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Modern Shatranj. A bridge between modern chess and the historic game of Shatranj. (8x8, Cells: 64) [All Comments] [Add Comment or Rating]

H. G. Muller wrote on Wed, May 1, 2013 05:46 AM UTC:

Oh sure, I am not claiming that this change is bad. On the contrary. The original Shatranj is an excessively boring game. In self-play ShaMax draws more than 70% of the games (for FIDE this is ~32%, for Spartan Chess ~20% and for Capablanca Chess ~16%). On top of that it is slow (the draws take about twice as many moves as in FIDE).

Making promotion decisive greatly reduces the drawishness, which is good. I am not sure what you mean by the 'mere speed bumps' remark. It is generally agreed that in FIDE Pawns are 'the soul of the game'. The basic dynamics of orthodox Chess games is:

gain Pawn -> trade Pawns to create a passer -> push passer -> passer binds one of opponent's pieces -> use your piece majority to gain more Pawns -> etc.

In Shatranj there is very little to worry if you are two pawns behind, especially if they all promote to the wrong color. Pawns basically only have value in the King-Safety evaluation. This does affect strategy from the beginning.