Talk:Grand Chess

Old talk
Is it OK if I put a link to something on my own web page, which was written by the world champion of Grand Chess. It is his extensive (and I mean extensive) notes on a world championship game he played of Grand Chess against the reining world champion, and is available here. I think the link is relevent to this page, but will not put the link in the encyclopedia entry myself because of the "no self-promotion" rule. Samboy 21:17, 6 Aug 2004 (UTC)


 * Since no one has said anything either way for over a month, I have just added the link in question. If anyone removes it because they feel it is self-promotion, I will respect their wishes.  Samboy 23:42, 20 Sep 2004 (UTC)


 * The link doesn't work correctly in Internet Explorer. Can you please check? Andreas Kaufmann 11:33, 23 Sep 2004 (UTC)
 * Fixed (IE really ought to honor the content type instead of trying to guess it itself; Apache really ought to not send out content types for documents with unknown extensions--a consequence of the old UNIX tradition of "if it doesn't have a special extension, it's probably a plain text file". Samboy 21:19, 23 Sep 2004 (UTC)

Capablanca Chess and Grand Chess
I undone move of this article into Capablanca Chess. These variants are very different, there is no sense to place it there. Andreas Kaufmann 15:37, 6 Nov 2004 (UTC)

How does this compare to Gothic Chess(improved version of Capablanca chess), also a very popular variant. It has the same new pieces (with a different name). The placement of the pieces are different and Grand Chess also has the extra rank behind the group of pieces.

Spirit
Define "spirit". CRC as invented by Scharnagl is related ONLY to the 10x8 form of the games invented by Capablanca and known collectively as Capablanca Chess. Since there was a 10x10 form of Capablanca Chess, the link to that game should remain. Other games that do not have 10x10 forms do not belong here. --AceVentura


 * Perhaps spirit was not the best term. The fact is that they are both very similar ideas- expansion of the board with the addition of new species which are formed by combining the abilites of standard pieces. JoshuaZ 18:20, 15 April 2006 (UTC)


 * The fact that the other 2 games use the same pieces as Grand Chess is insufficient to justify links since all of these pieces move differently between 10x10 and 10x8 boards. I realize the other 2 games are related in origin but not closely enough in my judgment.  Still, as long as I remain outnumbered by knowledgeable editors who disagree, I will leave it alone. --AceVentura


 * Well, right now, its only one other editor who disagrees. Does anyone else have an opinion on this? JoshuaZ 19:01, 15 April 2006 (UTC)


 * The link to Capablanca chess should stay. I don't have any strong feeling about two other games, they are accesible from Capablanca chess article anyway. Andreas Kaufmann 19:48, 15 April 2006 (UTC)

Piece values
I removed link to Grand Chess | Material Values of Pieces. The values given there seems to be wrong: 20 pawns / queen, 5 pawns /knight, 7 pawns /bishop - obviously wrong. Or I misunderstand something? Andreas Kaufmann 19:27, 15 April 2006 (UTC)


 * The piece valuations method by Nalls is reputable and fully explained in conceptual and mathematical detail within a 29-page paper. Read it.  Scharnagl has endorsed and published Nalls' values even as they differ slightly from those generated using his own acclaimed method.


 * There are 3 obvious reasons to me that pawns in this game carry a lower relative value than you would expect in chess:


 * 1. The pawns are much more limited in potential, probable material gain thru promotion under the rules of Grand Chess.  Read them.


 * 2. The 10 x 10 board makes pawns notably weaker compared to all pieces of unlimited range (versus the 8 x 8 board).


 * 3. The 10 x 10 board makes pawn promotion more difficult.  Although the distance covered and number of moves required to achieve promotion is about the same, the additional maneuvering options for pieces of unlimited range to use positionally to pick-off pawns getting close to promotion makes success (for pawns) less likely.


 * Unless you can discredit the calculation method by Nalls (and probably, Scharnagl as well), you should not destroy this useful, tactical reference. It will be restored.  Sometimes, what is wrong is not obvious.--AceVentura


 * I don't have time to check all calculations, but there should be a mistake there. 20 pawns / queen is radicuoulus. Add only 10 (not 20!) pawns to white and remove a white's queen. White wins without any troubles. Are piece values provided for grand chess were confirmed by somebody else? Link would be nice. Thanks! Andreas Kaufmann 20:41, 15 April 2006 (UTC)


 * This seems to be related to the general problem of how to estimate piece values. A good example of the problems associated with this sort of thing- on a very large board, n rooks will generally beat n-k queens, even when the point value is fine (in fact, this starts to occur for pretty small board sizes). In fact, one can get a similar thing to occur even if it is rooks v. amazons or rooks v. krakens. Point values are incredibly hard to estimate in a useful fashion in chess variants. I'm inclined to agree with Andreas in this case. It seems to be an example of where somewhat took a highly formulaic approach to calculate relative value. JoshuaZ 20:51, 15 April 2006 (UTC)


 * Give 8 pawns to White in standard chess and remove his queen. He'll have markedly few problems, because of his strong pawn formation. So I think it is not so simple: there are other factors that need to be considered if you are to do such an experimental verification of piece values. Double sharp (talk) 13:31, 29 November 2013 (UTC)


 * I checked Nall's results and there are also flaws in values for other variants. For example, in chess the rook is 5.7 pawns and not 5 as generally excepted. The rook is also totally overvalued for Capablanca random chess, where it is more valuebale then Archbishop! Any more or less experienced 8x10 chess player will confirm that this is wrong, see for example piece values in Gothic Chess. Andreas Kaufmann 21:05, 15 April 2006 (UTC)


 * I actually agree with most of the recent remarks by Andreas Kaufmann andJoshuaZ. You both think deeply like very good players who understand that the levels of depth and irony within the tactics and strategy of chess variants go to such extremes that every rule has an exception and every exception has an exception.


 * The point being that relative piece values should not be taken literally and to the extreme. They should only be used as tactical guidelines with limitations as an important consideration toward deciding in most (but not all) cases which exchanges to force or void.  Furthermore, they should be used with caution, mainly during the opening game and midgame.  Wherever game-winning objectives are attainable thru material sacrifices (esp. during the endgame), positional play must be used primarily (for survival or victory) with exchange values used only secondarily.


 * For example, if in chess, black removes the queen (valued at appr. 9 points) and white removes all 8 pawns (valued at 8 points- 1 point x 8), you might predict on paper that white has a 1 point advantage toward winning the game. Notwithstanding, playing without half of its pieces, white is going to lose!  Does that mean the well-established, relative piece values for chess are also wrong?  No.  This is not a case of contradiction.  Instead, it is a case of nuance.  An all-or-nothing expectation from any piece valuation method is unrealistic esp. when examples are used that push game conditions to the extremes.  Besides, how often can one realistically expect an exchange 10-20 pieces deep to occur via forced lines of play?  If you are a player involved in such a dangerous escalation, then you had better consider game-winning conditions as well as exchange values.


 * To the credit of both Nalls and Scharnagl, they adequately explain within their published works that game-specific, positional values are as important as material values. Moreover, Scharnagl actually uses his own piece valuations method within his SMIRF program with obvious success since it plays numerous chess variants strongly and quickly.  So, I have no good reason to assume their works are without any substance or merit. --AceVentura


 * You should not take the universally known piece valuations- rounded-off to the nearest integer!- for chess too seriously. I have seen about a dozen rational systems for determining piece values in chess and their range of values is such that Nalls' results are not out-of-range.  --AceVentura


 * You can't rely totally on calculations based on mobility. But the figures might be about right.  As people noted, on a bigger board (bigger than 8x8), pawns are worth relatively less compared to pieces.  So knight = 5 pawns might be about right (I'd guess 4 to 5).  On a bigger board, bishops will be worth more than a knight (I'd guess by 1 or 2).  So if knights are 5 and bishops are 7, 20 is about right for a queen, and a rook would be about 10.  On one hand, pieces may promote soomer but on the other hand their promotion is limited to previously-captured pieces, which makes them less valuable.  Bubba73 (talk), 04:13, 15 December 2008 (UTC)

The pawn is absolutely not that low in value. A more sensible average valuation might well be pawn = 1, knight = 3.5, bishop = 4 (and another 0.5 for the bishop pair), rook = 6, princess (B+N) = 10, empress (R+N) = 11, queen = 11. Remember that in grand chess the pawns can promote early, so that they travel a shorter distance than they need to in FIDE chess. (In fact, this means that one could well restore the FIDE promotion rule: promoting to anything, even pieces you already have a complete set of, and only at the last rank. This would restore the possibility that KP vs K might be a draw and make pawns that double-step travel the same distance as FIDE pawns that single-step.) I would not trust any values that come solely from thinking without actually doing the experiments. Once experimental values are obtained, only then we can theoretically think about explanations for them.
 * And indeed, I do not trust these values any longer, since they seem to obviously disagree with preliminary experiments. Double sharp (talk) 12:21, 3 February 2016 (UTC)

It's still kind of sad that it's very difficult to get a closed game. The greater average power of the pieces and the increased amount of space seems to result in more open, tactical games. Speaking of the pieces' power, the hierarchy is very top-heavy. We have knights and bishops as minor pieces, rooks as an intermediate, and three different major pieces (princesses, empresses, and queens). With the increased size of the board and increased power of the pieces, castling – the ability to immediately evacuate the king to the side that looks safer – is sorely missed. It's not like chu shogi where you have time to dally around building a castle of step-movers around your king, or tenjiku shogi when your king is at least really far at the back (even though there are some viciously strong pieces in the setup). Development is fast and rapid, and there are so many queen-like super-strong pieces that it looks really hard to mount a defence fast enough.

It looks nice to have a set of pieces with B, N, and R, and combining all three in the three combinations (princess B+N, empress R+N, queen R+B). But this results in a very top-heavy material balance. OTOH, replacing the queen in FIDE chess with a princess or an empress for both sides should make a reasonable game and a light introduction to variants.

I still think the large shogi variants (certainly at least chu and tenjiku; dai is just boring) hold up much better than these modern creations. Of course, they have a very different feel: dare I say, more epic, because the scale is even bigger. But they do not have the same feel as shogi (not even sho shogi without drops). And maybe that's actually it: changing the size of the board changes the feel of the chess-like game, as surely as changing other rules. Thus the quest to make a very FIDE-like 10×10 variant may well be in vain. Double sharp (talk) 15:16, 15 January 2016 (UTC)


 * You’re welcome to your opinion, but you’re a regular enough Wikipedia editor that I’m sure you’re also aware none of this discussion can be put in the Grand chess article for the simple reason it’s original research; this is why we also have the WP:NOTAFORUM disclaimer. That said, I did find some third party commentary by grandmaster Larry Kaufman where he feels Grand chess is actually superior to Chu Shogi: http://www.shogi.net/shogi-l/Archive/1999/Nfeb07-06.txt
 * Okay, how about Chu-shogi, the topic of much discussion on this list. [...] I give Chu 5 points [...] As chu is to shogi, Grand chess is to chess. [...] So Grand chess, despite its meager following, scores an amazing 6 1/4 out of 8 on my criteria, by far the best so far. It really is an excellent game and deserves a bigger following.
 * While it was self published, as per WP:BLOG, “Self-published expert sources may be considered reliable when produced by an established subject-matter expert, whose work in the relevant field has previously been published by reliable, independent publications”. Larry Kaufman has had at least five books about Chess published and one article of his published in Chess Life, so he looks reliable enough to have his self-published writings about Chess included in the Wikipedia.
 * Samboy (talk) 05:23, 27 March 2022 (UTC)

En passant
I take it that white would capture en passant when his pawn is at the 7th rank? Obuibo Mbstpo (talk) 02:25, 9 March 2008 (UTC)


 * I assume it would be on the sixth rank, since a black pawn could move from the 8th to 6th rank (from White's perspective). Bubba73 (talk), 00:47, 15 December 2008 (UTC)

Some references
Here are some WP:RS references for this game:


 * R. Wayne Schmittberger's book New Rules for Classic Games described this game favorably


 * David Pritchard's book Encyclopedia of Chess Variants also described this game


 * The August 1997 issue of Chess Life talks about this game, showing sample games


 * Also appears to be mentioned in a 1987 issue of Games magazine

I would like to see these references added to the article, but don't have time to learn Wikipedia's format for citing references. Just to clarify (talk) 17:44, 14 December 2008 (UTC)


 * It helps to have the year, publisher, and ISBN number. Then you can use something like the following

which gives You can also give page numbers (often good). There is also a slightly more sophisticated "citation".

The "citation" can handle inline author/date links but I don't think the first one can. Bubba73 (talk), 18:25, 14 December 2008 (UTC)

Some more about the references
Thanks for the cleanup with the references we have. Now, my issue is this. DreamGuy doesn't think the references are good enough. I think they are, for the simple reason they're pretty much all of the articles and mentions in books out there for Grand Chess. I know the ill-fated Abstract Games Magazine had some articles on Grand Chess, and this link, by Burt Hochberg (who also wrote the Chess Life article back in 1997) mentions Grand Chess, but I can't think of anything else that mentions Grand Chess.

What DreamGuy is asking for is something that doesn't exist: Other references for Grand Chess. If you don't think these references are good enough to merit a Wikipedia article, go ahead and put this article on the VFD block (vote for the article to be deleted). But these references are all that there is out there, and it's a lot more references than exist for most Chess Variants.

Just to clarify (talk) 06:38, 15 December 2008 (UTC)


 * Here is a reference (courtesy the web archive, since the magazine died a couple of years ago) showing that the ill-fated Abstract Games Magazine had an article called "The Grand Chess Corner" Just to clarify (talk) 06:45, 15 December 2008 (UTC)


 * Do you know the title of the Burt Hochberg article in Chess Life? Bubba73 (talk), 13:50, 15 December 2008 (UTC)


 * The article was called "Don't be Scared, It's Still Chess" (took a bit of poking around to find its name), and I've updated the page accordingly. Just to clarify (talk) 16:14, 15 December 2008 (UTC)

Playing Grand chess online
Just in case this article gets put on the VFD block, here are four places where one can play Grand Chess online:


 * http://www.mindsports.nl/index.php/arena/grand-chess/
 * http://brainking.com/en/GameRules?tp=74
 * http://www.gamerz.net/pbmserv/grandchess.html
 * http://play.chessvariants.org/pbm/presets/grand_chess.html

Just to clarify (talk) 18:03, 15 December 2008 (UTC)

Promotion zone
The promotion at the pawn-line is reminiscent of shogi and its large variants. Double sharp (talk) 03:10, 12 December 2013 (UTC)

Things that could be improved about this game

 * We don't need yet another set of names for BN and RN. Either Capablanca's or the problemist tradition are reasonably well known. Just use one of them.
 * The king should be in the centre, and preferably on its own colour to help orthodox chess players. I regret the loss of castling, as it means that you cannot evacuate your king from the centre to whichever side you choose: while the setup does not allow this, I would resurrect the old "king's leap" rule. Thus, my piece order for the second rank would be knight, bishop, princess (BN), queen, king, marshal (RN), bishop, knight; and you could evacuate the king up to three normal moves away on its first move.
 * Get rid of the ridiculous rule that disallows you to have more than the usual number of pieces. Philidor had the same idea and it was soundly rejected in the end.
 * While we're at it, get rid of the enlarged promotion zone. It makes KP vs K always a win. Promote only on the tenth rank.
 * Maybe this destroys the flavour of the game, but it's just not the same when the rooks have space on the back rank. The key point in FIDE is that you have to develop pieces to activate them and search for open files. Shortening the board to 10×8 (Embassy Chess) would work; another solution would be to keep it 10×10 but allow pawns an initial triple move like in Omega Chess.

This is just my personal opinion, though. Double sharp (talk) 05:59, 3 February 2016 (UTC)


 * I accept that some of this may be too far-reaching, so I would propose instead more modestly, but more seriously (that is, outside my own personal likes and dislikes):
 * Use the names from the fairy chess tradition (princess = BN, empress = RN). There is no real tradition in chess variants for what to call these pieces, but in fairy chess problems, there is. Why make up yet another set of names? As for notation: I personally never saw the problem with (BN) and (RN), but if you don't like two-piece symbols, C (to avoid collisions; sometimes it's useful to label pawns with letters) and E ought to do for the princess and empress respectively.
 * The current starting position is acceptable. So is the rook placement, which, while I'm ambivalent about it, does give the game a character.
 * However, an initial king's leap should be allowed for king safety. In such a king's leap, the king can, for its initial move only, go to any square that it could reach in three ordinary moves (even if there are pieces in its hypothetical path there).
 * I cannot stress enough that the extended promotion zone should be thrown away. Promote only on the tenth rank, and to any pieces. Thus you can have two queens, two empresses, two princesses, three rooks, three bishops, or three knights. (There are now three superpieces that you only get one of – all worth around 9 pawns – and three normal pieces that you get a pair of.) I have to insist that promotion be only on the last row, both because it makes more sense that way (you only promote when a pawn could move no further), and this allows the edge effects to come into play. Even in drawn KP vs K positions, you can always at least advance your pawn to the penultimate rank and stalemate.
 * This should keep the flavour of the game, while fixing the two rules that I feel were terrible mistakes: the abandonment of castling (to be replaced by the initial king's leap) and the rules on promotion.
 * The use of the princess and empress give this game the usual Capablanca-like character, with three "superpieces" at about the same strength (princess, empress, and queen), one intermediate piece type that isn't a "superpiece" but can force mate (rook), and minor pieces (bishop and knight). (Superpieces can attack whole continguous areas of squares, which is useful in attacking pawn chains or lesser pieces.) Now, instead of one immediately decisive promotion possibility to queen, there are three, and all are missing one of the basic powers (R, N, and B). So one will have to think for a moment about which one to choose, although in the endgame the queen is usually the best choice because the emptiness of the board is good for its wholly ranging moves. (If you promote first, but your opponent will get his pawn on the penultimate rank next move, and it is a rook or bishop pawn, you should pick the empress instead of the queen!)
 * If the RF and BW (dragon king and dragon horse) were used, one would similarly get a shogi-like flavour introduced into chess. Such pieces (RN, BN, RF, BW) are interesting because they mix ranging and leaping (or, degenerately, stepping) moves. Especially on a larger board, the result is a piece that packs concentrated power, and uses its long-range powers to get into a position where its concentration of short-range moves proves useful.
 * I'd better stop here, though, especially since (a) this isn't really what WP talk pages are for and (b) the Capablanca-style material balance is not my cup of tea. Double sharp (talk) 13:22, 3 February 2016 (UTC)

Requested move 24 April 2016

 * The following is a closed discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. Editors desiring to contest the closing decision should consider a move review. No further edits should be made to this section. 

The result of the move request was: Moved  &mdash; Amakuru (talk) 13:52, 2 May 2016 (UTC)

Grand chess → Grand Chess – The name form of this game is "Grand Chess" not "Grand chess", in the preponderance of literatures that refer to this game, and for anyone who is somewhat "close" to/acquainted w/ this game. (Just like the name form is "Andromeda Galaxy" not "Andromeda galaxy". And just like it's "Mississippi River" not "Mississippi river". And just like it's "Tony Award" not "Tony award". Just like it's "White House" not "White house". Just like it's "Pied Piper" not "Pied piper". Just like it's "Ivory Coast" not "Ivory coast". Just like it's "Carleton College" not "Carleton college". "San Francisco Bay" not "San Francisco bay". "Sicilian Defence" not "Sicilian defence". "Space Shuttle" not "Space shuttle". "Yellowstone Park" not "Yellowstone park". "Spam Museum" not "Spam museum". So on.) Ditto for "Capablanca Chess" (not "Capablanca chess"), "Alice Chess" (not "Alice chess"), "Chinese Checkers" (not "Chinese checkers"), regardless the current abysmal name-forms that currently exist on WP and are presumed policy-wise. Ditto "Hasami shogi" s/b "Hasami Shogi" even as "shogi" is lowercase like "chess" is lowercase. (Some game names compound the words the same as "Volleyball" does, for e.g. "Quatrochess", "Dragonchess", "Hexshogi", "Hexdame", whereby any name-form issue is conveniently skipped. David Parlett says in The Oxford History of Board Games that "Losing Chess" ... "is a game [name]", while "Losing chess" ... "is a disgrace.") The bad names stem from 2004/05/06 and apparently the policy then was different or some norm was adopted, but that norm isn't consistent w/ the overwhelming literature about these games, and actually that literature is not really abundant, just consistent. I know policy says what's majorly in the prevailing literature, and for at least these six games mentioned (and there are more!—unmentioned), that decision is absolutely clear. (Please don't ask me for refs to support my contention, when the opposite contention [current name-forms] are what needs justification [beyond "that's the way we've always done"], and that has always been a losing proposition; these names have hung on because *no one cares*, one cares to correct them, and just plain inertia [and arguments supporting inertia]. [Did this come off as frustrated!? Sorry.]) IHTS (talk) 10:20, 24 April 2016 (UTC)
 * Support, per nomination, proper name and common name. Randy Kryn 14:16, 24 April 2016 (UTC)
 * Support, for this article and the other similar examples of mis-titled chess variant pages. Quale (talk) 16:12, 24 April 2016 (UTC)
 * Support – I studied the sources, and it looks like the only book that doesn't cap it is a clone of our article. Dicklyon (talk) 04:07, 25 April 2016 (UTC)


 * The above discussion is preserved as an archive of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on this talk page or in a move review. No further edits should be made to this section.