Comments/Ratings for a Single Item

For the 4th round, these players will be paired together:

CIRCULAR CHESS
Nicholas Wolff (W) vs. Vitya Makov (B)
Carlos Cetina (W) vs. Thomas McElmurry (B)
Fergus Duniho (W) vs. Jose Carrillo (B)
Armin Liebhart (W) vs. Je Ju (B)

HYPERMODERN SHATRANJ
Armin Liebhart (W) vs. Thomas McElmurry (B)
Vitya Makov (W) vs. Carlos Cetina (B)
Fergus Duniho (W) vs. Nicholas Wolff (B)
Je Ju (W) vs. Jose Carillo (B)

MODERN CARRERA'S CHESS
Carlos Cetina (W) vs. Armin Liebhart (B)
Vitya Makov (W) vs. Fergus Duniho (B)
Thomas McElmurry (W) vs. Je Ju (B)
Jose Carillo (W) vs. Nicholas Wolff (B)

Since I'm tired, I will make the actual assignments tomorrow.

No problem Thomas.

Everything is back in track.

You may want to update the email address on your profile though.

Yes, that's what happened.  I had gone back one move to look at the previous position, and then I think I just went back in my browser history, so that I was looking at the current position on screen, but the server was working with the previous position.  Usually I'm careful to avoid such things, but this time I forgot (I must have been distracted by my increasingly uncomfortable position).

I hadn't meant to take back a move, and I've replayed my previous move so that we can restore the correct game history.

Fergus,

My opponent Thomas has made an illegal take back of moves in our 3rd round Euchess game.

How do we return the game to the position after my last legal move, which he also took back.

I sent my opponent an email to try to sort this out, but his email address is no longer valid, and the email bounced.

Can you please stop the clock in this game until the issue gets resolved?

Thanks.

Jose

/play/pbm/play.php?game=Euchess&log=crazytom-j_carrillo_vii-2010-59-178

I'm getting ready to assign games for the third round. So that I'm clear on what I'm doing, I'll write out everything here first.

AJAX ORTHODOX CHESS

With Joe and Sam gone, we have five winners and three losers from the first round. So one pairing is of a winner vs. a loser (myself). For the next round:

Jose Carrillo (White) vs. Carlos Cetina (Black)
Thomas McElmurry (White) vs. Vitya Makov (Black)
Fergus Duniho (White) vs. Armin Liebhart (Black)
Je Ju (White) vs. Nicholas Wolff (Black)

EUCHESS

With Joe and Sam gone, we have three winners and five losers from the first round. So one pairing is a winner vs. a loser. For the next round:

Vitya Makov (White) vs. Carlos Cetina (Black)
Thomas McElmurry (White) vs. Jose Carillo (Black)
Armin Liebhart (White) vs. Je Ju (Black)
Nicholas Wolff (White) vs. Fergus Duniho (Black)

EURASIAN CHESS

One game was drawn, and with Joe and Sam gone, we have four winners and two losers from the first round. So all the winners get paired with winners, and those who lost get paired with those who drew.

Carlos Cetina (White) vs. Fergus Duniho (Black)
Jose Carillo (White) vs. Vitya Makov (Black)
Je Ju (White) vs. Thomas McElmurry (Black)
Nicholas Wolff (White) vs. Armin Liebhart (Black)

These are arranged so that no one plays the same color in all three games, but they are not arranged so that between this and the first round, each players has each side three times. Where a loser plays a winner or a drawer, the loser gets the advantage of playing White this round.

With Joe Joyce leaving the tournament, we have an even number of players again, allowing everyone remaining to be assigned all three games for each round. Hopefully, everyone else will remain, and we won't encounter this problem again. I will accept Nicholas' offer to make Modern Carrera's Chess his choice for the tournament.

Nicholas, let me know when you will be away, and I can either put off assigning your games or adjust your time controls.

Reluctantly, I will withdraw from the tournament. The combination of family obligations and health issues and the tournament's rather quick pace is proving extremely difficult for me. Hopefully everything will resolve over the next several months, and I will then be able to participate more than I have over the past year. But right now, events have more control over me than vice-versa. I'll finish my current games, and ask that no new ones be assigned me.

My apologies to the participants in the tournament. I have enjoyed playing each of you, and would enjoy continuing. These tournaments are an excellent way to play new games and meet old and new friends, and I'll miss not continuing. But at this point, I seem to be unable to play even somewhat competitively with any grace period of less than 3 weeks. Heh, should anyone wish to play a slow game with me, I'm available. I just don't seem to be able to juggle everything both quickly and successfully now. 

Joe

Fergus,

If it would be for the better, I can either resign from the tournament, as well, or take his choice of variant as my own.  Whatever would work best for you, I would do.  I am soon to depart for 3 weeks for work and I might not be able to play much, so I will not be upset whatever you choose.  Thanks!

-Nick

Since Sam Trenholme has quit, the math will not work out for assigning
everyone to all games in each round unless something changes. Here are some
possibilities:

1) Someone else replaces Sam in the tournament, playing what would have
been his games.

2) Someone else quits the tournament.

3) Players already in the tournament play extra games, so that everyone
remaining in the tournament gets to play at least three games each round.

4) Sam rejoins the tournament.

If none of these happen, then three players will play only two games in
each subsequent round. This would be shared among the players as much as
possible, but with a loss of twelve games, and only nine players to
distribute the loss among, some would lose out on playing two games.

I am also considering dropping Modern Carrera's Chess from the tournament,
because this was Sam's choice for the tournament, and he has reneged on
the terms for including his choice in the tournament. This opens up a few
possibilities:

1) Allow a new player to join the tournament and pick a replacement for the
remainder of the tournament.

2) Let someone in the tournament who has not already chosen one of the
games in the tournament take on Modern Carrera's Chess as his official
choice.

3) Let someone in the tournament who has not already chosen one of the
games pick a new one.

4) Just drop Modern Carrera's Chess from the tournament.

Assuming Sam doesn't rejoin, which would remove all problems here, I favor
replacing him with a new player, and I would consider offering the
incentive of letting the new player pick a replacement for the remainder of
the tournament. But I would prefer to keep the games the same. So if
someone who hasn't picked a game would like to make Modern Carrera's
Chess his official choice, and if a new player joined without picking a
replacement game, that would probably work best.

Assuming we don't get a new player, then having each player play one or
two extra games during the course of the tournament would be the next best
option. But this would require the willing participation of everyone.

Short of getting everyone's participation in this, we could do it like
this. Those who are willing to play in place of Sam in a game someone would
have played against him will get priority in getting an alternate opponent
for the game he would have played against Sam. Those who are not willing to
play extra games may miss out on playing all their games.

Or we could do it like this. Anyone who replaces Sam in a game gets the opportunity to raise his score in the tournament, but to keep things fair, this opportunity would be given only to someone who has already lost the game in question. That way, no one could win any game more than three times.

Fergus, I changed Circular Chess board JPG Quality from 50 to 100 and it looks pretty nice now. 
Can you change it as default? I cannot do this in the game I'm playing.

I will finish all games I am currently playing. After that, I will not start any new games.

- Sam

What's the tournament filter name for this tournament?

Thanks

Thanks Fergus.

Everything is back to normal.

Everyone should be receiving the error below in their Ajax Orthodox Chess games:

Parse error: syntax error, unexpected ':' in /home1/chessvar/public_html/play/pbm/sets/alfaerie-ajax.php on line 2

Actually the error is affecting all my Ajax variants presets.

I asked Fergus last night to update the Ajax Piece set for Game Courier with a few more pieces for my Ajax Wars game coming up, but unfortunately there must have been a typo or something that messed up the Alfaerie for Ajax piece set I use in my Ajax variants.

I asked Fergus to take a look at it, and hope that the problem will be resolved soon.

Vitya, no, there is no 'bare king' rule in HyperModern Shatranj. The operative rule is: 

'Victory is by checkmating the opponent's king. Any other result is a draw.'

It is true that every other shatranj variant I designed has a bare king rule. However, by this point, the game is close enough to modern chess that such a rule was not considered. I don't recall Roberto, Christine, or I even mentioning it during our various discussions.

Thanks.

Fergus, I can playtest Circular Chess preset with you when it will be ready.

RANBQKBNMR

Where A = Knight + Bishop and M = Rook + Knight

It is on an 8x10 board; castling is done by having the king move three squares.

What castling rule is for Modern Carrera's Chess? 3->Rook?

No, the bonus time has not been working right. I was supposed to enter a 1 instead of a 0. I have now manually edited the round file, and we'll see if that fixes it.

Happy Palindrome Day to you too.

I always like to have a link to all the games in the tournament.

Is the bonus time working properly? My opponents and I have exchanged several moves within the 12-hour grace period, and I don't think any of us have received the six-hour bonus.

Oh, and Happy Palindrome Day to one and all!

Fergus, I have an idea. Instead of implementing Circular Chess in a 
hurry, you could make use of my zrf:
http://hem.passagen.se/melki9/circularchess.htm
In this varant only, you could make an exception and allow the use 
of an analysis engine. This is how they do it in ICCF, where computer 
analysis is permitted. In email chess the whole PGN protocol is 
typically sent. In this case you could send the move part of the ZSG 
file. Just save to file in every move. Then you will also get correct 
rules checking and no misunderstandings can occur. When a move is 
made, the receiving player can copy and paste the moves into his 
ZSG file. There is a point in allowing an analysis engine sometimes, 
if you really want to test how good a variant is. The ZSG protocol 
looks like this:
1. Pawn-ccw sa2 - ec2 White H M1
1. Pawn-cw nd2 - eb2 Black H M2
2. Knight sc3 - wa2
2. Pawn-ccw na2 - wc2 Black H M3
3. Pawn-cw sd3 - wa3
3. Pawn-ccw na3 - wd3
/Mats

Fergus,

Perhaps you can put links on the list of games for the tournament to the individual games' rules pages.

For a tournament targeting beginners sure is a heavyweight line-up of participants!

Can't find a description of or rules for Modern Carrera's Chess ... any help in finding those would be appreciated.

Thanks, and hope everyone rings in the New Year in good health and spirits.

The time controls should meet these goals:

(1) A game should generally take no longer than two months, proceeding at a pace of approximately one turn per day.

(2) Players should be able to take off extended periods of time occasionally.

(3) Games should be allowed to continue for as long as it takes to finish them.

To meet the first two goals, the time controls should encourage those who will be taking off time to move as quickly as they can while able, both before and after taking time off. To encourage making moves before taking time off, making moves should be able to extend the time a player has available to take off. But it should not extend it to the point where a player can take several extended vacations or play very slowly. Using bonus time with a maximum on the time a player has available should accomplish these goals.

To encourage moving afterward, the chance of running out of time should remain. So the bonus time given for moving quickly should not be too generous.

The third goal may be met with grace time, minimum time, or a combination of the two. Grace time gets deducted from the time used. Minimum time extends the time someone has left when his time left falls below the minimum. So if a person has 12 hours of each, they will allow 24 hours to make a move.

With this in mind, I will add bonus time, maximum time, and minimum time values to the time controls I already posted. So here is what I expect to use for time controls:

Spare Time: 2 weeks
Grace Time: 12 hours
Minimum Time: 12 hours
Bonus Time: 6 hours for moving within 1 second (before 12 hours grace time is up)
Maximum Time: 4 weeks

Fergus,

Please use my rated account for these games: nickwolffrated.  Thanks!

'Lol, Fergus, I am often known to take 12 to 24 days to make a move. My typical game
plays with a grace time of 3 weeks and no other time at all.'

I can make a move several months. But this tournament is not for such games. So, you must make moves quicker than usually.

Lol, Fergus, I am often known to take 12 to 24 days to make a move. My typical game plays with a grace time of 3 weeks and no other time at all. 

I'm not complaining, mind you. But I'm going to have to work to keep from giving free games to my opponents. Actually, I'm sure part of the motivation for the tight time controls was the extreme slowness of some of the games in the previous tournaments. And I have to admit my game with David Paulowich was the final one, and it may well have lasted 3 months past the ending of the other games.

Joe, if each player takes 24 hours after his opponent moves to make a move, then the game will proceed at the pace of one full turn every two days, and spare time will run out in eight weeks. If you move once every day, which is the target pace, the worst case scenario is that your opponent always moves right after you while you move 24 hours after him. This would use up your spare time in about four weeks. In the best case scenario, the game could be kept going at the same pace without any cost of spare time if you both moved 12 hours apart. In the most likely scenario, you will use up less than 12 hours per day while keeping the game going at the pace of one move per day. 
An average of six hours per day would use up your spare time in eight weeks, which is the target time for a game to end, but even after spare time ends, grace time can be used to keep a game going.

Tight time controls. I anticipate having time trouble [of course, I am one of the slowest players] but such is life. To be perfectly clear, we get 2 weeks of slush time, and have 12 hours to make our moves before dipping into our 2 weeks, but we get no extra time for making a move - is this right?

And now for a request. Might I ask the indulgence of people commenting on the games they're playing? I for one am interested in improving my designs, so I am always willing to listen, and, like now, actively solicit comments on my designs, good, bad or indifferent. 

Enjoy.

Fergus,

When is the start of the tournament?

I'd like to sign up, provided the time controls are such that I can safely average 1 to 1.5 moves per game per day.  If I had been in time to suggest a game, I probably would have suggested Extinction Chess.  But the six selections look like a good set of games.

Just in case it's being seriously considered, I'll say that I'm not a fan of Sam Trenholme's proposal for adjudication of long games.  If the point of the tournament for most of us is to try out new games, it would be a shame to be deprived of an interesting endgame.

The preset for Ajax Orthodox Chess is complete and enforces all the rules:
/play/pbm/play.php?game%3DAjax+Orthodox+Chess%26settings%3DAlfaerie1

mirari wrote:

My earlier question about the time control remains unanswered. Is it lenient enough to allow occasional traveling?

I think I'll start the tournament at the beginning of next month, so that travel over Christmas doesn't interfere with anyone starting the tournament. I plan to use time controls that will keep the pace fast enough to finish each round in a timely manner but also allow for time away. But I have not yet decided on what the time controls will be.

Sam, in Russian chess (Fide-chess with Amazon instead of queen), the single Amazon can easily get exchanged, leading to drawish play. Gustav III's Chess is totally different. Why don't you try my Zillions program? Play can be very brutally tactical in the middlegame. One can often sacrifice several pieces since the Amazon has such great mating potential. It's great fun.
/Mats

But the fact that the Amazon can easier achieve mate makes it easier to handle for the amateur. To mate with B + N is another thing, it's for advanced players. The Amazon is more straightforward than the other super-knights. Isn't the Chancellor a rather clumsy piece?
/Mats

My earlier question about the time control remains unanswered. Is it lenient enough to allow occasional traveling?

Fergus: 'I have excluded games with Amazons for the same reason that I don't use Amazons in my own games. The Amazon is too powerful against the King.'

Thanks for explaining, I understand this comes down to your personal taste in chess variants then, and that seems fair enough given that it is your tourney - I do wish this had been made clearer from the start though.

Myself, I enjoy a wide variety of variants, including several with pieces that would be too powerful by your definition - e.g. Chu Shogi with its Lion, Gustav III's with its Amazons and Tripunch with its whole range of insanely powerful pieces. I also disagree with your reasoning - even though one of these pieces can in theory cause chess mate on its own, I find that in practice, an unsupported attack won't succeed, because the king is defended by a team. (On the flip side, I have seen a lone queen occasionally go on a game-deciding rampage on the opponent's back rank... even though it can't deliver the actual checkmate on its own, it is powerful enough to decide the game nonetheless).

Still, I shall hope for other opportunities to play with such powerful pieces, and look forward to playing the variants that will be in the tournament.

Mats, that's not your call.

Je ju, there is room left in the tournament for more players, just not for more games.

I would enjoy playing in the tournament if space is still available.

I'll propose Football Chess be included (but don't really expect it to be).

Look forward to playing again.

We must assume that the players know the rules of check and checkmate. Those rules needn't be programmed. It's the piece movement rules which are important.
/Mats

This preset for Ajax Orthodox Chess is almost complete:
/play/pbm/play.php?game%3DAjax+Orthodox+Chess%26settings%3DAlfaerie1

It enforces all the Ajax movement rules, allows the dropping of Ajax Ministers, castling, en passant, etc.

The only thing that it can't do is tell that the King is in check when attacked by the Ajax Minister.

Fergus (or anyone else), can you please help me fix this final issue?

Thanks.

I think excluding Gustav III's chess because it has Amazons is a very spurious reason - the Amazon is in my experience a very simple piece for chess players to learn to play with - people I've played with have had more difficulties with the Chinese cannon, for example.

Regarding time controls - how does that work with holidays, etc.?  I am traveling abroad now and then (about every second or third month), which means up to a couple of weeks with limited possibilities to keep up with games.  Also, I am away for a long time this year over Christmas and New Year - from the 16th of December up to 10th of January - if either of those would cause a trouble with the time controls for the tournament, then it is perhaps best if I withdraw before the start rather than failing to live up to my commitment and forfeiting games once the tournament is under way.

To program Circular Chess, I have begun to develop support for logical directions, similar to how Zillions of Games handles directions.

Regarding time controls, I am thinking of adding options for minimum time and maximum time. After each move, anyone's time that dropped below the minimum would be raised to the minimum. This would be an alternative to using grace time. Maximum time would put a cap on the amount of time that could be accumulated with extra time or bonus time.

I'm thinking of giving each player 14 days of spare time and 24 hours of grace time. Rounds with different games may overlap if players haven't yet finished some games. I also have some other ideas regarding modifications I want to make to the time controls.

When the site goes down, I account for the lost time by hardcoding it into Game Courier.

As Mats said: 'If it's an introductory tournament to chess variants then one should perhaps have fewer rounds. It's easier for people to sign up if it's not that time-demanding.' I agree with this.

'if anyone doesn’t like the games, or what not, they are free to withdraw from the tournament.'

I think it's not your problem.

I also think there’s nothing wrong with having both Modern Carrera Chess and Euchess.

The important thing is to go forward with this tournament. Bickering about the games or tournament structure goes against this; if anyone doesn’t like the games, or what not, they are free to withdraw from the tournament.

'18 rounds is very ambitious. If it's an introductory tournament to chess variants
then one should perhaps have fewer rounds. It's easier for people to sign up if it's
not that time-demanding.'

Agree. 12 looks better.

'I change my choice for Euchess since it also can be useful as an introductory variant.'

Hm... What sense to play two variants with chancellors and cardinals only? (Capa variant and Euchess). Both are large variants. Yes, Euchess is larger, but main idea is the same.
Symmetric chess was interesting because of introducing bishop-conversion rule.

18 rounds is very ambitious. If it's an introductory tournament to chess variants then one should perhaps have fewer rounds. It's easier for people to sign up if it's not that time-demanding.
/Mats

What I personally like about Euchess is that it is even closer to Gross Chess than Grand Chess is. Gross Chess is basically Euchess + Eurasian Chess + Omega Chess on a larger board.

Euchess is an easy game to program. It can be done easily enough by slightly modifying the code for Victorian Chess. All you have to do is copy the code for that game to a Euchess preset and modify the code in the Pre-Game section that identifies the locations of the Kings (used for spotting check) and the flags on the spaces for the Kings and Rooks (used for castling).

OK, no problem; I change my choice for Euchess since it also can be useful as an introductory variant.

Regarding the enforcement of the rules, I don't know how to do it. If you or any other could help me, receive thousand thanks beforhand.

The preset is here.

So far, Joe Joyce, Vitya Makov, Nicolas Wolff, Carlos Cetina, mirari, Jose Carillo, Sam Trenholme, and myself are the only ones to explicitly state our intention to sign up for the tournament. So the list of games to be played looks like this:

1. Eurasian Chess (Fergus Duniho)
2. Modern Carrera's Chess (Sam Trenholme)
3. HyperModern Shatranj (Joe Joyce)
4. Circular Chess (Vitya Makov)
5. Symmetric Chess (Carlos Cetina)
6. Ajax Orthodox Chess (Jose Carillo)

This changes three of the games from the previous list. Note that Symmetric Chess is also described in my Experiments in Symmetry article, where it gets called Bigamous Chess. Regarding Symmetric Chess, I am concerned about its similarity to a commercial game. So if someone will suggest another game, and either sign up or already be signed up for this tournament, I will consider it. Regarding other suggestions, Nicholas Wolff's multi-move suggestions were rejected, but he could get another suggestion in. Mirari's suggestion of Gustav III's Chess is rejected for including Amazons. If M. Winther cares to sign up, a variant featuring one of his original pieces might be worth including in the tournament.

Is there such a shortage of enforced presets? All my presets are rule-enforced, as Gustav III's Chess, Mastodon Chess, etc., etc., etc., etc...
/Mats

'...and it should be programmed on Game Courier before the start of the tournament. I am able to program the rules for games you may not be able to, but if I can't do it, and no one else can, then the game won't make it.'

You need to read more attentive. Nobody told that we'll play presets without rules enforcement. Question is who will program the rules?! As I understand Fergus can do this.

Fergus,

I sent you an email with the include file for Ajax Orthodox Chess. Can you please upload it so that I can start testing the preset?

Thanks.

Vitya, I have played against my Circular Chess program and I can tell you
that it seems to works fine without the 'en passant' rule. One cannot
easily create a pawn blockade anyway. In Circular Chess the pieces have
different values. Firstly, the rook is more valuable, probably it's worth
more than two light pieces. The light pieces seem to be worth less than
three pawns. Probably a light piece can, at times, be exchanged for two
pawns. This means that a pawn blockade can often be removed by exchanging 
a piece for two pawns. The situation on the circular board is more 
unstable than on the standard board, and there is no sufficient hideaway
for the king. I don't think you have to worry about cowardly drawish 
play, using pawn blockades. After all, reasonably strong players have
tested this variant in the yearly Lincoln tournament. It works.
/Mats

On Circular Chess.

'Also, there is no en-passant capture. (This was because the inventor didn't like this rule.)' http://www.chessvariants.org/shape.dir/circular.html

Ha-ha! Lol! En-passant is a important thing in chess. In Circular Chess where row of pawn is 4 not eight it's more important thing against drawish wall of pawns.
There is no problem do you like it or not. It's an important rule.
So, I cannot agree with the inventor of Circular Chess.

But it's not a big problem. We can play it without en-passant or with it... It's playable.

I am all for the inclusion of Circular Chess. I am curious about the British version. I made a Zillion program of it, which I believe, is quite strong:
http://hem.passagen.se/melki9/circularchess.htm

It should be implemented in Game Courier. Remember that rules do not include en-passant.
/Mats

Sam Trenholme wrote:

Balanced Capablanca Chess (a.k.a “Capablanca Chess, Aberg setup” or “Duniho’s Capablanca Variant”)

When I programmed Aberg's Capablanca Variation for Zillions in 1999, I understood that he put the Chancellor on the Queen's side and the Archbishop on the King's side, whereas my variant switched these two pieces around from Aberg's. Yet the page for Aberg's made in 2003 uses the setup for Duniho's Capablanca Variation. So I went to archive.org to see what information I was using on Aberg's back in 1999. Here is what Aberg wrote: 'I think that one should perhaps put the piece that can move both as a rook and a knight on the queen's side. The reason is that this piece will be weaker than the one that moves as a rook and a bishop, and the queen's side already has more material than the king's side. One might still call the queen's side piece the archbishop and the king's side piece the chancellor, though.' Aberg switched the meanings of Chancellor and Archbishop, and the diagram that follows uses these switched piece names. In the 2003 page, Aberg has switched the pieces around, so that his setup now matches the one from Duniho's Capablanca Variation, and he now states, in agreement with the reason I switched the position of the pieces for my variant, that the Chancellor is more powerful than the Archbishop.

Regarding the name of the game, I would favor using Carrera's name instead of Capablanca's, because the setup is mathematically equivalent (or even identical) to the one from his game, and he preceded Capablanca by centuries. It is the reverse of Carrera's setup if we take our own page on Carrera's Chess as the authority, but another page I've seen (http://www.worldchesslinks.net/ezi01.html) shows Carrera's setup to be the same as it is for what you're calling Balanced Capablanca Chess. So I suggest using the name Modern Carrera's Chess, since it is Carrera's setup played with Capablanca's more modern rules.

'Anyhow, I thought Jose proposed Modern Chess a while ago.'

He proposed Ajax Chess or Ajax Random Chess.

'Vitya: Modern chess was suggested in this posting.'

It was said about Shatranj. Modern Shatranj.

'I think it’s perfectly fair to demand anyone who wants their variant played here to either make a full rules-enforcing game courier preset'

I'm not a programmer. It's not a big problem for Fergus, I hope.

Hey Sam, you said: '[I]f you want your variant in this tournament, you need to figure out how to program game courier to play the variant.' Lol, you're safe from my games, then. I'm lucky I can make basic, non-rules-checking presets. :)

Vitya - oops! Wondered about that. Anyhow, I thought Jose proposed Modern Chess a while ago.

Finally, Mats, for what it's worth, HyperModern Shatranj may not have been played as such yet at all. I honestly don't remember. So you may technically get your wish if it's played in the tourney. However, as George has just commented on another thread, it's more of a shuffling in and out of pieces and a rearrangement of the rules than an actual variant. The only reason I actually posted it as a separate game is that people kept coming up with it and saying 'put it in the shatranj games', so I did. And someone else posted a very similar game a week later. You'll see 4 names in my write-up.

George is very right about the minor fudging of pieces and/or places in the initial setup not being actual variants. They are 'merely' games, many quite good, of a variant or variant class. Of course, a good game is never 'mere', but changing one thing doesn't make for a new variant necessarily. A number of my games feature alternate piece sets, and some prefer different versions. HG Muller uses the DWAF instead of the WF as the default Great Shatranj game in his software. Christine Bagley-Jones did Capablanca Shatranj, which uses some long range pieces. 

Maybe it comes down to knowing how the game will play by reading the rules [because you've played so many similar games] before you ever need to push pieces. That's why they're called modest variants - they are close enough to the well-known that the quality of the game can be evaluated reasonably well without actually playing it.

'Looking at this list, the next three people who make a game courier preset enforcing the rules will get their game in this tournament.'

Ha-ha! :))) LOL!!!

M. Winther wrote:

In this tournament I propose that we only have variants which have never been tried before.

This is an introductory tournament, targeted at beginners, and beginners should start with games already known to be good. I plan to follow this tournament with tournaments of other themes. Three ideas I have are an intermediate level Chess variant tournament, a large Chess variant tournament, and a Green Eggs & Ham tournament. Sam may be able to explain that reference to anyone who doesn't get it. The Green Eggs & Ham tournament is the one closest to what you have in mind.

'The reason is that it is too easy to force the amazons to get traded off early on, and then you find yourself playing what amounts to a standard chess position with queens traded off.'

We can play it and I can show you that is not easy to force...