Greg Strong wrote on Sat, Jul 15, 2017 04:52 AM UTC:
All observations are welcome and I certainly don't think that there is any taboo against new 'twists' in general. I hope it doesn't appear that way.
What I see is that a lot of new inventors get carried away adding rules. It's possible that every single rule is good, but I've played a very large number of variants over the last 15 years, so I have some basis for my doubts. Especially since often the new inventors have no history of playing chess variants here, and so I assume they have no real history of exploring the world of chess variants in general (although in some cases that may be incorrect, but probably not.) It's good to explore first so you have a better idea of what makes a good game, and then start simple. You can always add rules later when you find room for improvement.
That said, inventors who want to go hog-wild are welcome to do so, but understand that it greatly increases the changes that your game won't see much play. There are thousands of games on this site and most are not played with any regularity at all. Many will probably never, ever be played again. It takes care, research, dedication, and flexibility to make a variant that plays well enough, and is appealing enough, that players will want to play it.
Regarding the specific rules in question in this game, forbidding a player from resigning a game doesn't make any sense to me. A hypothetical situation goes like this... White: "I resign."  Black: "No, sorry, you are not in check so you can't resign." White: (stands up and walks away.) Now what? If you are playing on a clock a player can always just stop moving until his time runs out. That's identical to a resignation but you've just forced the winning player to sit around and wait for the clock to run out. (The would-be resigner isn't forced to wait around as he can just walk and not waste his time - unless, of course, you add another rule that players must be chained to the table until the game is over.) And with a game with no clocks - no time control - the situation is even worse. The player who does not want to play just stops moving. At least with a resignation, the game ends. Now the game officially never ends. Walking away can't be considered a resignation, since that is illegal, so effectively, any time you are losign a game and are not in check, you can walk away and the game never ends and you never lose.
Regarding Kevin's comment on why this might make sense I can't address as I don't really understand what he is saying. But remember, in any formal tournament, the they can stipulate custom scoring systems or other guidelines for that tournament.
The rules around passing may be good or bad. I don't know. Like H. G. I'm wondering what the use case is for this rule. With unusual additional rules like this, if there is a reason, it should be spelled out - since naturally people will wonder. If it was just something that was made up on a whim, it should be acknowledged that it's an untested idea and raised as a discussion point.
All observations are welcome and I certainly don't think that there is any taboo against new 'twists' in general. I hope it doesn't appear that way.
What I see is that a lot of new inventors get carried away adding rules. It's possible that every single rule is good, but I've played a very large number of variants over the last 15 years, so I have some basis for my doubts. Especially since often the new inventors have no history of playing chess variants here, and so I assume they have no real history of exploring the world of chess variants in general (although in some cases that may be incorrect, but probably not.) It's good to explore first so you have a better idea of what makes a good game, and then start simple. You can always add rules later when you find room for improvement.
That said, inventors who want to go hog-wild are welcome to do so, but understand that it greatly increases the changes that your game won't see much play. There are thousands of games on this site and most are not played with any regularity at all. Many will probably never, ever be played again. It takes care, research, dedication, and flexibility to make a variant that plays well enough, and is appealing enough, that players will want to play it.
Regarding the specific rules in question in this game, forbidding a player from resigning a game doesn't make any sense to me. A hypothetical situation goes like this... White: "I resign."  Black: "No, sorry, you are not in check so you can't resign." White: (stands up and walks away.) Now what? If you are playing on a clock a player can always just stop moving until his time runs out. That's identical to a resignation but you've just forced the winning player to sit around and wait for the clock to run out. (The would-be resigner isn't forced to wait around as he can just walk and not waste his time - unless, of course, you add another rule that players must be chained to the table until the game is over.) And with a game with no clocks - no time control - the situation is even worse. The player who does not want to play just stops moving. At least with a resignation, the game ends. Now the game officially never ends. Walking away can't be considered a resignation, since that is illegal, so effectively, any time you are losign a game and are not in check, you can walk away and the game never ends and you never lose.
Regarding Kevin's comment on why this might make sense I can't address as I don't really understand what he is saying. But remember, in any formal tournament, the they can stipulate custom scoring systems or other guidelines for that tournament.
The rules around passing may be good or bad. I don't know. Like H. G. I'm wondering what the use case is for this rule. With unusual additional rules like this, if there is a reason, it should be spelled out - since naturally people will wonder. If it was just something that was made up on a whim, it should be acknowledged that it's an untested idea and raised as a discussion point.