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George Duke wrote on Mon, Jun 1, 2009 10:49 PM UTC:
Joe and Jeremy are talking about fundamental chess units subdivided different ways. Under ''Useful Atoms'' the Master's ''basic geometric units of chess'' here are Ferz, Wazir, Dabbabah, Alfil and Knight, ''the atoms from which other pieces can be formed.'' If anyone is diverging from these five, it takes a lot of explanation to grab the attention of other variantists. Of course 1000 regular Chess Grandmasters would never get beyond Knight, Bishop, Rook and Queen. 95% of them would not even think of a Seirawan-type Queen with Knight compound. Different perspectives, orthodox and variant. Are Rook and Bishop not fundamental to Betza? Actually, Ferz are Wazir really are not fundamental chess units, and Betza is wrong about that, except as recreational discipline --divertissement, entertainment -- because there is no reason to stop at only 1 or only 2. Lavieri's Lion is recent use of one- and two-stepping King-Queen non-royal [different from Winther's Mastodon, updating Paulovits' Pasha and Betza's Woody Rook,in lacking Alfil/Dabbabah knowhow], and it becomes no more natural than mediaeval Courier Chess Man just one-stepping. The only right line chess pieces fundamental are in fact Rook, Bishop and Queen. Every kid from Africa to China knows Rook makes sense and feels right, and ''Wazir'' does not at all. If you show him to go one step straight only, he goes two for contrariness and naturalness both, and so the only agreeable stopping point is none at all, instead all the way across. They didn't realize this about Bishop (as they did about Rook), to the extent Bishop came out of the old Ferz, for couple of centuries. Of course, historically far the oldest chess piece in use is Knight Knight Knight, predating the two millennia in chess-related games; so even Rook and king come out of Knight Knight Knight. But Betza's playthings nonetheless, the fun as can be F-W-D-N-A, are great for just that, playing at a pastime of whatever the syndrome may be called, designer game syndrome.

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