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Ok, but will these make a game more entertaining?

Well, individual pieces that can do something only N times is currently already possible: you define different piece types for each number of attempts they have left, and let those demote to the type that has one fewer attempt. The demotion can be specified by the morph parameter, and their permanent move can be exempted from it by marking it with an apostrophe in the XBetza description. Duplicating the piece type that way is not very elegant, though.

What is a problem is a 'global' budget, shared by all pieces (of the same, or a number of types). Then, if one piece uses the move, all other pieces that are capable of using it would have to be demoted. But implementing it that way would be quite inefficient.

I suppose a generic feature that is efficient could be this: a counter for each player is added to the game state, which by default starts at 0, but can be made to start at another value by a parameter counter=N. Moves in the XBetza description could be marked (e.g. with a t modifier); such a move would then only be allowed if the counter for that player is non-zero, and when such a move is performed it decrements the counter.

Yes, your no pieces idea is nice!

Sounds like some sort of limitation like "can only use  # times," or perhaps "only when there are no enemy pieces within # spaces," could be of help, from the perspective Aurelian proposes.

The former sounds to me like a possible use for t in XBetza; for example, t2mNN would allow two non-capturing Nightrider moves per game. I don't know how I'd code the latter, but I do know that I've come across several pieces with that type of limitation (and its inverse).

HG,

I'm not sure if the 0-1-infinity applies here. Having two aces in the pocket could be useful. The way I see it if you give full hippogonal directions to some of the pieces at least, the second move could be useful for a mid game relocation if the region where the first special move occurred got cleaned out. 3 will overdo it, most likely. But think about a phoenix with 2 just moving nightrider powers or a Kyrin with 2 just moving camel rider powers (in order to preserve the coloubounding). They could be useless after their first crash into the enemy forces. But if there is a second relocation move they can stay relevant. I think the downside of this is that such a piece may return homw making the game two defensive.

An even crazier suggestion would be to have an overall budget of relocation moves for all short leapers. Food for thought.

For some large games, taking a while to position one's forces is a feature, not a bug. ;)

But those are just a few. For the rest, I don't think I'd turn them into slides and rides, but long moves; rather than giving a Knight fhmNN, perhaps ifhmN2 or ifhmNX.

Indeed, the most-forward 4 moves of the Nightrider, as non-capture. Allowing it a single time seems cleaner that twice (0 - 1 - infinity principle).

Perhaps it is indeed no problem, as you say. It certainly would simplify the rules, which is a good thing.

@HG.

What is fhmNN? If I had understood correctly is the four foreword most directions of the nightrider.

I don't see a problem with saving the move for endgame. This is another strategical choice which can make the game better. I 'm thinking that even allowing a 2 times move should be fine. But yes, not too much.

Another way you could do it is with mandatory demotion upon capturing, or on entering some region of the board.

I am still contemplating this idea of using non-capture rider moves to accelerate bringing the short-range leapers to the battle. I would not like those to have that move available permanently, though; that really would make them into different pieces. Using them as an initial move only also is unsatisfactory; for pieces that start in the back you would then have to create an open path to for allowing them to use the move, which is a bit cumbersome. And for pieces that start immediately behind the Pawns the move comes too early; you want to move the pieces there out of the way quickly, to create create exit paths for pieces in the rear of the setup, but you won't want them to land close to the enemy camp as long as they cannot join other pieces engaged in an attack there.

Perhaps the concept of a 'one-time move' as an alternative for an initial move would be useful here. A piece would be allowed to make such a move only once, but not necessarily the first time that it moves. That would give you the opportunity to first develop the normal way, having the short-range leapers jump out over the Pawns, or first push some Pawns to have them land behind it, creating exits for the pieces on the rear ranks to move out. And once you have 'unpacked' your army, and are ready to launch your attack, you can then quickly transport the short-range leapers to it by the one-time ride.

The one-time rides could be chosen in accordance with the normal move of the piece; i.e. WD would get an mR, FA an mB and N an mNN. There probably should be a visible clue for whether a piece has already used up its one-time move. (E.g. as in Capped Pawns.) I would still like to discourage players from saving this move for tactical benifit late in the game, rather than just transport to the action. Perhaps this can be sufficiently discouraged by only granting forward one-time moves. Then the move would get less useful when the piece already has advanced a lot.

Perhaps all short-range leapers should get a one-time fhmNN move? With four different forward directions the move can always get you very close to where you want to be. You could of course also adapt the rule that a piece loses the move as soon as it enters the enemy half of the board, as well as when it uses it.

@Daniel: It seems to me that moving pieces like groups would give the game a very unchesslike feel. I suppose there could be other forms of 'air lifting', though, dependent on the presence of a transport piece, rather than its motion. E.g. highly mobile 'Aircraft Carrier' pieces could activate pure leapers other than King that stand next to it to emerge from an Aircraft Carrier elsewhere with a non-capturing move. Or perhaps be dropped on any empty square adjacent to the other Aircraft carrier. Or all leapers could be allowed to make a K step onto a friendly Carrier, to step off another Carrier in the same direction.

@Joe: 'piggybacking' a piece move on a pawn move would only lead to more participation of pieces when there are pieces that would otherwise not be worth moving. (Asuming the pawn moves were necessary anyway.) This seems to be a consequence of poor design in the first place. And a simpler rule would be to make all such 'non-worthwile moves' non-turn-ending.

The pawn double push seems to be a precedent for accelerating play with slow pieces. So I guess it would be natural to also grant multiple non-capture moves (in the same direction?) to other leapers, as long as they stay on their own half. And allow their e.p. capture on the squares they passed through.

I was running out of ideas for how to speed up such large games. And for the variants I had in mind (14x14 and 16x16) the ideas I already discussed seemed sufficient for making those playable. A fundamental issue is that it takes at least as many moves as you have pieces to move all your pieces.

I've always liked the concept of the transport pieces in Jetan Jeddara as a way to speed up large games.

My argument isn't about shortening the total number of individual unit moves, but rather about giving all the pieces more opportunities for movement and involvement in the game. Just for starters, every opening pawn move is matched with a piece move. Right there, you get all the turns that are just opening pawn moves to move a piece, also. That gives you a few extra moves right in the beginning of the game. I believe that will force both players to use more of their pieces in a game. And that is doubly true if you allow any 2 pieces to move per player-turn. I do agree that each turn will be longer, and the game overall might go on longer, but that was not part of my considerations. And for what it's worth, it's a lot better than the only other option for "forcing" more use of all the pieces that comes to mind now, which is to just remove the pawns and play without them, which is in some ways very instructive, but does not give you anything close to a game of skill.

I was thinking about pieces that could only be used once to inflict great damage. E.g. like a Fire Demon, but which also disappears itself on capture. In Tenjiku Shogi a Fire Demon is 'priceless', since it can continue to inflict damage for the entire duration of the game, and this will add up to more that it could ever destroy in a single trade. But with a kamikaze piece the damage stays limited, albeit large. If there is no defence against it, you must simply accept that a certain fraction of your army will be destroyed by  this without having been used. But it could be a different fraction, depending on the defensive strategy you employ. After the kamikaze pieces are gone it becomes a normal chess game. And if you wait too long using the kamikaze pieces chances are that you cannot do as much damage with them anymore, because population density went down.

Perhaps a Grasshopper that explodes on capture, destroying itself and all adjacent enemy pieces would be an idea. It has great forking power, so that the only defense against its attack is deciding which pieces you sacrifice to it.

@HG,

The non-capturring moves are non necessarily about shortening the games. Giving the fact that it complicates calculations, the game could be very well actually longer on the clock.

But, maybe having this rule reduces the locality of the turn. Things could happen easier in multiple parts of the board so many more pieces contribute to the decision making.

Your choice of aggressive capturing pieces (probably lion and fire demon) it shortens the games but I don't think it makes it more interesting. It could very well make it barren of strategic concepts!

One should not confuse moves with turns. Allowing multiple moves per turn doesn't shorten the game in terms of moves. You just re-order the moves.

@HG,

I agree with you that very long leapers are bad design because of being very hard to defend against. On the other hand if you give 16-24(I'm more for 16 and maybe accept 20) path mover (lame leaper) moves they become useful. The reason for that is that moves from the opponent in the mid game need to be calibrated so that it won't unblock such pieces. These path movers (lame leapers) in the mid game threaten terrible forks but are quite useless in the endgame providing an interesting strategic choice for the players. I like the strategic choices that are offered by unblocking paths (this is why I use all sort of bent riders). In exchange I don't like having many leapers. A disadvantage though as Jean-Louis always says is that these moves are difficult to see by humans.

Hi, HG.

I've been following this thread off and on, as I have a fondness for what others see as huge variants. I would argue that when you come to something like this: "A fundamental issue is that it takes at least as many moves as you have pieces to move all your pieces" you are seeing a restriction that may not need to be there.

Chessplayers as a group seem to be inherently conservative, and highly resistant to significant changes to any version of chess, and even minor changes. So something as radical as suggesting a multi-move approach to speeding the game up, which it will, leaps past heresy directly into the depths of anathema. So be it. Use 2 moves per player-turn to speed up the game. If that is too radical, allow an optional pawn move each turn. Move a piece and a pawn each turn, with no requirement to make the pawn move.

I was running out of ideas for how to speed up such large games. And for the variants I had in mind (14x14 and 16x16) the ideas I already discussed seemed sufficient for making those playable. A fundamental issue is that it takes at least as many moves as you have pieces to move all your pieces. And it sems silly to have pieces you would never get to moving. I suppose that this would not be so bad if there was such a large variety in strategies that you would use different subsets of the pieces in different games, so that in the long run all pieces get used equall often.

I guess another way would be to incorporate aggressive multicapture, which initially would quickly destroy the majority of the pieces before they moved. So that depending on how the opponent would use them you would be left with different subsets of the initial pieces, small enough to use them all without making the game unduly long. E.g. a piece that would capture as in Atomic Chess, destroying itself in the process. Players would be under pressure to use these pieces quickly, while the population density is still large and the strongest pieces have not yet been traded, to cause the most destruction.

I don't like leapers with very long leap. There is basically no defense against those; they can attack you with forks from within a safe location that you cannot reach. If you make them lame leapers, they get too easily blocked.

HG, You have sort of abandoned this thread for a while, and to me it is a very interesting discussion. The min 3 steps idea seems very good to me. I was contemplating something these days in relation to centennial chess. In that game you can move twice before the first capture. Maybe for such a large variant you could think about introducing the double non-capturring moves at any time. The games tend to become rather localized otherwise. Or in contrast to that you could use more leapers with long leaps like say a (4,1) leaper. Or you may replace the wizard (as you already have a camel) with (1,1)&(4,1). This will give more of an over the whole board sensation. On the other hand too many forks from such leapers could lead to a sentiment of randomness. And also easily jumping the pawn chains is rarely a good idea. What I'm proposing the is to have long path movers (like the falcon from falcon chess) with more (say 16 or 20) destinations!

I guess it is simpler to just require a minimum distance for the air-lift moves by rule, than to effectively cause this by having the closest moves overlap with already existing moves. So to the Knight we could add a diagonal airlift, with the restriction that it should land at least 3 steps away. The Elephant and War Machine/Champion can be imagined to have that same restriction, as they could land 1 or 2 steps away on the air-lift path through their usual moves.

No, I did not. Problem with these moves is in general that they are not reversible. But I suppose that air-lift moves are in general not reversible anyway, unless you were standing next to a piece in the opposit direction. So this would not really be a problem. Nightrider moves have the problem that it is not so easy to see where the first obstacle on the path is.

Since I only want 4 air-lift moves, the Snake Tongue (vW[vW-fsB]) could be a good choice. (Better than the Ship, where the moves would be very close together, an sideway speed is still small.) Problem is still that even though the original Knight move is on the path, it is the second square of that path. So if the Knight move is blocked (or a capture), there would be an extra vW move. A half Unicorno from Grant Acedrex would not have that problem, though: it would start its slide on the N squares. So a Narrow Knight move, followed by an outward diagonal slide. I like that idea. All air-lifts would then start with a move of the original piece, followed be a Q move.

Have you considered gryphon or manticore air lift moves for the knight?

I am still in doubt wheter I should add an air-lift move to the Knight as well. As it is also of range 2, it deserves to have one. But there doesn't seem to be a natural choice for it. With the FA and the WD I could use diagonal and orthogonal slides, respectively. Then these pieces can already reach the first to squares on the path. By using a move that stops just in front of the nearest piece, rather than hopping over it and landing immediately behind it, there will only be extra moves when the nearest piece is 4 or more squares away. This does not give much extra value, especially not for a non-capture-only move.

If I give an air-lift move along an orthogonal to a Knight, though, it has no targets in common with the original move pattern. There are already extra moves whenever that direction is not completely blocked, so the effect is similar to adding a mW or mF, which adds about half a pawn to the value. And I don't want the value to be too high, to prevent harrassing by a Vao.

Perhaps it is an idea to give the Knight hippogonal air-lift moves, in the vN directions to have only 4 of those. Then it least has the first square in common with the original moves, so that there are only extra moves when the nearest piece is 3 or more knight jumps away.