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Oct-02-07
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| al wazir: <CG>: I'm always glad to see new ideas tried out. Ultimately computers will become so strong that conventional chess will be unplayable. This is an attempt to avoid that outcome. Way to go! |
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Oct-03-07
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| whatthefat: <al wazir>
Openings aside, I don't think that Fischerandom is any more difficult for computers than standard chess. I suppose some positional algorithms (e.g., knight on the rim) might not be as applicable with certain starting positions, but humans will be just as badly affected. Frankly, I would have preferred it if this game had been engine-free, but it should still be interesting. |
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Oct-04-07
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| chessgames.com: The Cash-3 number for the October 3rd Florida Lottery was: 0-5-2
which yields the following Fischerandom position:
click for larger viewA team game will be set up soon with this configuration. It's a delightful position to use, because it's so reminiscent of traditional chess, but just different enough to throw all-known opening theory out the window. May the best team win! |
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Oct-04-07
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| chessgames.com: The game is now open for regsitration: Chessgames Challenge: Fischerandom: Team White vs Team Black, 2007 |
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Nov-17-07 |
| Gene M: WHATTHEFAT wrote: "some positional algorithms (e.g., knight on the rim) might not be as applicable with certain starting positions"
His comment is on the right track. In serious slow time-control games of chess960 (FRC), grandmasters would have to learn some different or additional principles. For instance, setups where both White knights start on the same shade of square might be significantly different than the different-shade setup reused endlessly by chess1. http://CastleLong.com/
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Nov-17-07 |
| Gene M: KING MEGA wrote: "I like it when the bishop is at the a1-h1. Allows the early fianchetto" I think WCChamp Vladimir Kramnik had a good point when he said chess960 setups with bishops in corners are problemmatic. A bishop on h1 has no degrees of freedom about how it can be developed. And that is a bad thing. Also, setups with corner vicars lead to excessive exchanges. These setups are probably more draw-prone than are most other setups. http://CastleLong.com/
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Nov-17-07
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| timhortons: <genem> are you the author of those book on frc?id been playing lately at fics in frc in 2/12 time board and i find it fun...though its difficult to find player of 1600 strenth in there...those 2200 strenth player of course would just stole the game away as always |
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Dec-05-07
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| popski: Chess960@home is a distributed computing project that runs on the BOINC software platform. It aims to create a vast collection of Chess960 games and to publish it on the internet for public use... http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chess9... |
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Jan-19-08 |
| Gene M: The acclaimed chess author and trainer Mark Dvoretsky, used his latest monthly column of "The Instructor" on ChessCafe.com to write at length about FRC-chess960. To everyone's surprise, Dvoretsky concluded by calling for more serious grandmaster tournaments to be held with non-traditional setups like FRC; tho Dvoretsky prefers to use dice to determine the first 2-4 plies of the game. A must read at...
http://www.chesscafe.com/text/dvore...
(http:// www .chesscafe .com/ text/ dvoretsky88.pdf)
Even after his retirement and death, Fischer continues to have a bigger effect on chess than almost anyone else. Fischer made the delay clock happen too. http://CastleLong.com/ for FRC-chess960 |
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Mar-12-08 |
| tud: Should not be the time to acknowledge that this is the future ? FR chess. Or memorizing huge lines spilled by computer helps better ? |
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Mar-24-08
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| Benzol: This thread has been quiet for a while. |
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Mar-24-08 |
| Petrosianic: And it still is. Your kibitz has no content. Neither does mine. |
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Mar-30-08
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| Eyal: Well, here are some interesting thoughts by Mark Dvoretsky on Fischerandom as the possible future of chess. The context of the discussion is his claim that the huge – and rapidly growing – amount of opening theory exerts a paralyzing influence on contemporary top-level chess, and that there's a need to figure out some sort of solution to this problem. (Part 1 of 4)
<The rules offered by Robert Fischer for this form of chess are the same (except for the
changes required in castling), but the initial setup of the pieces changes. The pieces are set
up behind the pawns on the first rank at random – that is, by lot, with the black pieces
arranged the same as White’s. There are some restrictions: the bishops must still start on
different colors, and the rooks must be on opposite sides of the king. There are 960 possible
variations of the opening position.
Clearly, opening preparation would be senseless in Fischer-random, since it’s impossible to
know which position you’d have to play; still less would you be able to know how your
opponent would play it. Creating and memorizing an entire system of opening variations
for each of the 960 possible setups would be unrealistic. You have to create, starting with
move one.
I’ve never played this game myself, but many of my friends and students have taken part in
the traditional Fischer-random tournaments in Mainz. Most of them liked the new game.
They were very happy not to have to waste time preparing for the game, and it was
interesting to test themselves and compete with their opponents in solving original tasks.
That being the case, one can only welcome the continued hosting of such events, and hope
there will eventually be more of them.
But this can hardly mean that chess-960 should be promoted as the designated successor to
everyday chess. Most of us love playing blitz, but nobody (well, except for GM Tkachiev –
I just remembered him) is suggesting we should replace serious chess with blitz. The
problems involved with such an enormous change in the rules should be examined from all
sides and tested, with all aspects considered in order to find out whether there are
drawbacks that might prove dangerous to the future of chess. The first things that springs to mind is the original shape that play takes from the very first
moves, and the almost complete lack of any connection with the usual strategic schemes.
Some will be scared off by the unusual nature of the resulting positions; others will like it –
but one could hardly give a definite answer as to whether this is a bad or a good thing. It’s a
question of one’s own system of likes and dislikes, and everybody’s different. Let‘s approach the problem from a different angle. The basis of our attraction to chess
comes from sporting as well as esthetic elements. The former involves, for players, the
battle for victory; for the spectators, it’s the intrigue of a tournament, “rooting” for one
player or the other, determining a champion. Obviously, changing over to chess-960 would
cost us nothing from the sporting standpoint – on the contrary, the battle would probably
grow even fiercer.>
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Mar-30-08
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| Eyal: (Part 2 of 4)
<The esthetic element, for the player, is expressed through his joy in finding and
successfully executing over the board beautiful and hard-to-find ideas. The spectators (and
most of us find ourselves on both sides: sometimes we play, sometimes we watch) gain
enjoyment from the players’ discoveries, usually after the fact when they play over already played
games. Then they can enjoy not only the moves actually played, but also the sharp
ideas that remained behind the scenes, yet were noted in commentaries. The best examples
of chess creativity are retained for many years, examined repeatedly in the pages of
magazines and books, giving joy to new chess enthusiasts, increasing their love for our
game, and their respect for its leading specialists, capable of creating such beauty over the
board. Here, I see a most important distinguishing feature of chess, separating it from any
other form of sport in which the most interesting part of the game is over when the
tournament concludes. This is one of our trump cards, and we must not, under any
circumstances, devalue the creative element of the game of chess.One of the main criteria of beauty (along with subtlety and originality) is the soundness, the
correctness of the moves, of the individual ideas, or of entire games. And here is where I
have some doubts about the future of chess-960.
Recall our examination of Zvjaginsev’s novelty [1 e4 c5 2.Na3!?]. Into the standard Sicilian position one fresh element is introduced, and immediately we have problems not easily solved over the board. But there, we could at least give a qualified assessment of the plusses and minuses
of this or that way of continuing the game, since we could refer to a known setup of the
remaining pieces, and tested plans of action in similar situations. But in Fischer chess, where the majority of the pieces – if not all of them – are standing in
unusual positions, we must deal with many new and unknown elements. As a result, a
chessplayer has almost nothing to refer to in looking for a move; he’s playing “without line
or compass.”
I can assure you that even leading grandmasters play a weak game of chess-960, full of
both strategic and tactical errors. Some of these blunders are immediately evident; others
are not easily uncovered, even during analysis, in view of the absence of reliable and
proven positional benchmarks. Fine, deeply considered decisions, close to the level of the
best achievements of traditional chess, become practically impossible. True, somewhere in
the midst of the middlegame, the position usually begins to look something like “normal” –
that is, familiar to us. But by that time, the players already have no thinking time left,
because they had to use it all resolving the hugely complex problems of planned
development from the very first moves. So these games almost never show us any aesthetic
value.
If we remember how hard it can be to discover the secrets of a position even in traditional
chess, where we can refer to many generations’ worth of experience, what I’m saying
becomes logically obvious. Nonetheless, I shall illustrate my idea with a concrete example.> |
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Mar-30-08
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| Eyal: (Part 3 of 4)
<Grandmaster Yusupov showed me the opening of two games from the Mainz tournament of
2005, both played in the same round. On that day, the game began with the following
position:
click for larger viewAronian – Bacrot
1 e4 e5 2 Nd3 Ng6?! 3 f4! Bf6? (3…Nf6) 4 Nc5 Rd8 5 Qb5 Nd6 6 Nxd7+ Rxd7 7 Qxd7, and
White parlayed his exchange plus into a win.
What’s to be said about this? Levon Aronian spotted one of the tactical peculiarities of this
starting position: the weakness at d7. He chose a developmental scheme, allowing him to mount a
quick attack on this weakness in his opponent’s camp (while simultaneously attacking another one
at b7). His opponent, meanwhile, brought out his pieces with no suspicion of the danger threatening him. The same motifs appeared in the following game, where it was Black who exploited the
weakness at d2:
Hertneck – Morozevich
1 d4 This move looks weaker than 1 e4, since it doesn’t open any lines for White’s pieces.
Evidently, Hertneck intended to develop the knight at d3, but did not wish to place it in front of
the pawn. This is a positional consideration taken from classical chess, laid down as a rule back in
the 18th century, as far back as Philidor. But is it correct to follow it in this situation? Nobody
knows. 1…f5 2 Nd3 Nf6 3 f3 g5 Strange. Instead of developing his pieces and fighting for the center, Alexander Morozevich advances a wing pawn – apparently for the same reason that I used
to explain Gerald Hertneck’s opening move: he wanted to develop the knight on g6.
4 e4 fe 5 fe? Nxe4! The queen is untouchable, because of the mate on d2. Clearly the German GM overlooked an elementary tactical shot, although after 6 Qe1, he definitely had compensation for the pawn in the form of Black’s lagging development (Morozevich went on to win the game). White should have played 5 Nc5, with threats of 6 Qb5, 6 Nxb7 and 6 fe. Black would
probably have had to protect his queenside with the “non-standard” 6…c6 7 fe Rc7
(without fear of 8 e5? Ne4!), but the position looks better for White. On the other hand, I
wouldn’t stake my life on any of my evaluations so far. This is all very curious and funny – but that’s all. The level of play demonstrated here by
grandmasters isn’t much different from (to take an example from traditional chess) the
efforts, successful or unsuccessful, to exploit the weakness at f7 from the starting position,
and deliver the “scholars mate.” Of course we need to take into account the fact that in
Mainz, the games were played in rapid chess; however, I suspect that, even under a
classical time-control, the quality of play would not have risen very much.> |
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Mar-30-08
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| Eyal: (part 4 of 4)
<In the early days of chess, many such naïve games were played. As experience grew, so did
the understanding of the principles of opening play; new schemes of battle appeared and
were worked upon, and those that didn’t work out were tossed aside. For example, it
became clear that certain gambits were not too promising; others, by contrast (like the
Queen’s Gambit), were positionally well-founded. Some excessively categorical statements
(such as Tarrasch’s thesis that it’s wrong to accept the Queen’s Gambit, because the white
bishop can then get to c4 in one move, without loss of tempo) appeared, and then lost their
power. The conception that one need not occupy the center with pawns, but could attack it
with pieces instead, proved viable. And it was this kind of idea-filled development of views
on the opening that undoubtedly aided the progress of chess – it was a positive thing, until
the time came when the process had grown into an enormous mass of purely concrete
information, needing daily absorption by generations of modern chess players.But in chess-960, there will be practically no accumulation of experience: there are too
many opening positions, and too many differences between them. And thus, the concept of
the opening phase will find itself frozen, for a long time, at a childhood level. Let me summarize, briefly: Playing Fischer-random is undoubtedly interesting (and
probably even useful: overcoming routine, and developing an unfettered approach to the
position). But studying played games is of no interest, because it’s almost impossible for
anything creatively important to come from them (when measured against the level that
both amateurs and experts in classical chess have grown accustomed to). So switching to
this new game involves a serious risk that we may lose the aesthetic element of chess – and
consequently, a great number of its adherents.> (http://www.chesscafe.com/text/dvore...) |
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Apr-30-08 |
| Gene M: M.Dvoretsky wrote (at ChessCafe.com):
As experience grew, so did the understanding of the principles of opening play; new schemes of battle appeared and were worked upon, and those that didn’t work out were tossed aside. For example, it became clear that certain gambits were not too promising;
Opening "principles" are a different subject than whether this or that particular opening "gambit" (usually a pawn sac) works.
Indeed, some of the 9 chess opening "principles" that Reuben Fine wrote about are not really principles at all. Some are more about particular tactical sequences that are esoteric to the hyper-analysis of the same one start position that is endlessly reused in traditional chess. The future may be a COMPROMISE: one FRC start position is announced (in advance) for each year (or for a whole WCChamp cycle); after which it expires, and a new start position is announced.
This would give grandmasters lots of opportunities to focus their creativity on rich new opening possibilities. The challenge would not be to find any decent opening novelty not already played before move-pair 20, but rather to find a stronger novelty than your opponent will likely find.
This would make the first dozen move-pairs exciting again. |
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Jun-24-08
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| nasmichael: <Gene M.> That would be a very interesting idea. That would be nice for classes too...imagine for chess students the option for "veteran" players to play against a coach after studying it for 15 minutes or so before the game... |
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Jun-27-08
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| Ron: Here is an article by Malcom Pein on a FischerRandom chess game played by Nakamura--though reading the article it seems that Malcom Pein got Nakamura's internet handle wrong:
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/arts/mai... |
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Jun-27-08
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| Ziggurat: <Ron> I think he does use the handle Smallville, although you might have other information suggesting that he used another handle in this particular event. |
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Jul-21-08
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| vikinx: I like position #395. You can castle right away.:)
click for larger view |
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Jul-21-08
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| vikinx: Position #414 looks just like #54, except the queenside rooks and knights are switched places.Position #414:
click for larger view |
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Aug-08-08
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| vikinx: Why isn't anyone kibitzing here? |
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Aug-23-08 |
| JimmyVermeer: I just discovered this page, which is why I haven't kibitzed here before. By the way, it is not unrealistic for a great chessplayer to memorize opening lines in each of 960 possible starting configurations, particularly if it was a player who specialized in Fischerandom chess. |
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Sep-07-08
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| artyom2008: cmon anybody wanna do some analisis on arno nickel no ? my fourm |
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