Comments/Ratings for a Single Item

Larry,

I have programmed a Xiang Hex Game Courier Preset. It seems to be working well, but before officially releasing it, I was wondering if you or anyone else would care to beta-test it and let me know if you find any problems with it. Note that it does not use the coordinates described on this page. It uses Game Courier's standard hex coordinates, which are easier to program directions of movement for.

John,

In a word 'Nope'. The 'river' cell already adds an extra step(or half step if you will) for the Soldiers.

Have you tried out the Zillions implementation yet?

Fergus,

Mucho kudos.

I ran the preset through a series of moves. Testing the Soldier promotion and captures, the Cannon move and capture, the Mandarin restriction to the 'palace' and the Elephants. Chariots and Horses seem to working fine. Even created a check position and the preset recognized it.

Looks like it's working good. But will probably have to be run through a few games just be absolutely sure.

Once again. Nice work. It looks good.

John,

Once again, 'Nope'. This will place the outside Soldiers under direct threat from the opposing Chariots.

I worked on this for quite a while. This is the optimal pattern that I arrived at. One not too big or too small. And matching the overall dynamics of the original game.

You should really try out the game.

Start one up, John.

One of the things that developers must keep in mind about the hexagonal cell field is that it is definitely not the same as a square cell field.

For example, the orthogonal movers on the square field only have two axes of travel. On the hexagonal field they have three. A potential increase of 50% in power.

Thus the reason for burying the Chariots. If they were given easy access to the field early in the game, they would proceed to slaughter.

I've uploaded a black and white graphic of the playing field(see the note just before the Setup section). I sized it to fit on a standard letter page. It will accommodate pieces which are three-quarters of inch in diameter or less(which my set is).

But it can be re-sized for larger sets. It will just not fit on a single page. ;-)

To keep the printout neat, just laminate it. Many office supply stores offer this service, including the printing of the page.

I merely slipped mine into one of those plastic sleeves which can be gotten at your local Wal-mart.

Janggi, or Korean Chess, could be applied to this playing field. Though the Elephants would never be able to fully express their potential moves within this field. But that is not a big negative in itself.

Give me time to work up a Zillions implementation of this game to see how it plays.

BTW, Zillions does not really play XiangQi well, like many other computer programs of the game. They tend to be too aggressive and cannot see the benefit of sacrifice for position. Or even the necessary material to affect a good endgame. Unless they are specificly programmed to keep track of particular pieces, they will often place themselves in the position of having no pieces which can cross the 'river'. As of now, human players rule the game.

It would not be a fair test of your programs. To truly test them, you might challenge a ranking master. Post your challenge to a few Asian sites.

And you might thoroughly read my posting. I did not say 'all programs'. I said 'many programs'. Yours may be an exception. I look forward to the results of your tests.

There was one program around 2006 that did very well against a human in a competition. Was this a dedicated system, or an addon software for the personal computer? Have you heard of any other since?

I am rather partial to the graphics in my implementation.

Some western players of Asian games have a prejudice of the Kanji symbols. This is primarily because of unfamiliarity. It is quite easy to become familiar with them, if a little effort is applied.

Here's a tip on how to beat many XiangQi programs. Play defensively. Let the computer opponent come to you. Sacrifice Elephants or Mandarins to gain material advantage. When the computer opponent has commited sufficient material to this bloodbath, strike.

Larry, I used your graphics and improved it, making it more readable. Now it's playing pieces proper, with Chinese signs on them, instead of just Chinese signs. I also made a wooden board. Chessplayers would prefer my graphics, but never mind.

The reason why Zillions plays Chinese Chess badly is because the pieces are wrongly valued. I changed the piece values to a more proper evaluation.  I tested my version against the Zillions version on a 1.6 GHz computer, at 15 sec per move. The colours were alternated and the openings went differently in each game. My version won six games out of six. I did the same thing with my Korean Chess, it won 5/5.
/Mats

For those who are interested, this is a record of the Game Courier game between John Smith and myself:

   Red(J. Smith)	Black(L. Smith)

1. Ca(b2)-e2		S-e7
2. S-e5			H(h8)-e9
3. S-e6			SxS
4. Ca-h6		S-i5
5. S-g4			S-a5
6. S-g5			CaxS
7. E(g1)-e5		Ca-i6
8. CaxH			HxCa
9. CaxS+		H-d6
10. S-i3		S-g6
11. H-g4		CaxCa+
12. M(f1)-e3		HxS
13. HxS			ExH
14. S-i4		H-f3+
15. G-f1		CaxCh
16. Ch-i3		Ch-b4
17. ChxH		ChxCh+
18. G-e2		Ch-g2+
19. G-f1		S-c6
20. Resigns

By initially concentrating on a defensive game, I was able to gain material advantage. John made the error of over-valuing the opening effectiveness of the Cannon on this hexagonal field and lost both early in the game. Once this occurred, I was able to quickly press an assault on his General, taking out both of his Chariots in the bargain. If he had not resigned I would have easily mated his General.

In Xiang Qi, the Advisor (what you're calling a Mandarin in your game description) is capable of blocking checks along every rank and file of the palace, and the Elephant is capable of blocking checks on the middle file and the top rank. In Xiang Hex, the two slanting ranks that pass through the middle of the palace cannot be reached by Advisor or Elephant. Consequently, checks along these lines cannot be blocked by any of the pieces capable of only defense. Furthermore, Elephants are incapable of entering the palace. Thus, defense is compromised in this game in ways it is not compromised in Xiang Qi.

Fergus,

Yep, hexagonal fields are different.

The Mandarin, and Elephant, are able to defend one another from the start(unlike the square game). And the Horse and Cannon are able to initial move into the 'palace', thus potentially covering any loss of defense on the part of Mandarins and Elephants.

But to state that defense has been 'compromised', you may need to demonstrate how a player can use this to their advantage. Else, the statement might best read as defense is 'different'.