window seat miscellany
Roommate A ate most of the mini marshmallows, but he did not use them for hot chocolate.
Last night Roommate B and I played my first games of Xiang Qi, Chinese Chess or "Elephant Chess". It's similar enough to int'l chess that almost all pieces (except the queen) have an analogue on the board, so much of your intuition can carry over quickly with some wrinkles. I've noticed the differences so far, without delving into the small scale piece interactions:
more space on the board (8+2 ranks, 8+1 files) but same number of pieces leads to less dense play, less space competition
Most of the pieces have much less defensive capability than their chess counterparts. Few pieces can move diagonally, some pieces are cordoned to a subsets of the board (bishops and king's guard), and a piece in front of the knight restricts it's jumps to half. This seems to lead to more aggressive play, or it could have been that we are beginning (me) and intermediate players.
After a hopeful warmup match R roundly dominated the second, but it was a good time.
If you'd like to get a feel for it, check out this applet version of Xiang Qi. It draws circles where you can move.
Last night Roommate B and I played my first games of Xiang Qi, Chinese Chess or "Elephant Chess". It's similar enough to int'l chess that almost all pieces (except the queen) have an analogue on the board, so much of your intuition can carry over quickly with some wrinkles. I've noticed the differences so far, without delving into the small scale piece interactions:
more space on the board (8+2 ranks, 8+1 files) but same number of pieces leads to less dense play, less space competition
Most of the pieces have much less defensive capability than their chess counterparts. Few pieces can move diagonally, some pieces are cordoned to a subsets of the board (bishops and king's guard), and a piece in front of the knight restricts it's jumps to half. This seems to lead to more aggressive play, or it could have been that we are beginning (me) and intermediate players.
After a hopeful warmup match R roundly dominated the second, but it was a good time.
If you'd like to get a feel for it, check out this applet version of Xiang Qi. It draws circles where you can move.