Comments/Ratings for a Single Item

One question: is a Yahoo allowed to move back to its starting square when the arrows allow for it, making a null move?

A comment about the 'Korean' Clodhopper -- following the analogy with the Korean Cannon, they should not be allowed to capture other Clodhoppers.

About the exit moves. I can see very easily how you ended up with them, and I for one like the forced exit rule, since it should make the game more decisive. An alternate approach if you did want to forbid them the tower in the first place would be to shade the arrows pointing into the tower, and add a rule that Ninnys and Yahoos may not follow a shaded arrow on their side of the board.

I have a black and white version of the board here:

http://www.samiam.org/new-ivorytower9x10-bw.bmp

- Sam

As Fergus has pointed out, Sam Trenholme's black and white version
consists of arrow outlines... with the squares not defined by borders or
colors.  But I think if these were added to basic color squares (as used
in most chess setups) we would have a board similar to that of the 'All
the King's Men' game, which has imitation wood and noticeable, yet much
more subtle arrows.  Note that I was likely spoiled by the physical board
I own and the 3D plastic medeival-type pieces that came with it.

Perhaps, most important here, is the fact that [other than myself and a
co-worker] I know of no one else who minds the bright colors and the
current piece set with eyes.  So, as the Star Trek Spock once said, 'The
needs of the many outweigh the needs of the one or the few.'  So there is
certainly no need to create a second board and piece set on my account,
that would be a waste of time and space. But I do thank Mr. Trenholme for
taking the time to create and present his black and white bitmap.

Perhaps for some, but that's not a valid statement because it is unconditional. I had a very successful experience playing STIT last night using my graphics, the first time I was able to play the game to completion. I personally find the Smess-like graphics unplayable.

Michael,

I have long known you as someone who has his head on his shoulders, and
you have long been one of the members of this site I hold the highest
respect for. I still believe that you are that person I respect, and I
will just assume you are having a bad day. I do appreciate that you went
to the trouble to make my game more accessible to people who may not like
my Smess graphics. I do not mean to be cold, but I do tend to be blunt and
to the point. In this particular matter, I could not be very encouraging,
because I was never excited over the idea of replacing my Smess graphics
with something more 'classic.' As for constructive feedback, I did give
that. I carefully explained how the board induced optical illusions and
gave specific recommendations on what to do to fix this.

Michael, please send me your new board. I would like to include an alternate board if it doesn't induce optical illusions.

For those interested, here is Michael's original board. I converted it to PNG for viewing on the web. If you want to use it with my ZRF, you can convert it back to BMP and edit the ZRF to use it.

Here is a recoloring of Michael's original board that I like much better. One trick I found helpful for reducing the tendency toward inducing optical illusions was to checker the board AND make the triangles the same color as the other color of square. I used black triangles in the Ivory Tower for better contrast. Another helpful trick was to combine the board with a marble background to give it texture. This helps the eyes to better distinguish each square. I converted it a JPG to display on the web.

My vote is for the original Smess-style playing field.  Please keep it.

You might offer that alternate field in the ZRF, if you wish.

My conspiracy antenna is giving me the signal that all this might be a
New_Coke/Classic_Coke propaganda ploy.  Push out a revised product to
create controversy and get lots of public attention then revert to the
original under the illusion of responding to public demand. 

Nah! No-one would ever do that! Would they? ;-)

I also like the more minimalistic look of Michael's board. I don't think I would have any trouble playing on this board. I can see where Fergus is coming from, though; I wouldn't call them optical illusions, but in some parts of the board the patterns formed by the triangles are noticeable. Some of these patterns have their own kind of beauty, and to my eyes they don't obscure the squares, but I can easily understand how some people could find it hard to play on this board, just as others find it hard to play on the Smess-style board. My own opinion is that Fergus's board is more fun to look at, but Michael's would probably be easier to play on.

As I write this I've just noticed Fergus's recoloring of Michael's board, which I like very much. The checkering helps a great deal (more than I expected), the texture gives the board life, and the colors are very well chosen. And it preserves the elegant simplicity of Michael's design.

If there's any interest in yet another StIT board, I think it would be nice to have one in the style of All the King's Men, which I think in at least two ways would be an appropriate complement to the Smess-style board. In All the King's Men, the squares resembled a wooden floor, and the arrows had a simple, uniform style, easy to see but not distracting. Iff Fergus and others are interested in having such a board, and if no one else wants to create it, I would be willing to try my hand, although I probably won't have the time until after New Year's Day.

BoardGameGeek's Smess page has some nice images of various editions of Smess, Take the Brain, and All the King's Men.

Here is a recolored redesign of Michael's latest board. His board used small arrows in place of the triangles. I drew lines between some arrows, then recolored it. It uses wood (maple and walnut) for most of the board and marble for the river and Ivory Tower. I think it looks best with the Big5 Chinese set shown in this screenshot.

Michael Howe wrote:

My personal preference at the moment, though, is still my tan-squared board with little black arrows, although now I'm considering giving it the same color-treatment. I doubt that I can do the texturing, though, with the simple software I use to make graphics.

You don't need to. Once I did the triangle board, it was simple enough to apply the same process to the new board. Here is the result. BTW, the graphics program I use is Ultimate Paint, a fairly inexpensive shareware program.

Here is my latest version of the board. I have added more connecting lines between arrows. These eliminate the problem of optical illusions without resorting to texturizing the board. They give each space a specific shape that helps define the terrain of the board. This allows for a board with simple colors and good contrast. I have also eliminated the lines between spaces, which are important only for a monochrome board, such as the ones Michael originally made. I will be using this board as a template for textured boards, since such boards still look nice and work better with certain piece sets.

I think it would look best with the colors of the wooden one, but without
the texture.

Just my two cents.

I like the new Clodhopper and Fuddy-Duddy pieces in the Smess-style set. I preferred the name Dumbo, though, as it seemed so perfect for a piece based on the elephant. Fuddy-Duddy makes some sense too, but I've known ministers who are anything but dull, conservative, and unimaginative.

Here is a board sent in by Larry Smith. Thanks, Larry. I renamed it and fixed the coloring of an arrow on one square. I am working on using this board as material for new alternate boards.

Here is how Larry's board looks with the Smess-style board's colors. Maybe some people would appreciate something like this with different colors.

Here is one possible recoloring of Larry's board. I added the moats back in to better distinguish the ivory squares from the neighboring light squares.

I had thought that I had previously rated this game. But after reviewing
all the comments here, I discovered otherwise.

I remember when a friend of mine dragged out a Smess game and tortured me
with it.  I was a fan from that day.

So when this XiangQi extrapolation of Smess appeared I was definitely
intrigued.  I suspected that the dynamics of each of these games would not
mesh well.  And the early version did have a few minor problems. This could
be the reason that I did not post an evaluation.

Now that the game has gotten a facelift, I took another look.

What can I say but 'Wow!'  Very nicely done.  The overall play of the
game appears to be quite nice. The various pieces interact very well with
the pattern of directions.  Now East Asians can enjoy the Smess
aggravation.

Here's a question: Is the name 'Smess' derived from 'It's a mess'?

Here's a set of 12 win-in-one problems for Storm the Ivory Tower. All the problems are displayed by Game Courier. Since they are all based on a rule-enforcing preset, it will tell you that Red has won when you enter the correct answer. Remember that you may win this game by either checkmate or stalemate. Some problems will be won by a checkmating move, and some will be won by a stalemating move. These are all simple problems to help you become familiar with the pieces in the game. I plan to provide some more difficult problems later.

#1 #2 #3 #4 #5 #6 #7 #8 #9 #10 #11 #12

For those who prefer a more Chess-like appearance, here are the same problems using the Alfaerie pieces and board. The Red pieces are colored white here, but it still says Red to move.

#1 #2 #3 #4 #5 #6 #7 #8 #9 #10 #11 #12

No, I'm saying that early prototypes of Storm the Ivory Tower were drawish. This is mentioned in the history section of the page.

Here is an alternative move for the Ninny I've been thinking about while meditating. Once the Ninny moves one space, it could move one more space to either adjacent space in a 2x2 square with its origin space. So an orthogonal move would be followed by a 90 degree turn left or right, while a diagonal move would be followed by a 45 degree turn backward. This would keep the Ninny from moving more than one space away at a time while giving it some more freedom of movement. This would be in accord with both the Smess rule that a Ninny moves only one space per turn and the Xiang Qi rule that a Pawn moves only one space per turn. And it would be sufficient to allow the Ninny to enter the enemy Ivory Tower and check the Brain.

But the current enhanced move of the Ninny also has its rationale. In Smess, Ninnies get to promote to Numskulls upon reaching a Numskull space. There is no longer promotion of this kind in Storm the Ivory Tower, but the enhanced movement of the Ninny does give it some of the power of a Numskull. So this is in accord with Smess, and it provides a viable alternative to giving the Ninny more directions of movement, which is not so feasible in this game given that the arrows determine the directions of movement.

Are you enforcing the no repetition rule of XiangQi?

The game could be won by simply forcing the opponent into a condition whereby they would repeat a previous position. An overall board position, not simply a single piece.

Just set repetition as a loss-condition. But this will only enforce three time repetition. So it really needs a human to evaluate this particular scenario.

Both stalemate and checkmate are win-conditions.

A draw-condition is when both sides do not have pieces which may cross the 'river'.

Draws are actually infrequent in XiangQi, when the rules are properly applied.

'Both stalemate and checkmate are win-conditions.'

I meant this to refer to the player who accomplishes this against an opponent.

In Zillions, it needs to be set as a loss-condition.

John and Larry,

Whether or not Xiang Qi is drawish is not at issue here. Storm the Ivory Tower is not Xiang Qi, and it is subject to factors that are not at play in Xiang Qi. Since the arrows determine all directions of movements, the Brain and his Toadies move the same, unlike Xiang Qi, where the General and the Guards do not move the same. This makes it easier for the Brain to escape check and for the Toadies to defend the Brain from check. This creates a greater tendency toward drawishness, which is further compounded when a player can move his own Ninnies into his Ivory Tower. Without special rules, they will get trapped and function as extra Toadies. To make matters worse, the original Yahoo could also get trapped in the Ivory Tower. Then, with the Elephant counterpart (originally called a Sycophant) unable to cross the river, the game veers toward extreme drawishness, because it becomes much easier to defend than to attack. The first release of Storm the Ivory Tower corrected some of these problems. It allowed the Elephant counterparts (renamed Dumbos) to attack, and it had special rules that allowed Ninnies and Yahoos to escape their own Ivory Tower. The second release made further changes. The Elephant counterpart (now called a Fuddy-Duddy) lost some of its mobility on its own side, decreasing its usefulness for defense. A rearrangement of the arrows prevented Ninnies from getting into the Ivory Tower, which solved one problem but introduced a new one. Without new powers of movement, Ninnies and Yahoos would be unable to reach the enemy Ivory Tower and attack its Brain. This would make the game extremely drawish if not corrected. This is the specific issue I was referring to when I said that I changed the Ninny 'only as much as I had to to allow it to attack the enemy Brain and keep the game from being drawish.' The new arrangement of the arrows had made it impossible for a piece moving one space at a time to get to either Ivory Tower from the outside. Giving the Ninny a two-space attack allowed it to get to the Ivory Tower, and making the Yahoo's movement no longer dependent on the arrows on its pass square did the same for the Yahoo. These changes allowed these pieces to check the Brain, keeping the game from becoming too drawish.

I did not mean my comments to be construed as a negative evaluation of this game. In fact, I find it very interesting.

I was only asking if all the conditions of XiangQi might be applied. If they were, any peculiarities of this game easily could be resolved. And modifications would be un-necessary.

But feel free to make any adjustments. That is totally the privilege of the designer.

I've thought of a change to the Ninny's movement which I think could improve this game. Instead of having a two-space capturing move when across the river, it would gain a two-space non-capturing move. This would better complement the Fuddy-Duddy, which gains a one-space non-capturing move across the river. Also, by not having any special powers of attack across the river, pieces would not be threatened by Ninnies two spaces away, which would make the game less confusing. These two advantages are mainly aesthetic. The main tactical advantage is that the Ninny would gain greater mobility, increasing its ability to storm the enemy ivory tower. This should do more to keep the game from being drawish than giving the Ninny a two-space capturing move across the river.

I have made a preset for the new version at /play/pbm/play.php?game%3DStorm+the+Ivory+Tower%26settings%3Dversion3

I have also corrected a bug in Game Courier that prevented the presets for Storm the Ivory Tower from working.

If you like Smess but would like a more interesting combination of pieces, you may well like Storm the Ivory Tower.

Here is my smess adaptation of Shogi (it's not complete, i did not chosen directions of arrows yet, and even if someone will help me to complete it, it don't seems ideal).

King, of course, replaced with brain. Flying chariot and angle mover both replaced with numskulls. All 4 generals (gold and silver) replaced with ninnies. Pawns are replaced with pieces, wich can move only 1 step forward and sideways. Lances replaced with pieces, wich can move any number of steps forward and sideways. Knights are pieces, wich moves as yahoos, but only forward and may leap. Numskulls dont's promotes, other pieces promotes to ninnies (according to Shogi rules). No prohibition of dropping pawn on file, wich already have one pawn, other rules like in Shogi.

Another idea (also don't seem ideal) is that arrows changes defination of 'forward'.

This is a great extension of the Smess idea!

Royal Ninny>Ninnyrider>Chinoise Ninnyrider>Yahoo>Ninny>Dumbo>Trapped Ninny