Author: Sune Fischer
Date: 09:17:35 01/07/04
Go up one level in this thread
On January 07, 2004 at 11:43:24, Tord Romstad wrote: >>So naturally some are bound to feel, incl. me, that the opening theory is an >>unfortunate side track and the game would be more enjoyable without it. > >But what we call "opening theory" is not really theory at all. It is >a mixture of tradition and educated guesses, nothing more. That is what I call opening theory, stuff empiricly proven to be hard to refute. >There is lots >of scope for creativity even in the first few moves of the game of chess, >as is proven by all the novelties which keep appearing even in the most >popular opening lines. If you don't like to follow the book lines, just >play something different. You will not automatically lose the game or >end up with an inferior position. I disagree, the unfortunate situation is that to become really good you must know a lot of theory, you must stay current with development etc. Sure you can be a decent club player without studying hard, but probably not a strong GM, and I wouldn't want to become a GM if that means hitting the books to memorize long lines. >The only phase of the game where we have any precise knowledge is the >endgame, which, ironically, is exactly the same in FRC as in normal chess. >In contrast, by introducing new board shapes and/or pieces, you immediately >get entirely new and unexplored endgames. You probably won't find any >books which teach you how to mate with king and two knights against king >in hexagonal chess! You are putting down FRC because it is different from chess but not quite as different as hexagonal chess? :) The point of FRC, IMO, is that you get the same game that everybody knows and loves, namely chess, but completely void of boring theory. Nothing more, nothing less. It's like taking chess and rewinding the clock a few centuries, to bring back the original spirit of the game. It is true that the endgame remains the same, but the endgame is not associated with as much knowledge, at least it is a more fuzzy kind about ideas and principles. That's the kind of theory I actually like, things will teach you something about the game, it's not brain dead memorization of lines. I get the feeling we are not going to agree on this, and it's hard to convince others if they simply "feel" differently about it :) Anyway, hexagonal chess, sure why not :) Or how about super advanced chess on a 16x16 board, 3 rows of pieces..!!?? Of course one advantage over hexagonal chess is that FRC can be played using a regular chess board, no need to go out and by new equipment :) >This is the really big problem, of course -- but it applies to FRC >as well as much as most other chess variants. Undeniably true. >>It's a shame, it would be nice if xboard supported more games. > >It would, but I'm afraid it will never happen. There are simply so >few people who are interested in such extensions ... It could be the chicken or the egg. I don't think there will be much support for a game until there are servers that support it and a GUI for the developers. And why would somebody develop a GUI if there is no interest in the game... :) Speaking for myself, the GUI has to come first! Alright I'm spoiled by being a winboard engine writer for too long now :-) >>For me to get interested there would have to be a GUI supporting it, it's just >>too much trouble to have to build everything from scratch. >> >>But once there is a GUI I probably would be tempted :) > >When my Mac OS GUI is finished, I will consider if it is feasible to >use the GNUstep tools to port the GUI to Linux and Windows. I have no >idea how difficult this would be, because I have never used GNUstep and >therefore don't know how much it resembles the Cocoa frameworks in Mac >OS X. That's the thing with GUIs all these non-portability problems. :( -S. >Tord
This page took 0.01 seconds to execute
Last modified: Thu, 15 Apr 21 08:11:13 -0700
Current Computer Chess Club Forums at Talkchess. This site by Sean Mintz.