Single Comment

H.G. Muller says today ''8x10 are rapidly becoming more popular with engine programmers.'' It is ironic that only one 8x10 board appears in 
the many hundred diagrams altogether in D. Pritchard's original fifteen-year-old 1994 'Encyclopedia CVs'. The one 8x10 there is on or about page  203.   Yet '8x10' should have been self-evident  as the correct expansion of played-out standard 8x8, since this H.R. Capablanca, expert Mad Queen player for what it is worth, had it almost 100 years ago now with reuse of the intuitive, albeit awkward and unbalancing, old Carrera Centaur(BN) and Champion(RN). Or put it favourably that our Capablanca orthodox grandmaster was unusually prescient for such olden time  between the world wars, not himself to survive World War II era, some would say for his own excesses in lifestyle, dead  for sixty-six years now. Would Capa still espouse his tweak of Carrera/Bird, or would he fall for some more recent ''prolificist'' extravaganza? As starter, probably he would agree there are no replacements for the F.I.D.E. 8x8 formula with 9 or more ranks. And very recent smaller boards as 7x8 are clear worsenings. Still plausible are the right-fit 2,3, or 4 new pieces on 8x12, set up like mediaeval Courier Chess. At least Jose Raul would recognize that by next milestone year 2100, there can surely be no more interest in intermediate Mad Queen than in Shatranj itself. Counting predecessor form the one reigned from circa 600-1500, the other 1500-2000. Not many Shatranj players around by JRC's day, or even Philidor's, or likely even Carrera's.