Ratings & Comments

I've been playing shogi for years here in Japan, both with people and on 
the computer.   There was a program 'xshogi' which was maintained until
1994/1995 and is still available through GNU.   Is anyone looking at 
picking up this package and updating it for Linux?

In order to prevent the upper levels from being clogged up, perhaps I
should introduce a gravity rule:  before a player moves, all of his/her
pieces that both (1) haven't moved in the past two turns and (2) have an
empty square directly below them descend one level.

Or perhaps, when an elevation isn't possible, a 'captured' piece could be
placed on any empty square chosen by the capturer.

I have been studying the advices in this thread and examining some of 
my ideas along this line. The following is what I have developed so far:

Pawnless Chess

-by Jianying Ji			

Introduction:

This variant is inspired  these primary sources: 
1: Kevin Maroney's Ur Chess
2: Ralph Betza's Halfling Chess

One of the main motivations of this variant is similar to that of Ur Chess
in that I was looking for a 'simplified' variant of chess. As I read Ur
chess I saw that many of the fiddly rules he was trying to change concerned
pawns, so it seemed natural to me to dispense with pawns alltogether. But
that led to an immediate problem, which is with the major pieces of FIDE
facing each other the opening usually end up with a lot of exchanges and
not many pieces on the board after the exchanges end.  To combat this, the
pieces needs to be weakened and captured pieces recycled. So I used
halfling chess to weaken the pieces, and added the capture return rule to
recycle the pieces. I changed the knight to halfling Knightrider to
strengthen the army a bit so that it won't be too slow. The details
follows:

Board and Setup:

Use standard chess board and setup with the pawns removed

r n b q k b n r
* * * * * * * *
* * * * * * * *
* * * * * * * *
* * * * * * * *
* * * * * * * *
* * * * * * * *
R N B Q K B N R

Rules:

1. All pieces move as they do in halfling chess, except the knight, 
which becomes a halfling knightrider.

Motivation: To weaken the pieces so the opening will be more strategic,
rather than tactical. As Peter Aaronson suggested and Ralph Betza showed.

2. A captured piece is returned to the owner, who is to put it back on 
its starting rank. It is the owner's choice, which open square to put 
the returned piece on.  If the starting rank is fully occupied then 
the captured piece is discarded.

Motivation: Since the ratio of pieces to squares is so low, to start 
with, this rule will keep more pieces in play longer, for a more 
tactical and longer endgame.

3. No repetition of a previous board position

Motivation: Super-Ko rule is adopted to reduce draws.

Object:

Checkmate or stalemate the opponent

Motivation: Stalemating the opponent is included as a winning condition 
to reduce draws.

Notation:

R        a1        x           a5  	         [a8]
piece	source   capture    destination    drop location

piece: name of the piece
source: starting square
capture: x if capture occured, - if non-capturing move.
destination: ending square
drop location: the location to which the captured piece is dropped

Can be abbreviated if no ambiguity arises.

Remember, if capture occurs, drop location must be specified.


Comments:

Shortest fool's mate is 2.5 moves, which is comparable to FIDE, 
with the added benefit of being more 'foolish'.

Tempo is most important in this game. Losing tempo can be fatal. 
It is even more important than safety of specific pieces. Since 
pieces are recycled.

I have done some playtesting but I would welcome more. And any
more suggestions!

I've submitted an entry and I think that perhaps, just perhaps, they should
remove the competing entry that's up there until they start adding new
ones...just to be fair.

Just a thought.

Regards

Tomas Forsman

IS THERE A TEN MOVE CHECK MATE??? QUESTION

IF U KNOW PLZ CONTECT ME AT WINGERJJ@HOTMAIL.COM

In Mexico Bughouse is known as ESPARTACO like the Roman slave. Drop a pawn
in 7th rank is not permited, but the rules can vary and nobody knows how it
came to Mexico, but it is really delightful specially for young people, who
considers it with so much excitement.

As the inventor of Invasion, I'm warmly thanking this anonymous reader for
his comments.
He wants a bigger board. Why not, good idea ! This game was designed for
the 84-square contest. I've just seen that this contest is frozen and my
game unlisted ! Tough award ! 
So, it might be the time to get free and think about a bigger board, dear
reader. Check it out in future here or on www.chez.com/cazaux/ Cheers

The link works again.
http://www.spielbox-online.de/indxtemp.html?/spielarchiv/ttm/dastroja.htm

> This also deals with the discovered check problem in multiplayer

Not to mention variants where both (or many) sides move simultaneously and
then the moves must be resolved. For example, the multiplayer game
Diplomacy, which IM Bela Toth introduced me to, has everybody move
independently and then conflicts are resolved by complicated rules; and for
contrast, the multiplayer game Risk (and thanks to Bela I can win this
game) is completely turn-based.

These things are complex, and this is unfortunate in a way because we
susally seek simplicity; but it may be necessary.

Synchronous Chess is an ancient chess variant where both sides move at once
and the conflicts are somehow resolved. 

Realtime Chess is a first-draft inspiration of the moment by me, and the
idea is that you just move your pieces without waiting for the other guy to
move. Your clock is *always* running. ((I see no way to make rules that
keep it from bing a simple stupid clickfest.))

NOTE: New permanent web page address for CHESMAYNE CHESS DICTIONARY

Hello,
        The 2002 edition of the Chesmayne Chess Dictionary is now available
at a new permanent address [below].  It has 100,000+ chess related
keywords, AZ indexes, pictures, midi's, graphics etc.  I would be grateful
if you could give me a link.  
 
http://chesmayn.valuehost.co.uk 
 
Yours sincerely,
 
Chesmayne.

I hve played the game a few times. mate does take time but not 
impossible, in fact draws should be extremely rare, since captures are 
nearly impossible and positions can't be repeated, so a mating position 
will have to come up, and failing that a stalemate position which is 
also a loss or win depending on the player. Though I am looking for more 
playtesting. email: jianyingj@yahoo.com