I should have seen that coming, but I guess it was hard to avoid. I enjoyed the game, and I'm pleased that it lasted longer than our first game of regular Shogi. I did well early on, but you pulled ahead and ended up with about twice as many pieces as I had, which gave you a distinct advantage. Unfortunately, I didn't manage to make a comeback, but I think I managed to hold out fairly well.
darth_ender said:
So I am curious about your thoughts. What would you suggest changing for once this game is done? I had suggested a positional change, one I'm still interested in. But I am not certain how well I like the cannons. They seem a bit too powerful for a game like this. What's more, they are not truly native to Japanese Chess. They come from Chinese Chess (gold cannon) and Korean Chess (silver cannon), and were adopted by a Westerner and given their present names for Cannon Shogi. But there is no actual Japanese heritage for them, so I've always felt a bit like a cheater for including them. On the other hand, they make the game exciting and faster paced, in what otherwise might take ages to complete. The silver cannon in particular is especially effective on a one dimensional board, and when a game can get so easily cluttered, it's nice to have a mobile piece. So I'm not sure.
Perhaps, rather than having a silver/gold cannon, you could use a silver cannon as the promoted value of another piece; perhaps a rook, which you could add to the board. That way you're only half cheating. ;) Of course, a rook would have the same moves as a reverse chariot on this board. Hmmm.... I guess I can't think of a suitable demoted value that isn't already in use.
OK, I thought about it for a bit, and I think they're a central part of the game as it's set up now, so leave them in. I don't think there's a problem with adding pieces to Shogi, which already has so many. It still has the Shogi feel to it, so I wouldn't worry about cheating by using a couple pieces not native to Shogi and variants.
I also think the first four pieces could use some more rearrangement. When we started this game, I couldn't see a way to initiate a trade without coming out behind. You did a good job starting the trades and getting our armies to clash, but it took some doing. With enough study, it would probably be too easy to identify the best opening moves to make. I want this game to be more complex than that. Now that we're in the thick of it, I think the number of options has increased and thus made it more interesting and complex. But the opening is too narrow. I think it would be better to include more long-range pieces towards the front (especially the somewhat offensively useless lance/reverse chariot, which is always stuck behind its own pieces unless captured and dropped by the enemy), while tucking a couple of steppers or leapers (perhaps the silver, knight, or goose) closer to the back to act as defense.
I agree. Here is my proposal for the board layout (from front to back):
(centre square)
Pawn/Go-Between
(space)
(space)
Lance/Reverse Chariot
Knight/Heavenly Horse
Gold General/Silver General (note the G as the demoted value)
Goose/Phoenix
(space)
(space)
Silver Cannon/Gold Cannon
(space)
(space)
Ramshead Soldier/Bishop
King
This puts the board at 29 squares. Only the silver cannon and the gold general cannot move on the first turn. The pawns will get taken early in the game (assuming the pawn victim isn't moved, it can be captured with two pawn, knight, or goose moves). This will allow for it to be dropped in a more desirable location and also serves to protect pieces from each other's lances for a couple turns. The knights and geese won't get in each other's way and the gold general can move out as soon as either the lance or knight is moved, and backwards as soon as the goose is moved. The silver cannon can't move until a few turns into the game, but I don't think that is much of a problem.
Hopefully there aren't any major flaws that I didn't spot, but please tweak it a bit if you don't think it quite works.
I'm not entirely sure I want to shrink the board anymore. Though it's rough for some of my pieces stuck way at my end, it's also good that the pieces in play have plenty of room to maneuver.
I like having the board long too. I did take one square away, but that isn't much. If we want a similar set-up and more squares, we can add two squares, which would put us at 31. Either way, it's just a one square difference. The disadvantage of adding two squares is that both the knight and the goose end up on the centre square. With 29 squares they don't meet until they get to the square the lance is on. The advantages of having 31 squares with my proposed set-up might outweigh the disadvantages though.
Anyway, these are my thoughts.
And those were mine. ;)