Comments/Ratings for a Single Item

Probably. I've now edited it to that effect, anyway. (Thanks for the catch!)

106. Mad Hatter. Another piece from Adrian King's Jupiter, the Mad hatter moves without capture like a Queen, and moves like a Knight but only to capture. (mQcN)

Anyone for tea?

107. March Hare. It stands to reason that where there's a Mad Hatter, there's probably a March Hare.* It likewise stands to reason that if the Mad Hatter moves like a Queen but captures like a Knight, then the March Hare probably moves like a Knight but captures like a Queen. (mNcQ)

And it stands to reason that where there's a Mad Hatter figure, so too there will be one for the March Hare.

Admittedly, the look isn't quite as iconic as with the Hatter, but once you know it's the March Hare there's no mistaking it.

*Otherwise, Batman.

mNcQ

Argh... right. mNcQ, not mKcQ. Fixing that....

108. Raccoon. The Raccoon is a simple short-range piece, moving on space diagonally, or leaping two spaces orthogonally or like a Knight. (FDN)

No move diagram at this time, and I think the piece does need a bit of "enhancement," but here it is.

Somehow, my mind got so caught up in other stuff the last couple of days that I forgot to post these. So, here's Friday's....

109. Horned Lizard. The Horned Lizard is the rotary partner to the Raccoon, moving one space orthogonally, or leaping two spaces diagonally or like a Knight. (WAN).

And the weekend's pair:

110. Viper and 111. Cobra. This is a pair of pieces I found in H. G. Muller's Minjiku Shogi, and of course I loved them as soon as I saw them.

The Viper slides diagonally like a Bishop, but also can rifle-capture to an adjacent orthoganal space.

Similarly, the Cobra slides orthogonally like a Rook, but also can rifle-capture to an adjacent diagonal space.

I only hope that the piece designs here do them justice at some level.

One of the things that I got "caught up in" the last couple of days was when, after experiencing some frustration over the (not unexpected) inconsistency of style in Public Domain icons, I realized that I could design my own SVG icons using Tinkercad. The results (so far) are here, and I think the quality runs the whole range from OMG to WTF. Do I have a snotload of adjustments to make? (I know something weird happened with the Archer and Centauride, though I'm not sure that it needs fixing.)

What's in that ZIP is what I consider the minimum to share here, plus a few extras; I'll have a lot of others to add -- if folks here think it'd be worth the effort.

I got a 404 error from your link.

Argh.

I'd edited out the early part of the URL, and probably took too much. I've changed the link now, back to the full URL.

And I'm doing it again here, just to be sure.

I'd want to see them actually on a board, but at first glance going through them in isolation (and at a very inflated size) some of these are rather nice :‌)

Thanks! I'm not too sure about the Bison (correction) Gnu or most of the felines, but I am pretty proud of the orthodox pieces and equines. :)

112. Archer. There are almost as many takes on what abilities an Archer should have as there are games that have them. I hunted through several such games, and found that there were, after all, two things that recurred most often: a move of up to two spaces diagonally, and a (1,2) rifle capture. The former move was sometimes (especially in older games) a leap to the second space, like a Modern Elephant, but more often was a two-step move. So, I put these two things together and called it a consensus. (It was pure coincidence, since it was after I designed Vanguard Chess, that that game's Archer was basically the same thing!) (F2cabN)

This is a hard piece to make a good physical design for. I've seen a couple of attempts, and they work but not quite satisfactorily. My attempt isn't really any better, but I tried.

Your piece is probably too fragile to be 3D printed. Aesthetically, I don't like it either. My preference for an Archer goes to the piece I present on Thingiverse. This one is not really my design, I have copied it and drawn it from an image I've seen on the web. But, well, it's a matter of taste.

I have another question. What is the diffence between Archer and Bowman in English? (In French the word for "bowman" is "archer". I used to think that "archer" was a French word by the way, from "arc" which means "bow").

I'm pretty sure the words "archer" and "bowman" are completely synonymous, in general usage. Having the two different words does allow us in the chess-variant world to have two different pieces with similar but different properties, though.

Well, ‘bowman’ does have a nautical sense too, though the piece name is definitely not intending to refer to that.

Arguably, ‘archer’ refers also to crossbowmen, whereas ‘bowman’ is more specific about the weapon used.

Also apparently the Chess Bishop (presumably with both its modern and archaic moves) was sometimes called an Archer, which may be why you're finding ‘archers’ moving like Elephants

Yes, Archer in German lands. The Bishop is the piece which has been the most flexible in the nomenclature. This is because an elephant (from Arabic "fil") was not understood or not perceived well fitting on the chess board in medieval Europe. Hence the variety of names, Bishop (from the shape of the piece), Fou (fool, from fil), the Aged, Kurier (from the modern sliding move), Flag bearer (Alfiere in Italian, from fil), or more simply Alfil in Spanish and Slon=elephant in Russian.

Then, a diagonal move for the Elephant has some grounds for me. As well as for the Archer. Fergus had represented the Vao (another story!) by an Arrow, I had a similar idea years ago with an Archer.

It also bears mentioning that an alternate representation of the Vao is as the Ballista (which I only learned very recently, thanks to you, Jean-Louis).

113. Hospitaller/Kangaroo. Speaking of pieces that can bear multiple names and representation, this is one example. The piece with the (1,2)(2,2) leaps can be known as either a Kangaroo, Hospitaller (after the order of Knights by that name), or Princess. (KA)

I tend to reserve the Princess name for other moves, but I can alternate between the other two depending on the theme of the game.

I've also put up a set of further SVG icons to supplement the rest. These are meant specifically for use with H.G.'s Diagram Editor with scalable graphics, using the "compound pieces" tool. The intent for most of them are pretty self-expanatory by either name or appearance; others are just open-ended. (I'll explain any or all of them on request.) A few of them could even be used as primary icons.

I also took to heart Bn Em's remark earlier about the icons being oversized for examination, and reduced said size from 800 units to 200. I'll make the same adjustment to the original set before I ask for a folder at /graphics.dir/svg/ (I'll also have about 35-40 more pieces to add, though I have most of them set already.)

I've now updated my original set of SVG icons, and added a few more to make sure it's useful to as many people as possible and meets any apparent requirements for the Interactive Diagrams, Play-Test Applet, and Diagram Editor. More will be needed to make the set really complete, but these plus the bonus set could go into a folder in /graphics.dir/svg/ when someone has the time.

I'll add another bunch later, including anything missing for playing Short Sliders or Zwangkrieg, some of my favorite discoveries and "pet" inventions, and anything people happen to request.

114. Templar/Carpenter/Doughnut. For a sheer variety of different, this piece doesn't hold the record, but it's up there. As Templar, it's the rotary counterpart of the Hospitaller, leaping (0,2)(1,2). The quasi-circular look of its diagram and the move letters of its components (Dabbabah and kNight) led to the name Doughnut, and the name Carpenter has also been used (see the Piececlopedia article for more on this). (DN)

It's also appeared as the Scribe and Ouroboros, though I only have piece designs for the three main names.

I don't know why the message I posted yesterday night has disappeared. I was saying that on Thingiverse you could find my lasted 3D designs, a Bison (CZ), a Wildebeest (NC) and an Okapi (NZ), knowing that you love Okapi Bob!