Comments/Ratings for a Single Item

~~Earlier~~ ⇧Reverse Order⇩ ~~Later~~

Al-Ces. Variant on 10 by 10 board with 30 pieces per player. (10x10, Cells: 100) [All Comments] [Add Comment or Rating]

Charles Gilman wrote on Sun, Mar 30, 2003 09:46 AM UTC:Good ★★★★

Promotable Elephants are a clever idea, as they are such a weak piece. Furthermore promoting them to Bishops reiterates the historical change of piece.

Charles Gilman wrote on Sat, May 17, 2003 07:02 AM UTC:Poor ★

Do not be too disheartened at this rating, as it applies equally to my Hasty analysis of this game when I last looked at it. It also serves to cancel out my previous rating. While it makes sense to promote Elephants, your Gold and Silver Generals are overcomplicated. Why have such a divergence in scale between capturing and non-capturing moves, and why retain the Shogi names for pieces so different in their non-capturing move? Perhaps they could be Gold and Silver something else - Elks, for example, as the race to which Elks belong is Alces Alces Alces (Moose are Alces Alces Americanus, another race of the same species).

George Duke wrote on Thu, Jan 27, 2005 01:48 AM UTC:Good ★★★★

'ABC' Large-CV thread: Charles Gilman's Comment here is concerned with the naming. I would cite the 13 piece-types in making strategy difficult to picture. Having different moving and capturing capabilities for three of them results in effectively dealing with 16 piece-type-moves. 16/100 (= 16%) for piece-types is rather unfriendly to players. However, the mix of FIDE types and exotic pieces is usually good practice.

George Duke wrote on Sat, May 3, 2008 05:53 PM UTC:Good ★★★★

Here is an interesting one. Lion of Karakus is very clearly quadruple-atomic (Dabbabah + Alfil + Ferz + Wazir). Karakus also created Perfect Chess, an attempt like Betza's Tutti-Frutti to crowd the Carrera compounds RN and BN onto 8x8.

David Paulowich wrote on Sat, May 3, 2008 08:24 PM UTC:Good ★★★★

The 'Lion' in this game lacks the ability to move like a Knight, it is in fact the same piece as the Squire: combines Modern Elephant + Modern Machine in Jean Louis Cazaux's list of Chess (Variant) Graphics. This Squire was used in Eric V. Greenwood's Renniassance Chess (1980).

George Duke wrote on Thu, Nov 5, 2009 09:09 PM UTC:

Al-Ces a few years after Assassination Chess also has an Assassin. The two piece-types are different. There is bound to be duplication in naming with so many CVs and piece-types. Frequently we find the same piece as to how it moves under multiple names, like Carrera Centaur BN. Just look through Man&Beasts 01 through 22 for hundreds of other examples. Also, Truelove's list is organized somewhat that way. The same name for different pieces may be just as common under misguided and pointless proliferation. This Assassin is a divergent piece after Divergent Chess pieces, but there are earlier examples of the class in 'ECV'. ''The class'' has not much to do with either case of repeat naming and is still another important cross-category. The class would be what the unit actually does in common with others, or is excluded from. Now Gilman's criticism is right and wrong. He is right there should be new names for this Gold General and Silver General. What is missed is that there are only one of each and they are deliberately powerful pieces in Al-Ces. The regular Pawns of Al-Ces are ordinary western divergent Pawns with the strange and useful one-time two step, eventually forcing us to accept en passant. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ship_of_fools

Daniil Frolov wrote on Mon, Jan 20, 2014 08:39 AM UTC:Good ★★★★

I like this kind of gold and silver generals. I guess, they have this way of movement to bring feeling of Shogi to game without drops. They have high non-capturing mobility (approximating to mobility of Shogi's pieces in-hand), but player must choose positions carefully for best use of their gold and silver directions.
However, i would not allow them to make "flying" move, once they attacked by opponent (generals in shogi can't flee such easily).

Kevin Pacey wrote on Tue, Sep 13, 2022 06:44 PM UTC:Good ★★★★

Inspiring game, yet it seems the action may take a while to get going

I don't yet get how to mobilize in the opening smoothly when playing this CV, at least when I tried to do so in my first game (with White, no less). After I moved the pawn in front of my king two squares, for example, I wanted to develop my knights to my fourth rank, towards the centre, in natural fashion. Yet that would allow Black to develop his deves (camels) similarly, and then to take my knight(s) almost at will - perhaps clearly at least a slightly worse exchange for me, since my pawn structure might be compromised without sufficent compensation when I recapture, and by my valuations (though tentative) a Kt is worth more than a camel on 10x10 (maybe even by as much as a pawn).

As my game (with arx) went on, I found my gold and silver had a hard time being deployed usefully for quite some time - an issue since they can get in the way of other pieces. I also had mobilization issues with at least one of two of my bishops, especially concerning if assuming castling is desirable in general. The assassins I had a hard time valuing, but guessed one could be worth as much as a queen. Maybe the inventor intended that mobilization be slow in playing this CV, I don't know.

@arx: I've sent you a personal invite to a Sac Chess rematch, in case you missed it, and wish to play.

8 comments displayed

~~Earlier~~ ⇧Reverse Order⇩ ~~Later~~

Permalink to the exact comments currently displayed.