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Aurelian Florea wrote on Sun, May 27, 2018 09:27 AM UTC:

I actually agree with Greg on every aspect. That is weird, is this the downfall of the internet? :)


George Duke wrote on Sun, May 27, 2018 12:32 AM UTC:

Here are more CVs that use one Marshall RN and one Cardinal BN, the two deployed as companion pieces pairing one with the other most of the time.

Amazon Grand 1 + 1 + 1 Amazon RBN a.k.a. Maharajah, 100.    Bird's 1+1 exact Carrera pieces, 80.   Optimized 1 + 1, 80 squares.    Demon 1+1+1A, 100.    Elite 1+1+1, 88.   Energizer 1+1, 64.

 


Greg Strong wrote on Sat, May 26, 2018 12:34 PM UTC:

With one Queen, one Chancellor, and one Archbishop, that yields two rook-movers, two bishop-movers, and two knight-movers.  I think that has a certain satisifying symmetry to it.  That said, I think two of each is fine, as is one without the other.  I perfer Archbishops to Chacellors myself.  I also don't feel that a game necessarily needs any piece-type "completeness" (possessing all combination of leapers or sliders.)  For example, when adding a Chinese Cannon to a variant, I do not think a variant is automatically sub-optimal if it does not provide diagonal equivalent (Vao.)

 

Kevin Pacey wrote on Sat, May 26, 2018 03:39 AM UTC:

The Chancellor has R+N powers and the Archbishop has B+N powers (thus not colourbound on a square or rectangular board), just as Queen has R+B powers (again not colourbound) and thus it could be argued there is no need of having minimally more than one of any of these in a given square or rectangular board variant's setup. Also, there is Ben's reasoning.

In the case of my 10x10 Sac Chess variant, I found it useful to have a pair of (for each) Archbishops and Chancellors simply because I wanted to fill up exactly 30 cells per side in the setup, to make each side's camp full (i.e. have no empty cells). I also used several other pairs of arguably classic compound pieces, such as Amazons, partly for this reason, and partly to cope with the 12 classic piece types in total I chose to include per side in the setup.


Ben Reiniger wrote on Sat, May 26, 2018 01:45 AM UTC:

I would think the "one copy" thing is so common as homage (whether conscious or not) to having just one queen in FIDE.


George Duke wrote on Sat, May 26, 2018 12:08 AM UTC:

Thanks for the insight.  What is meant by the sentence with boldface that Fergus quotes is chiefly those CVs that have the exact same pieces as Carrera did by 1615 -- 10 pawns, 2R 2N 2B  Q K Marshall Cardinal.  It is odd that they get matched together in so many CVs one of each, instead of paired with itself and placed symmetrically in array the usual way, say like two Rooks, one on one side and one other side of K-Q pair.  And the way Janus does with paired Cardinal. And the way Gross does with pairs of each.  The latter two CVs follow more accepted over-all practice and naturally appealing aesthetics.

 The wording could have been better, and even now the clarification is not so easy because there are perhaps two hundred CVs inspired by Carrera.  All of the usages are impossible  to cast in a few sentences.  Ones on 8x10 with the exact personnel are Schoolbook, Gothic, Paulovich's, Ladorean, Embassy, Victorian, Grotesque, Univers offhandedly to name a few.  Winther at one time had more than ten additional in differing line-ups separately written up or board-displayed.  Now Winther has Capablanca Relocation Chess as essentially 144 unique starting line-ups of again the very same piece mix.  Trenholme and I counted 30 different inventors of Carrera-Capablanca form once.  Then Capablanca Random may have up to 1000 arrays same pieces.  And Carrera-Capablancas are special so that any new starting array or rules tweak is considered to be new Chess variant.

As well 10x10s like Grand have the like peculiarity of one RN and one BN along with normal King-Queen.  No automatic disparagement is intended, more like scepticism, just noting the unusual predilection in, well, sarcastic "can't have one without the other."  

By contrast, when wanting to use Nightrider, designer probably puts one on c1 and one on h1. Want Unicorn instead? Place them c1-h1 or maybe b1-i1. Leaper Gnu, put one a1/d1 and other j1/g1. But as a rule, Marshall on d1 somehow calls for not another corresponding Marshall g1, but that automatic companion piece Cardinal there instead.

Gilman is exception when using one RN as queen replacement.  Also 9x9 Maura's Modern uses one BN with K-Q befitting the nine spaces. And Foster's Chancellor had done the same with nine spaces using King, Queen and one Marshall.  So the quite a few examples of one only without the other can be looked at (favorably) in their own light, case by case.


🕸Fergus Duniho wrote on Fri, May 25, 2018 12:18 PM UTC:

You seem to be talking about two different things. First, it is games that use only one of each. Then it is games that include both pieces. Some games do both, such as Carrera's Chess and related games. Some do neither, such as Janus Chess. But some do one and not the other, such as Gross Chess. In Gross Chess, each player starts out with two apiece of each of these two pieces. So, it includes both pieces, but it does not give each player only one of each.

I see that you do ackowledge this when you say and Gross Chess two Marshalls on 12x12 and also two BN. But later you say, Apparently though to most inventors, RN and BN cannot stand on their own hindlegs, you can't have one without the other. Credit Janus and Gross for not adhering to that philosophy. As you already mentioned, Gross Chess doesn't have one without the other.


George Duke wrote on Thu, May 24, 2018 10:03 PM UTC:

Marshall RN and Cardinal BN are peculiar in that most CV designs do not pair them, but use one of each.  Clearly they are two different piece-types. Other long-range pieces get the respect of generally being paired such as NN and the other Nightriders by Knappen, 40 some bifurcators by Winther, Cannon, Unicorn, you name it.

   Exceptions that do use two of these same piece-types symmetrically in backrank are Janus Chess having two Cardinals on 8x10 and Gross Chess two Marshalls on 12x12 and also two BN.   In CVs paired-piece placement especially long-range is just more aesthetic, when array is fixed.  Carrera compounds are great idea from exactly 400 years ago to show how the Queen came about differently as RB (one hundred years earlier).  Apparently though to most inventors, RN and BN cannot stand on their own hindlegs, you can't have one without the other.   Credit Janus and Gross  for not adhering to that philosophy.  Another balking at the convention of Carrera types having special need is recently cited Chancellor Chess, which chooses one RN to exclusion of BN. Also Gilman quite often uses one only RN without BN; it seems better to either pair them or choose one or the other.

Schizophrenic Chess has a Left Schizzy and a Right Schizzy one on each side of King, two distinct types connected by different orientation in manner of movement.  That's the sort of group Marshall and Cardinal are member of,  along with things like Great Herd that just strings one of each kind of different leaper across 8x8, not pairing any of them.

The Carrera-Capablanca RN and BN should be in top twenty variant pieces for historical interest and to ease those addicted to 64 squares to try something radical.

Probably only small fraction of GMs know even what RN and BN are by name.  Notwithstanding they get revived the same old way every generation -- chess master Bird in 1870s,  Capablanca in 1920s, Seirawan 2000s. Their phony stance that it is something original. This thread 'Fatally Flawed Marshall Cardinal' started with 28 comments earlier same title '1', and this is continuation.


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