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Grand Chess. Christian Freeling's popular large chess variant on 10 by 10 board. Rules and links. (10x10, Cells: 100) (Recognized!)[All Comments] [Add Comment or Rating]Too large size, Rook connection, tired compounds and strange promotion rules make this a bad game.
Carlos, Grand Chess links are the main way CVPage taps Christian Freeling's site. The site has better games than Grand Chess itself for sure. Nothing that you said, but I read elsewhere about Gabriel Maura and am still not sure whether he is only inactive in games now. For example, Robert Abbott, inventor of Ultima, commented here 5 yrs. ago seeming to say that unfortunately his age stopped him from analyzing or playing abstract games much any longer. I was just wondering whereabouts of Maura. [ Robert Abbott's comment about dropping out of strategy games appears 30.January.2004 under Rococo.]
That link gives me a 404. Please provide a correct, updated link.
- Sam
We´ve produced now an exclusive Set for Grand-Chess - see our
website.
Perhaps you can make a link on it and we do one on your site.
Christian Freeling's game is potentially excellent, but I feel it would benefit from two tweaks:
1) The initial array for the white major pieces should be Cardinal-D2, Queen-E2, King-F2, and Marshall-G2. (Of course the black pieces should be rearranged accordingly.) This setup does have the potential disadvantage of having the KBP on both sides initially unguarded, but the capture of either pawn would take several tempi and might lead to some interesting gambit play.
2) The king should be allowed a once-a-game safety leap of three squares either to the right or left. this would be in essence castling without the rook and would be subject to the same rules as castling, i.e. no prior king move and no moving over squares attacked by the enemy.
In any event the foremost requirement of viability for any chess variant is that the winning percentage for white be no higher than that experienced in ordinary chess.
R+Ferz,B+Wazir, RB, RN and BN all need explanation, as somewhat does 'N+nonroyal King'. First, it worsens 8x10 Carrera's to add squares and not pieces. Carrera's of dubious playability has much historical importance in creativity. Anticipating JG's rationale for GrCh, corner squares for Rook stand out. How about a spike for Bishop instead? It makes more sense because B (and N) are disadvantaged more than R by the two stock pseudo-compounds RN,BN. Rather than empty row for Rook alone, just add (test your visualization) solitary squares k2,l3,m4,n5,m6,l7,k8 reconnecting to j9. The other Bishop spike, or half-diamond, would be skewed oppositely between a2 and a10. (Rightly these should apply to mere 8x10) Two Bishop double-spikes for 'Bishop+Wazir', Queen and Cardinal, two holes in the board, unlike Morley. F V Morley's 'My One Contribution to Chess' is a 1940s classic, preceding GrCh by 40 years with the same type of empty corridors.
I'd like to say something about raison d'etre for Grand Chess later but for now, I just want to take something you said and talk about it a little: 'RN and BN are inherently inferior to RB' -- Do you mean aesthetically?
Let's at least pretend you are talking mechanically. Betza argues that on an 8 x 8 board, RN is equivalent to RB such that one could replace the one with the other to create equivalent armies, as he does in Sort of Almost Chess where he even says the following: 'Both kinds of Queen have exactly the same strength, so it is an even game, even for masters.' But I suppose on larger boards, the queen becomes more powerful, just as the bishop becomes more powerful than the knight. What sort of added powers would one have to give to the RN to allow it to keep up with the queen as the board gets larger?
What would one have to add to a BN to make it equivalent to a queen? I'd like to know about different possibilities. One possibility is to make the knight a nightrider. I created this variant to explore this, but one also explores it in Lions and Unicorns and Pocket Mutation Chess, two inspirations for me in creating the former practice variant.
We have panned Grand Chess several times elsewhere but never directly on its page. This game is a pitiful rerun for uncreative minds. If its date were 1800 or 1900, sure, there would be slight historical interest, thought not much in light of Carrera's, Turkish ones and all the others, but in 1980s it amounts to nothing. There are mediocre patents from 1970s with the same pieces that never reach this website. RN and BN are inherently inferior to RB, and medieval ingenuity made the right choice for the new Queen as full-stength RB(not one- or two-stepping) around 1496. Those prescient individuals from Italy and/or Spain presumably ignored out of hand BN, RN as weird, awkward, ineffectual exotics. Moreover, in all the Carrera derivatives, the individual Knights suffer overwhelmed by gross compounds. Grand's board acts overspacious and underutilized, largely because the misguided leaps to 100 squares increase over 50% the 1500-year 64-square standard and cannot cope. All this having been said before, the critique belongs here in the bowels of this loser. [Afterthought: Hey granted it is still a suitable game to build a player's rating at ridiculous one move a day with its straightforward standard moves]
Joe Joyce wrote on Sat, Jul 7, 2007 12:16 AM UTC:After posting my previous comment on Grand Chess, I received an email from Michael Howe [Nova Chess and others], who has been working on the pawn promotion/movement problem in his work. With permission, I present the relevant body of the text: [A pawn] 'can move to the back rank even when no previously captured piece is available, and while there it moves like a nonroyal king (commoner). If it moves out of the promotion zone it reverts to pawn. If it moves within the promotion zone it gets another chance to promote. A player can also move into or within the promotion zone and choose the commoner option instead of a piece promotion even if a piece is available: for example, in a situation when a commoner would mate but a cardinal or marshal would not. No in-situ promotion. I think this works better than a sideways-moving pawn because it is more threatening, although I doubt that this situation will come up much'. As I use the scheme I proposed in both Grand Shatranj and Atlantean Barroom Shatranj, I am adding this option to both games.
Joe Joyce wrote on Thu, Jul 5, 2007 03:49 AM UTC:Excellent ★★★★★The annoying promotion/pawn move rule is the only thing that prevents this game from being practically perfect. I'd suggest that pawns can move to the back rank even if they can't promote, and be allowed to move sideways along the back rank 1 square per move, capturing as they go. Reversals of direction would be allowed. I lean toward allowing a pawn to move, possibly capturing on the move, and then promote when the opportunity presents itself, as well as just promote in situ when a piece becomes available. In this scheme, promotion would not be required as soon as a piece became available.
I found a faster Fool's mate than the one published in Tony Quintanilla's comment.
this game is a classic
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
Play Christian Freeling's Grand Chess on BrainKing :-)
Some people has critiziced the initial setup. Others think that the Pawns in third rank and majority of bigger pieces in second is not the best idea. I strongly disagree, this game is excellent, and much more: for me, it is one of the best decimal variants ever made. The measures: the beauty, deepness and interest of an average game. Superb.
📝Greg Strong wrote on Fri, Mar 25, 2005 09:55 PM UTC:Excellent ★★★★★A fantastic variant, and my favorite variant on a decimal board. I think placing the pawns on the third rank, rather than the second, is important for decimal variants to get the game moving and interesting before dozens of moves have past. Even giving second-rank pawns a triple-space initial move still doesn't seem to accomplish the this. Omega Chess games, for example, seem to take forever to develop to a level with noticeable tension. Grand Chess also allows pawns to promote on the 8th rank, as in Mecklenbeck Chess, and this provides additional tension without making the game so dynamic that it hard to visualize. Finally, giving the back rank to the Rooks reduces or eliminates the need for castling, and I consider this a very good thing, too.
I've suggested in the forum that the Games Courier might implement a 'The World Against ...' system, whereby a champion at some variant would play White and everyone else plays Black. 'The World' can use a public forum to discus possible lines of play and could vote (in a strict time-span) on which move to make. Grand Chess would be a good game to investigate this way, because Mindsports Arena has held tournaments some years back, so it has recognized champions: Wayne Schmittberger and John Vehre. Either 'The World Against Vehre' or 'The World Against Schmittberger' would be great fun, I think, if either party could be enlisted for it.
Grand Chess design analysis: # squares: 100 # piece types: 8 Piece-type density: 8% Est. piece values: P1, K2, N3, B3, R5, C8, M9, Q10 Initial piece density: 40% Long diagonal: a1-j10 Power density: 1.22 Exchange gradient: 0.450; (1-G) = 0.550 Ave. game length: M = 3.5*100*0.08/1.22*0.55 = 42 Moves Features: All the B-N-R two-fold compounds appear Comments: Great exchange potential and relatively few types of pieces keep a decimal variant under 45-move average.
Charles Gilman wrote on Sat, Jul 19, 2003 07:45 AM UTC:Mark Thompson's idea of Zebrine Grand Chess need not violate the rule of each combination of two elementals, as the Zebra move could replace the Knight move as a component of the compound pieces as well as on its own. I have some ideas for naming such pieces if anyone is interested.
the link to freeling's grandchess page is broken. the site was redone last summer, so stuff was probably moved around at that time. i don't have the correct url handy.
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