Comments/Ratings for a Single Item

I'd also like to make a pair of piece sets to make Cataclysm a little more playable... With traditional pieces it looks like this. But there are a number of pieces and it could be challenging to remember how they all move, so either Jeremy or Joe made an alternate preset that looks like this. The second is helpful, I'm sure, but it's not visually pleasing...

What I'd like to do is create a pair of associated piece sets so that each player can choose to use either piece set. This even allows both players in the same game to use different sets. I'm not sure exactly how this is all set up, but I know it's possible because other games do it. A few years ago Fergus sent me a sample PHP file for a piece set and I was easily able to modify it to produce the piece set for Opulent Chess, so I'll dig that up from my email and put the sets together if someone is available to help 'plug them in.'

Hello, 
I got an email from Carlos about this tournament.  
I would bring ONE of 
1. King to Bunker Leap 
2. Shock Troops
3. Wreckage.  

in that order of priority .. 
I am not sure what the consensus or rules agreed upon - I haven't had much
time to be on chess variants lately.

Nicholas: OK. The porcupine icon is beautiful! I already could access the
rules. All is right. The scheduled date for beginning the tourney is
February 1, but after Greg's desires, perhaps we will need to postpone it
a while, since... who will make the icons he likes? How much time it will
be required?

By the way, I'm nothing obsessed with this issue and I'm willing to abort
it at any time.

Charles: Thanks for participating. The idea is that each person brings only
one game.

Joe: I hope you help me at this point for clarifying the things in benefit
of Charles Daniel. Thanks!

The icons all exist and I can compose the PHP files that create the piece
set.  I just need an editor to put them in the right place, and do whatever
magic it takes to 'connect' them so that Game Courier understands that
they two piece sets are equivalents, they way that, for example, 'Alfaerie
2: Modern Fairy Pieces' and 'Abstract 2: Modern Fairy Pieces' are
equivalent...  Really shouldn't take long.

All: My wife closed my window with my preset that I was making, so I have
to rebuild it, I think.  I apologize for this.  Once I actually get the
time, it shouldn't take me too long.  Perhaps this weekend.  Thanks,
Antoine, for the uploading and thanks, Carlos, for the compliment!  I hope
it is a tournament favorite :)

Greg: I understand your position and hope any editor help you; if not, we will have to use the Cataclysm's standard preset that, by the way, I see it's perfectly undertandable.

Charles Daniel: Given the order of priority, I take King to Bunker Leap as your bring. I think the best is to use the Shuffle system. We already have this preset.

We will play a Round Robin Tourney. Every player will play 2 games against every other - the game that each brought. The default choice of sides will be players are black in the game they brought. The only way this will change is if the opponent requests black for that game, in which case the opponent will then become black. This request must be made before the game starts.

Each player will have a reserve time of 5 months, and nothing else, for each game. All games will be started at the same time, hopefully the next Tuesday Feb 1st.

The players signed up are:
1)Fergus with Storm the Ivory Tower (Version 3)
2)Greg with Cataclysm.
3)Nicholas with Wildest Kingdom Chess.
4)Joe with Chieftain Chess.
5)Charles Daniel with King to Bunker Leap (Shuffle System).
6)Carlos with Coherent Chess.

Please let me know if you have any doubt.

Great, looking forward to it!

The existing preset is, of course, fine by me :)  Was just trying to be
helpful as we're asking people to learn quite a few new games and
Cataclysm has several new pieces (although I think they're pretty easy.)

I have now programmed a preset for Coherent Chess. As I understand the Knight in this game, it can optimally move to the same spaces an unblocked Nightrider can, but it moves there by sliding along the edges of a rhombus connecting the two spaces. I have programmed a new function for this called checkrhombus.

I have started working on a preset for King to Bunker Leap. So far, I have modified a preset for Fischer Random Chess, but I still have to add the King to Bunker Leap rule and modify the castling.

Fergus, took a fast look at the Coherent Chess preset. I moved the knight in one test, and it told me both I could not move into check, and when I went back, 'checkmate! Black has won.' Same thing happened when I started again and moved white's center pawn - with the Move option, of course. Further, the
sissa can also move 'backwards' or 'sideways', allowing it all the squares of the rook, also. The sissa can start its move either orthogonally or diagonally, then choose any of the 4 possible directions for the second leg.

So, besides moving along two edges of a rhombus, it can move along two
edges of a triangle?

The checkmate problem should be fixed now.

In 2008-04-15 Gary Gifford said regarding CC: 'Because the Pawns are very different from Fide-pawns, I think the pre-set would be better if Pawn graphics were replaced with one of the many King-like graphics. If I played this game I would constantly be battling my mind's desire to see the Pawns as Pawns.

'On a similar note, the Knight piece is not a Knight, so a different graphic to remind us of this would be good.'

For these reasons I edited in 2008-11-09 this preset which is what we should use.

In 1998 I named the CC's knight as 'sissa'. The simplest way to describe its movement rule is (according to me) this:

Sissa moves each time as Rook AND Bishop following a movement pattern of the form nR+nB or nB+nR, where n is any whole number.

nR+nB means 'first n squares like Rook followed by n squares like Bishop';

nB+nR means 'first n squares like Bishop followed by n squares like Rook'.

Then, if for instance n=5, sissa MUST MOVE 5 squares as Rook followed by 5 squares as Bishop or viceversa.

There is no restriction on the movement direction of the second stage respecting to the first.

Sissa doesn't leap. All squares it passes by must be empty.

As this tournament approaches, I realize I'm not looking forward to it.
There isn't a single game in this tournament that interests me besides my
own, and as much as I like my own game, I don't want to play five games of
it at once. I'm not used to playing ten games at once, and I don't want
to overload myself like this. Also, as I've been trying to program these
games, some of them have proven difficult to understand. Wildest Kingdom
Chess seems particularly complicated. It introduces a bunch of new pieces
that in addition to the way they move have special powers. This game seems
too difficult for me to understand or to program, especially in the short
time left before this tournament begins. So I think I will stop my efforts
to program the games in this tournament and withdraw.

I must admit I don't really see the appeal of super-complex pieces like
the Sissa.  Even in orthodox chess I have difficulty seeing more than a few
moves ahead and all those pieces are easy to visualize.  Granted, I'm not
a particularly good chess player, (just look at my win/loss ratio on game
courier,) but I think these multi-path pieces have got to make the game
more difficult for everyone when you must expend so much brain power just
to figure out which squares you can reach, and that determination requires
looking at lots of other squares in totally different directions.

Hey all!  I hate to jump on the bandwagon with this, but I need to
withdrawal.  I am going through a VERY taxing divorce right now and may not
even be able to make moves on my regular games, let alone add so many and
finish that preset.  I apologize for the very late notice.  Please keep
your thoughts and prayers right now.  Things are getting very ugly for
me...

-Nick

Nicholas, I'm very sorry to hear that.  I wish you the best.  I hope
that's something I never have to go through...

Fergus, sorry to see you go too, but I understand.  I think the method of
game selection in this tournament is unfortunate, but I'm in anyway
because I like the looks of all of the games except Coherent Chess,
including yours and Nicholas's.  I played an earlier version of Wild
Kingdom, and although I got stomped, it was still fun and a promising
concept.  I agree that Coherent looks flawed, but I'll reserve judgement.

Hey, Nick, sorry about your misfortune. I wish you and your family the
best. 

Fergus, sorry to see you go. I was looking forward to getting stomped in
Ivory Tower 3. I agree with you and Greg that the sissa is a devilishly
hard piece to deal with, especially as the board starts to open up. But I
think it's a very unique piece, and deserves a wider audience. I'll
discuss it further in other comments.

And now there are 4. So be it. A smaller tournament means less time
pressure and the ability to play more games outside the tournament. :)

To make such tournaments less demanding, I recommend that *modest* variants
are used, to a greater extent. People invent such complex variants so I get
exhausted just by reading the rules. 
/Mats

Mats, I agree that an 'easier' set of games would likely draw more
people, but I see no guarantee that these games would be more generally
'liked'. Much of what is played is basically expanded FIDE. In Game
Courier Tournament #3, roughly a third of the games were expanded FIDE
games [like Capablanca, Janus...] These games I only play in tournaments.
Individual games can be interesting, but in general, it's just FIDE writ
large. Nothing new.

As for unusual and difficult pieces, I offer [with apologies] the
wildebeest. This 2:1, 3:1, 3:2 leaper is what I would term a 'chaotic'
piece, like the sissa. The range of its second move is ridiculous. In that
sense, it's no different than the sissa. Or the rose, the circular knight.
Truthfully, I don't even like knightriders, despite Pocket Mutation being
one of my favorite variants. Pocket Mutation is not chaotic. It allows for
surprise, for twists and turns; it adds something to the tactics and
strategies of chess. 

Much of what is accepted today is the result of historical accident. A
different chess history would leave the same people having the same
arguments, but over different games. I see tournaments as a way to get
people to play games they otherwise wouldn't play.

I'm withdrawing not only of this thread/tourney but also of this website.

I have just realized that what I need is to try Chinese Checkers. So you
all will can find me playing it at http://www.gamesforthebrain.com

I can understand why I withdrew, because I'm me, and I can understand why
Nicholas would withdraw with a divorce looming, but for you to suddenly
withdraw to devote yourself to play Chinese Checkers makes no sense. This
tournament was your idea, and you're the one who insisted on keeping its
take-it-or-leave-it format. I think your feelings got hurt, perhaps due to
the withdrawals or to criticism of Coherent Chess. Let me be clear, no one
has criticized you here, and no one has expressed any desire for you to
leave. You are welcome to stay here, and you are welcome to run this
tournament as you see fit. Likewise, I'm free not to participate, because
this just isn't the kind of tournament that interests me. But that is not
any reflection on you, and you should not let it concern you.

Carlos, I'm sorry to see you go, my friend.  Good luck!