Comments by JorgKnappen

After following the long thread on the first move advantage in chess, I am
curious about the first move advantage in Shogi.

The major difference between chess and shogi lies in the "decisiveness"
of the two games: Western chess is rather drawish, while almost all shogi
games come out as wins or losses.

Is there a first move advantage in shogi (I don't know statistics, but I
suspect that there is a first move advantage, although some Shogi pages
claim the opposite) and how large is it?

I have not analysed Chieftain Chess, therefore I cannot contribute to that
discussion.

ut here is another factlet showing the superficially very similar games can
have very different first move advantages: Sam Trenholme analysed some
Carrera Variants with different first line setups with respect to first
move advantage in this posting:

http://www.chessvariants.org/index/displaycomment.php?commentid=23842

The numbers range from

White           win     loss    draw    games

ranbqkbnmr	46%	43%	12%	1010 

to

rmnbakbnqr	53%	37%	10%	1011 

which is remarkable. (I won't take the numbers too seriously, because the
draw rate is suspiciously low. I expect human master play to have more
draws.)

Look here

http://xkcd.com/1078/

Considering articles, I suggest the following additions:

Une (french)
L' (french)
Les (french)
Il (italian)
Gli (italian)
Lo (italian/spanish)
Los (spanish)
Las (spanish)
De (dutch)
Het (dutch)
Een (dutch)

I think it is a good thing to ignore articles in subject ordered lists.
Traditional german library instructions do exactly this.

First, it is really good to see Bittern in place of Ibis.

The table format is good, though I'd like to see the non-oblique leapers,
too. I was able to 
extract their names (assuming extensive use of Bi- and Tri- prefixes), the
only missing ones are 11:0, 11:11, 13:0, and 13:13 up to diameter 15.

If you consider further replacements; I'd suggest to take out Wyvern
because of its usage in Glenn Overby's Beastmaster Chess for a combined
leaper.

Problemists use different names for a few pieces in the table, but this is
not a serious problem for me. Synonyms are much easier to deal with than
homonyms, because the piece name is a handle to its moving pattern.

Unfortunately, the fix is not yet complete; here is the Link to Archabbot Chess from the Alphabetical Index section "Ar":

/play/index/msdisplay.php?itemid=MParchabbottches

and it now returns a 404 (instead of the home page of the pbm system).

After some hacking, I found the true link which works:

http://www.chessvariants.org/index/msdisplay.php?itemid=MParchabbottches

-- replacing "play" with "www" fixes the link.

Fine, it works again. Good work, Fergus :-)

Fergus, while at testing: The navigation from a user submitted page to the comments is currently gone. The newest comment is displayed (if there is one), but there is no way to the full list of comments or the function to add a comment.

Editor-made pages are not affected; they have the navigation right.

I have taken the time to cross-check the list of Shogi pieces with the sources I have. I found no errors (but I discovered some in my own transcripts ...).

A few comments: The Chinese Cock moves differently in Taikyoku Shogi on one side and Maka Dai Dai Shogi and Tai Shogi on the other side. The movement pattern given here is the Taikyoku pattern. A piece with the same move is known as Blind Dog (Moken) in Wa Shogi.

Old Kite and Old Kite Hawk are different translations of the same japanese word (kotetsu), what is named old-kite-hawk here is the piece from Taykyoku Shogi.

Savage Tiger (or with different translation of moku: Fierce Tiger) has different moves in Taikyoku Shogi (like a Lance), Dai Dai Shogi (the move given here represent english sources; japanese Wikipedia has 2 steps diagonally forward), and Heian Dai Shogi (moves as Cat Sword, better known in the west as Ferz).

@Joe: The clue to my rating of the Shatranjian Shooters is the observation that a Ferfil ist worth a Knight is worth a Bishop. To my experience this is true for a single Ferfil compared to a single Bishop. A pair of short range Ferfils does not generate a feelable pair bonus, though.

The Shaman ist about 1.25 pawns above the Ferfil. The Hero is similar to the Shaman, but has a larger overall mobility, I rate it half a pawn above the Shaman. The War Elephant is like a Queen, therefore it is 1.5 pawns better than its components. This gives the following calculation:

2 Heros @4.75 Points   = 9.5 Points
2 Knights @3 Points    = 6   Points
2 Shamans @4.25 Points = 8.5 Points
1 War Elephant         @10.5 Points
===================================
Sum                     34.5 Points

compared to 32 Points for the FIDEs. I don't know whether the Shamans already have a feelable pair bonus, therefore I don't put it in.

Of course, with a jumping general (about 7.5 points) the army is on the low end of the CwDA scale. 31.5 is less than the FIDEs have. The Hero and the Shaman are very tactically dangerous pieces, specially against the FIDEs with their unprotected rooks in the back rank.

This is a good game: It is fun to play. I even like the name showing some humour.

Since Charles suggested elsewhere to drop or change this game: please let it stand here as it is. It even inspired another game (I'm a Ferz, get me into there).

All in all, this game has well thought 'game mechanics' and is worth keeping.

Now there is a lot of input for thought, and I may create another army based on the fairy theme ...

For aesthetical reasons I don't like a 'queens left' setup, but H. G. Muller makes a strong point to consider it nevertheless. I have to think what rules for castling to prefer (Fischer random rules or just mirrored castling).

As a replacement for the phoenix/waffle piece, another knight-strength piece is needed. Candidates are the Kylin/Diamond/Duke (FD compound) or the 3 simplest amphibians Frog {1,1}+{0,3}, Toad {0,2}+{0,3}, and Newt
{2,2}+{0,3}---all of them are very thematic, but I have to playtest how they work together. That the halfduck is feasable in CwDA suggest that the amphibians aren't too dangerous to use.

[25] There is Zugzwang: players with legal moves are obliged to move even if every legal move leads to defeat.

This is one of the most outstanding features of chess and its variants. Compare it to go, where no player is ever forced to deteriorate their position, they may just pass instead.

@hubert It is not about a naming police, it is about respect to what is already here from traditional and modern chess variants. And paying respect includes noting that the pieces and the names were already used before. A designer may choose to differ and make this explicit in the exposition of his or her game.

Another point addresses potential players: It makes learning a game much easier when pieces with well-known names move as expected from their names.

Here's my interpretation of A. Blacks criterion 17:

17. Pieces moves like chess pieces can move.

(a) Pieces move like leapers (true leapers or 'lame' leapers), riders, chinese or korean cannons, or combinations of those.

(b) Pieces have highly symmetric movement patterns (full 90 degrees rotational and reflectional symmetry for all non-pawn pieces, reflectional symmetry with different forward and backwards movement [like in the Shogi gold and silver generals] counts as a mild violation of this)

(c) Pieces move and capture the same way or their move and capture are at least 'similar' in some sense (I consider the pawn movement and capture similar because of forwardness and shortrangeness, also the pieces of separate realm chess or chinese cannons are similar in movement and capture. Frank Maus' knibis and bishight aren't). 

This allow much more pieces than just the traditional FIDEs ...

Back to the terrain question: a promotion zone does not constitute terrain for me, also the forward direction of pawns is not dictated by terrain.

Holes in the the board are somewhat strange to Chess and may constitute terrain. Barriers of all kind are certainly terrain.

Possible terrain effect are: Difficult terrain (mountains, swamps) slowing units (pieces) down or forbidding some kind of pieces (two heavy to move there ...) on that terrain, land/water distinction (land units need boats or bridges to cross the water, water units cannot move on land (but maybe shoot units down on land), air planes can operate both on land and water, but need to land after some time and need airports or carriers for this purpose), cities (providing supplies fo any kind, generating new units, allowing of repair of damaged units).

This leads to another chess criterion

[24] A chess piece is either fully functional or captured, there is no such thing like 'damage' or 'health' with consequences to the piece (slower motion, need of repair, easier capturability). Of course, a bad position (e.g. pinned) does not count as damage. In FIDE chess the only (very mild) violation of the no damage rule is the loss of castling rights.

Wow, this is a really intresting result. Now I wonder how the Woody Rook aka Wazaba (WD compound) does in the end game against a Rook. I felt it was too clumsy in certain endgames with some pawns against a Knight and replaced it with the Phoenix aka Waffle in the Fearful Fairies army ( http://www.chessvariants.org/index/msdisplay.php?itemid=MSfearfulfairies ).

[23] All squares are essentially equal, there is no terrain to consider.

This criterion draws a line to war simulation games, where land, water and cities play an important role.  

Xiang Qi mildly violates this one.