[HN Gopher] Can Chess, with Hexagons? [video]
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Can Chess, with Hexagons? [video]
Author : miiiiiike
Score : 94 points
Date : 2023-07-12 13:35 UTC (9 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (www.youtube.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (www.youtube.com)
| nubinetwork wrote:
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=36679545
| TheDudeMan wrote:
| Yesterday it was lasers, today hexagons. Tomorrow, hexagonal
| laser chess.
| jedc wrote:
| Great Wikipedia reference about this here:
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hexagonal_chess
| wirrbel wrote:
| There are multiple hexagonal Chess variants, there is a Wikipedia
| article on that: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hexagonal_chess
|
| I am implementing a chess engine for Polgar star chess for fun
| currently
| Mountain_Skies wrote:
| In the almost Chess domain, I loved the 3M/Avalon Hill game
| 'Feudal', which was Chess-like but with more types of pieces,
| more complex movements, and terrain types.
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Feudal_(game)
| jmiskovic wrote:
| The Duke is another chess variant I'm fascinated by. It's still
| on rectangular grid, with more varied rules for each piece
| movement and attack patterns. What I find interesting is that
| these rules are inscribed on game pieces themselves. Some pieces
| even change their patterns after their action, by flipping over
| their tile and exposing the alternate pattern. I find this
| concept of game rules moving around the board alluring for some
| reason.
|
| https://boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/36235/duke
| kevinpet wrote:
| It doesn't make sense to me why pawns attack on a file (adjoining
| hexagons) rather than diagonal (hexagon pointed to but separated
| by the side between two others).
| mkehrt wrote:
| A youtube comment points out that this allows pawn walls which
| protect each other and block on file moves, just like in real
| chess.
| wakamoleguy wrote:
| In the final state where white resigns, it looks like the king
| could simply capture the queen instead. Wasn't it unprotected?
| amflare wrote:
| Yes, he mentioned in a comment[0] that he got his hex diagonals
| confused.
|
| > My brain was clearly too melted by that point -- I got my hex
| diagonals confused. CURSE YOU DIAGONALS! [0]: h
| ttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bgR3yESAEVE&lc=Ugz_oSLguMoeaVkug
| GN4AaABAg.9s-LI3bFJ389s-M7pcbfF2
| 1lint wrote:
| This brings back memories of first playing civ5, which used a
| hexagonal grid
| Aerroon wrote:
| I really don't like the diagonal moves.
| hammock wrote:
| One of the earliest computer games I played was 3-level chess
| (https://images.chesscomfiles.com/uploads/v1/article/288.2f44...)
| on like a Tandy PC computer (DOS)
| mikewarot wrote:
| Why aren't there 3 players? It could be scaled that way.
| wirrbel wrote:
| There is a hexagonal shogi variant with 3 players
|
| The problem is that 2 players kind of would team up to get the
| third player out of the game which is imbalanced. Than you have
| a 2 player game ..
| mr_toad wrote:
| But there is the possibility of betrayal and switching sides.
| In a winner takes all game as soon as one player looks like
| they're winning the weaker players have an incentive to gang
| up on them.
| globular-toast wrote:
| Is the title a joke that I don't understand?
| TheRealPomax wrote:
| No. It's literally what if chess, but hexagons.
| _nalply wrote:
| Now let's design chess variants on a hyperbolical plane!
| hinkley wrote:
| Red Queen problem?
| rini17 wrote:
| Or aperiodic tiles. There you can have every game with
| different "map".
| apendleton wrote:
| I've also seen several different variants for chess on a torus
| (imagined -- still played on a flat board, but you play as if
| each edge is connected to the opposite one). Pieces end up
| having basically the same allowed moves (IIRC the only required
| change is that a piece making a move where it loops around the
| board and back to its original position is disallowed), but a
| different initial setup is required, because given the regular
| one, both sides start the game already check-mated. For further
| brain-bending, you can do a Klein bottle instead of a torus.
| jerf wrote:
| Whenever you think to yourself that Chess, but X, would be
| interesting, you should just pop it into a search engine:
| https://boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/40511/hyperbolic-chess
|
| I say this not as a "you should have searched", but because
| it's _fun_. There are thousands of chess variants in the world
| ( https://www.chessvariants.com/Gindex.html ) and it's amazing
| where this simple game can be taken.
| qsort wrote:
| The problem with those variants is that they force the usual
| chess pieces in contexts where they don't really belong.
|
| Rooks and bishops follow the obvious geometry of the square
| chessboard. Knights are the natural complement of rooks and
| bishops: they move to any of the closest squares neither a rook
| nor a bishop could reach.
|
| Pawns defend each other and form the game's "structure".
|
| Queens are rather arbitrary (you could have rook+knight or
| bishop+knight instead of rook+bishop), but a strong piece is
| needed to allow for dynamic play.
|
| On an hexagon they don't really make sense. Is there a more
| "natural" set of pieces that's built on the geometry of an
| hexagon rather than being an awkward translation of the usual
| chess pieces?
| TheRealPomax wrote:
| If you watch the video, you'll find that on a hexagon, things
| make no less sense than on a grid and the folks who worked out
| hexagonal chess actually did a pretty great job preserving all
| those roles. Your brain just isn't use to hexagon logic.
| runarberg wrote:
| I find it kind of hilarious that whites first move can be 1.
| Qb4, past their beginning pawn wall, and staring right that
| blacks queen through blacks pawn wall, and where it is
| immediately taken by black's first move: 1... Qxb4
| hyperhopper wrote:
| Not specifically "hexagonal chess, but a very tactically
| similar hexagonal abstract strategy game called "Hive"[1] is
| very well regarded in the board game community and relevant to
| this discussion for anybody even tangentially interested.
|
| Personally, I think it's more worth spending your time looking
| into that than yet another variant of chess. Also if you get a
| hankering to play it, it is available on boardgamearena online.
|
| [1] https://boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/2655/hive
| Lyngbakr wrote:
| Hive is fantastic fun. I found it easy to learn, but that
| there was some strategic depth that really gave it replay
| value. An interesting aspect is that there isn't a board as
| such, rather the pieces together constitute the playing area
| which morphs as the game unfolds. It's a great on-the-go game
| since the pieces are tough and it's a convenient size to be
| chucked in a bag for the beach, train journeys, etc.
| jjnoakes wrote:
| The moves described in the video seemed like they were decent
| analogues to me. The bishop moved along the same color and
| could attack rooks and knights from safety and could slide
| between pieces. Rooks could attack bishops and knights safely.
| Knights could attack rooks and bishops and queens safely.
|
| What specifically did you think was way out of context?
| user070223 wrote:
| Interested in an engine piece valuation and "novelties" (like
| capture towards the edge, or perhaps overpowered openings)
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