Comments by Thomas McElmurry
Game Courier Tournament #1. A multi-variant tournament played on Game Courier.[All Comments] [Add Comment or Rating]There are a few rules that aren't clear to me, and these should probably be nailed down before the tournament begins. 1) In Eurasian Chess, if a pawn on the ninth rank is immobile due to a dearth of captured pieces, can it still give check? 2) The rules of Chessgi seem to allow dropping a pawn on the first rank, but they do not state how it may move from there. I can think of six sensible rules: a pawn on the first rank could step forward one, up to two, or up to three squares, and in any of these cases a pawn moving from the first rank to the second could either retain or lose the right to step forward two squares on its next move. Regardless of which rule is correct, I assume that the en passant rule is applied in the logical way. 3) There is also the issue of the precedence of victory conditions in Maxima, currently being discussed on that game's page.
Game Courier Logs. View the logs of games played on Game Courier.[All Comments] [Add Comment or Rating] Game Courier Tournament #2. Sign up for our 2nd multi-variant tournament to be played all on Game Courier.[All Comments] [Add Comment or Rating]I'm planning to play in the Tournament. I can't remember my PayPal password, so I'll have to mail in a check. I've been pretty busy and didn't find the time to vote in the approval and preference polls, but it looks like you all chose a great set of games without me -- hence the 'Excellent' rating [withdrawn 2005-04-16]. I hope this year's Tournament is as much fun as last year's!
I prefer the white marble board, followed by the blue marble board. The plain uncheckered board is hard on my eyes, and shogi on a checkered board just feels wrong. Also, did we ever decide how armies will be chosen for Chess with Different Armies?
Game Courier. PHP script for playing Chess variants online.[All Comments] [Add Comment or Rating] Shatranj. The widely played historic Arabian game, predecessor of modern chess. (Recognized!)[All Comments] [Add Comment or Rating]
Extinction chess. Win by making your opponents pieces of one type extinct. (8x8, Cells: 64) (Recognized!)[All Comments] [Add Comment or Rating]Also, I've just thought of the following pathological possibility. Suppose that, after 41 moves of a game of Extinction Chess, White's only Pawn is on b7 and Black's only Bishop is on c8. If White then plays 42. bxc8=Q, Black's Bishops are extinct, but so are White's Pawns. So the game is clearly over, but what is the result?
Shatranj. The widely played historic Arabian game, predecessor of modern chess. (Recognized!)[All Comments] [Add Comment or Rating] Extinction chess. Win by making your opponents pieces of one type extinct. (8x8, Cells: 64) (Recognized!)[All Comments] [Add Comment or Rating]I agree that such a position is very unlikely -- presumably it's unusual for a game of Extinction Chess even to last so long -- but it's not inconceivable. If the ruling had been for a draw, then one could imagine a game in which Black had no winning chances, but could force a draw by moving the Bishop to c8, forcing the Pawn to promote or die.
On the other hand, since the capture-promotion has been declared a win for White, it seems that the position as I stated it could arise only after an obvious blunder by Black. But of course the Black piece need not be a Bishop. One could imagine White pushing his last Pawn to the 7th rank, forking Black's last Rook and Knight.
Rococo. A clear, aggressive Ultima variant on a 10x10 ring board. (10x10, Cells: 100) (Recognized!)[All Comments] [Add Comment or Rating]For the sake of posterity, here is a link to the game in question.
I see two logically independent questions here:
1) What should the rules be?
2) What is the correct interpretation of the rules as written?
The first question is relevant to future games of Rococo and should be answered by the inventors, taking input from the rest of us if they wish to. For the particular case of the present game, I think that the second question is relevant, and that ideally it should be answered by consensus.
The rules as written contain a general statement describing the concept of edge squares and their role in the game, and a specific statement for each type of piece, describing how that piece behaves with respect to edge squares.
The general statement:
These marked squares on the edge of the board are edge squares, and a move may only end on an edge square if necessary for a capture. Or in other words, a piece may only end up on an edge square by making a capturing move that would not be possible without landing on the edge square. This includes moves that start on edge squares.
The specific statement for the Long Leaper:
It may end its move on an edge square only when that is the only way to make a particular capture.
As I read these rules, the only thing that could be construed to forbid my move to x0 is the definite article in the second sentence of the general statement. It's worth noting that David's interpretation, based on this definite article, is paradoxical (as Mike Nelson has pointed out), and that the definite article only appears in a sentence which is presented as a rephrasing of the previous sentence. The first sentence of the general statement and the specific statement both imply (in my opinion; there may be some room for debate) that one edge square is as good as another. Since I can't capture the black Leaper by moving to an interior square, x1 and x0, both being edge squares, should be equally permissible under the rules as written.
Peter's emendation of 'landing on' to 'landing on or passing over' does produce a well-defined rule, but in my opinion it is inconsistent with the intention of the edge squares. If the black Leaper were on x3, then this rule would say that I can capture only by moving to x2, not x1. But a piece on x1 is no safer from a Leaper than a piece on x2. On the other hand, a piece on x0 is safer, so it would seem reasonable to forbid capture on x0, not because it is not the first square beyond the victim, but because it is on two edges rather than one.
In fact, I think this was Mike Madsen's understanding of the rules. (I hope he'll correct me if it wasn't.) While I maintain my belief that this is not the rule as written, it seems sensible, and in my opinion would be the best rule for the game. It could perhaps be stated most easily by defining three classes of squares (interior, edge, and corner), and forbidding a piece to move to an edge square except to make a capture which cannot be made by moving to an interior square, or to move to a corner square except to make a capture which cannot be made by moving to an interior or edge square.
Feedback to the Chess Variant Pages - How to contactus. Including information on editors and associate authors of the website.[All Comments] [Add Comment or Rating]Browsers running under Windows XP:
Opera 7.51 (my preferred browser): When the content is hidden (i.e. before I select an item or when I select an item which opens a submenu), a small rectangle of the lavender background color (#ddccdd) is visible. When I click on any item which opens a submenu, it jumps down the page, so that the line reading 'Written by...' is at the top of the screen. When I scroll back up and click on any menu or submenu item which doesn't open another menu, the appropriate content displays on the right, with the top of the #fedead-colored box aligned with the top of the screen.
Mozilla Firefox 1.0: As with Opera, a small lavender rectangle is visible, but with a different size, shape, and location. When I click on any menu item, the top of the screen neatly bisects the question 'What do you want to do?' and the appropriate content displays on the right.
Netscape 7.1: Behaves identically to Firefox. Not surprising, since Netscape is essentially Mozilla.
M$ Aieee! 6.0.2900.2180.xpsp_sp2_rtm.040803-2158: The full content is visible as the page loads, and instead of the small lavender rectangle seen in other browsers, we have a larger lavender rectangle, whose height always matches the height of the visible portion of the menu tree, and whose width changes every time a different submenu is opened. Clicking on menu items sometimes causes the screen to jump vertically, but only slightly.
Browsers running on a Red Hat Linux system consigned to the 'care' of a Windows devotee:
Netscape Communicator 4.8: Reports two JavaScript errors as the page loads; I assume these are due to an obsolete browser running an obsolete version of JavaScript. The entire menu tree is immediately visible. Clicking on any menu item causes the screen to jump to a seemingly arbitrary point, with an apparent preference for the very bottom of the page. The content which should be associated with the various menu items is nowhere to be found.
Mozilla 1.0.2: When no content is displayed, there is a lavender rectangle at the far right of the screen. This rectangle is equal in height to, and aligned vertically with, the heading 'What do you want to do?'. It is also only slightly wider than this heading, and its width remains fixed when content is opened. Thus the text displays in a very narrow column, with much wasted space in the center of the page. The vertical positioning of the page is exactly as in the Windows version of Firefox.
Konqueror 3.0.5a-0.73.4: The menu tree expands and contracts properly, and clicking on any item causes the screen to jump to the top of the page (which is in my opinion the most sensible place to jump to if you have to jump somewhere). The content which should be associated with the various menu items is nowhere to be found.
General comments reflecting my taste in web design: The fancy JavaScript and CSS stuff would be great, if it worked flawlessly. But if the content can't be gotten to, or if navigating the menus causes jumping to nonintuitive points on the page, it's not worth it. Form should follow function. Also, since so few browsers make a serious attempt to comply with standards, any time you tune something for one or two browsers, you're probably breaking it for the rest.
Now, I only pretend to know HTML, and I know almost nothing about JavaScript or CSS, so forgive me if this is a stupid question: Why are HREFs and NAMEs necessary at all?
Rococo. A clear, aggressive Ultima variant on a 10x10 ring board. (10x10, Cells: 100) (Recognized!)[All Comments] [Add Comment or Rating]I have read the rules, very carefully, a great many times, and I remain convinced that my original interpretation was the correct interpretation of the rules as they were written before yesterday's revision. I have explained my analysis in gory detail, and of those who disagree, only Greg Strong has provided reasoning based on the text of the rules in response.
You say that under my interpretation the Long Leapers would have too much power. That may be so, but that is a subjective assessment which can only be made based on experience with the game (or perhaps experience with similar games and an intuition superior to mine). The fact (if that word can be used) that a particular set of rules does not yield the best of all possible games does not mean that that set of rules was not written down. As it happens, I think that the Long Leapers in Rococo may be too powerful regardless of which rule is used for capture along an edge. But one's opinions of the merits of a game are not relevant to interpretation of the written rules. The rules are what they are, not what you, or I, or anyone else, think they ought to be.
Also, the fact that some anonymous player once played a move which was not the best move under my interpretation (which you call the 'wrong' interpretation) cannot be taken as evidence for or against any of the three interpretations. It is not even evidence that the player interpreted the rules one way or another, unless the annotations (which I have not seen) contain some discussion of the matter.
Peter,
Regarding game design, I agree with Michael Nelson's last comment, but after your last comment I understand your position much better. I now see this as a question, not of logic, but of taste. And it's not my game, so I'll shut up about that.
I'm glad to see that the rules have been revised to reflect your intentions (although I had hoped that the tournament issue would be resolved first), and I believe that the revised rules are equivalent to what you have indicated in recent comments. But, if you're interested, I have a few suggestions as to how I think they could be written better, so as to avoid future misunderstandings.
The sentence that was most controversial in the original rules was this one:
Or in other words, a piece may only end up on an edge square by making a capturing move that would not be possible without landing on the edge square.Before the revision this sentence threatened to break the game; now I think it's just unnecessary and possibly confusing.
The section labeled 'Rules' seems unnecessarily complex and extremely redundant. The same statement is made at least four times, and if I were unfamiliar with Rococo, I would have to read this section three or four times to be sure I had it right.
You've now included a precise mathematical definition of the term 'capturing move'. This is good, because I now understand what you mean by the term, but I'm not sure that this is the best term for this definition. To see what I mean, consider this example: A Long Leaper on a4 could capture an opposing piece on a3 by moving to a2 or a1 (assuming both of these squares are vacant). In the absence of a definition of the term 'capturing move', I would regard these as two distinct capturing moves, since they are two distinct moves. But it seems natural to say that they result in the same capture. The rules would be clearer (to me, at least) if the term 'capturing move' were replaced everywhere with 'capture'.
The inclusion of the clarifying example is perhaps helpful, but it is not the best possible example, since it does not fully distinguish between the three interpretations of the original rules. A better example can be formed by placing the piece to be captured on x3 rather than x2, so that under the revised rules the Long Leaper can capture by moving to x2, but not to x1 or x0. Also, the example breaks up the flow of the redundant rules; perhaps it could be moved to its own paragraph. And if the rules refer to the square x9, the ASCII diagram should be modified to refer to the last rank as 9, rather than 00.
The formal statement of the edge-square rules is unambiguous, but statement 4 is completely unnecessary. It follows from the first three statements, and should therefore be treated as a theorem rather than a rule. If I'm not mistaken, the entirety of the edge-square rules could be stated in one sentence, something like:
A piece p capturing a set P of opposing pieces may land on or pass over only the minimal number of edge squares necessary for p to capture all the pieces in P.
The piece descriptions of the Long Leaper and the Withdrawer should include statements that these pieces, when moving along an edge, may move only the shortest possible distance for a particular capture. In fact, since each piece description contains the edge-square rules applying to that piece, I wonder whether it would be better for the 'Rules' section simply to introduce the general concept of edge squares, and leave the details to the individual piece descriptions.
Finally, I've noticed some typos: 'mininal', 'Moves that captures', and 'fewist'.
Game Courier Tournament #2. Sign up for our 2nd multi-variant tournament to be played all on Game Courier.[All Comments] [Add Comment or Rating]In addition to the two army-selection methods already proposed (sequential choice and random assignment), there is also the possibility of secret or simultaneous choice. If identical armies are forbidden, there is still the possibility that both players may choose the same army; in this case I like Ralph Betza's suggestion of letting Black choose which player will change armies.
I would be content with any of the three methods, so long as any advantage from the army-selection process goes to Black. In particular, if we choose sequential choice with identical armies permitted, then Black should have the second choice as Greg has proposed. If we choose sequential choice with identical armies forbidden, I think Black should have the option of choosing first (so as to be sure to get his favorite army) or second (so as to have maximum information available when he chooses).
Also, the order of choosing can make a difference even if identical armies are permitted. A player's preference may depend on which army he will be facing. Random example: If Alice is playing the Nutty Knights, then Bob prefers to play the Colorbound Clobberers, but if Alice is playing the Fabulous FIDEs, then Bob prefers the Remarkable Rookies.
CwDA is one of those games that includes FIDE Chess as a subgame, and I don't see a problem with allowing it to do so. It's worth noting that if the players choose their armies, then anyone with a sufficiently strong desire not to play FIDE-FIDE can avoid it by not choosing the FIDE army.
Also, we've already played Fischer Random Chess in this tournament. One FRC game in 960 is identical to FIDE Chess, and we didn't make any provision to prevent that from happening. Granted, the probability is somewhat higher in CwDA, but it's not all that bad. With unrestricted random assignment, there's about a 77% probability that FIDE-FIDE won't occur in the tournament.
It could be that in some games the player to move hasn't checked frequently to see whether the site is back up.
As for the emails, I can't speak for others, but I've received the notifications of my opponents' moves only inconsistently throughout the summer.
Castling in Chess 960. New castling rules for Fischer Random Chess. (8x8, Cells: 64) [All Comments] [Add Comment or Rating]The FIDE rule can be stated something like this:
In order to castle...But another statement is also possible, where (1) is replaced with
(1) ...the King moves two squares toward the Rook, and the Rook moves to the other side of the King.
In order for castling to be permissible...
(2) ...neither the King nor the Rook may have moved.
(3) ...none of the King's initial, intermediate, and final squares may be attacked by the opponent.
(4) ...the initial, intermediate, and final squares of the King and of the Rook must be vacant except for the King and the Rook.
(1') ...the King moves to the c-file and the a-side Rook moves to the d-file, or the King moves to the g-file and the h-side Rook moves to the f-file.and (2), (3), and (4) are unchanged.
From the standard starting position, these two statements are equivalent. But when we try to generalize to other starting positions, they differ, and we must choose one or the other (or a third statement not listed here). If we follow (1'), then we have the Fischer rule, with no change to the statement. If we follow (1) and include additional language to deal with the special case where the King begins on the b- or g-file and can't move two squares toward the near edge, then we have the rule proposed here (which I'll call the Lewis rule). Because of the necessity of handling this special case, I consider the Lewis rule to be not cleaner, but less clean than the Fischer rule.
At a glance, the Fischer rule may seem a bit ugly, since it explicitly breaks the symmetry of left-to-right reflection. But this actually makes the game richer, as it allows more possibilities. Under the Lewis rule (or any other symmetric castling rule), there is no meaningful distinction between a starting position and its mirror image, and the game should really be called Chess480.
Chess with Different Armies. Betza's classic variant where white and black play with different sets of pieces. (Recognized!)[All Comments] [Add Comment or Rating]I've noticed this also. The page starts to load, and then seems to get stuck for a long time (sometimes several minutes), usually after loading 4 kB of data. The problem is inconsistent; some days I have trouble getting to my games at all, while on other days everything loads quickly.
Chess480. Fischer Random Chess with orthodox castling rules. (8x8, Cells: 64) [All Comments] [Add Comment or Rating]Rather than thinking of 2 sets of 480 positions, perhaps it's better to think of 480 sets of 2 positions. The two positions in each set are related by left-right reflection, and have equivalent strategy trees.
I agree with John that it's aesthetically preferable to play all 960 positions, but if you want to choose just one from each pair, how about the one where the Queen is to the left of the King in White's starting position?
My understanding is that KBN vs. K can win in under 50 moves from any starting position except those where the lone King can immediately capture the Knight or Bishop. If my memory's not too crazy, I think the maximum number of moves required is somewhere around 30-35. It can be done in 50, but there's often not much room for error.
25 comments displayed
Permalink to the exact comments currently displayed.