Ratings & Comments
Re: Including Piece Values on Rules Pages:
Is this something that editorial staff really feel should be done for a well-completed Rules Page (say done in the Notes Section)?
In my latest batch of games I've put up for Review I've left them out (I may insert later, after possible publication). That is because Dr. Muller is currently on editorial staff, and he often vehemently disagrees with certain Piece Values I might give. In spite of my continued doubts about certain aspects of computer studies, for example. Ultimately justified in the course of time or not.
As a result I do not feel I have full freedom to offer piece values (at least for the sake of my peace of mind), even though most people know to take anyone's offered Piece Values with a grain of salt. What should be done? Assume H.G.'s values are infallible, and wait for the next study of his if he has yet to offer piece values for 12x12 boards with given armies, for example?
Many people may be content not to offer piece values, simply because they want to keep their own a secret, as it may affect their chances when playing a given CV (or because it may take a lot of calculations, they may feel). Personally, I don't think it matters too often that way.
One possibility I thought of today is perhaps to have a separate section added (to rules pages!?) for just piece values offered, if any. Another idea is to rate separately someone's offered piece values. The truth is not a democracy, you might say? Well governments sometimes consult experts on matters, but go ahead and put them up for vote in democracies, anyway. Even life and death matters, such as euthanasia and abortion, as we have seen in places around the world. Short of divine intervention/retribution, perhaps, such decisions by democracies are final, subject to future governments or changes of constitutions.
@Fergus you fixed it. Thank you.
Perhaps I need to clear cache?
Yes.
At the cv web site there is a menu bar. On the menu bar after I sign in is my userid. If I hover my mouse over my userid a sub-menu pop-up comes up. At that point I click "Your games on Game Courier". This is probably my most visited page. The banner for this page is "Your Active Game Logs + Open Invitations". A few days ago the color for my games that I need to act on was a yellow/orange background with a black color font. Today the color for my games that I am playing is black background with navy blue font color. This makes the result set/(table) (that 1 row) almost impossible to read. Would it be possible to change the color so that those rows are more readable? Perhaps I need to clear cache?
We can all jump with joy. ;)
Happy Leap Day!
Should be special for chessvariants dot com. :)
Happy Leap Day!
Should be special for chessvariants dot com. :)
H. G. Muller wrote on Wed, Feb 28 07:56 AM UTC in reply to Kevin Pacey from 02:55 AM:Note that the PTA also has a button for creating a HTML verbal piece description that you only have to copy-paste into the Pieces section, in order to save time when creating entirely new variants. For regular pieces this should work quite well.
I copied and pasted from a settings file - would save time doing it that way again.
if this works maybe Fergus or another editor can tell me if It's allowed in a 'Pieces' section of a Rules Page
Why wouldn't it be allowed?
if they can read my comment here from the original state I had it in before submitting it
Earlier versions of comments are not saved as revisions, but we can look at the source code of your comment if that is what you mean. The main change I would recommend is to use relative URLs.
Testing - if this works maybe Fergus or another editor can tell me if It's allowed in a 'Pieces' section of a Rules Page, possibly in future, if they can read my comment here from the original state I had it in before submitting it:
Amazon — Can move like a Queen or Knight.
Ship — Can move like a Rook, Knight, or Ferz. Also known as Heroine.
Freemason — Can move like a Bishop, Knight, or Wazir. Also known as Templar or Popess.
Chancellor — Can move like a Rook or Knight. Also commonly called Marshall.
Archbishop — Can move like a Bishop or Knight. Also commonly called Cardinal.
Sailor — Can move like a Rook or step one square diagonally like a Ferz. Known in Shogi as Dragon King.
Missionary — Can move like a Bishop or step one square orthogonally like a Wazir. Known in Shogi as Dragon Horse.
Judge — Can step one square in any direction like a non-royal King or leap like a Knight. More commonly known as Centaur.
Not sure if everyone can see it [all], but here is a link to the fairly new public Group 'Croatian chess', a chess variant-oriented Group on LinkedIn, that currently has 7 members:
Here's a link about (9) chess 'variants' suggested by former world chess champion Kramnik:
https://en.chessbase.com/post/alphazero-kramnik-exploring-new-chess-variants
Hi Lev
There are two existing Rules Pages for Chess that I am aware of. One is older, the one by Hans Bodlaender, while Fergus has made a newer Rules Page. So, not being the author of either, I cannot follow your suggestion regarding including a summary of the rules for No Castling Chess on a Rules Page for Chess myself. Hans no longer visits the site as far as I know, but maybe Fergus might think about your idea...
Hmmm.
Speaking of snobbery, reminds me of the era when the US extended a 'No Fly' zone over Iraq. The NY Times thought that was incorrect (Pidgin English) and used the term 'No Flight' zone in their newspaper. No one else followed their example.
H. G. Muller wrote on Sat, Feb 10 07:43 AM UTC in reply to Kevin Pacey from Fri Feb 9 10:53 PM:I'm not sure that we should reject this 'variant' - would we be seen as snobs?
Yeah, let us behave like ignorants, otherwise the ignorant masses notice we stick out...
Well, that is not my philosophy of life.
Bruh can you just add No-Castling as a version of Chess on its existing page?
That is what we usually do for small rule changes that do not need any additional explanation.
Bruh can you just add No-Castling as a version of Chess on its existing page?
I've edited my post I'm replying to, in case anyone missed it.
I wonder if Kramnik has realized his 'mistake' by now, or even cares? In any case if someone here wants to make a Rules Page for No Castling Chess, they can add mention of your 'clear refutation' of it being a true variant H.G. (i.e. that it's a poor opening variation that can arise from FIDE Chess) - that would be one more anecdote for an Introduction or Notes section on such a Rules Page. :) edit2: I'm not sure that we should reject this 'variant' - would we be seen as snobs?
edit: one note about your refutation H.G. - those rook and knight moves by both sides from the FIDE start position would eat into the 50-move rule count, but that's almost guaranteed to be restarted after someone should decide to move a pawn, if it were still FIDE Chess being played. :) Same goes for avoiding/allowing 3-fold repetition early on. :) However, note that it would no longer be possible to make an early agreed draw in the FIDE version, say at move one. :)
We have presets here that don't check any rules at all, and it never discouraged people from playing these variants.
That depends upon how you quantify people. It never discouraged everyone from playing these variants, but it has discouraged some people on an individual basis.
H. G. Muller wrote on Fri, Feb 9 10:33 PM UTC in reply to Kevin Pacey from 09:11 PM:Well, what do orthodox Chess players know about variants?
Some practical considerations are that an explanation of the rules is redundant; any Chess player already knows you can lose castling rights, and very likely has experienced this himself more than once in a game. Special computer programs for it do not have to be created, because all existing engines for orthodox Chess that are in common use already can play it. Special servers for it are not needed, because it can already be played on all servers for orthodox Chess. (The server would not be fully rule-checking in that case, but who cares? We have presets here that don't check any rules at all, and it never discouraged people from playing these variants. Many servers do allow you to play from setup positions anyway, and there you could even set up a position without castling rights.)
The only thing that is new is that you cannot find books with opening theory on it. But the fact that a player has not memorized an opening line does not make something a variant.
H.G. wrote "...the No-Castling initial position could be reached from the FIDE setup. Not in the way you mention, because you could not get the Pawns back on 2nd rank, but by Nf3-Rg1-Rh1-Ng1 (repeated for the other three Rooks)..."
I cannot argue with that, though somehow many people seem to be treating No Castling Chess as if it were a legit variant. Meanwhile, here's a link to an event in India with it being played, with 89% decisive games played in it:
Lol, don't give me ideas...
H. G. Muller wrote on Fri, Feb 9 06:32 PM UTC in reply to Kevin Pacey from 06:16 PM:OK, you are right about the promotion, although the effect of that would (especially in Seirawan Chess) be very minimal.
You cannot get to a position with castling rights in No-Castling Chess, but you can get to a position as would be reached after castling. In orthodox Chess castling rights are not preserved forever, and usually expire when most material is still on the board. All positions that follow would also be reachable from the No-Castling initial position. But the point was really the other way around: that the No-Castling initial position could be reached from the FIDE setup. Not in the way you mention, because you could not get the Pawns back on 2nd rank, but by Nf3-Rg1-Rh1-Ng1 (repeated for the other three Rooks).
That some moves in this opening line are sub-optimal is not really relevant. In fact all opening lines but one must have sub-optimal moves in them, in Chess. The whole idea of thematic tournaments is that you want people to play from positions they would not reach voluntarily. In computer matches one often intentionally uses opening lines that are very poor for one of the players, bringing them on the edge of losing, before the engines are allowed to play the moves of their choice. And then play a pair of games with reversed colors to make it fair. This to eliminate the draw margin, which by the standards of modern engine play is so wide that virtually all games starting from an equal position end as draws. By starting on the edge the outcome can go either way (draw or loss), with about 50% chance, and a reversed pair of games has only 50% probability of ending in a draw, between equal players.
So no, poor quality of an opening line does not make a game where that opening line was played a chess variant.
25 comments displayed
Permalink to the exact comments currently displayed.
I am in general against spreading misinformation; there already is so much of that on the internet, no one is longing for us to add more to it. The problem with posted piece values is that they are very often not rooted in reality, but spring purely from the imagination of the author. I don't see what value that would add to an article. Every reader should be able to make unfounded guesses without any help. And it is especially bad if people post values that contradict a large body of evidence.
If I were to edit the article on orthodox Chess, claiming that the piece values are P=1, minor=2, R=4 and Q=8, based on the theory that piece values are inversely proportional to the number of those pieces you have in a game... Should it be allowed to stand? Should it go accompanied by an explanation of how these were calculated? Or by a disclaimer like "virtually everyone in the world agrees that these values are very much off, but I present these here anyway for no other reason that I could calculate them through a method that did not require any experimental evidence"?
My brother always says: "if you don't have anything to say, then don't do that here!". Information should flow from where there is knowledge to where there is none. It is only useful to publish information that is better / more reliable than what the reader already has. Sadly, for piece values that will usually not be the case.