Beren the 32nd: I'm certainly a lot more cautious about castling. The extra diagonal moving piece (Cardinal) lessens the advantage of moving your King to the flank. Plus the Cardinal himself is a very good piece at harrassing the King, especially when he can trap him in the corner. Other times it pays to castle if you can get the Rook into play. It's hard to combine castling and getting the Rook to the file you need him on. So often times I don't castle and just move the Rook. If you survive the middle game it's good to have your King centered, so this is one reason to not castle. It can be a long walk back to the other side from castling. I go along with SMIRF Engine and also add how you think the Pawns might look later in the game. If they're going to afford some protection from an attack, then castling towards them can help the defense.

Fwiffo: I'm no master at either of them. My best game is Dark Chess, and as good as I am at it I still don't consider myself a master. I do like to play them both.

I'll delete the Embassy Chess invitations and send some Grand Chess ones in their place. Is a 3 day time OK, or a Fischer clock? 1.6 14.1?

Fwiffo: I'm know he does.

Want to play a couple of games of Embassy Chess?

WhiteTower: That's what I was thinking too.

HalfPawn: Does that site have other games on it? I wouldn't mind playing a game or two Embassy Chess or Dark Chess live.

If you can make the connection to the royals being on one side I would think you'd not have much trouble with the rest of the court being on the other side. Least ways that was the connection I was making. I suppose Cardinal side would work or Marshall side, but that's not consistant with royalside since you'd be naming one side for two pieces and only using one piece for the other side. None of it matters much as long as the people you're talking know what it is that you're talking about. Avoiding confusion is the main thing.

HalfPawn: Courtside is easy enough. It is the King's court, eh?

Thad: Nothing as long as you remember White's left is Black's right. I think the naming of the Kingside and Queenside predates the notation and was the traditional way to describe it. If you have books old enough it will say Queenside castles or just castles if there's no ambiguity, instead of using the zeroes.

Since Embassy Chess is mirrored like regular Chess it is probably preferable to emulate describing like things in each game in a similiar way. Kingside and Queenside will work just fine too, but I think some people would rather not call them that seeing how the King and Queen are on the same half of the board. Hence other names being thought up. It sounds like Reinhard has heard of people that already deal with this issue in other large board Chess games that have castling or notation of a like kind. I think I'll stick with royalside or courtside and name the square if there's a doubt. Seeing how I just play on this site and the notation is not something I have to deal with at the moment, it doesn't matter all that much. I brought the matter up for those that might play off line or who write their moves down and take them to show someone away from the computer. I'll also have to keep the M and C straight if I do want to write a game down, least ways until Fencer changes it over.

WhisperzQ: You can just say the King's ending square. A royalside castle would be a "B-file" castle. Not too pretty, but there's no doubt as to where the King is going. Either way works and is easy to remember plus you could say them both to remove all doubt.

What I have trouble remembering is which gets the three zeroes.

HalfPawn: I had this same problem and posted about it a few days ago. I suggested calling the side with the King and Queen; the Royalside, and the side with the Marshall and Cardinal; the Courtside. Royalside in honor of the royalty and Courtside in honor of the rest of the aristocracy. http://brainking.com/en/Board?bc=34&ngi=501381


I thought it was a sensible idea, but maybe you have one that'll work better? It seems easy enough to refer to the Royalside of the board and know which side you're talking about. Files A through E. And you can always just name the actual squares or files to avoid any misunderstanding or confusion if there's any doubt.

That post also had some comments about the naming of the pieces and the notation used on this site for the other games and for castling.

Caissus: Cool, I'm sure panzerschiff will appreciate it.

HalfPawn: I can't read French, so how am I to know what the articles and posts say? The graphics look as if lifted right from another page, especially how it shows the board. It does have a little English. It makes a point about four files being the same as regular Chess and the other side's three being the same too. IF that's a selling point for the superiority of the game, may I point out that Embassy Chess is even move Chess like in its set up with five files on one side being the same as in regular Chess and three on the other side. Not only that, but with the King being next to the Queen instead of spaced once, you get a lot of the same threats and themes as in regular Chess.

panzerschiff:
A booklet on Janus Chess is sold by Stephan Blasius, Lebacher Str. 30, 66606 St. Wendel, Germany, for DM 8, plus an extra amount for postage (Variant Chess mentions DM 3 for postage). Janus Chess sets are sold for over DM 100 by Schachhaus Madler, Wagenerstr. 5, D-01309 Dresden, Germany.

I found this at the Chess variants page.

Jules: Hi Jules, it was you and Pedro that replaced me as moderators of the Gothic Chess board, by the way. I don't have any hard feelings about it. The board wasn't in business much longer after that, a couple of months, say? And you both stayed on with its merged self here.

TheLamer: They haven't gone unnoticed, just not responded too. Least ways not until right now. Why should I lower myself to his level? I went to the link just now. I didn't see my name in those posts, but I had seen it somewhere else over there where he calls me a weak player and a few other things. He's entitled to his opinion of me. Unlike him, I never said I was all that good of a Chess player. Just because someone can play a game better than myself doesn't make them a better person. It just means they can play a game better than me. He even talks about his misadventures at the Run Around the Pond discussion board. We all know he never even played one game of it under his own handle, but he sure talked a good game of it. His well documented fear of losing any game prevented him from playing Ponds or Dark Chess. It is a shame too. I believe that Ed would probably be the best Dark Chess player of all if he'd just play the game. But as anyone that has played Dark Chess knows, you will lose a certain percentage of games from time to time no matter how well you play.

I just recently read all the posts on this board from it's creation until August 4th, 2004. How he was removed the first time as moderator is quite enlightening compared to how he reveals it on his web site. The first removal:
___________ _________ _________ ___________
Fencer 16. January 2004, 09:31:21
Hi Ed,
I don't like the way how you moderate Gothic Chess discussion board. There are currently 43 banned users and it is not normal. No other board has such problems. Moreover, even if you feel insulted by several other people, you cannot misuse the moderator function to solve your personal problems. A moderator must be kind of adaptable and show some basic diplomatic skills to do the job properly. I've been watching your activities for several weeks [or even months?] and, unfortunately, I don't think that you can moderate any BrainKing discussion board any longer.
I am taking over this board.
__________ _____________ ___________ __________
GothicInventor from the Gothic Chess site March 9th 2006
...so I left the moderator function of my own accord. I sent the message to Fencer myself. Subsequently, after several months, I was re-appointed moderator after whoever was in charge was removed, but I was acting in the capacity of co-moderator. I did very little moderation of any kind from that point forward. Again, a few months later, someone named "Bumble" then posted a comment one day saying "who wants to be moderator of this board", and that person took my place. There was no "ousting" of any kind as you suggested


This is not at all what happened. It is me that Bumble removed, not Ed. It was Fencer that Ed replaced as moderator when he came back the second time, not some other person. This happened way before I had ever played Gothic Chess or visited the discussion board. Somehow he got the moderator's job back a few months later. And again Fencer removed him after that time too. It is then that I was made moderator. On my very first visit to the discussion board! Fencer must've really been ticked off at Ed. When Ed was removed the second time there were no Global Moderators. July 9th, 2004 is when I became moderator. My first act was to unban everyone, including Ed. It is Fencer that banned him two more times while I was moderator. I only ever banned two people, danoschek and some guy that posted racial epitats about the losers of the world wars. I will continue my research of my own actions eventually. I learned a few things about people and moderating since those times. Ed's first banning caused a lot of trouble in the discussion board as he had a lot of friends get mad and flame the board as did his detractors. I generally let this go on for awhile. When I finally took sides with those that didn't agree with the game being patented, he went ballistic and got banned again. A few months went by in relative quiet as for some reason the groupies didn't do a "Bring back Ed" campaign this second time around. Then I started to get messages from Fencer to remove the ban on Ed. We sent a few messages about it and I did remove the ban. I also warned Fencer that Ed was trouble and I'd probably not survive as moderator. I was right, but not in how I thought I'd be. The global moderator's position was only a month or two old at this time. I was removed without any notice from them. I have posted at length about this on the BrainKing discussion board about a month after my removal last year. Ed's victory was a short lived one. Fencer abolished the Gothic Chess discussion board shortly thereafter and then removed Gothic Chess from the site completely.


If he wants to re-create history on his site, it is his prerogative. I am surprised that he's letting Thad have his say and that he is responding to Thad's assertions. I remember when Thad was one of Ed's supporters. It reminds me of the saying, "Friends come and go, but enemies accumulate."


Now that I've played a few games of Embassy Chess I can say the game is superior to Gothic Chess. Not by much, but it is a better game. I don't play the random version of it, so I can't speak for that version. I do know that if it wasn't for Ed and his intransigence over Gothic Chess, those two games would almost certainly not be on this site at this time.

Edit 3-17-6 After further research I have found I was wrong in some of my rememberances listed here. Fencer only banned Ed once while I was moderator, I banned him twice. And the guy with racial epitats was unbanned upon my ousting. I'm going to call it quits again as there's still another 14 pages for me to read.

http://brainking.com/en/Tournaments?trg=13972&trnst=0&u=2644

http://brainking.com/en/Tournaments?trg=14677&trnst=0&u=2644

JinkyOng: Yes, now if I could just take advantage of this flaw. :)

Walter Montego: The SMIRF offered a draw and I accepted. I wasn't able to see a way to profitably trade a Knight for a Pawn or two and try to get an attack going. I have the feeling SMIRF never would do that either.

So the game ended after 66 moves and no Pawns captured, nor a Pawn making a capture. I'll challenge SMIRF to another game in a few days. I'm thinking this game was a fluke, but there's something to thinking longer range even if it's just a vague plan in trying to beat a machine. We all know how much the nature of a game can change with the placement of even one Pawn.

ColonelCrockett: I'm thinking if I can figure how the machine evalutes a position and then get the position so that I'm control of it that the machine can be beat because they don't think outside of their programming. This must be why Pythagoras' methods work so well for him. I haven't defeated SMIRF in a long time.

Pythagoras, ColonelCrockett: A couple of moves ago I almost captured the Pawn on B4 with my Knight. I was thinking I'd take two of its Pawns and start marching mine, but I thought SMIRF would get his Marshall and Rook over to the Royalside and I'd regret doing it. So I'm back moving Knights around. It's Pawn by my King is something I might be able to capture. There are a couple holes in the wall that I can get into. I'm not used to playing in this manner. I'm thinking my best bet might be to force a passed Pawn by giving up a Knight and get it promoted.

Reinhard has from time to time through the game told me SMIRF's evalution of the points it keeps track of for a position. It would seem that you and SMIRF agree about the value of a Rook compared to Bishop in a position like this. It only had itself a Pawn up back then. I'll ask him what the score is again.

Still no Pawn captures or captured Pawns either.

I'm playing a game that has gone 47 moves without a Pawn capture. There might have been one 20 or so moves ago, but I stupidly let myself get Bishop skewered and had to retreat to a defensive posture. I've never played any game of Chess without a Pawn capture after maybe 30 moves, so I find this rather unusual. We'll be repositioning for some more moves and maybe I'll see a chance to attack the Pawn wall for something. As I'm playing against a machine it doesn't matter if you want to speculate or comment on the game or not.
http://brainking.com/en/ShowMove?g=1452511&m=2030


I was trying Pythagoras' plan of a strong Pawn center and then a sacrifice as a way to beat programs, but like I said I screwed up earlier. I told Reinhard that I didn't believe SMIRF had long range or grand view thinking and doubted that it'd be able to use it's material advantage to win the game with it locked up as it is.

JinkyOng: Ah, I misunderstood you. You are talking about the design of the pieces used to play the game over the board. That sounds like a good idea. I have never played any of these games except over the internet and just use the icons on the screen to make my moves. The Grand Chess designer has some pieces that look pretty good.

andreas: You asked this question in 2003, before I'd ever played a large board game of Chess. Caissus, Ed, and rabbitoid all had answers for you that I find interesting. Caissus' reply answers my question about German and it appears M and C work very well in that language. That's your native tongue isn't it SMIRF Engine Reinhard?
_________ ____________ ___________ ____________

andreas Names of new pieces in other languages 29. December 2003, 00:25:05

Is there any translation of new pieces names (Chancellor and Archibishop) in other languages? In particular, I am interested in German and Russian translations.
_________________ _________ _____________
Caissus 29. December 2003, 01:59:19

Ich denke auf Deutsch doch einfach "Kanzler" und "Kardinal".
__________ ____________ ____________
rabbitoid December 2003, 02:09:08

not good, think of the abbreviations for notation. how about Erzbischof?
____________ ________________ ___________
Caissus 29. December 2003, 02:17:47

Okay,the abbreviations is an argument (many K`s),but then better for the Chancellor: "Marschall" = M,the other usual synonym for this piece and "Bischof" = B,or we use the more usual "Kardinal" and the abbreviation "C"
____________ ____________ __________ ___________ _______
Grim Reaper 29. December 2003, 05:46:48

From the perspective of the Roman Catholic Church, there are Bishops, Archbishops, and 'special Archbishops' that are candidates for becoming the next Pope called Cardinals. You can be an Archbishop and still not be a Cardinal, but all Cardinals are at least Archbishops.

I am not sure if that adds clarity or confusion.

A Chancellor should be easier to translate into German, since that is an official Title of State. A Chancellor in American lingo can also be someone of Academic importance at a University.
_________ __________ ______ _______ ________

Walter Montego today! So it seems that M and C are a natural choice for all of these games in German. You guys all speak that language and still would rather have A and C. I'm confused about this.

HalfPawn: You know, now that you mention it the Marshall does bull his way in. Same M too. It doesn't fit with the name of the game though. An embassy has dignitaries and government representitives. Minotaurs are from mythology and live in caves right? I hadn't thought of the translation of the names. Isn't S used for Knight in Germany? Or is the N the standard for everyone nowadays?

andreas: Are you sure of that? Caspablanca had a number of different games called Capablanca Chess. 10 × 10 board too. The Chess variants site has a few of his game designs there.

http://www.chessvariants.org/large.dir/capablanca.html

It shows four different games and mentions that the names of the pieces were called other things besides Chancellor and Archbishop, though it doesn't say what.

http://www.chessvariants.org/large.dir/bird.html
Predates Capablanca's Chess various versions by 40 or 50 years.

Embassy Chess is made up from Bird's Chess not Capablanca Chess. The names of the pieces are those used in Grand Chess. Bird named the pieces Guard and Equerry, but those names don't seem too popular. I personally don't like the names Chancellor and Archbishop. One is a school official and the other's name is part of a piece already on the board. Whereas Marshall and Cardinal seem like good names. Marshall is the second strongest piece on the board and is a military general. The Cardinal is a powerful Bishop that can change colors to have the power of two Bishops.

As for changing them, the letters should match the names of the piece where it is practical. I remember when I first learned to play Chess, the Knight was written as Kt. But it's been N for a long time. M for Marshall and C for Cardinal, seems simple to me. What's so special about A and C? The C is conflicting with the name of the pieces. The A doesn't match any of the pieces. At least with the N for Knight you have the sound of the word Knight and you eliminate confusion with the K for King.

Seeing how it's kind of confusing to use the terms Kingside or Queenside when refering to which side one castles toward, I've been trying to think of some better names. It is true enough that we can use the regular Chess names and keep in mind what really happens, but seeing how the long castle is on the regular Chess Kingside in Embassy Chess it seems to me a different set of names would work better.
With the royalty on the one half of the board and the military and ecclesiastic leaders on the other it should be easy enough to just name them in that manner. A royalside castle would be moving the King to the "B" file and a courtside castle would be moving the King to the "H" file.
Yeah?

Fencer reversed 0-0-0 and 0-0 in relation to regular Chess notation, but they do match as to which side is the long side. Courtside gets the three 0's. There shouldn't be any confusion unless you are able to castle on either side that move. You can always write the square you move the King to to avoid ambiguity.

Now about them C's and A's! Fencer said a few months ago he was aware of the problem when he was talking about Grand Chess. Same piece names as in Embassy Chess. When Embassy Chess was added I asked about it and he said he was aware of it, but it had a low priority. Apparently it's an artifact of the Gothic Chess HTML notation used on this site. Ed Trice had a quip about the icons used for the Marshalls and Cardinals in both games too. Janus Chess has its "J" for Janus and the strange puppy icon. Maybe all it requires is every C and A changed in the HTML code to M and C respectively. If so, send the code over Fencer and I'll take it up and send it back. It's got to be less than a couple hundred edits, right? A rather tedious job, but I'll do it. If it requires something that requires programming knowledge, then no, I won't be able to help.

ColonelCrockett: I think you might want to try the regular round robin format if that's your goal of lots of games. Two games each player. From what I can see of this newly created tournament, the maximum number of players is four and the most games anyone will be able to play is two!

Pythagoras: So when Hermes gets back to Zeus about the doings here on earth the heavens will roil and boom with thunder and lightening? Yes, I can see the storm clouds forming now.

Though I prefer another analogy:
Nice fishing, looks like you got a live one or two.

Pedro Martínez: Thanks. That's interesting! I know little of the Olympus Gods. Hermes and Mercury aren't the same God? I guess I got confused with Romans and Greeks, eh?
Zeus and Jupiter and all.

I used to bank at Mercury Savings years ago and they used to pitch a mutual fund called "Hermes Fund". I guess I missed the evolution that Pythagoras noted. :)

Anyways, if anyone else would like a game or two of Embassy Chess, just let me know.

Edit: Or Janus Chess

Pythagoras: Mercury?

Pythagoras: Why do you keep addressing your replies to GOD?

HalfPawn: In the meantime, are you up for a game or two of Embassy Chess?

HalfPawn: You are showing a lot of naivete and a lack of the history of that game and its "inventor" on this site. Perhaps you should get to know Ed a little better and ask him yourself.

Pythagoras: You know, I've heard it said in plenty of places that machines have an advantage in speed Chess. I'm think what Colonel Crocket is also doing is having the guy using the computer to help with the moves also having to enter them into the online site. This would cost some of the advantage afforded the machine because of the human part of entering the move. If the moves are entered directly into the machine and then displyed immediately it seems the machines almost always win in speed Chess no matter how strong the opponent if they're good programs.

ColonelCrockett: It's hard not to. It is a part of the header of this board and the story of it is a big part of the reason that Capablanca Random Chess, Embassy Chess, and Grand Chess are on this site. Though I can see a reason to avoid it from the trouble such discussions caused in the past. It is still a good game, though I'm liking to play the other games more each day. I also have personal reasons not to play it.

ColonelCrockett: It is a good game. :) I'm glad it's here.

Walter Montego: All of these games are predated by Carrera's Chess which is over 300 years old. If you go to the Chess variants website it has a large page devoted to Capablanca Chess. He apparently used different sized boards and names for the pieces at different times. They show some of his versions and have links to the other games on that page too.
http://www.chessvariants.org/large.dir/capablanca.html

I see where the Lasker comes into it from reading the page. So you won't have to answer my question. Thank you.

HalfPawn: If you set up the Grand Chess pieces and then move the Rooks up on square each, the set up is the same as Embassy Chess. The game itself was made up out of Bird's Chess. Bird's Chess is on the Gothic Chess site along with Capablanca Chess. Bird made up his version in or around 1874. Capablanca in 1920's. Grand Chess is 1972. I think Gothic is from the late 90's. I'm not sure when the patent was granted but I think 2002. Embassy Chess in 2004 no patent. It gets its name from Modern Bird's Chess. MBC. I tried to get Fencer to add that to the rules section but aside from adding Kevin's name he left the little history blurb out of it. I've never seen a Lasker version of this kind of Chess. How's it go?

HalfPawn: http://brainking.com/en/GameRules?tp=74
Grand Chess is on this site. It is played on a 10 × 10 board. It has its own discussion board on this site too. It uses the same pieces as Bird's, Capablanca, Gothic, and Embassy Chess. Check the rules page out. The pieces are set up as in Embassy Chess except that the Rooks are back one row from the rest of the pieces. This game has no castling and the Pawns can promote on the 8, 9, or 10th row and can only promote to a piece that your opponent has captured from you. With the Rooks being able to move from the start of the game it has a different play to it than the other large games using these pieces. With all the other pieces up on the second and third rows it makes the play seem like a 10 × 8. It's a pretty good game. The back rows aren't too important later in the game. Early in the game they come handy. Besides positioning your Rooks, you can sometimes use the Cardinal to line it with a Bishop. Your King has space to run and he needs it. I'm fairly sure there are no quick checkmates in this game as there are in the others.
Fencer has added a link in the rules page to the inventor's page.

HalfPawn: The answer is yes. Chess Variants has it. I'm not sure how their deal works though. I've not joined their site.
http://play.chessvariants.org/pbm/presets/embassy.html

The game is only two years old. If Fencer had not added it to this site I have the feeling it would still be an obscure game in Kevin's mind not being played anywhere. I'm glad it's here. It's a good game.

I've tried it in one game so far. I did it wrong, or it's not the way for White to start. My opponent accepted the gambit and I've been covering my tracks since then. I thought his move after the check wasn't the best one for him, but he's taken the initiative in any case.

Pythagoras: On what do you base this developing pieces is easier in Gothic Chess than Embassy Chess? I don't have a problem getting my pieces out in Embassy Chess. If anything I've found it slightly easier than in Gothic Chess. The Cardinal and Marshall can both move as Knights from the start of the game and not step on each other. Not so in Gothic Chess. Embassy Chess seems to move fast too. Lots of trouble right from the start. It's going to take me awhile to figure what's going if I ever do. By the way, you are going to start moving next Monday? You can't develope them if you don't move them. :)

HalfPawn: SMIRF is a program that plays Chess and some Chess variants such as Embassy Chess, Capablanca Chess, Janus Chess, and Capablanca Random Chess (CRC). I believe it no longer supports Gothic Chess. He too had a falling out with the patent holder of Gothic Chess. He goes by SMIRFengine on this site. There's also a Colonel Cricket on this site.

Reinhard is the guy's name that has SMIRF. He has a website that tells you about SMIRF and some of the larger board Chess variants. One of the pages deals with assigning strength values to the pieces on a 10 × 8 sized board. A few people have different ideas about it and how the pieces might change in strength as a game progresses. This is to help one decide if it's wise to trade a Bishop for Knight. It's not always straight forward thing in regular Chess even if most people use the P=1 N=3 B=3 R=5 Q=9. The larger board makes some pieces worth less in value to others, so the positioning of the piece greatly affects its value. And then there's the newer pieces themselves. As a Queen is valued more than the two pieces it can move as, the Marshall and Cardinal can have this too.
http://www.chessbox.de/Compu/schachveri1_e.html

If you can read German, you should use that site's links for that. Reinhard's native tongue is German.

HalfPawn: As far as I know it is only played here. I made reference to it on a Chess variants Capablanca comments page, but the game has yet to get very widely known. It's only a couple of years old and it so similiar to the other four games of this type that it might be sometime before any of them become widely played. Gothic Chess would seem to have the most current players, but things change over time.
http://www.chessvariants.org/large.dir/capablanca.html

For some reason it's hard for the larger board variants to get many players. It's probably do to the lack of on hand playing equipment. If I ever get around to it, I'm going to make some larger Chess boards and some extra pieces. I'll still the problem of finding someone to play though. :(
That's why I play here. Regular Chess is tough enough for most people. These larger games with a couple extra unfamiliar pieces thrown in are just too much for a lot of people it seems. I like the games and think they're fun and challenging to play.

tedbarber: I just noticed that having the King and Queen side by and off center as they are in Embassy Chess makes the set up very similiar to the Queen's Gambit openings of regular Chess. The Queen cannot attack the King directly in Gothic Chess, but it is a really possibility in Embassy Chess as in regular Chess. The Kingside Bishop being further to the side now attacks Black's Queen's Pawn when it is moved two squares initially, so this will play a lot different.

I'll have to check this out some more. I had stopped trying the Queen's Pawn just recently and had been going with the Marshall's Pawn to start the game as White, but now I'll have to give the Queen's Pawn another look through. I suppose it's always a learning deal when there's no book or history on a game. For some reason I haven't tried opening the King's Pawn, even though that's my preferred opening in regular Chess. The Cardinal's Pawn looks to be trouble as it too isn't guarded when move two squares, but I'm kind of conservative in my approach to Chess. Those players that like to throw bait out there or like sacrificies can do that. As in Gothic Chess, the extra power on the board makes the King less safe and the opportunities to attack more.

HalfPawn: It is a game almost identical to this game http://brainking.com/en/GameRules?tp=41 and was derived from Bird's Chess and Capablanca Chess. Somewhere in that link to the Gothic site has the history of the game. I went to the link and it shows the set up. Compare it to Embassy Chess and you'll see they're very similiar games.

tedbarber: Current win rates on this site for Embassy Chess:

Statistics
White won 64 (48.48 %)
Black won 65 (49.24 %)
Draws 3 (2.27 %)

Seems fairly even so far.

tedbarber: You should try this game if you like diagonal threats! Them Januses make lots of trouble. I finally started to play Janus Chess a little better, but I think I like Embassy Chess more. Hard to say as I've not played Embassy Chess too many times yet. I did teach myself a couple good little traps in Janus Chess that I'm not having much success in emulating in Embassy Chess. So I'm starting from the ground up again. Would you like to play a game or two of Embassy or Janus Chess? Or anyone else? I like both games and should give you a run for your money. I move often, but on occasion I might not get to the game for up to four days. I need a new job! 3 or 4 day time limit should keep me from timing out.

I'm going to have to challenge the SMIRF again. Pythagoras gave me some pointers for playing against a machine, but I don't know if I'll be able to impliment them into my play against it. I still kind of like the "winging it" method of my play. :)

tedbarber: I've played both games, Gothic Chess and Embassy Chess, and I'm here to tell you that the Queens start the game on the same squares in both games! Also the Bishops are on the same squares, and the only other diagonal moving piece, the Cardinal (Archbishop in Gothic) is also on the same square. The only change in the game beside the minor thing of the naming of the pieces is the Kings and Marshalls are on different squares. I'll grant you the switching these two pieces might make a big difference in some of the openings, but the play will all be the same later in the game. Least ways in a way that us humans can tell apart. And by the way, neither of them move diagonal. What do you mean by the long diagonal? Are you sure you're playing Embassy Chess and not confusing it with some other game?

This game seems like a real good game to me and is as playable as Gothic Chess is my opinion, plus it doesn't suffer from all the of baggage and feuding of Gothic Chess. All the Pawns are guarded in the intitial set up. If anything, it looks more traditional having the King and Queen side by side. The pieces are arranged in Grand Chess' order and that game predates Gothic by about 30 years.

There's three major pieces. The board has an even number of squares along the back row, just how can you place them to have balance when comparing one half of the board to the other half? Doesn't sound possible to me. Gothic Chess is no more balanced than Embassy Chess or Bird's or Capablanca.

I for one want M for Marshall and C for Cardinal. Grand Chess was made up in 1972. Seeing how no one uses Bird's names for the pieces, Guard and Equerry, and I've yet to hear precisely what Capablanca called them as he changed their names while putting out different versions of his Chess, I believe they are better names and should be the ones used.

As for the icons themselves, I agree about the Janus looking like a dog. In fact Cassius and I had some fun at the poor puppy's expense quite awhile back on the Janus Chess discussion board.
http://brainking.com/en/Board?bc=34&bscx=254784#254784