Comments/Ratings for a Single Item

Very nice adaptation of Falcon to hex, Abdul-Rahman. It appears very traditional [if I may use that word for something as new as hex chess], but you obviously did some thinking about the game; you trimmed the 6 corner hexes off the board. [And Graeme's graphic does justice to your game.] Even though I have very little experience in hex chess and have great trouble wrapping my head around the 'diagonal'move in hex games, this one looks like fun to play.

I do have one question about this style of hex setup in general, though, and that's with the pawns. I've never understood why they are set up in two 'V's with the points almost touching and the legs extending away from each other. The distance between facing pawns ranges from 1 to 6 hexes. To me, this destroys the whole pawn skeleton, a major part of chess. Further, this setup exaggerates the values of the center pawns and diminishes those of the flank pawns, as far as I can see.

Has anyone tried the following? The 3 hex board colors can be called Light, Medium, and Dark. The pawns are now set up in an orthogonal line that goes L-M-D-L-M-D... Drop the 3 center pawns back 1 hex each. Move the 2 end pawns on each flank up 1 hex. Now, you've moved 7 pawns per side 1 hex, and the pawn lines are each along two parallel neighboring 'diagonal' lines. The pawns are now set up on an L-D-L-D-L-D... 'wavy' line. This puts all facing pawns either 3 or 4 hexes apart, in an alternating pattern. This gives a more 'chesslike' pattern to the pawn setup, and gives up very, very little, just the possibility of matching an opponent's double step pawn move with one of your own on occasion. Practically, the 1 step reply still results in the pawns blocking each other along the centerline of the board.

(Speaking of ZRFs, the variant in the following link might interest you as well.) Link

Thanks again ..

Joe,

Thank you for the comment.

As for the pawn structure, this game was intended as a re-modeling of Glinski's Chess to include the Falcon. So almost all the setup 'ideas' are borrowed from that game. As I understand the philosophy of Glinski's Chess, this setup ensures that all pawns are protected (they protect each other,) AND that all the pieces can move in the opening setup.

Your idea of the zig-zag line was used by Christian Freeling in HexDragonfly. It is probably just as workable as anyother setup. Link

I'd always thought the main idea behind the pawn positioning was to have them start the game equi-distant from a promotion hex.

Hey, Graeme, yeah, I've seen that rationale, too, but I don't believe it's valid. [I still figure that these things are usually done by chessplayers that have been so conditioned by the external trappings of FIDE that they often unconsciously bring them along.] My last post was already overlong, so I didn't add this part - figured I'd do it if someone said something. 

I'd argue a better extrapolation would be to note pawns promote on the rank behind the one their opposite numbers start upon. The 'parallel neighboring diagonal' lines the pawns would be set up on are, in color/shade D-L-D-L..., the promotion lines would be the 2 'parallel neighboring diagonal' lines directly behind the setup, colored/shaded L-M-L-M-L-M... This allows each pawn to move directly forward to its own promotion hex. 

This is a general 'argument' [ie: discussion] about the best spots to set up pawns in hex chess variants, and is in *no* way meant as any sort of criticism of the fine game upon whose page this discussion appears.

George Duke misses my point. Switching has nothing to do with reaching the entire board. Consider the following pieces on a square board:

The Rook is neither bound nor switching, but can reach any square in an odd or even number of moves. Likewise the Falcon, as stated above in contrast to its analogue here.

The Camel is both, as it is bound to a single Bishop binding, but that binding comprises two Dabbaba bindings of which the Camel always moves from one to the other. Likewise the Ferz.

The Halfknight (Heavenly Horse) switches between the Bishop bindings but is bound to alternate ranks, a binding which is also a pair of Dabbaba bindings.

Well, coincidences do happen, I suppose. It did look uncannily like a reply
to my original comment, which was referring to the 'switching' in the
text. I'm not sure what 'changing' means in this context. Is the Rook
colour-'changing', or the King, or the original Falcon, or the Cardinal,
or the Gnu? Is it, in fact, simply a synonym for non-colourbound?
	Note that I am not criticising the variant, only pointing out that a
symmetric hex piece never has a switching property, regarding multiples of
2 or 3 or any other number of moves. It can retract its last move (return
in 2) or triangulate (return in 3), and any larger number of moves can be
a sum of multiples of those. I also like how this page hints at an
exploration of hex analogues to square-board pieces and where they break
down - the conflicting orthogonal and diagonal definitions of 'Camel',
for example.

Colourswitching is something that I first read about on these pages (for
example http://www.chessvariants.org/unequal.dir/seeping-switchers.html)
and understood very quickly. The significance is that if a piece
alternates between two bindings, then the one that last moved from is the
one that it will next move two. You can glance at a Knight at any stage of
a square or cubic game and correctly predict that after it has made [insert
number] more moves it will be on a [insert light or dark] cell. It was
analysed long before I knew anything of it. What is the significance of
moving from one for another of three bindings, or even four? The King
(once it can no longer castle) always moves to a different Dabbaba
binding, likewise the Gnu, but both can triangulate. Moving between
Dabbaba bindings matters only to the likes of the Ferz and Camel, which
alternate between only two of these.