Comments by TonyQuintanilla

Perhaps it's time to close this group? We have the Comments and Game
Courier for forums.

Mats, this is an interesting item. Could you create a link page for it?

Christine's comment about many more variants is interesting. I've often
marvelled at the seemingly endless bounty out there. This site is like the
goose that lay the golden eggs. That's why I completely agree with the
open-ended editorial approach. Sure, many games are a passing fancy, but a
few are trully golden, and they only emerge after being tried in the fire
of this community. Will there ever be a 'rococo' period, where good
ideas dry up and we are left with empty frills? (No pun on Peter's excellent 
game intended!!) I don't know, but it's not today! Happy New Year.

Chess is far from dead. As far as I know, no computer can yet *enjoy* a
game of Chess! Example: my kid enjoys tic-tac-toe, another 'dead' game?!

Happy New Year! Thanks to David for all his work to keep this site going
(especially the difficult site maintenance necessities).

Gary, I've used sculpy too, but how do you make sure you get a smooth and
even split when making the 2 mold halves? It's a nice and simple idea. As
you mentioned, the colors are very nice and come in a large variety. Do you
have pictures? Thanks.

'I wish to state a variant based on the current listed variant called 'Three Handed Chess'. My version is exactly the same layout, conditions and reasoning as 'Three Handed' except for the variation rules to eliminate ganging up on the third man.

'My method is that when attacking the man on the right and removing a piece, you get to remove the same piece from the man on the left as well. This has two effects; it shortens an otherwise very long playing game, and it means no player can afford to ignore his best chance of winning, i.e. attacking his '2 for one target', the man on the right. Also you can never trust the man on your left to leave you alone for very long. You are just too good of a target.

'Notice also that attacking is of higher value than defense. But at some point, you must try and slow your attacker down. This is a fast, aggressive game.

'However, there is one more rule; after a check, if a possible check-mate exists and the third player has not had a turn between the check and the failure of the victim to escape, the third player is guaranteed one last move to break the check-mate. If he succeeds, play continues in the normal direction from the 'third' player.'

Glinski page in Spanish posted. 

See all languages: 
http://www.chessvariants.org/index/whatsnewalllang.php

The editors received the following correspondence from Doron Singer:

Your example claims Bxc1 wins. It, in fact, loses, which goes to show
suicide chess is deeper than what most people give it credit for.
Black's win is as follows:
1. Bxc1 g5
2. Bxg5 a6
3. Bxe7 axb5
now:
4. Bxf8 Nc6
5. Bxb5 Nd7
6. Bxd7 Ra3
7. Bxa3 b4
8. Bxb4
0-1

or:
5. Bxc5 Ra3

if:
6. Bxf8 Nd7 and so on
and if:
6. Bxa3 Nc6 and so on.

Doron.

Gilbert: this is an ongoing debate. For a good introduction see Jean-Louis
Cazaux's excellent discussion at,

http://history.chess.free.fr/comparison.htm

Retrograde Chess? Like the planets, you expect a normal move, then the
weird back-swing. Quick question, how will a Pawn or King advance?

Sam, may I suggest that you convert this message into a member-posted page?


http://www.chessvariants.org/index/membersubmission.php

That way, it will be properly indexed and posted. Otherwise, it is likely
to get lost among the myriad messages posted on this site.

The editors received the following correspondance from Rainer Hecker:

Dear Sirs and Madam’s,

thank you for this fascinating Page about “Star Trek Chess”. But if my
information is correct you have made two mistakes:

No movable Level (or in Star Trek terminology “Attack Board”) is ever
placed below, always above a corner! For some reasons: 1. Continuous use
would wear the Boards and Pins so that the Attack Boards would hold any
longer upside down. 2. I have never an Attack Board below a corner,
neither in the original series nor in any of its following series.

The position of the pieces at the start of the game is not correct.
According to my sources the queen and king start the game on the Attack
Boards occupying the places of the knights in your diagram. the knights
start the game on the Main Boards on the outer lines occupying the places
of the bishops in your picture. The bishops start on the inner lines
occupying the places of king and queen in your diagram.


yours sincerely
Rainer Hecker

It would be nice to hear from Ralph again on this forum....

I am not rating this page now, because I want to try the 3D board first.
This may deserve an 'excellent.' 

One significant problem with 3D variants (some very interesting) is that
they are difficult or near impossible to properly visualize on a 2D
platform, such as Game Courier or ZOG. 

One needs a physical 3D board (sometimes not possible), or a
computer-generated 3D model that can be manipulated to present various
views, to appreciate 3D games.

2D platforms require players to imagine the 3D connections between 2D
slices of the board. An analogy would be trying to visualize a 2D board
cut into 1D slices, say each rank presented side by side, instead of top
to bottom as usual. Try playing on that board! 

Anyway, the offered computer generated board may work. Let's see!

Well, I don't know about that...but, take a look at:

/play/pbm/play.php?game=Jetan+Jeddara&log=tony_quintanilla-whittlin-2006-142-201

Ibu Ibu Alice Alice Chess! What a concept! Nothing if not fun, I'm sure.
All in 3 days, too! This would make a great 3 day feast -- perfect for
Memorial Day. 

Seriously, keeping the growing number of pieces and possibilies straight,
flipping from board to board especially, would be a true mind-bender, but,
hey, that would be the fun of it!

I went ahead an added a 9x9 board.

Link

This is a nice idea.

Namik,

David Howe has just added the ability to make a page for Game Courier
presets at,

http://www.chessvariants.org/index/membersubmission.php?isgamecourier=1

You still have to create the basic HTML code for the Game Courier preset
URL and any text you want.

Try it for your presets.

Thanks to David!

Joe,

David Howe has just added the ability to make a page for Game Courier
presets at,

http://www.chessvariants.org/index/membersubmission.php?isgamecourier=1

You still have to create the basic HTML code for the Game Courier preset
URL and any text you want.

See also:

http://www.chessvariants.org/large.dir/contest/mammoth.html

Interesting setup. 

It looks like you created a Game Courier preset for the setup diagram. 

It would be nice if you could add a preset button to your page? To do
this, copy the HTML form code for the preset button into your page HTML.
You can see to code at the bottom of the 'Editing a Preset' page, in a
window just above 'Available Pieces.'

The editors received the following message by e-mail from Namig Aliyev:

Dear sir!
I would like send to You some comments about Grand Chess.
 
1.'Fool mat' in classic chess is 
1.f4 -e6
2.g4 -Qh4x -2 moves
 
2.In Capablanca chess for opening set up like this (Optimal set up,all
pawns protekted,force line of pieces very good
balanced)-R-N-B-A-C-K-Q-B-N-R, 'fool mat' is
1.c3 -h5
2.Ac2 -f6
3.Ag6x -3 moves
 
3.In Grand Chess for opening set up -3rd row pawns,2nd row from square b2
-N-B-A-C-K-Q-B-N, 1st row Ra1 and Rj1 (this variant more
preferable,because white king snand up in dark square and vice versa)
'fool mat 'is 
1.c4 -Rjg10
2.Ac3 -Rae10
3.Cf4 -Af10
4.Nh4 -h7
5.Ag7x -5 moves
 These examples shows us in Grand Chess a king is more safety position
then in Capablanca or Classic Chess.
 
P.S.I think all rules in Grand Chess is very interesting and good. But if
we make one exceptoin it will be better.
Rule:A pawn can be promoted when it reaches 9th row. The promotion is
optional on these rows.
In this case I think many chess fun and players will be joined to this
beatiful game.
With best regards, FIDE Master,FIDE Trainer Namik

Thanks Michael for the kind comments. I have now posted the ZRF. Yes, I've
played it against ZOG to test the game mechanics, unfortunately ZOG plays
this game very poorly. 

I also hope that the game plays well! But I'll have to wait for a human opponent!

ZOG vastly overvalues moves to the intersections. I considered multiplying
'add''s for standard moves, but even with 3 adds, it did not alter
ZOG's priorities (besides making you choose between multiple identical
moves, which is annoying), so I abandoned this approach. As with many
games that significantly alter movement structure, ZOG is mostly useful to
test the game mechanics and to play by e-mail.

Matthew, that would be an interesting experiment. We could use Game Courier
as the interface with the CPUs doing the thinking! Can you suggest a game?
We'd have to have it available in 3 platforms, your program, GC, and ZOG.

No. Checkmate has to be proven.

Very nice. Interesting. I may also help to pair players, finding fair
partners and also more challenging ones. Of course, the wide variety of
variants makes this rating less 'firm' than chess ratings. 

I think that Gary's suggestion to allow a game to be rated or not would
be a nice addition. This could be a choice made at the start of the game,
allong with time controls, etc. This would also allow some players to
develop rated 'niches', such as Shogi, or Shatranj-variants, while
playing other games 'just for fun.' Some may just want to be rated
generalists. Others may not want to be rated at all.

How about a new volunteer?!

John Brown writes,

'Hi Tony,

I've just began work on the Third Edition edition of Meta-Chess, which I
hope to have in stock by 03.31.06. It will be very similar to E-2 but with
errors corrected and the writing improved. Feel free to post this if you
like.

Happy New Year,

John William Brown'

Mike Adams' replies with news in the best spirit of David Pritchard's
legacy (Mike's Chess club page is at: http://www.guildfordchess.fsnet.co.uk/),

'Dear Tony

Thanks for this. I have just returned from the Hastings International -
last night on New Years eve we held an evening variants tournament in
memory of David. We played 8 different 5 min variants, which attracted an
entry of 17, won jointly by IM Andew Greet and Jack Rudd.

Best wishes

Mike Adams'

Michael, the page exists on the site's directory but it was removed from
the indexes, as you previously requested. Do you want the HTML file
deleted? Apparently it was found through Google, but it would not be found
through the CVP indexes.

Hello,

I'm Celine Roos WIM. It was just luck that I found a page through Google search for Books which linked to a French translation of an 1805 report established by a Research Society on Bengalese studies.

The book is free of copyright, here are the libraries where it is available. http://worldcatlibraries.org/wcpa/oclc/07026195

Also here you can see the whole book:
here

or just the article (starting p 207):
here

I guess the English original must be available somewhere. If I had more time, I would propose a translation into English but I'm terribly busy these days, having left the world of chess for the world of National Education in France.

Yours, Céline Roos
Strasbourg - France

See the rules of chess:
http://www.chessvariants.org/d.chess/chess.html

Repetition of moves
If the same position with the same player to move is repeated three times
in the game, the player to move can claim a draw. (When the right to make
a certain castling move is lost by one of the players between positions,
then the positions are considered to be different. For the fine points of
this rule, see the official rules of chess).
Refer to section 10.10: 
http://www.chessvariants.org/fidelaws.html 

One case where the repetition of move occurs is when a player continues to
give check forever.

You need to be a member to create your own pages directly, using your id
and password. 

http://www.chessvariants.org/index/membersubmission.php 

Non-members need to submit their write-ups to the editors for us to create
a page, after which they can register as members.

http://www.chessvariants.org/feedback.html#submit

Jack Cheiky writes: 
'The very first international correspondence game of Geodesic Chess is
underway. We began on Saturday, October 22, 2005. My opponent is Austin
Lockwood of England, who is also curator of the on-line chess community,
www.schemingmind.com .

We are two moves each into the game. We both have hand-held Geo-boards,
and I'm keeping track of the moves on a series of two-dimensional
dymaxion projection maps, which are being posted in the 'Photos' section
@ http://games.groups.yahoo.com/group/GeodesicChess/ .'

Eric, that's precisely the reason, so that you see the most recent
comments, the ones you are most likely responding to, first.

Matthew, the chessvariants.org site does not require logon. For some
functions, like verified comments or polls, we require that members enter
their user IDs and passwords, but this does not apply to the site in
general. What specifically were you unable to do?

I would like to clarify what a 'takeover' capture is. I defined it in
Takeover Chess (http://www.chessvariants.org/41.dir/takeover.html); it is
literally taking over ownership of the piece without removing it from the
board. I distinguish this kind of capture from standard capture by
replacement.