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Ultima. Game where each type of piece has a different capturing ability. (8x8, Cells: 64) (Recognized!)[All Comments] [Add Comment or Rating]
Gert Greeuw wrote on Mon, Nov 19, 2001 12:00 AM UTC:Good ★★★★<p>Thanks for your good treatment of Ultima. It seems like this game is a common assignment for computer science students in AI classes. My programming class just had to make a 'Baroque Chess' program, and I put mine on my web page as an applet, just in case you want to link to it.</p>
<p><a href='http://people.tamu.edu/~jwp2654'>http://people.tamu.edu/~jwp2654</a></p>
<p>Thanks again for the help your site offered in designing the program. BTW, I did cite your website in my program report. :-)</p>
<p>
Jesse Plymale <br>
[email protected] <br>
http://people.tamu.edu/~jwp2654/
</p>
I notice that Robert Abbott has had some correspondance where he agrees on some simple changes to the Ultima rules to correct the flaw that he saw in the original game design (that defence was more effective than offence). Would it be possible to add an Ultima variant here that incorporates the 'revised' rules? Having played Ultima (very intermittently) since my schooldays, I have to say that I think the proposed revisions make sense... regards mike
Robert Abbott has to officially say what are the definitive changes. I have ever been interested in ULTIMA, and I have played it enough for feel myself some of the problems with the game play, but it is necessary to say that regadless of its problems, ULTIMA is a great game. When cleared the new rules officially, perhaps I can try an implementation on Zillions, and in every case, the game can be played NOW with the new rules (if desired) using the PBM system...
I have always been an Ultima fan. This game was the major inspiration for Rook Mania (which incidentally spent about three years in development, and which I am developing a more 'traditional' version of). It amy be true that this game favors defense over offense, and it may not be a perfect game, but the concept -- having all the pieces move similarly, but capture differently -- is a purely beautiful one. I also agree with Mr. Aronson that the imbalance of pieces is not necessarily bad, although I do not necessarily agree with his analogy -- the reason those games faded out of popularity was probably in favor of more balanced ones.
During my final year in school (1972/73) I was one of a group who
experimented with all sorts of chess variations, including Ultima. Our
source for the rules was not very good, even the name of the game was
wrong ('Ultama') and there were several flaws in the rules as we had
them - we had to debug them ourselves to make a playable game since we
did
not know of any 'official' source. We got one 'debug' right (the
Withdrawer must move directly away from the piece it is capturing) and
two
wrong: (a) the pawns captured by sandwiching the enemy piece between
*pawns*, not between a pawn and any piece, (b) the chameleon could
capture
pawns even on a diagonal move. In one contrived scenario, the chameleon
captured seven pieces at once by (a) starting off by withdrawing from the
withdrawer, (b) en route leaping a long-leaper, (c) landing in a
quadruple
pawn-sandwich and (d) co-ordinating with its own king to grab the
co-ordinator.
Naturally we tried variations. In one we pinched two large (matching)
corks from the chemistry lab, painted one black and introduced them to
the
game as the Protectors. A piece could move onto a Protector and, for as
long as it stayed there, was immune to capture. Another variation was to
rename the pawns Othellos - a piece captured by them was removed from the
board and replaced by an identical friendly piece.
And we didn't like the name 'co-ordinator' and tried to think of an
alternatve without success. Many years later I coined the Sindarin
(Elvish) word 'palangurth' based on two radicals meaning 'death from
afar' with reference to its method of capture.Yes, that assumption would be correct. In fact, in the illustration, the white chameleon imitates four different types at once and puts the black King into check, since it could capture the King by replacement. This, however, brings another question to mind: Must a chameleon be adjacent to a King to capture it? Since there is an orthogonal restriction for them when capturing pawns, is there also a one-space restriction when checking the King?
--Jared
How does chameleon capture chameleon?
Ultima is a great game, regardless the opinion of the author, Robert Abbot, about 'what is wrong with Ultima'. The case is that many people around the world plays Ultima, and accept the game as it is. The game play is closed almost all the time, and it is not easy win this game, and draw is the most possible result in many games between two experienced players playing more or less well. If someone wants an improvement that add richness to the game play without the loss of the philosophy and main ideas behind Ultima, perhaps the most simple way is introducing two pieces missing with Queen movement: First, the Advancer, and second, The FIDE-QUEEN!. The idea is reduce the number of Long-Leapers and Chameleons to only one each, it is not clear the need of two of them, as pointed out by Antoine Fourriere. I have pre-tested a version with this new elements, and the game play is nice, more dynamic than the original game, but you can feel the essence of Ultima regardless the new changes. But this idea, and perhaps any other, could find resistance by the relatively numerous fans of this game, that continue playing it, as originally born.
Michael, I think the Leo is a good idea, but it is the need of diminish a little its power in this game. Unfortunatelly, Leo can conduct many stages of the openings with attack of pieces and checkmate threats, with an initial advantage for White. On possibility is that it moves like Queen, but limiting its action: it need an ADJACENT intervening piece for attack the next positions. I´ll try both of them in the next days. As it can be easely noted when you try the variant, FIDE-Queen is very powerful in Ultima, surprisingly it looks much more powerful here than in FIDE-Chess, and it is certainly more powerful than the Long-Leaper. Advancer is a little weaker, but LEO would be at least as powerful than the Queen. Peter: I have dowloaded the Rococo variants. I have not tried it yet, but I have the intuitive idea that the Archer is great for this game, but I have serious doubts about the Bird. Other thing: I have my own Gallactic Graphics and board for Rococo. I´ll send a copy to David and you, although Alfaerie are very nice too.
I had been looking for the rules of Ultima for the longest time. It is heartening to see it included here. I also feel that the rule description format is excellent.
Ultima is the best, nobody needs Ultima variants!.
i have two questions about rules i am not completely certain on. 1/ can a pincer pawn capture more than one piece (in one direction)? e.g. if there is a friendly piece on f4, and enemy pieces on f2 and f3, can a pawn move to f1 and capture both? i think this is unlikely, but i want to check. 2/ can withdrawers capture by moving away on the diagonal from an enemy piece? e.g. enemy on g5, can a withdrawer capture it by moving from f4 to e3? thanks.
thanks for the swift replies. that is how i initially thought the withdrawers must operate. but when playing my game of ultima in the tournament, i got in a position to take in this (diagonal) manner, but typed in my move and the piece remained on the board. so i changed my move. until i saw ben's next move, i did not realise that i had to manually (as it were) remove the piece from the board myself with a separate command. never mind! thanks again for the clarification.
Is there anywhere to play the game online, other than against applets?
I love the game, although when I used to play it the pawns moved one step orthoganally, could not be captured, and had still the (in that case) fairly unused ability to capture in a pincer fashion, one piece at a time.
They mostly just got in the way. Civilian pedestrians, as it were.
Greg, I have tested three ULTIMA games using Chess V. Good effort!, I appreciate it a lot, but I have some observations. First, you can take the enemy King and the game continues without end. It happened with immobilized Kings in the three games, so I have not seen if it happens in other cases. The second observation is about the A.I. game play, it is possible that you have noted that Chess V is a weak ULTIMA player, (much more than I thought at first, surprisingly to me) and I noted a strong ingenuity with the Immobilizer power, perhaps you must augment the penalty for immobilized pieces to 50%, but it is necessary that the A.I. take also in account situations in wich the immobilizer is immobilized with a Chameleon and then be vulnerable in the future. I could capture the enemy immobilizer in this way twice. Kings can act in a better way in Coordination with the Coordinator, it is necessary augment the bonus in the position evaluation when there are more enemy pieces in line with the King after a King move. Pawn movement is ingenuous too, but it is not easy a solution, perhaps the best should be a good bonus in the position evaluation (not in the piece) for a movement that reduces the brut mobility of enemy pieces (number of squares the pieces can reach), and other bonus in the evaluation function (a bit less than the other) for a Pawn move that augments the number of potential capturing squares using the pawn moved, i.e., looking how many sandwiches can make the Pawn with own pieces, although there is or not an enemy piece between (covering potential). I know it is not easy improve a lot this game, but it should be good a revision. I´m very sorry I can´t help a lot with the code, but I´ll try to help you as I can.
CHESS V BEATED ZILLIONS!. Well, Zillions is a weak ULTIMA player, and I have had curiosity in a test game with the two programs. The game have had not great quality, but it was clear that CHESS V played with much more concept, and it won in a good final. CHESS V game play should be improved, but it was a great thing that Zillions was beated. Congratulations, Greg!. To all the interested people, I can send the saved Zillions file.
Chess V, playing White, beated Zillions, 30sec. per player, in this ULTIMA test game: Zillions Save Game File Version 0.02 HC RulesFile=C:\Archivos de programa\Zillions Development\Zillions Demo\Rules\Ultima.zrf VariantName=Ultima 1. Pawn g2 - g5 1. Pawn a7 - a6 2. Pawn b2 - b5 2. Pawn f7 - f3 3. Pawn h2 - h4 3. Pawn c7 - c4 4. Pawn h4 - f4 x f3 4. Long-Leaper b8 - h2 x f4 5. Pawn c2 - c3 5. Long-Leaper h2 - e5 6. Pawn f2 - f5 6. Long-Leaper e5 - a5 x b5 7. Long-Leaper b1 - b3 7. Coordinator a8 - a7 8. Coordinator h1 - h2 8. Withdrawer d8 - c7 9. Withdrawer e1 - g3 9. Coordinator a7 - f2 x e2 10. Withdrawer g3 - h4 x f2 10. Pawn c4 - e4 11. King d1 - e1 11. Pawn e4 - a4 12. Long-Leaper g1 - g3 12. Pawn d7 - d6 13. Coordinator h2 - f2 13. Withdrawer c7 - c5 14. Withdrawer h4 - b4 14. Pawn a4 - a3 15. Long-Leaper g3 - e3 15. Pawn d6 - d4 16. Withdrawer b4 - a4 16. Long-Leaper a5 - b6 17. Withdrawer a4 - b4 17. Long-Leaper b6 - c7 18. Long-Leaper e3 - e6 18. Chameleon f8 - f7 19. Long-Leaper e6 - e4 19. Withdrawer c5 - d6 x b4 20. Pawn c3 - c4 x d4 20. Pawn b7 - a7 21. Pawn c4 - a4 x a3 21. Long-Leaper c7 - a5 22. Coordinator f2 - c5 22. Long-Leaper a5 - a3 x a4 23. Coordinator c5 - c3 23. Pawn a7 - c7 24. Pawn f5 - a5 24. Long-Leaper a3 - c5 25. Chameleon f1 - f5 25. Long-Leaper c5 - a7 26. Chameleon f5 - e5 26. Chameleon f7 - f2 27. King e1 - d1 27. Withdrawer d6 - c5 28. Pawn d2 - d5 28. Long-Leaper a7 - b8 29. Pawn a5 - b5 x c5 29. Long-Leaper b8 - b2 x b3 x b5 30. King d1 - c2 30. Pawn h7 - h5 31. Coordinator c3 - f3 x f2 31. Chameleon c8 - f5 32. Long-Leaper e4 - g6 x f5 32. Immobilizer h8 - h6 33. Chameleon e5 - f6 33. Pawn e7 - e5 34. Coordinator f3 - f5 34. Pawn c7 - c5 x d5 35. King c2 x b2 35. Long-Leaper g8 - c4 36. Pawn a2 - a3 36. Pawn h5 - h3 37. Chameleon c1 - b1 37. Pawn h3 - d3 38. Chameleon b1 - d1 38. King e8 - d7 39. King b2 - b1 39. Long-Leaper c4 - a4 40. King b1 - a2 40. Long-Leaper a4 - f4 41. Chameleon d1 - a4 41. Long-Leaper f4 - f3 42. Immobilizer a1 - d1 42. Long-Leaper f3 - h5 43. Immobilizer d1 - g4 43. Pawn a6 - a7 44. Chameleon a4 - f4 44. Pawn a7 - a8 45. Chameleon f4 - e3 45. Pawn d3 - d1 46. Chameleon e3 - d4 46. Pawn e5 - e3 47. King a2 - b3 47. Pawn c5 - e5 48. Coordinator f5 - e4 x e3 48. Pawn e5 - f5 x g5 49. Chameleon f6 - f7 49. Pawn a8 - a6 50. Coordinator e4 - e6 50. Pawn g7 - g8 51. King b3 - b4 51. Immobilizer h6 - g5 52. King b4 - c5 52. Pawn g8 - g7 x g6 53. Coordinator e6 - g6 x g5 53. Pawn d1 - d2 54. Coordinator g6 - h6 x h5 54. Pawn d2 - a2 55. Chameleon d4 - d6 55. King d7 - d8 56. Chameleon d6 - e7 56. Pawn a6 - a4 x a3 57. Chameleon e7 x d8
Comment on the game: ChessV vs. Zillions, 30 sec. per player per move. Opening was weakly played by both programs, and you can observe the that the Pawn movements are not the best in both. The game play was more tactical than positional, the pair King-Coordinator is not used in the best way, and Immobilizer potential-and-risks is not well appreciated. But Chess V 'understood' better the game philosophy, and the end was played relatively good by Chess V, although with clear deficiences by Zillions. Very interesting test game!.
Three tests more, Zillions playing White, Chess V playing Black, 10 seconds per move. Results: Chess V won 3-0 !. Chess V is still relatively weak playing against humans, but it is definitely stronger than Zillions. I have detected an important bug, as I said, that must be corrected inmediately: When Chess V King is immobilized, it appears that if you can capture it, the prgogram does not detect it is Checkmated, you capture the King and the game cam continue endless. Now I think that 50% of penalty for immobilized pieces is perhaps too much, but I suggest augment it a bit, 30%, but if your immobilizer is immobilized, the value of your immobilizer must fall at least to half. There must be an important penalty for an immobilized King, much more if the immobilizer is potentially safe, Chess V takes not a good care with its King sometimes against the enemy immobilizer. I´ll add more when I have more to add.
Well, in my fourth game against Chess V, the program beated me, playing in a good manner. I have not played bad, neither commited fatal errors or clear blunders. Analyzing the game, I have played different than in my previous three games, with a relatively open position. It seems that Chess V plays well this kind of instances.
Robert Abbott now has a set of Ultima puzzles on his website! http://www.logicmazes.com/games/puz1to4.html
In contrast to the Carrera family, which have less differentiation, Ultima-like games are more sharply delineated in their features, metaphorically like USA Colorado's 54 'fourteeners', not somewhat similar hills of Carrera-Capablanca terrain. I would much rather have invented the 'Rococo peak' within the Ultima family than the 'Gothic hill' in its family; yet that one stands out within its environment.
Nice description of the game of Baroque, but we always played it with
Leapers limited to capturing one piece, and multi-leaping was illegal; as
for deciding which Coordinator (aka 'Vaporizer') to turn upside down at
the start of the game, thereby turning it into an Immobilizer, that was
White's prerogative to do first, and Black had to choose second.
<p>There are (or at least WERE) versions of Baroque played on a 9x9 board,
with a 1 square Bomb occupying an extra square on the 1st rank, next to
the King on his right, if I recall correctly. An immobilized Bomb could
not explode on its own accord, but an Imitator (Mirror) could detonate it,
so long as it was not immobilized too. The 9x9 version - with a Bomb -
used to be called Renaissance. I think the history of the 'Bomb'
variation to Baroque was a matter of interference from the 1960s game of
'Camelot.' Blowing up both Kings resulted in a Draw. Anyway, like
Baroque, Renaissance ended with the capture of the enemy's King.
<p>Regards,
<p>Matthew Montchalin
<br>[email protected]
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