Comments/Ratings for a Single Item

In the text the flying cat is said to be fN but it's moves are fDfA.

Nice spot. Turns out it was also in Dai Seireigi. I fixed both.

Chu Seireigi is ready

The new version of Chu Seireigi is ready.

Two critiques:

1. In keeping with the Running Wolf and Running Leopard, the Running Rabbit probably should have the Wind modifier behind it (rabbit--wind).

2. I'm not sure that a piece should promote (when promotion is at the far end of the board) to something whose primary move is forward, as the Gold General does into the Great Elephant. (I'd suggest Phoenix instead, but then you'd probably have to change Silver General to promote to Kirin for symmetry's sake.)

Otherwise, I'm loving what I'm seeing.

@Bob Greenwade,

Here is my response to your two critiques, in the order that they are listed in your comment.

1. In keeping with the Running Wolf and Running Leopard, the Running Rabbit probably should have the Wind modifier behind it (rabbit--wind).

1A. Now that I think about it, I think it may actually make more sense to not have modifiers on unpromoted pieces where possible. The most important part of the graphics are the animals (except when pieces are not animals, such as with the Rook and Bishop) for obvious reasons.

2. I'm not sure that a piece should promote (when promotion is at the far end of the board) to something whose primary move is forward, as the Gold General does into the Great Elephant. (I'd suggest Phoenix instead, but then you'd probably have to change Silver General to promote to Kirin for symmetry's sake.)

2A. The main refutal of this critique comes from H. G. Muller in his critique of an early version of Seireigi. In that comment, he quotes Hidetchi in a response to an old proposal to have Golds promote to non-royal Kings. Hidetchi replied that this was pointless because it doesn't provide anything of substance with which to check the enemy King with, and the act of dropping a general in the zone, promoting it and then moving the resulting promoted piece takes unaffordably long. Hidetchi's point is that he King tends to stay in the back for the majority of the game, and would never expose itself willingly. As such, forward-facing moves are needed in order to force the enemy King to an area where he can be checkmated.

Also, having such pieces is perfect for promotion chains, as they can serve as an intermediary between a weak piece and a strong piece that exclusively appears with promotion. For example, in Dai Seireigi I can have the Free Pup and Treacherous Fox in the initial setup and promoting to something stronger.

However, even if both of these reasons were to be completely untrue, the pieces that promote to them mainly serve as defensive pieces since their moves are weak but maneuverable and are effective at stopping Lion attacks, so they are unlikely to occur anyway.

I have decided to rename the Free Pup to Whale, to include a marine animal and balance out the number of dog and cat piece types (bears are dog-like).

This change also applies to Dai Seireigi.

the description of Treacherous Fox needs an update

As far as I can tell, the only typo I made was not changing Great Stag to Treacherous Fox in the move description.

@François Houdebert,

I saw your Jocly implementation for Chu Seireigi. It works much better than it used to.

I went through and tested everything, and here is a comprehensive list of all known errors that I found:

-------------------------------
Piece Movement/Promotion Errors
-------------------------------

Ram's-Head Soldier and Prancing Stag are not forced to promote when reaching the last rank (these pieces must promote on last rank)

Strong Bear (Starting and Promoted) still has its old move (should move one square diagonally or sideways)

Whale is missing its forward orthogonal step

Flying Swallow is not forced to promote when reaching the last two ranks (this piece must promote on last two ranks)

White Golden Bird is missing its sideways orthogonal leaps, Black Golden Bird is missing its (1,-2) leap from White's perspective

Kirin promotes to Lion (should promote to Bishop) and White Kirin moves has extra (2,2) leap in all directions (should move as in Chu Shogi)

Phoenix promotes to Queen (should promote to Rook)

-------------------------------
Board Setup Errors
-------------------------------

There currently aren't enough spaces in the hand to accommodate all the droppable piece types (there are 19 in total). You will need a second column of hand spaces on each side to account for this.

Black Running Leopard and Black Running Wolf are swapped from where they should be in the initial setup.

Most of the Movement/Promotion adjustments have been made. The only point I'm having trouble with is finding a way to extend the number of places for hands. I'd probably have to override the drop model, but I'm not sure I could do it quickly on my own. Anyway, for the time being, it's a good way to get familiar with the rules.

Thanks. Hopefully we can also upload your implementations of Hectochess and Seireigi to the site soon.

I have tested the new moves and will update you on bugs to be fixed. Here are the errors I found as of the writing of this comment.

-------------------------------
Piece Movement/Promotion Errors
-------------------------------

Whale is missing its backward slide

White Golden Bird is missing its sideways orthogonal leaps

For some reason Flying Swallows that are dropped from the hand (not the ones present initially) have their move reversed

-------------------------------

As for the trouble with the hand spaces, maybe ask H. G. Muller about that? He is the one who made the original model if I remember correctly. It shouldn't be that hard for him to figure something out.

As far as I can tell, you should only need a second column of hand spaces on each side, but of course, it's probably not as simple as I am making it out to be.

I think I've corrected the bugs you mentionned.

If HGM has the time and the possibility to add the parametrisation of the hand space in the drop model, of course I'll use it, but I don't know if it's that easy to do.

I can share a zip if you want, with these 3 compiled games (Hectochess/Seireigi/Chu Seireigi)?

Looks like you fixed everything, save for the hand spaces of course, but I won't bother you on that too much until you are ready to test the solution.

I would at least like the ones for Hectochess and Seireigi. Ideally, the files should be placed in such a way so that I know which files go where.

You may include Chu Seireigi if you wish, but I am doing one last update to make it easier to defend against a Lion:

• Renaming Prancing Stag to Running Rabbit (fBfR), which promotes to Prancing Stag (fBsRvW)
• Strong Bear moving the same as Chu Shogi Drunk Elephant

I had your Jocly implementation play out several games, and even though it played rather poorly (for obvious reasons), it was clear that there needed to be more defense.

P. S. I'm surprised you changed the Whale's symbol to a trident. I guess it makes sense if you take into account Greek mythology. I think the whale tail symbol you used before would look more accurate, but it really comes down to personal preference here.

In general, I try to associate a visual with a movement whatever the game in jocly. I don't know if it's the same for everyone, but I have to adapt a lot when the movements of a known piece change. That's why I used the trident that had been envisaged for the whale in chu shogi. I realized that the movement differed from that of the whale in chu shogi when I was making the documentation, and it seemed preferable to me to avoid confusion.

It would be interesting to add mnemomic sprites as an alternative. I don't know if you'd be interested in making such a file.

Here's an SVG seireigi set if you want to test the creation of a physical game. Example in plywood (compact / cheap and quick to make but rather simple), the color code for laser cutter is red/cutting, blue engraving recto, yellow engraving verso.

Here's a link to the jocly seireigi and hectochess implementations. It would require to code evaluation function to improve the level of the engine  which still needs to be done, and will probably require some expertise. Personally, I don't mind the computer being beatable.

Here's a link to the jocly seireigi and hectochess implementations. It would require to code evaluation function to improve the level of the engine  which still needs to be done, and will probably require some expertise. Personally, I don't mind the computer being beatable.

The link is broken, it seems... Actually, do include the Chu Seireigi implementation. Testing with it will be valuable.

In general, I try to associate a visual with a movement whatever the game in jocly. I don't know if it's the same for everyone, but I have to adapt a lot when the movements of a known piece change. That's why I used the trident that had been envisaged for the whale in chu shogi. I realized that the movement differed from that of the whale in chu shogi when I was making the documentation, and it seemed preferable to me to avoid confusion.

Okay, makes sense.

It would be interesting to add mnemomic sprites as an alternative. I don't know if you'd be interested in making such a file.

Here's an SVG seireigi set if you want to test the creation of a physical game. Example in plywood (compact / cheap and quick to make but rather simple), the color code for laser cutter is red/cutting, blue engraving recto, yellow engraving verso.

Maybe, once I finalize everything.

I am currently testing the KNAD move for the Lion. Unfortunately, I am no carpenter, but your set looks good (though you did forget the Coppers in the plywood example.)

Here is a link in https for the implems of hectochess-seireigis to avoid complains from some Browsers

The Coppers are not in the pictures but are in the svg. With inscape you might have to zoom to see all the drawings because of the various thichness of the lines, but laser cutting software can handle this king of file.

If HGM has the time and the possibility to add the parametrisation of the hand space in the drop model, of course I'll use it, but I don't know if it's that easy to do.

In the current drop-model.js you can request extra ranks for hand pieces above and below the board, in case there are more piece types that can go in hand than there are board ranks. Does that satisfy your needs?

I'm going to give it a try and see what it does, but how do I go about it?

Do I need to specify anything in the model to the cbDropGeometry?
Or in the view at the boardLayout?

It should be explained in the commit message of the drop model. Unfortunately that is not easy to access now that GitWeb is disabled on my website (I haven't had time to fix that yet). But if you have pulled the pullreq branch you should be able to see it on your local machine.

I found it. I understood that the 3rd parameter of

cbDropGeometry(files, ranks, bottomHoldings) can be used to add rows

I will test it

I made a first draft. It seems to work.

I still need to find a way to adjust the sprite sizes. Is it possible to display a grid? maybe it's hidden by size issues.

I actually found a better replacement for the Old Kite with the Running Rabbit (fBfR).

Thankfully, this is the last time I will need to make any changes.

Here are all the errors I found in your draft:

Piece Movement/Promotion/Drop Errors

Old Kite should be replaced with Running Rabbit, which slides in any forward direction (fBfR)

For Pawn, Lance, Ram's-Head Soldier, Running Rabbit (currently Old Kite), Knight, Flying Swallow, White's promotion is always forced, while Black's promotion is never forced

When captured, White Kirin is not being placed in Black's hand

Board Setup Errors

White King and White Great Elephant are swapped from where they should be in the initial setup.

Other

The grid seems a little off, but you probably already knew that.

I fixed it from the rabbit / kirin / elephant : current dev version

For the grid display, it's going to take a little time, I need to understand how it works quietly.