Comments by BobGreenwade
84. Baboon. I originally thought of this piece for completely different move combo, but decided against it in favor of something else; weeks later, this combo came to mind, and I thought it was perfect to call it a Baboon. The combo is simply a leap of three spaces either orthogonally or diagonally, or (1,2) like a Knight. (NGH)
I haven't put this into a game yet (not even a Dealer's Chess Expansion Set), but that'll come. I think it'd make a fine piece on a 10x10 or 12x12 board. In fact, I really only have one problem with the piece.
Yeah, that's pretty much it. With the abstract-geometric style of my physical pieces, this is the best I could come up with for the long-faced ape. I think just about anyone else could do better.
Play-test applet for chess variants. Applet you can play your own variant against.[All Comments] [Add Comment or Rating]I poked around for a bit on the new version of the applet a bit this morning. I think this is pretty close to ready. I'd love to have things like saving a setup as a file locally and reloading it later (so I don't necessarily have to do these large, complex ones like Short Sliders in a single sitting) or being able to reorder the pieces (so that, again referencing Short Sliders, all of the starting pieces are together, then all of the first-promotion pieces, then the second-promotion), but those things can wait for some future release.
85. Clown. We already have the Fool, the Jester, the Joker, and various others, so why not a Clown?
The Clown's basic move is four spaces in any direction; however, it cannot capture with this move. The Clown also can imitate the move of any piece, whether friendly or enemy, in a space adjacent to its starting spot. It can capture in this manner, but doing so is an act of self-sacrifice. (mQ4xK+)
(The + in the above refers to the kamikaze nature of the xK, which I don't know how to code in XBetza.)
The Clown also has a special ability all its own, which comes in two parts: first, it's a bifold piece, meaning that two can fit into one space. A capture made against two Clowns in one space captures both if it's a regular displacing capture; rifle, locust, withdrawing, and similar captures only capture one.
Second, if the player also has a piece like a Carrier (a special piece that transports other pieces), the player can fit as many Clowns on it as he has. However, sitting on a Carrier, the "move borrowing" is suppressed. When they get to their destination, all Clowns unload in the same turn, using only their innate (non-capturing) move; if spaces run out before Clowns, the remaining Clowns stay on board the Carrier
Short Sliders. Pieces are initially limited to 4 spaces (if that), and promote to longer moves. (12x16, Cells: 192) [All Comments] [Add Comment or Rating]I think I've finally managed something reasonably decent for the Jackal: 
Now I'd really like to find or figure out something for Bison and Buffalo that's distinctive from the Wildebeest....
86. Antelope. There's plenty of love for the Giraffe (which I don't mind, given that giraffes are my favorite animal), but we don't see much from the Antelope; to date, that I'm aware of, the only game where it's used is my own Dealer's Chess; otherwise it's only been seen in fairy chess problems. With a (3,4) move, it's not exactly a powerhouse, and better suited as part of a compound such as the Impala or the Rabbit, but it could be handy in a particularly large board. (NY)
Notably, the Antelope is a color-switcher, and can access the entire board... eventually. A leap of (4,3) is built for speed rather than precision, so making good use of an Antelope takes either a bit of luck or, more likely, masterful strategy.
The Antelope is distinguishable from other ungulate-based pieces mostly by the backward-curving shape of the horns.
Vanguard Chess. Game on 16x16 board, with 48 pieces per player. (16x16, Cells: 256) [All Comments] [Add Comment or Rating]I think the Game Courier Preset for this game is ready to go. I'm not clear on how to get it listed on the Index or anything, though.
Dealer's Chess. Armies are chosen by dealing special cards. (8x8, Cells: 64) [All Comments] [Add Comment or Rating]I have most all of the graphics uploaded for the "outlier" set, and tried to put up a Comment with a test display for the pieces, but somehow I have an error in there (a wrong number of colons on a line, I'm guessing) so it's not ready yet. But I'm getting there.
87. King Cheetah. In a rare genetic mutation, some cheetahs have spots that run together, such that most appear large and blotchy, with those on the back forming stripes running parallel to the spine. Though not a separate species or even breed, they've come to be known as king cheetahs. As an animal with both stripes and splotches, it seemed appropriate that the name apply to a chess piece compounding the moves of a Zebra and a Giraffe. (ZFX)
Usually, having longer leaps such as those of the Zebra and Giraffe make for a weaker piece, because of the sacrifice of speed over precision. I think that this combination can have the opposite effect, though, because the landing spaces are clustered together; the King Cheetah could be pretty formidable.
The physical piece I have for it takes some liberties with the animal's description, but it does have the benefit of being distinctive.
Vanguard Chess. Game on 16x16 board, with 48 pieces per player. (16x16, Cells: 256) [All Comments] [Add Comment or Rating]Thanks, Fergus! It turns out that I'll have to wait until some of my waiting variants are approved, but now at least I know how to do it.
I thought about Pronghorn for this, and it's not exactly off the table; the main issue I have with King Cheetah is the potential for King + Cheetah confusion (despite the Gilmanesque logic behind it). I've settled on this for now, though I may make Pronghorn an alternate form in the not-too-distant future. (Good suggestion, that.)
Honestly, the King Cheetah is the only animal I could find that had both spots and stripes.
Plus, I put a lot of effort into getting those vertical stripes right (I wish I'd done that for the spots on the sphere).
But I think you'll like tomorrow's. :)
I don't think it needs to be a separate animal to be a separate piece, as long as it's distinctive.
That said, on reflection your earlier arguments convinced me. I'll do something different tomorrow, and come back to this (as a Pronghorn) and its rotary companion next week.
Well, there's already the Dog and the Blind Dog from Shogi, which are two different pieces, and there are probably other examples from Shogi as well. But that's neither here nor there; the name confusion with a King/Cheetah compound would be enough (even though I think that exists under another name).
As to your Magician, Lev, I have another piece whose physical appearance could easily enough stand in for it without designing something new, and I'll put it up for you Monday as #91 (since #89 and #90 will be a weekend pair).
Dealer's Chess. Armies are chosen by dealing special cards. (8x8, Cells: 64) [All Comments] [Add Comment or Rating]The preceding represents the current state of the diagram showing the icons I've uploaded here. Some notes:
Right now they're just in the piece overview. I'd hoped to have them in a scrolling menu at the side, in the manner of the playtest applet.Fixed.Only about a third of the pieces I've uploaded are shown; I'd also hoped that the rest would appear appended to the end, also like in the playtest applet.- The moves shown on this list are either "official," common, or recommended.
- The piece name on the list isn't necessariliy the name on the graphic. Do an "open image in new tab" (or some other trick) to see the image name. (Or ask for a recommendation!)
- I wish I'd gone through them all before uploading, and made sure they were all the same size instead of ranging from 35 to 48 pixels. You have my apologies for that negligence. If may go through at some later date and create a page dedicated to the collection, in which case I'll make sure they're all equally sized (maybe even in a variety of sizes).
- There's more to explain and discuss, but that can wait for another time.
I've appended this to the table:
<div style=overflow:auto>
<table id=allpiecesTable border=1>
</div>Clearly I'm doing something wrong with the style parameter.
(I also changed the hand number from 0 to 99; I'll wait until later to look at the DirList thing.)
Update: I got the style thing worked out.
PS: The box is so wide because of the Berserker move. It's supposed to be a three-step version of the Japanese Lioin, and I'm not sure KANDGCZHcaKmcabKcacaKcaaK is the shortest (or even correct) way to express it. I might even need to add mpafaFmpafsaFmpafaW ([A-aK][N-aK][D-aK]).
88. Mongolian Pawn. Since I'm set to make serious changes to yesterday's piece before posting its companion, today I'll be presenting something else. (The companion piece, and the updated version of yesterday's, should be up on Tuesday.)
Hiashatar is played on a 10x10 board. With the larger board, Pawns get an extra forward space for their initial move; otherwise they move as in standard chess. (mfWcfFimfW3).
I'm not aware of any other game that uses this, though
The design on the head is simply the top of the Bodyguard (scaled down to fit).
Betza notation (extended). The powerful XBetza extension to Betza's funny notation.[All Comments] [Add Comment or Rating]Just throwing this out there; it'd be simple to do, I'm sure, but I'm not sure about how practical it would be.
Just as K is used as shorthand for WF and Q for RB, what if there was a shorthand atom for AND, and perhaps even one for HCZG? AND could be S (for Squirrel) and HCZG could be T (for Titan, since C for Cheetah is already in use by the Camel).
My doubt about it is whether they'd be used often enough to warrant the change. I know it'd shorten some things (Squirrel, Cheetah, Japanese Lion, Sabertooth, etc.... and, yes, the Berserker -- and I've even stumbled across a Squirrelrider); I don't know that it'd be worth this trouble. (But I do think that it's worth mentioning, which is why I'm doing so).
Yeah, that's about what I figured. But, like I said, it's worth mentioning.
Dealer's Chess. Armies are chosen by dealing special cards. (8x8, Cells: 64) [All Comments] [Add Comment or Rating]Now getting a look at the DirList function, and confirming that I understand everything (which is unlikely, as this is my first time working with Javascript).
I started with <script type="text/javascript">, followed by the variable declarations for theme, lDef, dDef, wDef, bDef, and def; then copied the entire DirList function. I changed the root and list variables to /membergraphics/ and MSdealerschess/ respectively, and also changed the graphicsDir reference later in the listing.
I'm not sure what to do with the if(type == lines near the end: edit, remove, or leave alone? (Right now it's the last.)
It's not in the dialog yet; for now, I just have it in a word processing file.
I'm also still a bit unsure about the Berserker move; I may delete it from the "established" list.
OK, I'll take those parts out and give it a whirl. If this isn't edited with the results in a half hour, something went horribly, horribly wrong....
Update: Well, not horribly wrong. I strongly suspect that the line that's hanging me up is:
if(list.search('404') >= 0 || list.search('not found') >= 0) list = get_url(root + 'svg/alfaerie/list.php');Probably I should either delete it, or hardcode the directory to the SVG graphics.
Update #2: Neither of those two things worked. The only effect of having the javascript in place is that the scroll bar disappears from the piece summary.
The script currently looks like this:
<script type="text/javascript">
function DirList(type) {
var root = '/membergraphics/';
var list = get_url(root + 'MSdealerschess/');
if(list.search('404') >= 0 || list.search('not found') >= 0) list = get_url('/graphics.dir/svg/alfaerie/list.php');
var lines = list.split('<');
var t = ':', total = 0;
for(var i=0; i<lines.length; i++) {
var one = lines[i].split('"');
if(one.length < 3) continue;
if(one[1].search('.png') < 0) continue;
one = one[1].split('.');
if(one.length < 2) continue;
if(one[0].search('w') != 0) continue;
one = one[0].substring(1, 30);
t += one + ':'; total++;
}
var t2 = '' + t, diagLines = original.split('\n');
for(i=0; i<diagLines.length-1; i++) {
if(diagLines[i].search('graphicsDir=') >= 0) diagLines[i] = 'graphicsDir=/membergraphics/MSdealerschess/';
if(diagLines[i].search('99') < 0) continue; // not a piece line
if(diagLines[i].search('--') >= 0) continue; // compound, keep
var fname = diagLines[i].split(':');
if(fname.length < 4) continue; // should not happen
fname = (fname[3] == '' ? fname[0].substring(8, 99) : fname[3]);
if(t2.search(':' + fname + ':') < 0) diagLines[i] = null;
else {
t = t.split(':' + fname + ':');
t = (t.length > 1 ? t[0] + ':' + t[1] : t[0]);
}
}
var tt = '';
for(i=0; i<diagLines.length-1; i++) if(diagLines[i]) tt += diagLines[i] + '\n';
t = t.split(':');
for(i=1; i<t.length-1; i++) tt += t[i] + ':::::99\n'
return tt;
}I feel like I missed a line, or something similarly important and obvious.
House of Staunton Chess Variant Kits. Photos of Chess variant pieces sold by the House of Staunton.[All Comments] [Add Comment or Rating]A lot of the issue, I think, is lack of information and awareness. I never knew any variants (other than Strato Chess and Star Trek's 3D Chess) existed until a few months ago.
Your (Kevin's) chess variant tournaments can help somewhat. I'm hoping to start taking one or two of my variants (at a time) to game and comic conventions here in the northwestern US late next year. These sorts of things, focused where people would gather who would (or might) be interested in these things, would be most helpful.
That, and after seeing the most recent photos that Jean-Louis posted of his own designs, he could start selling those on Etsy (and I'd likely buy a few myself if they're not too much).
Pincer Pawn. Moves as rook, and takes by enclosing.[All Comments] [Add Comment or Rating]I don't know that it's the origin of the term, but the only other place on this site where I can find the Pincer Pawn mentioned is in this variant.
89. Blue Gecko. and 90. Purple Finch. While they make for a symmetrical pair on the board, these two strange pieces are so diverse in background that I couldn't even reasonably put them together in the same collection on Thingiverse.
The Blue Gecko is an invention of Adrian King, for his game Jupiter. It can move up to four spaces diagonally forward and to the right; two spaces directly backward or to the left; or one space directly forward, diagonally forward and to the left, or diagaonlly backward and to the right. (frB4lbW2flFbrFfW)
This, to be honest, is the most incomprehensible move combination I've seen to date -- which is part of why I'm drawn to it.
The blue gecko is an actual species of gecko, native to Tanzania (and critically endangered). I hadn't been aware of that before, so I simply named the piece Gecko at first, but there's room for other species of gecko -- though probably not on the same board.
(At first, I wasn't very happy with this design, but then every time I look at it I hear this London-accented voice trying to sell me auto insurance. I don't know how well that reference will play outside the USA, of course.)
Mr. King doesn't provide any symmetrical partner for the Blue Gecko, so I invented one myself: the Purple Finch. This piece, not unexpectedly, slides up to four spaces diagonally forward and to the left, or two spaces directly backward or to the right; or steps one space directly forward, forward and to the right, or backward and to the left. (flB4brW2frFblFfW)
I don't recall why I zeroed in on the purple finch for the name, especially since I found it before I realized that the gecko was legitimately blue by name. I wanted a different order of animal, and a bird seemed right.
Maybe it was the distinctive crest on the bird's face, coupled with its small size. (At least it isn't trying to sell me auto insurance; I don't even own a car!)
I could happily put one of each of these on any large chess board, with the Blue Gecko on the far left and the Purple Finch on the far right, on the row behind the Pawns.
Dealer's Chess. Armies are chosen by dealing special cards. (8x8, Cells: 64) [All Comments] [Add Comment or Rating]It should also help if I put </script> at the end! #DepartmentOfDuh
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For the Treasurer, on the Musketeer Board Painter, I'd suggest either the Gold or Silver Pashtun.