Comment by stavros
8 hours ago
Wait, how is the "put off checkmate" objective scored? Turns before checkmate? Or what?
Is it just a joke?
8 hours ago
Wait, how is the "put off checkmate" objective scored? Turns before checkmate? Or what?
Is it just a joke?
The sibling comment proposed a possible scoring mechanism which might result in enjoyable gameplay, but I think the bigger point (for me, at least) is the Mind Chess represents a reducto ad absurdum of the strategy game genre. It eschews as many rules as possible, leaving you only with the goal of knowing your opponent's mind. So Mind Chess is more of a thought exercise.
It's similar to the 2-minute version of Diplomacy - get everyone together and the second sneakiest bastard wins; because nobody will let the sneakiest bastard win.
The Search for the Longest Infinite Chess Game
https://youtu.be/b-Bb_TyhC1A
I have never played it, but I could imagine a scoring mechanism that would make it interesting, and perhaps is implied by the rules:
The score value starts at 1. Every additional "check" multiplies the score value by 2 (so 2, 4, 8, 16...). The first player to say "checkmate" receives the score. Track your summed score between games; the player with the highest overall score at any given time is "winning."
Isn't the optimal strategy just to say "checkmate" immediately? That dominates anything else.
I think to have any chance of making this work, you’d need to have a community of players in a tournament. Everybody gets to issue some number of challenges, and the winner is the person who accumulates the most points over the course of the tournament. I think you should only get points based on the length of games you win.
Then the game at least has a chance to develop some mechanics. Players who delayed longer have a chance at winning more points. They also might be challenged more…
That would be the equivalent of spawn camping.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Camping_(video_games)
It only works if there are more than two players
Give two players cards, "Check" and "Checkmate".
Both players choose a card. Players then in turns reveal their card, and if Check, make another choice. The player first revealing Checkmate wins if their opponent's currently-chosen card is also a Checkmate.
But then this just gives the win to the first person to open their card, since in that round they had both selected Checkmate. Or, you have an incentive to rush to open your card when you know you've selected Checkmate, as you want to be the first one to open.
In the proposed game above, there is no rounds, just alternating plays, in which you have to select you play before the other player announces their play, then swap and repeat
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