Nordlandia wrote:Does the value of the pawn enhance slightly due to new promote options?
Doubtful, except maybe when it can promote to Amazon. Even in that case any enhancement will be small. None of the other new pieces are worth more than a Queen.
The value of a passed pawn is really that of the least valuable piece that the opponent is willing to sacrifice to prevent promotion.
Hi
I intend to "enhance" the power of the pawns (only 3 or 4), a trial to avoid some closed positions and many endings finishing with a draw.
When giving the pawn some extra properties when it crosses half the board this gives the pawn a bonus.
When giving the pawn (i'll name those new super pawns the Musketeers) other rules such as the possibility to move in diagonal (for a limited number of moves) this also gives the pawn more power.
My aim is not to "denature" the soul of chess, but to give some extra possibilities (in certain positions or for a limited number of moves) sothat the strategical, tactical patterns will be more rich and there will be plenty of other possibilities.
Concerning the powers of the new pieces, i find that the best pieces are: Cannon, Leopard, Hawk and Unicorn.
In fact those new pieces are of intermediary power between the light and heavy pieces. In some positions they are much more valuable than the Rook, especially during the opening and middle game. The more pieces are traded the less "valuable" these pieces become.
They cannot replace the light pieces (except unicorn is a super knight) because the light pieces are still of importance especially the Bishop whom value is approaching 400 or more centipawns because it's the only light piece capable of attacking these new pieces.
The knight's value is also a little bit enhanced (=350 centipawns), but the relative value of Knight and Bishop will drop if the new pieces are exchanged.
These new relative values need to be tested. I'm still waiting for strong engines playing Musketeer Chess. For the moment only a few trials i made on Zillions of games are by far the best engines. Those developed by our friends on Winboard are unfortunately very weak.
inventor of Musketeer Chess. A modern commercial chess variant.
musketeerchess wrote:
These new relative values need to be tested. I'm still waiting for strong engines playing Musketeer Chess. For the moment only a few trials i made on Zillions of games are by far the best engines. Those developed by our friends on Winboard are unfortunately very weak.
Well, SjaakII is not, and never will be, a strong engine - it's far too general for that.
However, Zillions should normally be much weaker. Can you provide a sample game between the two?
I tried the engine playing classic games and I easily win each time. Zillions is strange when playing as it plays for example the flank pawns (moves like a6 b5 for example without developing his pieces) which gives a positional advantage for white (when I play white). But apart from the opening phase where it doesn't perform well it is capable of putting good middle game complications and to win. I'll certainly publish here a few games vs zillions with some wins but also losses
inventor of Musketeer Chess. A modern commercial chess variant.
Hi
The pair Bishop bonus is too small to account significantly in case you have two archbishops.
The bonus is important because each Bishop controls a different color whereas the archbishop due to hybrid capabilities could control all the squares (white and black squares). That's why this bonus is not at all important
inventor of Musketeer Chess. A modern commercial chess variant.
"Trading archbishop for two bishops can be considered a fair trade, mainly due to the bishop strength increase on wider board variations and the pair advantage subsequently."
I think the archbishop sligthly stronger than the pair of Bishops.
It's simply due to the fact that the Archbishop can control all the squares on the board (black and white alternatively) but does not need coordination whereas for the Bishop pairs even if they are a strong association but they need coordination to be efficient and strong.
inventor of Musketeer Chess. A modern commercial chess variant.
