Chess Readers and Writers discussion

Would anyone mind if I promoted my book here? Mods - please feel free to delete if I'm doing something I shouldn't be...

Will,

I am reading your "Once Upon A Chess Game", and it is simply delightful. If you are promoting equally good things - I can't imagine anyone should complain. They should, instead, check out the work and be glad the found out about it!

Randy

Randy

You are a star! I hesitated because most Goodreads forums have strict rules about authors pimping their books, but I couldn't find the rules for this forum.

Maybe it's because we are such a small but perfectly formed group?





Will

I have a question for you fellows. I'm about to start a sequel to my recent sci-fi book.

My question is, in the sequel, their are 2 alien races that at war and are good at different things: tactics and strategy. Like in Chess, one without the other doesn't work well. I was a big fan of the John Carter of Mars series (I own them all), and am thinking of having one of the alien races having a game similar to chess, ala E.R.Burroughs' The Chessmen of Mars. Plus I used to work at IBM and actually had a simplified version of Deep Blue that could run on a laptop and that the research guys gave me to show to high school chess clubs, so I know a fair bit about how their innards work.

Do you think that's too much of a 'been there and done that' thing? (After all, even in Harry Potter they had a chess scene.) In which case I will make it only that they've studied our Earthling chess from our radio transmissions. I'm kind of on the fence whether to introduce a chess variant since I'm not sure it would add much to the story. It would be more of a nod to the Burroughs' stories. What do you think?

And I thought I was taking a punt by promoting a chess book in a chess forum! I admire your enterprise, sir.

I've not seen many sci fi books use chess in the way you describe, so offhand I don't get a strong sense of "been there done that". Sure, Harry Potter had a chess scene, but it was a one-off and not a constant plot device.

It wouldn't be too hard to imagine an alien race inventing a game similar to chess. Board games have been invented separately all round the earth, so it seems not unreasonable for another species to do something similar.

Most games have an element of randomness about them - the use of dice in backgammon or the turn of a card in poker. Many card games also have a hidden element in that you cannot see your opponent's cards. Chess is unusual in being a totally open game with no random or hidden elements.

In theory, chess could be "solved" because there are only a finite number of possible games - although the number of possible games is astronomically high. So an advanced race might see the earth game of chess as a puzzle rather than a contest.

A couple of random thoughts - in part, chess is a test of memory and the ability to calculate without writing anything down (which also tests memory). An alien race with superior intelligence or memory could find the game much easier than us. That is partly why computers are now much stronger than human players. A superior race could consider chess to be like the game of tic-tac-toe - once you know the strategy you will never lose. It then stops being a game.

All in all, I can't see any reason why you shouldn't include chess in sci fi. I don't think it would win you many new readers but it could be an interesting dimension.

Will wrote: "And I thought I was taking a punt by promoting a chess book in a chess forum! I admire your enterprise, sir.

I've not seen many sci fi books use chess in the way you describe, so offhand I don't g..."

Thanks Will.
RE. the random element, don't forget Fisher wanting to place the pieces on the 1st/8th rank in random order to get around the memorization of openings. It never caught on. Hey, there's even an online generator!
http://www.chessgames.com/perl/fische...

From what I've read, it is still undecided if chess can be 'solved' some day. Perhaps if we have quantum computers.

Have you ever tried 3D Chess? I had a Strato 3D chess board once. It was awful. Perhaps a 3D variation might make sense for an advanced species.

I do have a sneaking suspicion that Fischer proposed his random chess idea so that he could carry on winning when his memory could not keep up with that of his opponents.

Similarly, Capablanca proposed extending the board and adding new pieces. Maybe it was all those boring Queens Gambit declineds...

Neither idea caught on. There is enough complexity in the standard game for us mortals. Us homo sapiens, mortals, that is.

The problem with 3D chess from a fiction perspective, I think, is that Spock played it in the original Star Trek television series. I think 3D chess would have readers shouting "rip off" far faster than standard chess.

I've never really been one for chess variants or for chess pieces in anything other than the Staunton pattern. It's more than complicated enough for my little brain.

Will wrote: "I've never really been one for chess variants or for chess pieces in anything other than the Staunton pattern. It's more than complicated enough for my little brain."

Unfortunately I love various chess set designs. My wife was very understanding when we visited England a number of years ago, and I found a beautiful medieval chess set and board on sale in the town of Chedder and she let my purchase it. Of course, with all the ins and outs, I have to constantly dust it! Chess is hard enough without watery eyes from dust.