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'Am I right in thinking that this means just the two slightly-forward-but-mostly-sideways diagonals, as the straight forward diagonal would advance the piece two ranks'
That's correct. To quote Derick Peterson:
'A pawn may capture any piece which rests on one of the two hexes directly diagonally ahead of it (in the sense of a bishop's shortest move) to its left or right, but it may not capture diagonally straight ahead toward the enemy's back rank ...'
Does anyone know what the rule "...Pawns must promote on reaching the last rank when the choice is not restricted to captures." means?
Maybe it wants to say that "and choice is not restricted to captures", replacing "when" with "and ". It would make sens to reward that way reaching as far as the 10th rank, but it is pure speculation.
Personally I would have made no reference to whether a pawn arrives by capture or non-capture on the last rank of it's file to a promotion cell (that is, at the back of the enemy camp I guess), as this would be confusing, if you are correct Aurelian.
What also puzzles me now is what happens if there has been no enemy non-pawn piece captured so far whatsoever. In that case, I would guess a player cannot legally move his pawn with a non-capturing move to what would otherwise be a promotion cell on the last rank for it, as there would be as yet no pieces it could legally promote to, since no enemy pieces captured as yet. However, I suppose it would give check if the enemy king were on a promotion cell it could otherwise capture to (Fergus has this sort of rule in some of his games, for example).
I don't see anything about reaching the final rank by means of a capture or a regular move. The question if you promote at rank 8 and 9 you may promote only to pieces that you had previously lost, but at rank 10 you may promote to any piece in the starting array, which I guess would be usually a queen and on rare occasion a Marshall :)!
I think you've solved my question, Aurelian. Your interpretation in your last post of this thread now makes full sense of the otherwise ambiguous: "...Pawns must promote on reaching the last rank when the choice is not restricted to captures."! :) I also don't wonder if a pawn can give a diagonal check to a king on the last rank. I presume so.
There is nothing specifically explicit on that but I see no reason why not, as pawns may always reach rank 10 :)!
This hexagonal variant looks intriguing, and I'm a bit surprised that so far it has received no tests on Game Courier (presumably it did by now on ZoG). The pattern of the board (vertical hex alignment, rather than horizontal) and the peculiar way the pawns move might prove a refreshing change from McCooey's or Glinski's variants. My biggest concern is that a well played game might take a relatively large of moves on average.
edit: when in doubt, see this page's Grand Hexachess link for a different wording of rules that are clearly meant to be the same.
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