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V. Reinhart wrote on Wed, Jul 19, 2017 05:47 AM UTC:

Kevin, thanks for your information about piece values. Your comment about a queen being more powerful on larger boards is interesting, and a good point.

A few months ago I used HGMuller's Fairy-Max to play a bunch of games to estimate the value of a guard (to confirm or dispute HGMuller's earlier work). I did it on a 10x8 board, and used the 4 extra squares for pieces to add guards and/or minor pieces. From these tests, I found that a guard is very nearly equal to a bishop, and slightly superior to a knight. (let me know if anyone would like more info about test details).

Nicolino, I hope you don't get rid of any of the Star Cats just because of their power.

This is a big board, so there's room for a few powerful pieces. Opponents have plenty of room to maneuver, create defenses, avoid attacks, and to create counter-attacks.

Btw, even though HGMuller's formula applies only to short-range leapers, I suspect it still might be good for pieces which jump up to 3 squares away when played on a large board.

Long range jumpers on a small board have the problem that long jumps go "off the board". But on a large board, attack points are more likely to useful, possibly helping the formula to remain accurate.

Maybe within a week or two, I'll calculate the "power density" of this game. It's a method I've used to determine the relative power of all pieces as a ratio to board size, and compare it with other games. I believe it's a useful measure of how "dynamic" the play can be expected to be. I'll update here if/when I finish the calculation.


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