Comments by jean-louiscazaux
A different game, played with Xiangqi pieces. Played on the squares of half a Xiangqi board but using all the pieces. (8x4, Cells: 32) [All Comments] [Add Comment or Rating] Who crosses the river first?. A variant on Chinese Chess. (9x10, Cells: 90) [All Comments] [Add Comment or Rating]This variant is the winner of 'The Most Mysterious Chess Variant Ever' Award! Incredible that after all these years nothing has emerged, not even a Chinese name! About the rules, it is strange that to say that there is no capturing whereas capture is mentionned for the Artillery. Let's pray we know one day.
The Game of the Three Kingdoms. Another variant on Chinese Chess for three players. (Cells: 135) [All Comments] [Add Comment or Rating] Gala. Medieval game of German farmers. (10x10, Cells: 100) [All Comments] [Add Comment or Rating]I wish to get in contact with Arnold Mayer about Gala game. If by chance you read this, please contact me at jlg.cazaux(.at.)free.fr, replacing (.at.) by @ of course. This is important. I will explain to M.Mayer why, please contact me. Thank you very much
Janggi - 장기 - Korean Chess. The variant of chess played in Korea. (9x10, Cells: 90) (Recognized!)[All Comments] [Add Comment or Rating] Hexagonal chess. Chess on a board, made out of hexes. Variant of Dave McCooey. (Cells: 91) (Recognized!)[All Comments] [Add Comment or Rating]Answer to Charles Gilman: Yes, me, I tried. See Echexs for 3, or 6, players with McCooey's arrangement.
Echexs. Hexagonal variant for three or six players.[All Comments] [Add Comment or Rating]10 years after, I see the comments! Yes, my mistake in the text. Each player has 16 pieces, not 18.
Metamachy. Large game with a variety of regular fairy pieces.[All Comments] [Add Comment or Rating]Hello friends,
Two things. I would like to know what was not clear in my description of metamachy? I could make corrections.
Second, it is a bit severe against me as the inventor to write about the Prince "Despite what its name suggests, it has no royal properties". It moves like a King, I think this is a strong royal property. It can be checked, and this is logical, the capture of the Prince should not be the end. A Prince is not a King. Its name is well chosen or I miss something.
Best regards
Game Courier. PHP script for playing Chess variants online.[All Comments] [Add Comment or Rating]This comment is for Metamachy: as its inventor, I regret that my choice of an Eagle is changed to a Gryphon. It is wrong to think that a Gryphon was present into the Grant Acedrex of King Alfonso X of Castile (1283). No, the piece was an Aanca. An Aanca was an Arab-inspired beast, a giant bird, like an eagle, able to capture and draw elephants in the air. The drawing on the original codex illustrates that. The fault is from the great chess historian HJR Murray who interpretated this Aanca as a Gryphon, another mythical animal. That being said, my choice of an Eagle is in my opinion a better choice for this modern game. The presence of both a Lion and an Eagle, the two most used symbolic animals in heraldry is important to my eyes. I wish you could respect my choice. I don't feel bounded to Murray's errors, despite I owe a great respect to his immense achievements in general. Thank you.
Metamachy. Large game with a variety of regular fairy pieces.[All Comments] [Add Comment or Rating]Thank you for all these explanations and feedbacks. I will correct soon the description on my own page.
- The end-o-game rules, checkmate, stalemate, etc. are identical to standard chess
- King's jump: you guessed well. At his first move, the King may jump to a free square at 2 squares' distance. It does not matter if the square jumped over is occupied or not; however, the jump os forbidden if that intermediate square is threatened by an enemy piece. When jumping like a Knight, at least one of the two intermediate squares must be free of threat. The King's jump is not permitted if the King is in check.
- The King cannot capture with its initial jumping moves (it may jump to a free square only)
- En passant: any time a Pawn or a Prince takes a double step and passes through the capture square of an opposing Pawn, that Pawn may capture the Pawn or the Prince as if it had only moved one square. This en passant capture must be made in the immediate move following the double step. Only a Pawn may capture en passant; the Prince does not have this option.
Eurasian Chess. Synthesis of European and Asian forms of Chess. (10x10, Cells: 100) [All Comments] [Add Comment or Rating]About Vao: maybe Dawson gave that name because it was phonetically from the same family than Pao, and the V because this letter is made of diagonal strokes. Maybe it is not that, but it can be used as a mnemotecnic mean. Remark, it could have used Xao as well, that would have been looking more Chinese.
About Game Courier. Web-based system for playing many different variants by email or in real-time.[All Comments] [Add Comment or Rating]Does anyone has any news from Fergus? Considering the current situation I do worry. We were engaged in a game of Metamachy since December, each of us playing a move every day more or less. It happens that he never answered the last move I made 11 days ago (we are April 9). I sent him an e-mail but I got no answer so far. Hope Fergus is safe. If you read this Fergus, please make a sign. Take care. (I'm Jean-Louis Cazaux)
I'm really glad to read your answer. One can understand that in this tense period when so many people are suffering from CoVID19 all around the world, a sudden break of communication is worrying. For reasons I don't know, I had not seen your message of 2020-04-06 before I posted mine, otherwise I wouldn't have done it. The simplest would have been just to answer my PM e-mail anyway. I hope you will resume our game where you invited me. Thanks a lot.
Bent Riders. A discussion of pieces, like the Gryphon, that take a step then move as riders.[All Comments] [Add Comment or Rating]I came on this page and I am horrified to read what I read.
"In H.J.R. Murray's History of Chess, page 181 states that the Alfonso manuscript was published in about the year 1211" >> no, not 1211! Murray wrote it right: 1283.
"which on page 346 is said to have used algebraic notation, and to have described a chess variant that included the modern B and Q": not at all!
That chess variant wich used algerbric notation and modern move is another one, from India, written in Persian and dated 1796-8. It is reported quite clear in Murray page 181 for who has eyes to read!
Page 348, Murray gave a short description of Grant Acedrex from King Alfonso X.Today this is better known thanks to the PhD work of Sonja Musser. I worked a bit with her on this, this is reported in my book A World of Chess (McFarland, 2017). In few words: what was called Unicornio in medieval spanish was clearly a Rhinoceros. So the Rhino was a piece first jumping like a Knight, then going away like a Bishop.
It was the counterpart of another piece moving one step diagonal then moving away on rows and columns. That later piece is called Aanca in the manuscript. It's an Arabic word, not Spanish, designating a giant Eagle or prey bird, from oriental legends (able to carry elephants). This was mistakenly traduced by Gryphon by Murray. This is unfortunate as the Gryphon was a very different legendary animal. This is why I prefer to use the name of Eagle in Metamachy and not Gryphon to avoid replicating that mistake.
"Not described there is a piece which makes a one step Rook move and then continues outwards as a Bishop. For lack of a name, I'll call it the Aanca."
No no no please! Aanca is the Giant Eagle, or the Gryphon if you want. Do not give that name of Aanca to a piece which is different and is more like the Unicornio / Rhinoceros. This is a very very bad idea. Stop adding confusion, I wish one is more careful when reading the work of Murray.
Dear HGM, I'm sorry to disagree with your demonstration.
It is very unfair to say that the "Spanish abuse the word Alfil". This is denying chess history. First we largely owe the Spanish to have transmitted to the rest of Europe chess from the Arabs in the years 950-1000. Alfil in Arabic is/was "al fil" which means "the elephant". It stayed in Spanish as Alfil, and was adopted in France as "fol" in Occitan, then "fou" in French, meaning "fol". Due to the shape of the piece, also borrowed from the Arabs, with 2 protuberances for the tusks, it was assimilated to a bishop's miter by Englishmen. So the Spanish just kept the name. The move was only modified 500 years later, also first in Spain! It is not because some American and English chessvariant lovers decided to revive the world Alfil in the 20th century that Spanish have abused whatever.
Consider that Russians are calling the bishop a "slon" which also means elephant in Russia! Russia for chess is something no? Spanish are not so wrong after all. But OK, I will not say that English are abusing :=)
I would agree with you that it would be difficult to forget the Gryphon or Griffon for CV lovers, but Aanca no. Aanca is Anka in Arabic and is what I said, a legendary giant Eagle, found in The 1001 Night Tales. In context of chess, it is found in Alfonso X's codex where it has clearly the move of what you call the Griffon. And shall I need to remind that Alfonso X was not writing in modern English but in medieval Castilian. (tired to read that the world griffon is found in the Libro de los juegos from king Alfonso >> it is not!).
Actually, the same Alfonso described a piece, in the same Grant Acedrex, almost moving like W followed by diagonals. Actually, it was just skiping the W squares, first jumping like a knight to the diagonal. That was an Unicornio, that it is demonstrated that it meant a Rhinoceros. Alfonso didn't have access to Wikipedia to check what a Rhino is. So, rather than Aanca, Rhinoceros would be a much better name. This is what I selected for Zanzibar chess.
Calling that piece an Aanca, is like calling the a Bishop a Rook. Absurd.
Game Courier. PHP script for playing Chess variants online.[All Comments] [Add Comment or Rating] Sho Shogi. Historic predecessor of shogi. (9x9, Cells: 81) [All Comments] [Add Comment or Rating]Very good information! What is not clear for me at the moment if that Asakura shogi is a reconstruction of a possible step in the evolution of shogi, or if that form of game is really asserted and supported by historical proofs. I may ask a specialist that I know. Thank you again.
Bent Riders. A discussion of pieces, like the Gryphon, that take a step then move as riders.[All Comments] [Add Comment or Rating]Interesting discussion. I don't want to push for my choice of Eagle for F-then-R as Gryphon is more popular in CV community. Eagle is just my personal choice in the frame of Metamachy as it has some resonance with the Lion, carrying some heraldic meaning. Btw, my use of Lion, and also Elephant is also personal and I don't push.
In the case of Aaca by Betza it is primarly the result of a wrong reading of Murray. There are more examples in that page that demonstrate that Betza read it very very quickly, the least to say. So, we shouldn't keep what is really a mistake.
N-then-B is exactly the Unicorn, drawn as a Rhinoceros by the medieval artist in the original codex. I don't see the need for another word, but if you believe so, why not Hippogrif. Finding another mythic animal for W-then-B is a good idea. Maybe one with a big horn.
To Greg Strong:
you wrote: "As Chess evolved the elephant was enhanced from leaping diagonally to sliding diagonally. It was at a later point that the English name (and maybe other languages) was changed to bishop while other languages, such as Spanish and Russian retained the existing name."
As the matter of fact, no, it didn't happen that way, they didn't change the name after the move was changed. The name was changed much before.
Old chess, similar to shatranj, was transmitted to Christian countries and reached England about 1050. The "Fil" was soon called Bishop there and in other Scandinavian lands. For example, the famous Lewis set has pieces depicting Bishops. The modern move for that piece (although it had some forerunners in Grant Acedrex or in Courrier Chess) has been adopted about 1475-1500. So, during almost 500 years the piece called Bishop in English was played like the one we call Alfil in our chessvariants.com pages.
Btw, same thing for the Queen, called a Queen and played as a Ferz during 500 years.
Hmm, I'm not a fan of the spider, even a monstruous one. The link with Rhinoceros/Unicorn is too remote. We need an horn :=) But also because Musketeer Chess has proposed and is even selling a Spider already, even though I don't like at all the definition he used.
What about the Monoceros, see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monoceros_(legendary_creature) I'm pretty sure that it was never used in CVs (I'd be surprised) and there is an obvious parenthood with Unicorn.
I have the same so-so feeling than Fergus about inserting Harry Potter's here. Why not my suggestion of Monoceros, it is a fantastic beast recognized in WP, it has a link with the Unicorn. As Unicorn is the N-then-Bishop in Alfonso's description, why not Monoceros for W-then-Bishop? The difference between the 2 moves is thin, so is the difference between the 2 names.
Metamachy. Large game with a variety of regular fairy pieces.[All Comments] [Add Comment or Rating]Could it be possible to remove now the line saying:
Some of the rules that were not clear from the original description on Jean-Louis Cazaux's website were derived by Fergus Duniho from the Zillions-of-Games implementation of Metamachy.
As soon as I saw it, I asked what was not clear and I have clarified the original description.
Many thanks
Bent Riders. A discussion of pieces, like the Gryphon, that take a step then move as riders.[All Comments] [Add Comment or Rating]OK, I understand. The idea should not come from me. Btw, the ferz-then-rook has also an 8-leg move. Good luck with your spiders, starting with A or not.
Metamachy. Large game with a variety of regular fairy pieces.[All Comments] [Add Comment or Rating]Thanks a lot. I didn't know about Lioness, very good.
How to Design and Post Your Own Game. A reference for those who want to post their own games here.[All Comments] [Add Comment or Rating]Hello, I would like to know how long can take the review process. I've made a submission one week ago and I see nothing happening. Maybe it's the normal delay, or maybe I did something wrong. Having no feedback at all, it is difficult to know. Thanks to all reviewers.
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