Comment or Rating]💡📝David Howe wrote on Thu, Mar 23, 2006 04:48 PM UTC:How about: 0 Poor 1 Below average 2 Average 3 Good 4 Excellent As with any rating system, it will only be as good as the quality of its inputs. If people are generally thoughtful, honest and objective, then I think the system will work well. As others have said, the more valuable input is the more qualitative vs. the quantitative, although quantitative input can have some value that qualitative input does not have. So the more ways we give people to give feedback, the better. I do hope that people will avoid abusing the system for personal gain. Such acts decrease the value of the system overall and are damaging in the long-term.
Index page of The Chess Variant Pages. Our main index page.[All Comments] [Add Comment or Rating]David Howe wrote on Thu, Apr 27, 2006 04:31 PM UTC:I like the idea! Personally, I would be interested in doing something along the lines of idea number 4...
>> 4. not sure about this, but maybe another idea for a game could be 'bizzare' ... of course 'bizzare' games can be completely serious, still, it could be an idea.
The Black Ghost. Betzan attempt to remedy White's first move advantage in FIDE by giving Black a noncapturing but capturable teleporting piece.[All Comments] [Add Comment or Rating]David Howe wrote on Thu, May 11, 2006 04:49 PM UTC:Jeremy, if an entry starts with a 'the', or 'an', or 'a', you can edit the item so that the 'the', 'an', or 'a' goes in the summary prefix field. This will help the indexing system properly file the item, because it uses the first letter of the summary or link text. Let me know if you have any questions. Thanks.
David Howe wrote on Tue, Jun 6, 2006 04:36 PM UTC:I have proposed a chess variant rating system
here. I am tempted to start implementing it.
Chess Variant Pages Rating System. Missing description[All Comments] [Add Comment or Rating]💡📝David Howe wrote on Wed, Jun 7, 2006 08:57 PM UTC:It seems a desirable goal to give more meaning (or weight) to the more extreme ratings. However, the technique you describe might have unintended consequences. It may lead to a rater 'buying' points by rating some large number of entries as 'Okay', not because they want to rate those entries, but because they want to gain points.
Another possible system might involve awarding points over time (everyone gets N points every M days). The points would be of the 'use it or lose it' type, so that point hording would not be possible.
Or perhaps a 'free market' system, where each rater starts out with N points, which the rater uses to 'buy' the right to rate a particular entry from the entry's owner. Eg. Dave has 10 points. He buys the right to rate Peter's Anti-King Chess, which Peter is selling for 3 points. Dave now has 7 points left, and Peter has 13 (assuming he had 10 before the transaction).
The down side to these schemes is that they discourage free expression by putting certain artificial limits on expression.
Games for Game Courier. The many games you can play online with Game Courier.[All Comments] [Add Comment or Rating]David Howe wrote on Sat, Jun 10, 2006 04:12 PM UTC:Hi Fergus, yes, I will fix that. Sorry for the annoyance...
Chess Variant Pages Rating System. Missing description[All Comments] [Add Comment or Rating]💡📝David Howe wrote on Fri, Jun 23, 2006 05:37 AM UTC:Hi Joe, >> Next, how do I sign up? Go to any of your game pages (the quickest way to do that is to go to your information page, and click on the 'Items this person invented' link. Any of the items under the 'Game' section can be submitted for entry in the rating system. Just display the web page for the game you want to submit, and you'll see near the bottom, right above the author/inventor line, a link to 'Submit this game to be available for rating!'. Click on that link and follow the instructions. You have 7 games you invented, so it shouldn't be too much of an effort for you to submit them individually. I just hope Ralph Betza doesn't try to submit all his! ;-) Note that only GAME pages may be submitted for rating. If you have a game courier or zillions item that you want to submit, just create a game page for it first, and then submit the game page. I am limiting ratings to game pages to avoid one person rating game X's zillions page, while another person rates game X's game courier preset and yet another person rates game X's game information page. All for now. Please continue with the feedback, and thank you for the kind words. My experience tells me I will be making lots of changes to this system, so don't be shy about suggestions.
Alfaerie Expansion Set 4. More Alfaerie graphics![All Comments] [Add Comment or Rating]David Howe wrote on Thu, Jul 13, 2006 01:31 PM UTC:Yes, that would be a lot less confusing. However, due to my own short-sightedness, I called the file for the first expansion set alfaerie2. And now, to be consistant with the previous sets, I must name the files with an N+1 suffix, rather than an N suffix. Let this be an example to all of how not to name their files! ;-)
'...Of myself forever reproaching myself, (for who more foolish than I, and who more faithless?)...'
Game Courier Developer's Guide. Learn how to design and program Chess variants for Game Courier.[All Comments] [Add Comment or Rating]David Howe wrote on Fri, Aug 4, 2006 01:42 PM UTC:I've changed the name. I will look into the problem you had changing the name. As to the number of players, there is currently no way to specify a range other than to make two separate index entries. I will look into improving this aspect of the indexing.
David Howe wrote on Mon, Aug 7, 2006 02:35 PM UTC:Fergus, I cleaned it up. Editors: please do not categorize a variant of chess as 'chess'. The 'chess' category is reserved for FIDE chess information only. There are other categories for slight variations on FIDE chess (ie. the chess variants using standard FIDE chess equipment categories).
David Howe wrote on Sun, Aug 27, 2006 02:04 PM UTC:I have contacted our web hosting service. Possibly they made security changes that caused the uploads to stop working. We haven't changed any of that code in ages, so it's likely some environmental change was made that was outside of our control. We'll keep you posted on this issue. In the meantime, thank you for your patience!
David Howe wrote on Mon, Jan 1, 2007 02:11 PM UTC:Happy New Year! We at the Chess Variant Pages would like to thank all our contributors, readers and players for their involvement with our site. It has been a good year, with many significant contributions. It has also been a difficult year, with many technical glitches, and some 'people' issues. We appreciate your patience, your dedication to chess variants, and, of course, your continued participation.
Many thanks also to our volunteers, which includes our entire staff. Being a volunteer here is a practically thankless job (except perhaps once a year!), but we do find it rewarding to be able to support this site, and help foster an interest in chess variants all over the world.
Zone X . Chess with a special central Zone, a new piece, and new moves.[All Comments] [Add Comment or Rating] Voidrider Chess . A 43 square variant with movable spaces.[All Comments] [Add Comment or Rating] Russian Symmetrical Chess. Rusian 9x9 variant with symmetrical setup and Pawns that get more powerful halfway across the board.[All Comments] [Add Comment or Rating]David Howe wrote on Thu, Jan 18, 2007 03:21 PM UTC:I cannot find this file in any of our backups. Does anyone know where this file might be hiding?
David Howe wrote on Thu, Jan 18, 2007 04:39 PM UTC:Hi Larry, please send it to me at my yahoo address. Thanks!
David Howe wrote on Fri, Feb 9, 2007 05:08 PM UTC:If a company is actively marketing a chess variant, then it would be best to obtain permission from that company before posting a set of rules on this site. Another option is to simply post a review of the game, without including a comprehensive description of the rules. Posting a review generally does not require permission.
Chess Variant Pages Membership. Missing description[All Comments] [Add Comment or Rating]📝David Howe wrote on Mon, Mar 12, 2007 02:24 AM UTC:You are now a contributor! Apparently, all you have to do is ask!
David Howe wrote on Wed, Mar 21, 2007 03:10 PM UTC:Unless Rifle Chess is also commonly known as Distant Chess (and I don't think it is), my thought is to remove the Distant Chess page. We can, if necessary, add an index entry for Rifle Chess as Distant Chess, if people like the name better, or the name is commonly used. In any case, I don't think we need a separate page for this.
Index page of The Chess Variant Pages. Our main index page.[All Comments] [Add Comment or Rating]David Howe wrote on Tue, Apr 10, 2007 09:18 PM UTC:I have created a Chess Variants Wiki, as a test to see if it would make sense to have a 'sister' site that would be more collaborative in nature. Any one interested should go to: http://chessvariants.wikidot.com/ This will be a learning process for me, as I am not familiar with administrating or building Wikis. My impression is that the Wiki community itself does most of the work. Is that right? ;-)
David Howe wrote on Fri, Apr 13, 2007 01:44 AM UTC:Thanks Joe. I hadn't realized I had to approve new members. I've set up the site so that a password can be used so that new members can avoid waiting for me to approve them. The password is cvp2007 The proposed chessvariants wiki is at: http://chessvariants.wikidot.com/ It is not intended to replace chessvariants.org, nor is it intended to replace the chess variants section of the wikipedia. 3 people have joined up so far, but couldn't do anything because I hadn't approved them.
David Howe wrote on Fri, May 25, 2007 02:35 PM UTC:There was a strange character at the end of the name, which messed up my script. I removed the strange character (it was ampersand pound 1611 semicolon, which is an arabic diacritic). Here how the character would appear in HTML:
ð
Anyway, it was expanded into an HTML entity character sequence, which my script doesn't handle well. Sorry about that.
Armies of Faith 1: The Dawn of Civilisation. The first in of a series of 3d variants themed on various religions of history. (3x(9x9), Cells: 243) [All Comments] [Add Comment or Rating]David Howe wrote on Wed, Jun 6, 2007 02:08 AM UTC:John William Brown uses the term 'lame' in his book Meta-Chess (page 12-20), which was published in 1997. It also appears in our Glossary of Chess Variant Terms: http://www.chessvariants.org/misc.dir/coreglossary.html#L
Multimove Chess. Players spend points to make multiple moves. (8x8, Cells: 64) [All Comments] [Add Comment or Rating]💡📝David Howe wrote on Thu, Jul 26, 2007 12:39 PM UTC:'For any other piece [than a knight] to make a non-capturing move two spaces, it costs 3 points.' I don't think that's true. Rather, it is true for pawns and kings, but for a queen, bishop or rook, it would cost 2 points (1 point to move through the first square, and 1 point to move into the destination square). Jeremy, if you could point out which rules have lead you to believe the statements you made, I would appreciate it. I'll want to modify them to be more clear. Thanks!
💡📝David Howe wrote on Thu, Jul 26, 2007 05:53 PM UTC:Yes, that's correct! Pieces that can change direction in the course of a single, legal move, would not pay an extra point for doing so. The penalty is only for making extra moves (not for moving through extra squares).
💡📝David Howe wrote on Sun, Jul 29, 2007 02:02 PM UTC:Or how about a progressive extra cost, so that the 2nd move costs an extra point, the 3rd move costs an extra 2 points, the 4th move an extra 3 points? I would be willing to try this, or your suggestion of a fixed extra 2 points.
Chess Variant Pages Membership. Missing description[All Comments] [Add Comment or Rating]📝David Howe wrote on Mon, Aug 6, 2007 12:28 PM UTC:You have two accounts, one as a contributor and one as a user. Your
contributor account had no email address associated with it, so there was
no option for you to register. I have now added your email address to your
contributor account, and you should be able to register using that account.
Just go to your member page.
45 or 46 Cell Contest - 2007 Design Contest. Quick contest for 45 or 46 cells. Deadline for Submissions: November 30, 2007.[All Comments] [Add Comment or Rating] 3d Minishogi. A variant originally devised for a contest that never materialised. (3x(3x5), Cells: 45) [All Comments] [Add Comment or Rating]David Howe wrote on Thu, Sep 6, 2007 02:40 PM UTC:Depending on many factors (one being the width of the window one uses when browsing) the diagram can appear horizontally skewed. The fix for this is to enclose the diagram in an html table.
David Howe wrote on Sat, Sep 22, 2007 08:57 PM UTC:If you post it as a game, I'll change it to an article.
Whale Shogi. Shogi variant. (6x6, Cells: 36) [All Comments] [Add Comment or Rating]David Howe wrote on Tue, Oct 2, 2007 01:54 PM UTC:Doug, you should now be able to register. Just go to your information page and follow the instructions. Your information page is here.
Once you finished registering, you should be able to post your own games.
David Howe wrote on Tue, Oct 16, 2007 02:48 PM UTC:I've been thinking lately that we should expand our 'recognized variants' system to include people and software. As an editor, I will refrain from making suggestions, but if enough of our readers feel a particular person or program deserves recognition, please post something under this subject. Thanks!
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