Future of Chess
Speculation on the future of chess
There has been some discussion recently (Sept-2007) at ChessVariants.Org concerning the possible form of a future orthodox or standard chess.
I thought such a subject deserving of its own area on this wiki - so here it is!
page revision: 4, last edited: 24 Aug 2009 05:55
There seems to be some support for this variant
Comment by Susan Polgar
Thanks for the site reference; I thought one person there looked familiar. :-)
I consider chessplayers inherently conservative from the responses they give to anything that is not FIDE. I was initially surprised to find at least half the respondents in favor of FRC/Chess960; but then I went over more of the site, and saw that Ms Polgar herself is looking at alternatives. Then I realized that about half the people on a site that is avowedly for the enhancement of chess do not find even 960 worthy of being considered chess. Did notice the one guy who was pushing flying bomber chess; wish he could have found a better [or at least less gimmicky] variant to tout. (Found it interesting that he avoided the CV site. Possibly safer for the site, though; "real chessplayers" would likely flame us forever, based on what I saw in the original posts at the Yahoo CV group, the original home of chessvariants.org.)
I think Grand Chess or Wildebeest Chess would be fine replacements, given that they both take something existing in Orthodox Chess already and expand on it with a larger board and more pieces.
However, both contain an element which, I think, dooms them to the same fate as Chess - a fixed opening array. This is no sin, as most Chess variants have this, but it does mean that the development of exhaustive opening theory would be inevitable if the games were played regularly by millions of people. In my mind, this is the primary element that makes OrthoChess "stodgy" - it has simply been analyzed to death. One who hasn't studied openings can often be defeated in the opening even if he is a brilliant tactician and strategist.
I think the ultimate replacement for OrthoChess would be a game that allowed much more flexibility from the beginning. Something that allowed for different board sizes, different arrays of pieces, and different opening setups. In essence, a sort of Meta-Chess that contained a large subset of all possible Chess variants.
Something like this:
1. White chooses the number of ranks, within certain limits.
2. Black chooses the number of files within the same limits.
3. White and Black alternate choosing pieces from a long list - first White, then Black. Each chosen piece is given to both players so that both have equal armies at the end. This continues until there are a number of pieces in each army equal to the number of files minus one (for the king).
4. White and Black alternate choosing pawns from a short list, beginning with the player who chose the second-to-last piece in step 3 (this insures that, in the case of an odd number of files, Black at least gets to choose the extra pawn). Each chosen pawn is given to both players. This continues until there are a number of pawns equal to the number of files.
5. White and Black alternate placing pieces on the board, on their first rank, until all pieces are placed.
6. White and Black alternate placing pawns on the board, on their second rank, until all pawns are placed.
7. White moves first.
This is, obviously, pretty rough. It's an idea I've been kicking around for some time, but haven't quite fleshed out. Many questions remain.
What would be the minimum and maximum numbers for the ranks and files (I'm thinking between 7 and 21 or something)?
What pieces should be allowed? I'm thinking it should be limited to atomic pieces and their combinations; something like wazir, ferz, alfil, dabbaba, knight, camel, zebra, H (0,3), G (3,3), rook, bishop, and all combinations thereof. That's already a whole lot of pieces.
What about the pawns? It might make more sense to skip steps four and six and just have ordinary OrthoChess pawns. But what about Berolina pawns, Shogi pawns, or Yoemen? I prefer Shogi pawns, but they ought to start on the 3rd rank rather than the 2nd.
And when do the pawns promote, if the board size is flexible?
Yep. Pretty rough. And probably a bit too flexible to ever catch on. A less ambitious version might…perhaps a fixed board size and placement of King and Pawns, but keeping the free choice of pieces and their placement.
Hi Joshua,
I quite like where you're going with this flexible chess. My first thoughts are:
1. I'd be inclined to use the mechanism of screen chess instead of alternate placement.
2. I think I'd also replace piece selection with piece construction, with each player receiving a set of building blocks - captures (c), orth-steps (o), diag-steps (d), slides (s), and leaps (l).
Looking at the FIDE set up we have:
Pawns => o/4 .or. (d/2 + c)
Knights => (d .and. o).l + c
Bishops => d.s + c
Rooks => o.s + c
Queen => (d.s + c) .or. (o.s + c)
giving totals of 16c, 7o, 9d, 6s and 2l
which could be expressed, for example, in terms of ranks (r) and files (f) as
c = sqrt(f.r).2
o = sqrt(f.r) - 1
d = sqrt(f.r) + 1
s = sqrt(f.r) - 2
l = sqrt(f.r) - 6
So on a 10x10 board each player would get - 20c, 9o, 11d, 8s and 4l.
3. Range for ranks and files - I'd suggest 8 to 16.
Cheers
Graeme
Grayhawke,
Glad you like it! I think such a game would be interesting right from the beginning no matter how many games one has played.
I prefer alternating placement to the secret setup of screen Chess for several reasons. If white has to place first, this gives black a slight advantage during the placement phase as he can see where each white piece goes before he places his; this might make up for white's first move advantage. Hidden information games like Kriegspiel and Screen Chess can be fun, but I think their spirit is somewhat different than that of Chess. Chess is all about being able to see everything going on - the question is just whether one can see farther than one's opponent.
I do like the concept of piece construction, but I don't think such a game would catch on with the Chess-playing public (not that any variant will with the most conservative elements, but I digress… :) ). I think only those of us who enjoy Chess theorizing would play such a game. Any replacement for OrthoChess would have to be simple enough for an eight year old to learn and complex enough to engage grandmasters, as with Chess itself. Granted that having to learn the moves of a few hundred pieces is not trivial…but if the moves are all based on combinations of just a few elements, I think it's managable.
8 to 16 sounds like a good range. I love 7x7 boards - Christian Freeling's Dragonfly is one of my favorite variants - but I have a feeling that smaller boards amplify white's advantage. I love the idea of a Go-esque 19x19 Chess game, but such a large game would probably take a ridiculous length of time to play.
I think I'll try to work out a humbler version of this and post it. Maybe something with fixed board size and pawns and/or a list of acceptable pieces. The idea is more of a meta-game than a game at the moment, so I think we could get a number of different variants out of this. Free placement is something that has been underused, in my humble opinion.
joshua
I'm working on a game that combines all the major version of chess from around the world. I'll go into more detail later.
I would propose the following answer, as a "Chess of Tomorrow" project. Let's come together, organize what the variant community has, from its pieces, to its set ups (shuffle, drops, etc), to win conditions, and then have a toolbox people can "roll their own". These "roll your own" variety should be able to mapped to the system and parts laid out. I believe also that part of the community should come up with a one step off base from FIDE Chess, that will then allow as many variant hooks into it.
From here play the different varieties and see what works. Then play this. Have it embrace all the flavors of the chess variant community but one that let's everything be best of breed. Have the cream rise to the top, and you have the future of chess.
Just my take on this. And to this end, I would offer The IAGO Chess System as a piece to consider, rip apart, and perhaps take bits and pieces. We can rebuild it, make it stronger, faster…
By the way, I believe Chess960 can be part of the answer. Also, I believe since chess is an abstraction of war, people give thoughts to the elements in war, and see what can be added in an abstract manner to chess.
By the way, if anyone is working on the project, please speak up here:
http://chessvariants.wikidot.com/forum/t-51667/chess-of-tomorrow-project-who-is-interested
hey, Rich - your link is broken - you left an "example.com" or somesuch in the html code Joe
Ok, I edited it to this:
http://chessvariants.wikidot.com/forum/t-51667/chess-of-tomorrow-project-who-is-interested