[HN Gopher] 4-Die Chess
___________________________________________________________________
4-Die Chess
Author : memorable
Score : 40 points
Date : 2022-08-13 09:11 UTC (2 days ago)
(HTM) web link (erinbern.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (erinbern.com)
| mark_l_watson wrote:
| Not for me, but each to their own.
|
| I like to play Stockfish, with the playing level set so I win or
| lose about half the time.
|
| For dice games, Backgammon is just about a perfect game, and
| skill matters.
| timbit42 wrote:
| No game with random elements (eg. dice) can ever be perfect.
| bena wrote:
| I don't think he's using it in the same manner you may be.
|
| A game can have random elements and still be "perfect".
| Because his perfect game may be a game where he can lose due
| to variance. There is something to seeing if you can play
| around variance. That way there's always a way the game can
| be challenging.
|
| Unlike games with perfect information and no variance. Those
| games can be completely solved (given enough resources). And
| I think that's what you're thinking of, games with perfect
| information.
| marcofiset wrote:
| I would've liked an explanation on why each of these rules were
| added to the game. As an advanced-beginner chess player, most of
| those new rules add needless complexity to the game and seem to
| serve absolutely no purpose.
|
| > Each player rolls the die, and the number is the amount of
| turns each player has.
|
| I'll have to think about this. My knee-jerk reaction was to call
| this "absolutely ridiculous". It may hold some potential upon
| further thought.
| backpackviolet wrote:
| It's for fun. It takes playing pieces most people have
| available, rules many are familar with, and makes a new game
| with just a few more rules. For fun.
| bena wrote:
| But what if it's not fun? "For fun" is trying to dodge valid
| criticisms of the ruleset provided.
| flyaway123 wrote:
| I agree that more clarification is necessary for this to be
| adopted mainstream, however that didn't seem to be the
| intention of the article. i.e. 'fun' for 2 persons knowing
| each other is highly subjective.
|
| Think of it the other way - some people find it fun just by
| throwing the dice in turns and whoever has the larger
| number wins. In this case, there's even a chance for
| whoever has the huge disadvantage (unlucky) to make a
| comeback. In cases where it's fatal, either those are added
| as exceptions e.g. re-roll, or accepted as auto-win. Not
| unlike some gambling games.
|
| My friends and I had fun adding different rules to existing
| way of playing various games. We might find out later on
| that the rule might be incomprehensive, which we could
| either discard or adjust. It might also never be perfectly
| balanced. Either way we definitely had fun.
|
| I take the article as more of a "story sharing" than a "new
| specification" for chess.
| bena wrote:
| The bulk of the post is a description of the new rules
| with a small anecdote about why they were created.
|
| It seems like the intention of the article was to share
| the rules. As such, we should be able to discuss those
| rules. And this person would like to know the reasoning
| behind the rules as that does give insight. Maybe the
| rule is counter to the actual goal of the rule and would
| be better served by another rule. Or to get rid of it
| entirely.
|
| Because even chess hasn't always been chess. Chess has
| been developed over years and settled into its state
| after a lot of refinements.
|
| "It's for fun" is a thought terminating phrase.
| tetha wrote:
| > I'll have to think about this. My knee-jerk reaction was to
| call this "absolutely ridiculous". It may hold some potential
| upon further thought.
|
| I'm not sure, but my gut feeling is that every roll above 3 and
| maybe even equal to 3 is an immediate checkmate or at the very
| least a crushing advantage. Like, rolling a 4 on the first move
| wins the game, rolling a 3 wins the queen, ... that much tempo
| is devastating.
|
| However, it does remind me of a rather funny chess variant. In
| that variant, each player has three D6 and each face value
| corresponds to a piece - 1 for a pawn, 2 for a knight, and so
| on. Each turn, you roll your 3 dice and you can make one move
| with either of the pieces you rolled.
|
| This ends up being pretty instructive, because you really have
| to activate all pieces because you might not roll your most
| active pieces on a turn.
| backpackviolet wrote:
| > Like, rolling a 4 on the first move wins the game
|
| No, that and your checkmate concerns are almost certainly why
| they came up with this rule:
|
| "The rest of a piece's moves are forfeited if a check is
| obtained."
|
| So you cannot move and strike the King is the same moveset,
| and your opponent will have 1-4 moves to counter/flee.
| Hasu wrote:
| 1. e4 2. Bc4 3. Qf3 4. Qxf7 (or the same with turns 2 and 3
| reversed, the final move can also be the bishop) wins with
| the first check being a checkmate.
| xnorswap wrote:
| E4 Bc4 Qf3 Qf7#
|
| There is no check there until checkmate is delivered.
|
| If the enemy is then allowed to play 4 moves to capture the
| queen while the king is in check then that implies illegal
| moves are allowed in the intermediate moves.
|
| But if illegal moves are allowed then white can open with
| 1. Qxd8 Qxa8 Qxh8 Qd1 because once illegal moves are
| allowed then the whole game devolves a step further.
|
| Accurately encoding the rules of games in a manner that
| does not allow for loopholes is a really hard problem. Just
| look at golf. A simple game in which you hit a ball into a
| hole in the shortest time yet the "official" (R&A) rules
| run to 230+ pages and has frequent updates to fix issues.
|
| Cricket appears to be a far more complex game yet the laws
| of cricket as published by Wisden actually comes in at a
| slightly shorter 208 pages.
| zimpenfish wrote:
| > you hit a ball into a hole in the shortest time
|
| Technically the "fewest number of strokes" rather than
| "the shortest time", I think?
|
| (apologies if there's a speed-golfing community)
| Someone wrote:
| There is, with each stroke counting for 60 seconds
| (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Speed_golf)
| jjnoakes wrote:
| > that implies illegal moves are allowed in the
| intermediate moves
|
| Seems simple enough to define illegal moves as moves that
| end your turn in check, which is basically the same
| definition as regular chess. I don't immediately see the
| problem there.
|
| > if illegal moves are allowed then white can open with
| 1. Qxd8 Qxa8 Qxh8 Qd1
|
| This isn't the same thing at all...
| xnorswap wrote:
| But the rule in chess is actually:
|
| > No piece can be moved that will either expose the king
| of the same colour to check or leave that king in check.
|
| And you're right that you can re-write that rule, but my
| point is that it needs to actually be done here, which it
| hasn't been.
|
| I'm not trying to shit on these rules, I'm just
| highlighting the difficulty in actually writing
| consistent rules.
| jjnoakes wrote:
| Right, I didn't say the rule in chess was exactly that,
| but "basically" that - which effectively is the same.
|
| The rules could certainly be written out in more
| legalese, but I found them easy to understand as-is
| without resorting to suggesting that the queen could also
| start ignoring and moving through pieces at will.
| dev_tty01 wrote:
| >I'm not sure, but my gut feeling is that every roll above 3
| and maybe even equal to 3 is an immediate checkmate or at the
| very least a crushing advantage. Like, rolling a 4 on the
| first move wins the game, rolling a 3 wins the queen, ...
| that much tempo is devastating.
|
| That advantage is held in check, so to speak, by the check
| limited turns. Once a piece has put an opponent in check, it
| can't move again. Other pieces cannot put the opponent in
| check on the same move. That still creates the possibility of
| checkmate in one turn, but remember that the opponent will
| likely also get multiple moves to get out of the situation.
| Assuming that the in-check player can use all of their moves
| to get out of check, they might get 3 or 4 moves with which
| they can wipe out the advantage gained by the other player on
| the previous move.
|
| Of course, if the in-check player only happens to get one
| move then it is probably over. Basically, this injects a
| significant level of chance into gameplay and it speeds up
| the game. Its really a different game. The more I think about
| it the more interesting it becomes.
|
| To make it more even handed and less dependent upon chance,
| it could be done with only 2-3-4 move turns. Being allowed
| only a single move after an opponent had 4 moves is a
| disaster. Or maybe a limit on the delta between move counts
| for successive turns.
| xnorswap wrote:
| Oh absolutely, just 1 or 2 moves would be more than enough to
| really shake things up and make players far more defensive.
|
| Three moves are generally crushing and four is totally
| unplayable. There aren't many positions where four moves for
| your opponent won't get you checkmated.
|
| There is general chess advice of "Give you opponent three
| free moves, what would they do?"
|
| But even that advice implies those moves would be sensible
| moves, i.e. not just hang pieces in the intermediate moves.
|
| Perhaps if pieces couldn't move en-prise in the intermediate
| moves it would be improved but I think 3 or 4 moves would
| still be crushing.
|
| Even a single tempo loss is a big concession, to the point
| where in some opening lines players will happily sacrifice a
| pawn to be a tempo up with a good attack (e.g. Smith-Morra).
|
| It feels like there are missing rules about not being able to
| capture in intermediate moves (or a capture ending the whole
| turn). Given 4 moves a queen could trivially capture three
| enemy pawns/pieces then move to a safe square. Even just
| capturing two pieces and moving to safety would be a decisive
| advantage.
| twright wrote:
| I mostly agree but I think the complexity is explicitly the
| purpose and some people like that.
| seunosewa wrote:
| A good simplification: Toss a coin before each play. If it
| lands on a tail, you lose your turn.
| egypturnash wrote:
| Alternately: heads, two turns; tails, one turn. Having a
| "turn" where all you do is say "I don't have anything I can
| do" sucks all the fun out of a game at very, very high speed.
|
| "I keep getting tails and you keep getting heads, this sucks"
| is still a problem but it's not going to be quite as bad as
| "dude I never even got to move and you won, let's play
| something else".
| twright wrote:
| If the player going first rolls 4 or more they can checkmate? e4
| Bc4 Qf3 Qf7# (for White with a mirror equivalent for Black) With
| closer reading I think there's a missing rule where you just move
| a single piece that many times?
| jjnoakes wrote:
| I assume it is only checkmate if black's reply can't get him
| out of check by the end of his turn.
| backpackviolet wrote:
| No, there is a rule in there that pieces causing Check forfeit
| further moves.
| vlovich123 wrote:
| There is no check in op's stated list of moves
| olddustytrail wrote:
| This article is not intended to be serious. Read the rules
| carefully: none of them make sense.
| dmos62 wrote:
| Cheers. I find it stimulating when people rethink something
| that's seemingly set in stone. Rules for chess in this case.
| karmakurtisaani wrote:
| There are actually dozens of chess variants out there. Yet, the
| classic version seems to remain the most popular.
| ZetaZero wrote:
| Today's "classic version" is just a variant that allows pawns
| to move two squares on their first move.
| karmakurtisaani wrote:
| You know, at this point I can't even imagine HN without the
| all encompassing pedantry.
| cyrialize wrote:
| Is this in reference to how chess was played in India
| (Chaturanga)? I've been reading a book on Sultan Khan [0],
| and it talks about the many different ways Chess was
| played.
|
| Interestingly enough, the only common rule amongst all the
| different versions of Chess (since it changed depending on
| where you lived) was that the pawn always went one space.
|
| [0]: https://www.amazon.com/Sultan-Khan-Servant-Champion-
| British/...
| Imnimo wrote:
| >The opposing player has 1-turn to defend, or remove, the king
| from danger.
|
| Does this mean that if I am put in check, regardless of what I
| roll on the die, my king must be out of danger after my first
| move?
| xnorswap wrote:
| Very few of these rules make sense without more clarifying rules.
|
| Never-mind the impossibility of Kings playing en-passant, there
| is also the concept introduced of "higher piece" without defining
| an order. Can a bishop upgrade to a knight? Can a knight upgrade
| to a Bishop? Can a rook upgrade to a bishop?
|
| Despite the popular "valuing" of pieces, they aren't actually in
| the rules of chess and need to be stated.
|
| > If a king is within its starting row, it can castle with both
| rooks.
|
| What does it mean to castle with _both_ rooks? Is that a typo for
| "either"?
|
| Also it seems to suggest that you can move the king along the
| starting rank and still castle later. How would that work if your
| king was on b8 for example?
|
| This is a strange kind of nonsense. It shows the difficulty of
| translating some home-brew rules into actual rules that others
| can follow.
| bena wrote:
| With a 4 sided die, the game will end on the first turn about
| 6% of the time. The Scholar's mate takes 4 moves. And if the
| other player rolls a 1, then it's a win for white.
|
| Yeah, kings playing en-passant, rule 2, seems useless. The king
| moves in all eight directions, you can just like, take the
| piece. If the two kings try to pass each other, the passing
| king will check the opposing king, end the turn, then you just
| take the piece. Unless you're automatically checking the piece
| when your turn starts, in that case, it's just a stalemate as
| each king is checking the other at the start of the turn and
| ending the turn.
|
| Third rule is just promotion but for all pieces. This is just
| saying "and everything becomes a queen".
|
| Fourth rule is just a more relaxed version of castling.
|
| Fifth rule is to just get new pieces on the board, because
| otherwise, the game ends in a draw. No one is going to
| willingly put their king next to the other king. Also "starting
| position" is kind of nebulous. There are 8 of them. Do I get to
| choose which column to start the pawn on? After that, it's just
| a race to promotion.
|
| The rule about allowing another turn after check just extends
| the game. And unless you roll a 1, you should be able to get
| out of most checkmates.
|
| This is adding more rules, not adding complexity. Every rule is
| to make the game easier, removing restrictions. The die lets
| you get around the 1 move per turn rule. Rule 2 is pretty much
| for decoration. Rule 3 gets you faster promotions. It's about
| who can get to the opposite row first. Rule 4 makes castling
| easier. Rule 5 is about not wanting a draw. Because with Rule
| 1, sometimes the king can take a queen with no assistance. This
| is a game the creator thinks is brilliant and thinks shows how
| smart they are because they are virtually undefeated because
| all of their opponents eventually get tired of playing because
| it's just so tedious.
|
| It's like all the rules added to Monopoly. They're all to make
| the game "more fair" or "better", but all they wind up doing is
| making the game take longer because no one wins.
| pc86 wrote:
| I think the en-passant rule is a bit more clever than you're
| giving it credit for. At the root of en-passant is that a
| pawn moving into the space the opposing pawn "skipped" allows
| you to take it, but only if done immediately.
|
| So we're playing this version, down to just two kings, I roll
| a 4 and move from E6 to E2. If you're at G3, and you roll at
| least a two, you can move over to E3 and capture me en-
| passant. Or at least that's my understanding of the rule. You
| moved into a square my king was occupying in the turn[s]
| immediately following mine.
| bena wrote:
| That just seems... bad.
|
| Also easy to circumvent by moving along diagonals. You can
| even zig-zag your move so you can wind up where you want. I
| could go E6-D5-C4-D3-E2, then you couldn't en passant to
| E3. Not that you could do it on E3 as that would put you in
| check and isn't allowed. But G4 to E4 is a legal move with
| the same outcome in your scenario.
|
| I really can't see a way that you'd be able to en passant a
| king that's not easily routed around or just illegal.
|
| It also violates the concept that you're taking multiple
| turns. You can capture a pawn en passant because the pawn's
| double move is a relatively recent rule. It's solely to
| make sure you can't avoid capture by using the double move.
| But it's still a single turn.
|
| The die roll lets you move that many pieces. As N distinct
| turns. If the turns would have played out one-by-one, it
| wouldn't be allowed as a player can't put their own king in
| check, and even if they were allowed, the opposing player
| could just take the king in response.
|
| And it's no longer "in passing" if it's from several
| columns away.
| Someone wrote:
| > Also "starting position" is kind of nebulous. There are 8
| of them. Do I get to choose which column to start the pawn
| on?
|
| I think you would have to. If the location is predictable, my
| king would be next to the place that pawn spawns at, ready to
| take it.
|
| If you can choose the column, my king would be in one of the
| four center fields, and still would win the race to take it,
| but if you're smart, you place one in column A first, force
| me to run there, and then place one in column H.
|
| On the other hand, once you're on the last row, you can spawn
| a new pawn every second move, but so, likely, can I. This
| might be interesting to analyze.
| ulkesh wrote:
| This assessment is exactly what went through my brain when
| reading the list. It's great if it's fun for the author and
| their gaming partner, but I, for one, would never play this.
| It's way too ambiguous and adds chance in a game that is
| designed not to have chance in the game (aside from who plays
| white).
|
| I'm probably an elitist board gaming snob, but I prefer games
| that have a lot of player agency and as little luck involved
| as possible. Chess, Go, Diplomacy (though you may lose some
| friends), and Scythe (which has some instances of luck, but
| has mitigation mechanics) all come to mind. Granted most
| popular games will have elements of luck because it can add
| to replay-ability.
| anonymoushn wrote:
| > What does it mean to castle with both rooks? Is that a typo
| for "either"?
|
| The king moves two squares in both directions (you have two
| kings now) and the rooks move to the other sides of the kings,
| so you finally have KR_RK where you had __K__ before.
| dev_tty01 wrote:
| It is for fun. If any thing needs to be clarified, you and your
| opponent make a decision and then play the game. Maybe you do
| multiple games using different variants and see what works
| best. I don't think the author is proposing a new game
| standard. They are just trying to describe a variant that they
| found enjoyable.
|
| I agree that some things need to be clarified, but that's part
| of the fun. You are correct that this does point out the
| difficulty in converting home-brew to a formalized game.
| However, that doesn't make it nonsense. Just think of it as a
| good starting point.
| vlovich123 wrote:
| I agree but not for the reasons you've stated. The rules you
| have complaints about seem to have straightforward
| interpretations.
|
| On reaching the last row it's the same promotion rules as
| pawns.
|
| Re castling what they're saying is that you can keep castling
| with rooks provided your king has never left the home row (ie
| the rook would have to leave to let you castle with the other
| one). A7 implies the king has left the home row and can no
| longer castle.
|
| I do agree that there is ambiguity to clarify though:
|
| * where is the castled position when the rooks aren't in their
| starting position?
|
| * what on earth does en pessant mean for kings?
| xnorswap wrote:
| Sorry, I meant b8 not a7.
| zuminator wrote:
| I thought the castling section meant, not that they could
| castle multiple times, but that unlike normal chess they
| could still castle after moving the king as long as it
| remained in the home row.
|
| You might very well be correct though. So I agree with the
| previous poster that there's too much ambiguity here.
|
| One thing I'd like to know is the ELO rating of the variant
| creator. Is this a game that someone who understands standard
| chess very well came up with and play-tested, or is it a game
| that someone with passing familiarity with chess thought of
| off the cuff? If the latter, the chances that the game is a
| well-balanced variant are not so high.
|
| Also, is "baring" a typo for "barring"?
|
| Finally it should be noted that dice chess is already a
| thing: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dice_chess
| cactacea wrote:
| > Never-mind the impossibility of Kings playing en-passant,
|
| Players can make more than one move:
|
| "Each player rolls the die, and the number is the amount of
| turns each player has."
| anonymoushn wrote:
| Can you explain your interpretation of the rule so that other
| people who think it means something can compare notes?
|
| For pawns, en-pessant means "a pawn may, during the move
| immediately following another pawn's move, capture another
| pawn that has chosen to move two spaces in one move as if it
| had only moved one space." I think for kings you would like
| to say "a king may, during the sequence of many consecutive
| moves by the same player, capture another king that
| immediately before has made many moves in a row by attacking
| a space it moved into in one of those moves but no longer
| occupies."
| rawling wrote:
| Why do kings need en-passant?
| clan wrote:
| It seems like they play until you have a winner. With only
| kings left (with normal chess rules) you would have a remis
| (draw). Kings are simply not allowed to move into a threatened
| position.
|
| Edit: No it does not make much sense. Re-read the rules. I'll
| be the old grump who prefers the old vanilla boring rules.
| rawling wrote:
| Yeah, but I don't see how en passant helps with this. If you
| can get them en passant by going diagonally, you can get them
| normally by going sideways, but they'd have just taken you
| instead of passing in the first place...
| marcofiset wrote:
| I don't know and it's not even possible. One of the kings would
| need to get next to the other, which is an illegal move.
| jjnoakes wrote:
| One king can walk two spaces on a turn without getting too
| close to the other king. Then the other king might roll high
| enough to land on a square that the first king passed through
| on the previous turn.
| blowski wrote:
| I really like the challenge of taking a well-known set of rules
| and adding some new ones. I'd like the author to clarify a few of
| the questions, but the spirit of this is great.
| isolli wrote:
| This is my favorite chess variation:
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bughouse_chess
| m_eiman wrote:
| One of my ideas for a toy project is Schrodinger's Chess or
| perhaps Quantum Chess:
|
| when you move a piece, you can move it to any and all possible
| squares at the same time - your piece is on all of the squares
| you've placed it, so in your opponent's next move they can
| eliminate your piece by attacking any of the positions it's
| currently in.
|
| In your own next move, you can move the piece from any of the
| positions it's currently in and place it in a new set of
| positions.
|
| Eliminating or moving a piece removes it from all positions it's
| currently in.
| dfan wrote:
| You may be interested in Quantum Chess
| (https://quantumchess.net/how-to-play/).
| j_m_b wrote:
| To determine who goes first, you can just have one player select
| even or odd, then both role dice. The even/odd of the sum of both
| dice determines who goes first.
| aloisdg wrote:
| or go for the coin throw directly
| atilimcetin wrote:
| My favorite chess variant is duck chess: https://duckchess.com/
| (and HN discussion:
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31429290)
| jstanley wrote:
| What's the benefit of rolling a 4-sided die to decide who goes
| first, over flipping a coin? Each player has 50% chance of going
| first, except with a single coin flip there can't be a tie.
| wang_li wrote:
| How does one decide who flips the coin. Whoever flips is at a
| disadvantage since the coin is flipped on a tie of die roles.
| The outcomes of the flip are another die roll or the other
| player goes.
|
| Also quite strange that you can't quit until there are 3 pieces
| per player left. How is that supposed to be enforced? Domestic
| violence or something?
| Karliss wrote:
| I guess this might be due to using the same dice to decide how
| many moves you can do in each turn.
| verytrivial wrote:
| I think they're non-binary.
| tromp wrote:
| It fits in with the overall theme of adding unnecessary
| complexity:-?
| backpackviolet wrote:
| Uses the D4 motif that this variant is based on? If anything,
| why have a coin flip to resolve the tie? Just re-roll the D4
| and stay in-universe
| jstanley wrote:
| In that case you could roll a single d4 and give one player
| the odd numbers and the other player the even numbers.
| samatman wrote:
| With the additional advantage that the original rules need
| 2d4, but only once, at the very beginning.
| yewenjie wrote:
| After something like 1.e4 (or basically any move) if black gets 4
| moves, they can just checkmate white and the game ends.
___________________________________________________________________
(page generated 2022-08-15 23:02 UTC)