There is a well-established scoring system used for chess tournaments, which allocates 1 point for a win, zero for a loss, and ½ point each for a draw.

The problem with this system is that due to chess being a turn-based game, white, who moves first, has a slight advantage, usually pegged at around 52%:48% against black. The current scoring system does not take this advantage into account.

On balance, white should win, and black should lose, so if it ends as a draw, that is a victory of sorts for black.

There was an alternative scoring system that allocated 3 points for a black win, 2 points for a white win, and 1 point each for a draw, but the weighted distribution for those numbers is wrong.

So I propose an alternative system, which is easy to understand and implement, and which accounts for the odds in favour of white.

For a win, white would get 48 points. If black wins, he gets 52 points. In case of a draw, white gets 24 points, and black gets 26 points. Losers get no points.

I am actually pondering a more complex version of this paradigm, but it’s not finalised yet.

So let’s tale a look at some examples, firstly a small tournament I ran on my PC with the Douglas Modern start position. The final results were:

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Am running some tests with my Douglas Modern start position, and happened to catch this game where Stockfish outplays Komodo rather well. Komodo was tricked into losing the queen rather early.

My personality type has a worldview that “everything can be improved”. While testing the Douglas Modern layout, I noticed a lack of variation in opening moves, so in an attempt to offer the engines more variety, I tried two variants.

As a reminder, the current layout looks like this:

My first change was an attempt to provide the rooks with better protection. At the moment the knights can be pinned, and there are frequent rook swaps.

So I tried this: Continue reading →

The name may be a bit “look at me” but other people tag their names onto things they do so why not? 🙂

I did consider names like “Atast” (Advanced Tactics and Strategy) or Etast (Enhanced Tactics and Strategy), because from watching the games, the level of difficulty seems higher than normal chess.

My basic thinking was to create a scenario that more closely resembled what chess is supposed to be… a simulation of old-style warfare as practised by the Persians and others in that area.

The layout lends itself to murderous combat to the death amongst the disposable (from the king’s point of view) peasants (pawns), while the flanks are free for the calvary (knights) and elephants (rooks) to storm down and attack. Continue reading →

Lately I’ve been watching computer chess over at TCEC, which is at times interesting and at time frustrating as the engines lock themselves up into knots. They get into positions where basically the only way to make any sort of progress is to make a slightly bad move. Which of course they don’t do.

So we end up with kings and queens dancing around until such time as the 50-move rule kicks in, or TCEC decides it’s a draw based on engine evaluation and some other criteria.

The other problem with computer chess is that they may end up playing the same game over and over, unless you force them to use different opening books. To be fair, they then play the same opening again after swapping colours.

Anyway, I decided to try evaluating my own unique starting position, which has a more limited set of opening moves, and hopefully will force engines to randomly pick one of several “equivalent” moves, thus producing more random openings.

I did look in THE CLASSIFIED ENCYCLOPEDIA OF CHESS VARIANTS by D.B. Pritchard, and the only “similar” variant I can find is this one:

Crowded Chess (quoted by C. Pickover,
1992). Each player has two rows of pawns
(2nd/3rd & 6th/7th ranks) and the usual
pieces. (Mazes for the Mind)

Unfortunately there is no picture worth a thousand words, so it must either look like this:

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