Game Reviews by JianyingJi

Excelent and under-appreciated gem! In a few game of this variant, 
I found how the simplest change alters the game dramatically. For
example this variant makes bishop no longer color bound, and 
nullifies the use of castling.

Absolutely cool! Very well explained! Simpler in feel and direct in play 
#than some of the other similar ideaed games

This game is highly remaniscent of Capriccio described by Mark Thompson
at
http://home.flash.net/~markthom/html/capriccio.html. though maybe arguably

better since the goal is better defined.

Since the major pieces in the back row are weak, it might make sense for
the following variant:

No apprentices, Just the backrow pieces. and have the pieces promote to
full strength when they reach the backrow. With the same object of
checkmating the king.

Every move imitates the ability of the piece moved before, except the
first move for nothing is before it. What if time is circular, in that
spirit I propose the following variant:

As a first move, any piece can be moved with any power, however this
implies the last move must be made with a piece with such power, and
any move during the game that would make such a ending impossible is 
declared illeagal.

Nice concept and very cleanly explained, however the example might be
flawed, since e1-d2 should be illeagal for it moves white king into
check, because the black king has the backing of a queen so it can
move as a queen and take take the white king in the next move. a
black bishop instead of queen would work.

Sometimes a random search can come up with amazing things, I was
searching for some material for an variant of mine when I came across
this item. It is very well illustrated and strait forward and provides
a good blueprint for how intergrid peice should work. very nice work
indeed.

I would suggest that at the beginning of the game only allow the black
player to spinnach, this would balance the first move advantage.

This variant can be easily handicapped by giving the weaker player 
an extra amount of zorkmids at the start. the amount depending on
the deference between the players.

this is absolutely amazing. a very clear exposition and easy to follow.

The thing that intrigues me the most is a move leading to stalemate is
not allowed. which get's away from the fuddily rules in FIDE and other
variants dealing with stalemates. I think this is a worthwhile rule to 
adopt in other variants.

It might be interesting to try the following modest variant of ximeracak:

0: all rules as Ximeracak except as noted below
1: when the general is under check it can switch with
   the pegasus, provided of course the pegusus is not
   also attacked.

This simple modification will increase the pegasus's streategic value
which will make people be more careful before putting pegasus in harm's
way, and keep it in the game for the end game. In fact it should have
the overall effect of decreasing the apeal of captures in the game.

This been an idea I been thinking of for a while. It pleases me to no end
that someone has made a variant along these lines. It would be great to
see more variants using 'influencing' as an element in them.

Since white has slight opening advantage, it would be more equitable
if the game start with black refusing one move from white and then 
white move and refuse black then game continues as described ...

Really well designed and explained large variant without the clutter that
often afflict them

excellent game,

one of the illustration has the wrong coloring for the squares. The 
second set in the middle of the page, board2 should have the opposing
coloring

I was thinking along these lines sometimes ago, but my ideas never geled
into a playable game. So it very nice to see some incarnation of it. 
Absolutely cool!

interesting variant, I wonder if giving king a knight's move would make
the king too hard to capture. With all those combo pieces, it seems only
fair to give the king a bit more movements too.

This list is quite comprehensive, and quite impressive. Which makes it 
doubly strange that the odds chess has not persisted in any serious way 
in chess clubs today, especially organizations such as FIDE to determine
the rating, handicap correspondence.

Cool!

one thing I find a bit aethetically off is that linking is not compulsary
in that player could ignoire linking completely and play normal chess. So
to satisfy my twisted aesthetics I would recommend following changes as a
sub-variant:

0. Twinkie Danger Chess rule apply unless contradicted below.
1. White start on board 0 and black start on board 1
2. King remain on the board they started

In this sub-variant no progress can be made without linking, so linking
becomes crucial way to mobilize your forces.