Rated Comments
Adding the frog on a Capablanca board is a very nice idea. I'd suggest adding an fil move to the knight's first move, preferably a just move power, so that it can occupy it's regular place in the orthodox chess repertoire. But I don't see this as a problem more as a small enhancement, maybe, also motivated by the fact that the knight in this game starts so far from the center. Overall an excellent game!
Adding the modern elephant on a Capablanca board is a very nice idea. I'd suggest adding an fil move to the knight's first move, preferably a just move power, so that it can occupy it's regular place in the orthodox chess repertoire. But I don't see this as a problem more as a small enhancement, maybe, also motivated by the fact that the knight in this game starts so far from the center. Overall an excellent game!
The idea of introducing two waffles (phoenixes) on a Capablanca board is a very interesting one. But the main drawback proved to the author to be finding a position where all pawns are defended in the initial position. This leads to a sole position where the waffle and knight share the best first move development field. To this gets in a way of the usual castling. To counter this a new way of castling is introduced. I don't like that because it requires to little effort creating a new problem of it's own. I'd approach this by offering the knight the forward fil moves when unmoved. Probably with just move power. This will help the knight further to the center without hindering the waffle's development. It can also go the other way around offering the field towards the center to the waffle by allowing it the two forward wide zebra move. This has the advantage of having the knight on it's orthodox chess spot after it's initial move, so orthodox chess openings can be used. This would help the game become more popular among regular chess players. Both solutions seem to be better than an arbitrary castling rule.
I have played this game extensively in the Ai Ai software package since adding it, and I feel it may be the best iteration so far of Jean-Louis Cazaux's series of 12x12 variants. The piece density and variety generate very interesting interactions on the board. The various Pawn- and Pawn-like pieces in the 3rd/4th ranks create a nice sense of progression, leading the board to gradually open up and allow more powerful pieces to enter the fray.
In a sense, the game reminds me slightly of a Chess equivalent to Dai Dai Shogi, which has a long opening phase that gradually expands into a delightfully complex middlegame. As a fanatic for large Shogi I consider this a plus :)
In any case, I highly recommend this game for fans of larger variants. In the future I hope Maasai might generate some similar developments of Gigachess and Terachess as well. I have experimented a bit myself with adding the two ranks of mixed Pawns to those games and the results were quite enjoyable.
Having implemented this variant in Ai Ai and having played it a bunch of times, I really enjoy this game. Being a large Shogi fanatic, the higher piece density of Yangsi doesn't bother me in the slightest :)
For me this game is an improvement on something like Sac Chess, as the pieces in Yangsi are more interesting to use. In fact I was inspired by this game to make what I called 'Heavy Shako', an extension of Shako that fills in all the gaps in the back rank with other pieces used in the larger variants by Jean-Louis Cazaux. The original concept was much improved by some excellent advice from Jean-Louis, and the resulting game has been a lot of fun.
I'd enjoy seeing an extension of Yangsi to 12x12 with a high-density setup, too.
I like this, it brings out a rural realm to the game. Well done!
I wish this game were more popular. It seems like an excellent design. The piece selection seems strange at first but after thinking about it I can see the beauty of it.
I imagine the aanca could have originated as an enhanced ferz, to go with the bigger board. Then the knights could have become unicorns by gaining a diagonal slide after their leap to complement the aanca. The crocodile is a fairly obvious addition. The giraffe and Lion both make knight-like leaps, suitable for the large board, and the Lion includes and extra 3,0 leap which removes it's color binding and forms a nice looking pattern.
The result of all that is eight pieces with a nice range of power and an aesthetically consistent set of moves. There are all of the 2,1 3,1 and 3,2 leaping moves, the rook and bishop moves, and bent rook and bishop moves (unicorn and aanca). The leaping pieces are differentiated in power by some of them having additional movements, but they don't ever feel like arbitrary combinations.
The initial setup is also elegant. The Pawns start as far apart as they do on the 8x8 board, and the pieces are all on the back rank. The promotion rule fits well with this setup and is another great innovation.
I think the main weak points, if there are any, would be the pawns and the king's leap. It seems unlikely that the king would benefit much from a 2 square leap on such a big board with so much empty space; and perhaps modern pawns would be better. But overall this variant appears to be carefully designed.
Greetings, Thanks for doing this website. I don't see Commander Chess or Cờ Tư Lệnh in Vietnamese. This is not to be confused with the Vietnamese Chess listed here for zillions of games. Commander Chess was designed By Colonel Hải Nguyễn Quí and released in 2010. I think it's been adopted as the official Chess of Vietnam.
It's a modern warfare, sort of XianQi variant. Uses tanks, aircraft, a navy. Here's a link to the BGG for it:
https://boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/191203/commander-chess
The Colonel has been trying to share his game with the world and I know for a fact they are about to release a new Commander Chess game set and online/mobile platforms to play online as well.
I'm working on making one of these with custom-built clay pieces!
I'm working on making one of these with custom-built clay pieces!
Fun idea! Might I suggest the name ChiMPs?
You only need to checkmate/fork one King. In the standard-Rules version. Game play tends to be the same length as regular-chess.
Its one of the least complicated 3D-Games. Simply set-up 2-sets of chess-men.
The hardest part to explain is why its frowned upon to go on side-ways diagonals (in 3D) or that knights should not go in L-shapes without advancing or retreating from the opponent. I say frowned-upon, because of course you can change to non-standard rules. But you may find the game much longer, and knights to be as powerful as queens. Stalemates to be more attainable...
I have, as per Freeling’s comment, made a number of variants to Congo to address the issues brought up:
- To address the fact Congo looks drawish, I have adopted the “Ko Rule” in my variant: Someone who repeats a previous position in a game loses. This eliminates draws.
- To address the issue with river drownings making attacks harder, I have made the A, B, F, and G files of the rivers have “islands”: While the crocodile can move like normal on these squares, other pieces will not drown.
- I have made the pawns stronger: A pawn can not retreat until it is promoted on the 7th rank; on the other hand, pawns across the river can now move and capture sideways. A promoted pawn is more powerful: It can move or capture to any space one or two squares away (like Chess, a promoted pawn should win unless it can be recaptured quickly)
- I have made the elephants able to move forward like a Shogi Lance. They can also only move backwards one square.
- I have changed the opening setup from GMELECZ to ZCELECZ, removing the Monkey and Giraffe, and having a second Zebra (Knight) and Crocodile. This way, the game can be played with an ordinary chess board and pieces.
In my Zillions-vs-Zillions testing, the games are never draws, and Black wins more often once we give Zillions 30 or more seconds to think through a move.
My changes can be seen here: https://github.com/samboy/ChessVariantResearch
Look in the folder “Congo”. Full rules for this variant, along with multiple possible opening setups, is here:
https://github.com/samboy/ChessVariantResearch/blob/master/Congo/EBW-1.md
Out of respect for the copyright included with the Zillions implementation of Congo, I am not distributing a modified version of the Congo zrf. Instead, I am distributing the original version, along with a Linux/Cygwin script to change Congo to have another .zrf with the modified rules. I have also made from scratch board artwork representing the new river with islands.
(Admin: This is Sam Trenholme. If you have a chance, please update my email address to be “pbm” in the domain “samiam.org” so I can reset my password).
An interesting and very playable game. The figures are divergent pieces moving as the nominal piece and capturing as Querquisites.
Here's an animation of the game:
https://lichess.org/study/WjUgZzpG
I like black's idea on the final move (Rh2! hoping to provoke Kg1), however white called the bluff.
I'm pleased to see this game! One correction : it is a trigonal, not hexaxonal, chess variant. The cells are triangles, not hexagons.
That said, I think this is an excellent contribution to the much under-explored trigonal tiling. Apart from a couple of games contributed by Graeme Neatham and Christian Freeling, along with a couple of my own, I think this is a little-used tiling which has lots of interesting possibilities for play.
I dig this board. I tried writing a Zillions of Games .zrt for Masonic Chess last night. I think it's about finished, but I can't seem to get through debugging to try it out. Anyone here still messing with Zillions .zrt files?
The table in the center of this page has several mistakes in the description column
This is a very good game. Everything fits together well. The random setup provides variety without being completely chaotic. The brouhaha squares are a great way to add more pieces without making the board so big it feels empty. The promotion rule encourages more variety in promotion, which is something I look for particularly; and I like the auxiliary pieces used here. The Mameluk especially is fun.
I think I might slightly prefer the Modern Apothecary game, for it's Dragon and Griffin, which to me are more interesting than the Chancellor and Archbishop, but I like the Siege Elephant and Mameluk as auxiliaries, so it's hard to choose one game over the other. I don't know if I'd agree with the statement that the Joker can't defend well. It seems to me that it's ability to mimic an attacker's move makes it particularly good at defending and more difficult to use aggressively. I'm not great at chess (in any form), though, so I could be wrong about that.
I'm interested to see what the next games in this series will be like!
Excellent write-up, Eric. I actually didn't know Fischer presented 960 in 1996 - always thought it has been around for longer.
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A very well thought and pleasing out blend of a Capablanca's Chess and Shogi. I am curious about the rule against having identical promoted pieces other than promoted Pawns. I consider it a small wart on a otherwise perfect design.