Comments/Ratings for a Single Item
Make your pages have a 'printer option!' That way I could take your data home with me and actually use it!! Also, put a 'home' buttin at the bottom of each page, it would make site navigation easier... Thanks, Daniel
Another variant could be, and this probably exists under some name, to start with two boards and two sets of pieces each. Except that there would be no King on the second board. Just a thought. The game is very fun to play however. Tomas
The starting setup of graphics version is wrong. Bishops in 1b/8b should be in 1c/8c respectively. Knignts in 1c/8c should be in 1b/8b respectively. The game is wonderful but too complex to play for me. Thanks. Masashi Yamazaki
When you're implementing the rules of a game, you have to pay closer attention to the consequences of the rules than you would have to just to learn the game. This page omits an important detail I had to discover on my own. En passant is possible only for a Pawn on the second board. When a Pawn makes a double move, it moves to the second board. If it had moved only one space, it would have still moved to the second board, and only a Pawn on that board would have been able to capture it. Since en passant is supposed to allow a Pawn to capture an enemy Pawn it would have been able to capture if it had moved only one space, it follows that en passant is for the Pawn waiting on the second board, not for any Pawn on the first board. Furthermore, I have deduced that a Pawn can be properly situated for making an en passant capture only if it has never made a double move. To be properly situated, a Pawn must be on a player's fifth rank. To get to the fifth rank, a Pawn may make three single space moves or a double space move and a single space move. With three single space moves, the Pawn will be on the second board. But if it makes a double move and a single move, its two moves will return it to the first board, and it will be unable to capture anything by en passant.
could someone check out my game with Laila and advise on the situation - my interpretation is that a move made on the mirror board will send you back to the original board. laila thinks opposite, that once on the mirror board you stay there. i have already misunderstood this game once, so i am probably wrong again.
There is a Shogi form called Curiosity-Alice-Shogi. I don't know who was the developer. It appears to play the same as Alice Chess. Drops are allowed to re-enter on either board.
In the Kibbitizing section of an ongoing Alice Chess game, I entered a question about an ambiguity in the rules. If you have any expertise on Alice Chess, please look at my question, which concerns the specific position in that game, and help me resolve the ambiguity I'm concerned about. The game can be found here: /play/pbm/play.php?game=Alice+Chess&log=quux-cvgameroom-2004-136-987
Moving Rook b1-b4 will block the attack from that Bishop. Why not try King e1-d2? The standard rules state that a King cannot be left in check, the move is legal for the King. The only standard rule which states that a King cannot moved through an attacked position is while castling. In standard Chess a King may not move to an attacked cell, but d2 is not attacked by the Bishop since it will be empty. The King will not be present to be captured by the Bishop on the next move.
And I know that the rules in 'Curiouser and Curiouser' state: 'For example, the King may never move to a checked square on his board, even though the transfer to the other board immediately afterwards might actually move the King to a safe square...' I've always used these stated rules but never really understood the logic of them. But hey, it is V.R. Parton's Alice Chess and he had the right to establish its conditions. But I've always wondered why.
First, let me mention that the ambiguity I wondered about is now resolved. Turning to Larry's puzzlement over the logic behind Parton's rules, I think the logic lies in what makes for best gameplay. There are two extremes that each seem more consistent than Parton's choice. One extreme is to count check only on the completion of a move, and the other is to never allow any move that leaves a King in check before the transfer of a piece to the other board. In contrast to these two internally-consistent options, Parton chose to count check only when a move puts a King in check before the transfer is made, and to not count check when the King is already in check and the pre-transfer move does not eliminate the check. I think Parton made the right choice, and here's why I agree with it. The first option I described, of counting check only when a move is completed, would make it too easy for a King to escape check. The second option, of always counting check before the transfer, would make it too difficult to escape check. In fact, it would remove all possibility of blocking a check. Any move that blocked a check before the transer was complete would fail to actually block the check, because it would be transferred to the other board, where it no longer blocked the check. To make it neither too hard nor too easy to escape check, the right choice is to not allow any move that puts one's own previously unchecked King into check, while allowing moves that merely postpone the elimination of a pre-existing check until the end of the full move.
I agree that Parton's restriction does make the checkmate much more easier. But without it, there really is not a reduction in the potential of checkmate. Dropping this restriction actually brings the Kings themselves into the end-game formulae. With the ability to pin the opposing King with a King on the other field. There is also an increase possibility of stalemate, if the player is not aware of this particular position against a lone opposing King. Now, I'm not advocating elimination of this restriction. But variant play might include the lifting of this restriction.
Yay Polgar! (Sorry I just had to...) My question is that I don't get all those B-colors, N-colors and P-colors and how this gives eight. Can someone explain this to me again? Thanks.
At both Chess and Alice Chess, the Bishops are restricted to one half of the squares. But at Alice Chess, this holds true also for the Knights, and for the Pawns once they've completed their first move. So you can paint the squares in eight different colors, each color meaning: This square will not accept: 1) the dark-square Bishops (OR the light-square Bishops) 2) the Knights which started on a dark square (OR the Knights which started on a light square) 3) the white Pawns whose first advance was of two squares and the black Pawns whose first advance was of one square (OR the white Pawns whose first advance was of one square and the black Pawns whose first advance was of two squares) This amounts to eight different square types. Something like: 1 2 1 2 1 2 1 2 3 4 3 4 3 4 3 4 5 6 5 6 5 6 5 6 7 8 7 8 7 8 7 8 1 2 1 2 1 2 1 2 3 4 3 4 3 4 3 4 5 6 5 6 5 6 5 6 7 8 7 8 7 8 7 8 1 2 1 2 1 2 1 2 3 4 3 4 3 4 3 4 5 6 5 6 5 6 5 6 7 8 7 8 7 8 7 8 1 2 1 2 1 2 1 2 3 4 3 4 3 4 3 4 5 6 5 6 5 6 5 6 7 8 7 8 7 8 7 8 Or you can have three ways of painting the squares: light and dark as usual, in two colors I'm referring to as B-colors, to separate the Bishops in two classes (1368 vs 2457) reversing the colors of one chessboard, in two N-colors, to separate the Knights in two classes (1467 vs 2358) even-numbered rows of one chessboard and odd-numbered rows of the other chessboard, and vice versa, in two P-colors, to separate the Pawns in two classes (1278 vs 3456) However, a Bishop can be captured only by a Bishop of the same B-color, while a Knight can be captured only by a Knight of the other N-color and a Pawn only by a Pawn of the other P-color.
During a recent game at SchemingMind, the subject of the weakness of the Alice Knight brought forward an interesting possible variation to the rules. Allow the Knight to capture on both fields. In additions to the standard capture move, it would be allowed to capture the destination cell of the opposing field. It would still only perform a single capture during a move, and still be bound to one-half of each field. And it would still be restricted from moving to a friend-occupied cell. This increase in power would greatly improve its influence in the game. Unless this variant rule has been previously proposed, I suggest that it be called Alice Knights.
This game definitely challenges the player's ability to extrapolate positions. Keeping track of the oscillation of every moved piece and maintaining some form of strategy, the player is fortunate to be able to plan more than several moves. This is also the joy of the game. A player who desires an easily comprehensive form might well be warned about the dangers surrounding this game. But they should not fear to attempt it. My favorite variant is the Mirrored Alice set-up, whereby opposing pieces begin on seperate fields. This offers a large variety of opening moves.
It was Jellis, not Parton, who said 'it is usual to forgo it.' This is a crucial point, because Parton, not Jellis, is the inventor of this game. If Parton had said it, we could safely assume that Alice Chess has no en passant, but Jellis does not speak of the game with anything like the authority of its inventor. I'll look at the page on Passar Battaglia later. I'm not up on the term and cannot comment on it at this time.
The application of en passant in Alice Chess is really not that confusing. The opposing Pawn must have immediately performed a two-step move to the capturing Pawn's field, resulting in a position orthogonal adjacent. The cell which the capturing Pawn is moving to must be vacant, in both fields. This denotes that the single step was a viable option for opposing Pawn. If that cell on the capturing Pawn's field is occupied by either friend or foe, en passant is not viable since the single step of the opposing Pawn was not possible and thus capture of that Pawn on that cell was not an option. If it is occupied by an another enemy, a simple capture of this enemy piece is still possible but this would not result in the capture of the opposing two-stepping Pawn.
hmm this place is a bit frisky lately, anyway, i'm going to rate some unusual games, and what better place to start than here. This is an amazing game, no need to say anymore. Highly original, strikingly beautiful concept.
En Passant
While reading through the various discussions on en passant in Alice Chess, I came up with an option not mentioned that seems to be quite consistant with the core rules: When making an en passant capture, it's irellevant if the destination square on the board of the capturing piece is occupied, as the pawn really ends up on the other board, which is open.
This satisfies the three main rules:
- A move must be legal on the board where it is played: By standard Chess rules an en passant capture is allowed when a double pawn move places a pawn adjacent to an enemy pawn.
- A piece can only move or capture if the corresponding destination square on the other board is vacant: In order for the captured pawn to have made a double move, this must be true.
- After moving, the piece is transfered to the corresponding square on the other board: This applies as normal.
This interpretation may seem strange, but it's entirely internally consistant. The standard chess en passant rules have no provisio for the destination square being occupied because it's impossible. I propose Alice Chess ought to have none, because it's irrellevant (unlike other variants where this issue is raised).
The other interpretation (that the destination square must be empty) really only makes sense if paired with a rule that makes double pawn moves illegal is such cases. In which case, the supposed ambiguity is, once again, not possible. However, I don't really like this option.
Firstly, it adds additional complications to the rules. With all other moves, legality is determined by the state of board the piece starts on. However, the legality of double pawn moves is dependant on both boards.
Secondly, the basis of this rule is that a double pawn move basically two seperate moves. If that was the case, in Alice Chess the pawn would end back on the board it started on. (Which could be an interesting option. If you handle en passant as I suggest, it works.)
Check
While there seems to be no special mention of check and mate in the rules on this page, it seems to me that it ought to be handled as normal. In other words, the king is in check if it could be captured on the next move.
Since Alice in Wonderland is currently in the theaters, I thought it would be a good time to make a video about Alice Chess.
Well here's another approach to En Passant. Given that this is a special move comprising two 'normal' Pawns moves, should it be treated as such, with the first step taking it from its starting board to the other board and the second bringing it back? Were this the case an enemy Pawn capturing En Passant would have to do so as if the Pawn being captured, now back on the starting board, were on the other board having made only the first step. A question that follows is what about Castling, whose bar on moving can also be seen as a form of En Passant - and again the King makes two of its 'normal' moves. On the issue of the film, is anyone else surprised that in this age of gratuitous sequels the film conflates two quite distinct stories, even going beyond previous films in this respect by conflating two queens? You would think that this would be a golden opportunity to make two films, one for each book. Through the Looking Glass in particular has its own distintive (chess-related) plot structure that gets lost when the two storylines are merged.
A pretty playable subvariant would be with both boards full, and ordinary moves, starting and ending on the same board, by necessity, legal. You could even adapt the mechanic for higher dimensional games, with layers of boards, with the rule that for a piece to move legally from one board to another, the move would have to be legal on all intermediate boards aswell...
I made a dedicated derivative of Fairy-Max to play Alice Chess. It uses the method of a single board with 'pedestals', i.e. it uses the same coordinate notation on both boards. This to make it playable in a GUI as if it were normal Chess, when you switch legality testing off. (The GUI will see moves jumping other pieces, that in reality are on the other board, and would not think these were legal...) The engine can be downloaded from http://hgm.nubati.net/Alice.zip , and can work under WinBoard. I might some day equip WinBoard with special support for Alice Chess, so that the user can actually see which piece is on which board. The Alice version of Fairy-Max does not have e.p. capture. It has castling, but I am not sure what it considers 'passing through check', and for Q-side castling also b1 has to be empty. Normally this should not be a problem. The rules of Alice Chess suggest each move is to be considered a multi-step move, the transfer between the boards being the final step. Otherwise there is no logic in the requirement that you must not move the King to a square that is attacked on the board it came from, but can stay as long as you want on a square that is attacked on the other board. So if there were e.p. capture, I think that it should be possible to capture a Pawn that just moved on the board it came from, even if it did not do a double-push. (And of course you can always capture it on the board it ended up on.) It does not seem that the game was intended to be played that way, however, so it would be logical to forbid any form of e.p. capture.
Alice Chess is a 3D chess variant that works very well, with only minor trickery required (i.e. that no piece is allowed to occupy the corresponding square on the opposite board). Not only that, but interesting exchanges of differing piece types can still be made, with there still being a variety of 'major' and 'minor' pieces. Beautiful.
What a great classic variant I've only recently discovered! This description mentions that you can use only one board. I agree and think it's easier visually. After each piece is moved, you could just mark it with some sort of large poker chip underneath (or clip something onto the top) and vice versa - when a marked piece is moved it loses the marker.
Then, the players could simply have an understanding that marked pieces and unmarked pieces are not in each others' way and cannot capture each other. So a game could go like this:
1. d4 Nf6
(now the white pawn and black knight are both marked)
2. Qd6 now possible for White because White knows the unmarked Queen can go "through" his/her marked pawn. Then the Queen becomes marked at d6, threatening the marked Black knight. The Black knight then moves to e4 and loses its marker.
This is a trial for using the Interactive Diagram for Alice Chess. Custom-supplied functions BadZone and WeirdPromotion take care of refusal of moves to squares of which the mirror square is occupied, and take care of shuttling the moved piece to the other board, respectively. The boards are separated by strip of 'hole' squares, which has to be two files wide to prevent Knights from crossing it.
I implemented e.p. capture as a move by the Pawn on the board where the doubly pushed Pawn started. This seemed the least illogical way to do it, as the e.p. square on that board will always be empty (or the double push would not have been allowed). And it is the square the double push really passed over, and thus where it could have been blocked. The move could still be illegal because the corresponding square on the other board is occupied, but that is normal for any move to an empty square in Alice Chess that would be legal on its own board. There has to be no extra rule to prevent double capture this way. This method of e.p. capture corresponds to one where the doubly pushed Pawn must first make a single retrograde step before being captured, rather than replacing its double step by a single step. That this is not the same is the fault of an Alice double push not really being two consecutive single pushes.
I still have a comment to make about the legality of moves (an aspect that the diagram doesn't address). The ambiguity here seems to be caused by not making proper distinction between legal and pseudo-legal moves, but heaping them all under the term 'legal'. A more precise description would have said that a move in Alice Chess is pseudo-legal if (before transfer) it would have been pseudo-legal in orthodox Chess on the board where it is made, and the target square on the other board is empty. And then an Alice move is legal (as usual) when it does not expose the King to pseudo-legal Alice capture. This prevents solving distant checks by interposing a piece that was on the board where the checked King resides (but then disappearing to the other board, so that the King can be captured) from being considered legal. Despite the fact that they would have been perfectly legal orthodox Chess moves on the board with the King.
WHITE TO MOVE AND MATE IN EIGHT MOVES
If the Bishop was on (f4), placing all the pieces on the same board, this would be a simple mate in two moves. But I needed help from ChessV to solve the given problem. Apparently the trick is to move the White King from (b3) to (C2), effectively "wasting a tempo". Bishops cannot do this in Alice Chess - while the Bishop could travel from (F4) to (f4) in three moves, that is not actually the same square. ChessV 2.2 game record is given below.
Alice Chess Player(White) = ChessV Player(Black) = Human FENStart = "16/16/16/16/2N10B2/1K14/16/1k14 w - - 0 1" StaticExchangeEvaluation = false Moves = { F4g5 b1A1 b3C2 A1a2 g5H6 a2A1 c4D6 A1a2 H6c1 a2A1 D6e4 A1a2 e4C3 a2A1 c1B2 } Result = 1-0 {White wins}
This is actually a common manoeuvre in checkmates with pieces that cannot triangulate (e.g. Knight + Camel). Often you cannot afford to triangulate with your King, because that would give the bare King the room to triangulate as well, thereby cancelling the effect. In Alice Chess no piece can truly triangulate, because they must alternate between the boards.
But I suppose there is a way around that when checkmating a bare King, as in that case it doesn't really matter on what board the King is: the bare King can never approach it without either moving into check or through it, both of which is forbidden. So you can treat it like the King is always on both boards.
P = 1, N = 3, (WA) = 3.5, B = 5, (BW) = 7.5, R = 7.5, Q = 13.5 is just a guess at middle game piece values under Alice Chess rules. Recently I thought about adding some Chu Shogi pieces to this variant. Multiplying the numbers for N, B, R by 1.08 brings us very close to the Zillions estimates that Antoine Fourrière listed in this article. Zillions values a Queen in Alice Chess as slightly lower than the total of a Bishop and a Rook (just as it does for FIDE Chess). The relatively low value of a Knight is probably because it is "Alice colorbound" (light squares on one board and dark squares on the other board).
A simple Alice Chess endgame with all chessmen on the first board: WHITE: King (f1), Pawn (a6) BLACK: King (a8).
After 1. a6-A7 a8-B7 2. A7-a8 and promotes. The Black King was never on the right board to make a capture. Looks like a Pawn may be worth fifty percent more in the endgame. Variant Chess: Volume 6, Issue 42 is available on the web, with three games on pp 20-21 and the article "Paradoxical Endings in Alice Chess" on pp 28-29.
You write
And then an Alice move is legal (as usual) when it does not expose the King to pseudo-legal Alice capture.
. As far as I can tell, this isn't quite true. It must also not expose the King during the intermediate time between the piece making its move and transferring to the other board. This can be seen in this quote from Vernon Parton's work:
Fools Mate in Alician style.
(1)P - K4, P - Q4, (2)B - K2,PxP, (3)B - Q Kt5 and the black monarch is checkmated.
Here it will be seen that the move Q - Q2 (as well as B - Q2) fails to intervene as the
Q (or B) would be transferred to the other board, still leaving their King in check to the White
Bishop.Naturally, the move K - Q2 is forbidden, because the King would break the Alician
rule that he must make a legal orthodox move before being transferred. (This quick mate was
given by Mr. C. H. O. Alexander on radio.)
.
54 comments displayed
Permalink to the exact comments currently displayed.