Comments/Ratings for a Single Item

P=100, N=300, B=310, Commoner=390, R=500, Q=900 are the best values I have found, where the Commoner is a (Ferz + Wazir). Ralph Betza has valued the Gryphon (Ferz, then Rook moves) at 1.46 Rooks, in calculations mostly independent of board size. A Gnu (Knight + Camel) moves to 16 of those same squares. The color-alternating Aanca (Wazir, then Bishop moves) should be worth 80 percent of that. A Gazelle (Knight + Zebra) moves to 16 of those same squares. Adjusting the values for the 12x12 board used in Gryphon Aanca Chess and other games yields:

P=100, N=300, B=375, Commoner=325, R=600, Q=1075 and

Spotted Gryphon=400 to 450, Gazelle=450, Gnu=500, Aanca=700, Gryphon=875.

Back in 2001, Peter Aronson introduced the Hippogriff in his Zillions Rule File for 'Yet Another Decimal Chess Variant'. This version of the Gryphon starts with a Knight leap and continues outward along eight paths as a Rook. There is no Ferz-move and it cannot be blocked on an adjacent square. This piece is much stronger than the historical Hippogriff. My Spotted Hippogriff starts off as a Knight and continues outward as a Dabbabah-rider. This piece and the Spotted Gryphon together cover all the squares that the classic Gryphon can reach.

 . . . . . . . . . .
 . . . x . x . . . .
 . . . . . . . . . .
 . . . x . x . . . .
 x . x . . . x . x .
 . . . . H . . . . .
 x . x . . . x . x .
 . . . x . x . . . .
 . . . . . . . . . .
 . . . x . x . . . .

David, I like your spotted gryphon idea very much. Excellent idea.

Pawn=100, Rook=500, Chancellor=850, Queen=900, Raven=1000 to 1050 are my values on the 8x8 board, where Chancellor = Rook + Knight and Raven = Rook + Nightrider. The Chainsaw = Rook + Spotted Gryphon. This new piece has less than half the value of the Reaper in Ralph Betza's Tripunch Chess. At first glance the Chainsaw is better than the Raven at concentrating its attack on a small area of the board, while the Raven can move in 12 (widely separated) directions. These two pieces may turn out to have equal strength.

 . . . x x x . . . .
 . . . . x . . . . .
 . . . x x x . . . .
 . . . . x . . . . .
 . x . x x x . x . x
 x x x x C x x x x x
 . x . x x x . x . x
 . . . . x . . . . .
 . . . x x x . . . .
 . . . . x . . . . .

Very nice piece! A more than linear, but less than 'massively linear'
[eg:harvester] piece. This looks like it'd enjoy a spot on a rather large
board; it combines a powerful slider with a weaker but harder to block
piece. I may have to change the first sentence to 'Very nasty piece!'

I found a use for the Spotted Gryphon in Rose Chess XII - which also includes a Chainsaw movement diagram.

A nice piece and a good name for it. Congrats!

'Here's another funny observation: The Ferz is at the same time colourbound and colourchanging. It is bound to one half of the possible squares, but with each move it changes from one quarter of squares to the other.' -- Jörg Knappen [4 Dec 2001].

In other words, the light squares on odd numbered ranks make up 25 percent of the chessboard and the light squares on even numbered ranks make up another 25 percent (true for any rectangular board with an even number of squares along each side). The Dabbabah and the Dragon are restricted to 25 percent of the chessboard. The Ferz and the Spotted Gryphon can reach 50 percent of the squares on the board, but always alternate between an odd numbered rank and an even numbered rank. None of these pieces: Wazir, Knight, Ferz, Spotted Gryphon are able to triangulate, they each take an even number of moves to return to their starting square.

I found the comment quoted above by looking at a nonindexed page on this site: Recent Ratings and Comments, which actually covers old comments from [27 May 2001] to [31 Mar 2002]. This list is also available in another format: alphabetic by variant name.