Why does chess development invoke no interest?

[Mats Winther]

Why is forum "Chess Development" locked? I had hoped that somebody would care to evaluate some of my revolutionary ideas, such as Relocation Chess. I am slightly dismayed by the monumental lack of interest in my work. You could easily try out the diverse positions in Relocation Chess if you own a program that can handle FRC castling.

Relocation variants - rearranging the initial array

Can creativity be safeguarded in chess? Too much focus on computerized
opening preparation, and also the way in which amateurs try at all costs
to avoid theoretical paths (due to its advanced development), could
damage the creative aspect (the French Exchange, and the Queen Pawn
opening, will become boring in the end). As a complement to Fide-chess,
I suggest this method as a remedy. The various relocation methods allow
the players optionally to relocate king and/or queen before the play
begins, whilst retaining the castling rights. The players can abstain
from this if they prefer the standard setup. It is a cogent method of
rearranging the initial position to enhance opening ramification, while
allowing the players to remain in control. The resultant positions
deviate marginally from the standard position and would be experienced
as natural by most chess players.

Read the article here:
http://hem.passagen.se/melki9/relocationvariants.htm

M. Winther

[Matt Mackenzie]

To answer the thread question - because most of us still find "traditional" chess rich and fascinating enough not to need any "developments"?

Some on here *are* interested in variants - but as an adjunct to the classic game, not a replacement for it.

[Mats Winther]

Chess players are evidently a very boring and conservative species. I thought that these variants, at least, could be used in training and in rapid chess, to spice up the game. By the way, why do we get to choose only infantile pictures (or hats) as avatars? This isn't a children's forum, is it?
/Mats

[Rob Thompson]

I resent the suggestion that Disney films are in any way infantile.

[Stewart Reuben]

Mats - try reading David Pritchard's book 'The Classified Encyclopedia of Chess Variants'. Your 'relocation' chess in one form or another dates back to at least the 19th century. Try Fischerrandom.

[Mats Winther]

I own that book. There are no relocation variants in it. FRC is not to the taste of most people, because the player has no control. In relocation variants the player himself decides how the pieces should stand. It is interesting from move one. /Mats

[Kevin Thurlow]

Fischerrandom should be called "Chess960" as it was known before Fischer suggested it...

[Carl Hibbard]

I do tend to archive off complete sections when there is no posts in several months!

[MSoszynski]

Oughtn't this thread, despite its misleading title, be in the Not Chess! section?

[Mats Winther]

This is chess. The Fide-position follows the rules of relocation variants. It's just that the players refrain from performing a relocation, which is allowed in relocation variants. The castling rules in Fide-chess also follow the Chess960 (relocation) rules. Everything is the same. Fide-chess is just a special variant. It is the first position (upper left in the image). I discussed it with a Chessbase representative and explained that it would be fairly easy to adapt the software to relocation variants.

If some of you cunning players would only care to investigate it, you would like it. Chess training would become more effective. You have to think strategically from move one. For example, below are the 20 possible positions (all mirrored) that can occur after the players have relocated according to the rules of Placement Chess. In Placement Chess Black may optionally decide the initial positions of the kings, while White may, thereafter, optionally decide the initial positions of the queens, after which he makes the first move.
/M. Winther

[Giulio Simeone]

Why is forum "Chess Development" locked? I had hoped that somebody would care to evaluate some of my revolutionary ideas, such as Relocation Chess. I am slightly dismayed by the monumental lack of interest in my work. You could easily try out the diverse positions in Relocation Chess if you own a program that can handle FRC castling.

Relocation variants - rearranging the initial array

Can creativity be safeguarded in chess? Too much focus on computerized
opening preparation, and also the way in which amateurs try at all costs
to avoid theoretical paths (due to its advanced development), could
damage the creative aspect (the French Exchange, and the Queen Pawn
opening, will become boring in the end).
M. Winther

Well, I think that your idea didn't get any interest for various reasons. First, your ideas of "creativity" and "boredom" are rather personal, and different, I think, from those of the chess players' majority. The French Exchange, as any other opening, after 15 moves can result in millions of different positions(approx. 30^30, a very big number), how can you say that ALL these positions are boring? Let alone the fact that, in my opinion, a chess game where the result is not yet decided is never boring, because you can always make lots of strategical and tactical considerations on it. People who say that a certain opening is "boring", probably have never played that opening, or just understand little about chess.

Second, I don't question that chess rules could be modified in order to make the game more interesting. That would work if you were playing chess only with your relatives, or in your neighbourhood. But chess is beautiful also because it groups together millions of people all over the world, which play all with the same rules. Imagine that your idea turns out to be successful, and 7.000 swedish players start to play with your rules. In Indonesia another player discovers that chess is more interesting when it is played with four bishops each, and 7.000 indonesian players follow him. In Brazil, etc., etc., and you now have many different games that are played all over the world, and can't organize the World Championships any longer, the Olympiads any longer, etc. The current rules may not be the best possible rules, but they group together millions of people, and that's already quite something, it seems to me. Or would you like that all the world would start to play with the relocated king and queen?

[Mats Winther]

If I play the French defence on Fics or ICC I get to play the exchange variation in half of the games. This is boring in the end. Why do people always see these suggestions as a threat to Fide-chess? Fide-chess is an integral part of it. Relocation variants are meant to increase the chances for people not so knowledgeable of theory. It can make chess even more interesting. It cannot overthrow chess since the standard position is the theoretically best position.

The rules for the above variant, Placement Chess, can be restricted so that black is only allowed to relocate the king to d8, if he wishes. This generates 8 possible positions, where the king is positioned in the centre. Also in the case when the king alone is relocated, it means a thorough kill of theory since the king must jump three squares when castling short, but only one square when castling long. Why are the seven extra positions completely uninteresting to chess players?
/Mats

[John McKenna]

Mats, one reason why chess development invokes less interest than perhaps it should is that it means different things to different people. This topic may well have originally started out as a discussion on the development of junior chess and certainly contains some posts that indicate it. Even that interpretation of the topic seems to excite little interest here nowadays. For example an English IM's take on the development of one of the best juniors of recent times, viz. -

http://www.chessbase.com/Home/TabId/211 ... 00813.aspx

has produced, as far as I can see (which is not all that far), not a single post on the forum!?

(Many forum topics suffer from the problem of becomimg vehicles for multifarious subjects since people have trouble sticking to the point. Me included.)

[Andrew Bak]

Mats I think you are trying to solve a problem that doesn't yet exist - normal chess seems to be working fine at the moment, especially at amateur level!

I think if current chess is eventually "solved" or exhausted to such a high degree that there is only one opening played, why not just invent one new standard position, FIDE could just vote on one of the other 959 starting positions to be the "new" chess and we could play that for another 150 years until that got exhausted etc. That should be chess going for 144,000 years at least!

[Stewart Reuben]

There I disagree. All 960 positions 'suffer' from the same defect. Basically they are all minor variations on the game chess and computers would solve each position to the same extent equally deeply and deeper than the human brain can.
Thus the lack of interest is caused by the lack of difference. At least as far as I am concerned.
My three favourite mind sports are: chess, poker and bridge. All three require different skills and different ways of thinking.
Play Kriegspiel and the game is completely unlike standard chess and requires different skills.
Play Alice Chess and, even though I have played it, on and off for nearly 60 years, I still haven't grasped what is going on because it is so alien.
Plsy 4-handed chess and, being a partnership game, it would require different skills. But 2 computers would rapidly outplay 2 humans.
Play on a 10 by 10 board with two extra pieces for each player and the complexity of the game would obviously be higher and the knights would be much weaker. But would it be a different type of game? I think not.
Play Shogi and clearly it is more tactically complex and there are far more choices. I don't have the experience to know whether I would enjoy it.
Play Go and it is obvious the rules are simpler and we are told the thinking is several levels more complex than chess. Again, I am totally inexperienced.
Play backgammon and the element of chance sets it aside from chess. This is another game I am ignorant of.

So I have chosen 3 mind sports, all totally different on which to concentrate. If that makes me a member of a very boring and conservative species - so be it.