NetNews Usenet Archive 1992 #31/NN_1992_31.iso/spool/rec/games/abstract/676

Text File | 1992-12-23 | 3.3 KB | 64 lines

Newsgroups: rec.games.abstract
Path: sparky!uunet!paladin.american.edu!howland.reston.ans.net!usc!rpi!batcomputer![e-mail]!mcherm
From: [e-mail] (Michael Chermside)
Subject: Re: Timber Chess
Message-ID: <[e-mail]>
Sender: [e-mail]
Organization: Cornell-Materials-Science-Center
References: <[e-mail]> <[e-mail]> <[e-mail]>
Date: Thu, 24 Dec 1992 00:06:29 GMT
Lines: 52

In article <[e-mail]> [e-mail] ( Nate Smith) writes:
   [ Stuff Deleted To Save Bandwidth ]

>                     ...some "defects" in some games have absolutely no
>function otherwise, such as "en-passant" pawn capture - now how in- what
>was the circumstance that led to that rule??  i'd like to go back in time
>and see where they came up with that one...:-))
>
>the search for a game without defects continues.....
>
>- nate

Unfortunately, my reference on this one is at home, (home as in
another state, not a nearby residence) so without some effort I can't
substanciate(sp?) this, but I believe that I remember the origin of
"en-passant".  If I remember rightly, it was introduced to allow the
pawn-moves-2-on-first-move rule.  At one point, the game had neither
of these rules, but it suffered from very slow (and booring) opening
play.  The 2-square pawn move was added to compensate and to get
things off to a good, quick start but somebody (some "game defect"
purist I expect :-)) was upset that it wasn't JUST a speedup, in
certain circumstances it could change the game play.  "en-passant" was
introduced to re-correct for this: a pawn is allowed to capture
another pawn which used the 2-space move as a "trick" to escape it.
Presumably, en-passant applies only to pawn-vs-pawn captures because
with any other piece one can move forwards AND backwards, and so ought
to be able to get into position without such a special exception.

Just for fun, I'll point out that castling was another rules
"innovation" introduced simply to speed the game (it's the kind of
thing you'd like to achieve anyway, castling just makes it easier).
In much the same way as the en-passant rule, this explains the special
proviso that castling is illegal if any of the spaces involved OR
passed through is subject to attack (ie, a square in which a king
would be in check).  Presumably, if one's opponent had that kind of
control of one's side of the board, she would be able to prevent the
castling if it were attempted "the long way" (using normal moves, I
guess).  And the fact that castling was NOT intended to provide a new,
special kind of move, but was only to be used to speed the game a
little, explains why neither rook nor king may have moved previously.

I certainly understand (and enjoy/agree with) the search for a
defect-free game, but in the case of Chess, it looks like the people
in favor of being defect-free got in arguments with the people who
wanted to make the game more "playable", and the result was even more
severe defects.  Moral anybody?

**********************************************************************
* Michael Chermside * [e-mail] * "a raving mathophile" *
**********************************************************************
--
                                            --- Michael