Comments by BobGreenwade

I just recently developed an Inquisitor piece, moving BDC.

(I just thought I'd mention it, in case it matters to you.)

I suspected as much. I'll ditch that rule idea (for now).

65. Retriever. No, this isn't the dog breed from Labrador; it's supposed to be short for "Fugitive Retriever." (Clearly the piece design isn't the only problem here; I need a better name for someone who hunts down fugitives, but "Hunter" and "Marshall" were already taken by well-known pieces, and "Brute Squad" just doesn't quite work.)

I'd just finished a set of leapers when I noticed that one had a good opening for a Bishop, and the other for a Rook. The Bishop-based one, the Inquisitor, came out fine (I might share that one next week). The Rook one, not so much, though I like the concept: it also moves as an Alfil or Zebra, in a sort of broad diagonal jump. (RAZ)

This (and the Inquisitor) could be a decent powerhouse in a large-board game, I think.

The big thing is, as you can see, I'm rather at a loss for even a decent concept for a look. I thought about doing something that looked like the medieval counterpart of a paddy-wagon (think of all those period and fantasy movies where someone's being transported in a cage on wheels), but somehow this is what developed. It has distinctiveness in its favor, but nothing about it says (at least, to my eye), "This represents someone who hunts down fugitives."

As with the last two pieces, suggestions are very welcome. (In this case, it also includes name suggestions!)

I like this! Are the capture-only Camel moves (row 7) supposed to be leaps, or lame?

Well, it's distinctive enough for me, but then again I'm of a mind that even a slight difference makes something new.

If it really worries you, then perhaps you can take away one or more of the HH's forward steps.

I did find at least one game preceding my proposed game (which is currently awaiting confirmation) that uses the Friend, as well as the Orphan: UC-170-13, an expansion of Universal Chess. A related game, UC-170-17,  exists but doesn't really have a page here, though it does have a Game Courier preset.

The Goshawk is an interesting little piece. Now if only I could find a good FZ piece to go with it....

For some large games, taking a while to position one's forces is a feature, not a bug. ;)

But those are just a few. For the rest, I don't think I'd turn them into slides and rides, but long moves; rather than giving a Knight fhmNN, perhaps ifhmN2 or ifhmNX.

Then maybe if there's no FZ already in place, it can be something unlikely, like a Chihuahua.

66. Centaur. This has been a topic of discussion before, and it's definitely a challenge. Generally the piece is represented by its alternate name, the Crowned Knight, based on its KN move.

I have my own Crowned Knight version, putting on the King's crown with the cross removed (to make it distinguishable from the Royal Knight).

But as for a Centaur, I really couldn't think of many ways to represent it short of trying to sculpt the full figure of a centaur (and trust me, the world is better off without me trying that). I did come up with two ideas, neither of them really satisfactory.

Given the option right now, I'd go with the horseshoe for most purposes, but I'm not ready to give up on the helmeted version quite yet if there are any ideas out there about how it could be better.

Would there be sufficient utility for a null-move atom (say, S for "stay")? It could be a handy shorthand for the Japanese Lion or the Zero, rather than mabK, but I'm not sure what other utility it would have... maybe to activate spells or area-effect captures without actually moving? (Now that I think on it, it might be simpler to just allow K0 for that sort of thing.)

I also had hoped that multiple uses of j on a slider would continue to increase the size of the initial leap, such as jjB (or something similar, like j2B) where the Bishop's first step is three spaces, but no such luck. I guess bracket notation ([nG?fB]) will have to do for now.

I was already aware of the Sorcerer (WZ); the Wizard (FC) and Okapi (NZ) are also already fairly well established, from Omega Chess (1992) and Pierre Monréal's fairy chess problems (1965). As for the Ferz-Sorcerer, I was rather hoping for a more colorful name, especially an animal one (given the Goshawk).

Thanks for the note on that, though. :)

Unless there are any other notes (such as that this would be better on 12x12), I think this is ready to post.

(Getting an ID, GC setup, etc. will take a good bit of time, at least for me to do.)

That's probably true. But something as unlikely as that, anyway.

(Prairie Dog? Housefly? Goldfish?)

[nG?fB] does work, at least on the Play-test Applet.

I'm away for Rose City Comic Con this weekend, so my ability to post my Piece of the Day will be rather limited. (Not that some of you wouldn't welcome its absence, I'm sure...) So rather than my usual two-piece weekend, I'm posting a full QRBM set.

QRBM stands for Queen, Rook, Bishop, and Mann (because the King is royal), and refers to combining each of those four pieces with the same oblique leaper. So, here we go with the Wildebeest Set:

67. Indlovukazi. 68. Sangoma.  69. Umbusi. and 70. Mkuu. Since the wildebeest (ala gnu) is native to southern Africa, I thought that a southern African language would be a good choice to go with, in the same way that I'd used Swahili for the Zebra QBRM. When Aurelian Florea mentioned the Sangoma, I checked and found it as a Zulu name, and I knew that Zulu would be the language to go for.

I therefore have Aurelian to thank for this group.

The Indlovukazi is a dead-on translation from "Queen." The word takes a little practice for an English-speaker to pronounce, but it's worth it; the word is (in my opinion) as beautiful as the personage to which it refers. (QNC)

On the piece design, I think I need to raise the collar a bit to make it more visible, but otherwise it fits.

The Sangoma is named for a traditional Zulu healer, in keeping with Bishop compounds being religious leaders (such as the Archbishop and Caliph). (BNC)

The piece is based on photos I was able to find of actual, modern-day sangomas, with tightly braided hair, crossed sashes, and in a couple of cases a distinctive headpiece. I need to fix the shoulders of the sashes on this piece, but otherwise I'm pretty satisfied.

Umbusi is, quite directly, the Zulu word for 'governor." I take a cue from the Chancellor, and name Rook compounds for top government officials. (RNC)

The piece shows the formal cylindrical hat and chest drape worn by government officials in parts of southern Africa. The latter does need a bit of work, but it's getting there.

Finally, for the Mkuu... while the Mann is basically a Commoner, for the Camel compound, István Paulovits called this a General in 1890, and for my version I translated this to Janaaral (the English loanword to Arabic). Thus, when I can, the Mann compounds are named General, and only if that fails do I go with Commoner. Therefore, the Mkuu is named for a Zulu war leader. (KNC)

The piece features the headband, triangular fur-shouldered shoulder drape, and distinctive shield of a Zulu warrior.

I'd promise to soon feature more QBRM groups in the future, but I'm having a little trouble naming the Mann figures for the Okapi (Lingala) and Bison (Russian), and a lot of trouble finding any good translations for the whole Buffalo set (probably Lakota or some other mid-North American language). There may be others, too; the Giraffe, Antelope, Impala, and Aurochs all have potential, and I have a Tibetan group set aside for my (2,5) Bharal.

My apologies for taking up such a large chunk of Comments; I hope these pieces inspire some creativity in y'all (or, conceivably, a desire to include one or more of them in your variants).

Sounds like some sort of limitation like "can only use  # times," or perhaps "only when there are no enemy pieces within # spaces," could be of help, from the perspective Aurelian proposes.

The former sounds to me like a possible use for t in XBetza; for example, t2mNN would allow two non-capturing Nightrider moves per game. I don't know how I'd code the latter, but I do know that I've come across several pieces with that type of limitation (and its inverse).

(BTW, it is an interesting question how a hopper should be handled that passes though the brake zone. I suppose it should be able to hop over a mount there; but should such a square count as a mount when it is empty?)

I personally would answer this as a "no." I've generally regarded the hop as a bypass to a specific target, and in the case of a brake spell there's no target.

My question is: should a brake affect a rifle capture? I'd also say "no" to this on principle, but I'm not sure you could program the ID to recognize the "cab" string as "immune to brake."

For me, more piece images = good thing (though of course I'm quite a piece-nik). I'd make a bunch if I could, but I lack both the talent and the tools.

However, this comes at the cost of having more moves to remember (14 in total).

This is precisely the reason that I love the Mnemonic images so much. I'd love to have them for Short Sliders, if I ever get around to making an ID for it.

I do draw a distinction between rifle and locust captures; that's why I specified cab as the trigger string (though I think it's actually caib for sliding atoms).

But that fog spell sounds like a winner to me. It'd be a good counter against pieces like my Sniper (the (0,5)(3,4) rifle capturer).

Mind that I'm paying close attention to this discussion; I just had a request for a GC of Vanguard Chess. :)

The Interactive Diagram you included defines the Nightrider as the (only) royal???

ARGH!!! I'll have to fix that after I get home tomorrow.