💡📝Joe Joyce wrote on Fri, Apr 13, 2007 03:43 PM UTC:
Joshua, I thought I was the first, too. V.R. Parton beat us both. At the great risk of being immodest, I will suggest my version might be a little better than Sphinx Chess, so I encourage you to push on with your design. The problems of 4D chess are very, very far from being solved, and a new view is always good.
J.C. Ruhf, my apologies for not acknowledging your comment sooner. You are proposing a mixed 2D-4D variant, with all pieces able to move either way. I did post a mixed dimensions game, with bishops and knights always moving in 2D, rooks and kings always moving in 4D, pawns able to choose either, and queens and chancellors moving as 4D rook and either 2D bishop or knight. It's a tough game. Your suggestion creates a real mindbender of a game; I'd want Spock on my side just for starters.
I have learned some things about piece values. Pawns are noticeably stronger than their FIDE counterparts. Bishops are stronger than rooks. The most amazing thing is that knights and queens are about the same strength here. Just seeing the knight's possible moves is difficult. In view of this, I designed a 'flat' variant called Chess on 2 Boards, which eliminates knights and any move that has '4D freedom'. The game becomes [much?] easier to play with this change.