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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]

Mike Nelson wrote on Wed, Sep 4, 2002 03:29 PM UTC:

Ralph, I did indeed believe you.  Your work on the value of chess pieces is
the best in the game's history.  What surprised me is how strong the
synergy of rapid developement and leveling could be.

Zillions tries too hard to avoid exchanging FIDE minor pieces for their SR
equivalents--the material difference is only about a pawn and many times
the sacrifice is worth making for better developement.
 
Zillions is a flawed oracle, but a good strating point--if a game is
hopelessly unbalanced on Zillions, it is more likely to be worse than
better among masters.

Another experiment I've tried on Zillions:  The Separate Realms army vs
the Reverse Separate Realms army (Rook is mRcDD, etc.) Zillions is
notorious for undervaling capture and rates the reverse SR pieces as
nearly as strong as their FIDE counterparts.  Consequently it will glady
trada a SR Rook for a RSR minor piece.  Yet the game is no contest--the
reverse SR army is slow to develop and the pieces don't defend each other
well--its over in 18-24 moves.

Just as your work suggests, a divergent piece with more capturing power is
more valuable than a divergent piece with more non-capturing movement. In
any army I'll take mDDcR over mRcDD.  The above experiment suggested one
possible exception, the reverse SR King (FmW) seemed stronger than the SR
King (FcW).  The King's ability to avoid capture is more important that
its ability to capture.