Post by petejwatts on Oct 1, 2012 21:15:49 GMT -5
I once foun d two websites called "Why chess sucks". One was for novices who complained about the difficulty of the castling and en passant rules. The other was highly sophisticated critique by likely a striing player who was an expert on chess variants.
Superficially very different, there wasactually an overlap. Wrinkles like en passant and castling rules have resulted from an attmept to accelerate the game without upsetting the basic dynamics of the original.
conventional chess is a marvellous game of a depth and subtlety to still fascinate much brighter talents than me. However one problem results from the repeated use of the same start position combined with the very poor initial mobility, where only the pawns and knights can move and a long period of vulnerability to oening traps exist. Many people like this but I do not, as it forces the novice to either have great natural talent, or a willingness to learn lots of opening theory, and also the ability to deliver sucker punishes that have been known about for 700 years that you picked up from Youtube. Imo regular chess is better played in Fischer Random 960 format where the start position is randomized.
Hex and Circular chess solve this problem very well, particularly the former.Circular chess has neither En Passant or Castling and I dont know of any opening traps. Hex has En Passant but it could be played without it, and no castling.
The more common form has a great start position where every piece can move initially without moving a pawn first, so there is no awkward mobilization phase. The initial position is very strong with all the pawns well defended so there is no weakpoint like f2 and f7 in regular chess and no swift mates. Another form is slightly weaker and with a theoretical early smother mate, but almost certainly an improvement.
There is so much mobility that it appears to be essentially middle game from the gitgo and even though it has been played for decades from that same start position I doubt there was ever much opening theory as the possibilities are just too big. The same for Circular chess too. I now have sets for both variants.
So please folks, join me in the great delights of the Chess Variants. email watts_pete@hotmail.com or ask the Wookie when you see him in the park or Nero!
Superficially very different, there wasactually an overlap. Wrinkles like en passant and castling rules have resulted from an attmept to accelerate the game without upsetting the basic dynamics of the original.
conventional chess is a marvellous game of a depth and subtlety to still fascinate much brighter talents than me. However one problem results from the repeated use of the same start position combined with the very poor initial mobility, where only the pawns and knights can move and a long period of vulnerability to oening traps exist. Many people like this but I do not, as it forces the novice to either have great natural talent, or a willingness to learn lots of opening theory, and also the ability to deliver sucker punishes that have been known about for 700 years that you picked up from Youtube. Imo regular chess is better played in Fischer Random 960 format where the start position is randomized.
Hex and Circular chess solve this problem very well, particularly the former.Circular chess has neither En Passant or Castling and I dont know of any opening traps. Hex has En Passant but it could be played without it, and no castling.
The more common form has a great start position where every piece can move initially without moving a pawn first, so there is no awkward mobilization phase. The initial position is very strong with all the pawns well defended so there is no weakpoint like f2 and f7 in regular chess and no swift mates. Another form is slightly weaker and with a theoretical early smother mate, but almost certainly an improvement.
There is so much mobility that it appears to be essentially middle game from the gitgo and even though it has been played for decades from that same start position I doubt there was ever much opening theory as the possibilities are just too big. The same for Circular chess too. I now have sets for both variants.
So please folks, join me in the great delights of the Chess Variants. email watts_pete@hotmail.com or ask the Wookie when you see him in the park or Nero!