For first you should know that everything i say, don't mean to offend anyone. It is just my opinion although many times seems offensive, but never is......
And second i don't take into consideration the patent thing, at all........I see only the game itself.......

As for the patent thing: Since you have to obey other laws at life -laws that other have voted- you have to obey the patent thing law too.....I don't see why this is bad.........

So i guess you would not see the difference between a horse and a donkey too......
I don't say that Gothic Chess is better from CRC (i believe that it is but this is too subjective), i only say that there is a huge difference between these two games........!

WOW! Impressive. Convincing win against the invincible before a year Gothic Vortex.......
The FEN tags on your post are wrong, because an empty line is inserted probably by Brainking's system -a known bug-.....
Anyone wants to see the game should copy and paste this to a text-editor and remove the empty line.....

Pedro Martínez: NEVER say NEVER!

But why? The only problem i see with a quick look is the advanced d-Pawn. And you have a nice double-pin after all.....

A nightmare..........! Who is winning......?

It was not me that asked but i have a question:
Is the 2.Kf5 forced for white in order to win......? By other words: Does all other moves at the second move draw the game(or lose it).......?

One more difficult answer to find (time consuming actually) is: What percentage of moves for the whole mating procedure of white, has just one move for white that wins......?

Almost exactly. He hasn't felt that ChessCarpenter and me were moving too slow, but we were moving too slow!
I feel sorry about this because if i knew he would resign, i would play a lot faster.......

Sumerian: Of course.........My offer will be always valid though........

Sumerian: for those simple initial moves without any understandable reason for that.

I have around 650 games waiting for me to play so i play only them that have 1 day or less to expire......
For reasons i don't know and since the game is 4 days/move, the time limit was much longer, that's why i didn't play with a speed of 4d/m........
For ChessCarpenter of cource i can't answer......

I'm willing to give the prize for the tournament if i win against ChessCarpenter.........If you agree OK, if not then again OK. Of course Ed should agree too.....
And you are right. The time control is 4 days/move and i haven't played for a longer time at this game.....That's bizarre?!?!?!?

Grim Reaper: Agreed..........Andreas is amazing at positional play.....!
I have 2 games running with him and i've not seen any dymamic attacking move, but just a slow occupation of my space, killing me step by step.......Patience-patience-patience....I don't know if i'll have 2 loses finally, but he has the initiative at both games. Actually the positions for both games are quiet but we can say that he has the "positional" initiative.....
And initiative at Gothic Chess in my opinion, worth 70% the win......If one side has even a Knight less but has a nice initiative, he has the best chances to win. Gothic Chess is much more dynamic than Chess.

Grim Reaper: Again, everybody can, so there is some intersection of these two sets regarding skill.

I would replace "skill" in the above statement with "instant playability" or "ability to play instantly" if there is no such word(playability).

If the logic of your 3 statements was correct, then since any Chess player can learn in 7 seconds to play Extinction Chess, he would be good at it if he is good at Chess too, but this isn't happening, obviously. And this is general of course and doesn't occur only at Extinction Chess........

ColonelCrockett:
If you mean that your Chess strength imroved tremendously by playing Gothic Chess, then i much doubt about it..........

I clearly believe that someone by playing Gothic Chess, cannot by any way have a positive (nor a negative) profit at Chess in the strategical area.......

I also clearly believe that someone by playing Gothic Chess, can benefit from it only on a tiny (not even small) degree in the tactical area at Chess.....

Why? Because Gothic Chess is played on a different board with 2 different pieces............

The same exists for the Chess---->Gothic Chess direction...........

Oh....... My reason is that more extra features/abilities should not be given at Pawns, since they would have one reason more to become a Knight or Rook.......
By giving to Pawns the ability to participate quickly in new tournaments, then the difference between a paying membership and a non-paying membership becomes a lot closer, yet there is a huge difference of course.......

Pawns are important for this site and perhaps they are the soul of Brainking, but without Rooks and Knights.............?!?!?!??!?

This is not very convenient and it should be automaticaly happen. But that belongs to feature requests! Since i don't have this problem and i believe that it should not be fixed (for the obvious reason......) i will not report it.......

No, i didn't say that the systems are illogical BUT that the people who still use them are, because they are old and because all world except them uses another system(S.I).......
Of course it's none of my business to criticize what they should use or not, but i find it not so logical to still use the old unit-systems........

No logical European writes 2m08.............!

Don't try to compare the "illogical" American and British way of writing the units with our international way.........
I wonder why it's so difficult to the 2 aforementioned "illogical in this matter" countries to accept the S.I..............?

P.S: I don't have any problem OF COURSE with these countries, i just comment their unit system.......

Oh that was feet and inch? OK............

So she is 6'4 = 6·12*2.54 + 4·2,54 = 193,04 cm
WOW! She is really tall............!

6'10 what? How this is translated to cm or m.......?
Damn Americans

It was the last Gothic Vortex Gold-beta you have send me. It was one day before the release of the final version. But it says 1.0.9.........

I played a small tournament with myself, Smirf BC-056 and Gothic Vortex 1.0.9. Each player played 2 games (1 with White, one with Black) against each other. I won both 4 games. Yeah............!
Time control was 30 seconds per move, with 64 MB hash for the engines...........

1)Me-G.V 1-0
I had a nice attack as always with many surprising sacrifices for G.V, but the damn computer resisted amazingly and managed to hold with an equal position(i think) until move 33. Then it had only one line that would hold (an easy to see-33...Qh7) but it played horribly the moves 33,34,35 and lost immediatelly............!
After the game i could not immediatelly reproduce 33...Qd8? It played the correct Qh7 2 times, then the third time, it choosed e6 and after a computer start-up it choosed the Qd8 again ?!?!?!? And when i play from move 30 all the moves, it always plays the Qd8 move.......


2)G.V-Smirf 1-0
After some logical opening Pawn and Knight moves by both players, GV played an unorthodox Knight move(7.Ni5) and Smirf replied badly (7...Bxc3?). After some developing moves in an unusual position, Smirf saw a big advantage after 18...Bxd3? but it was a huge mistake. After white castled game was already over..........G.V finished the game with a nice attack.......!


3)Smirf-Me 0-1
I gave a Pawn, Smirf's development has become slow, i gave a Rook and a Bishop for an attack and mated some moves later........I have the impression, in fact i'm sure, that Smirf could win this game.....But let me intrude in its position and win.........


4)G.V-Me 0-1
I've managed to create an invisible(for G.V) attack for the white King, which G.V allowed me to make after a long time (after the fix of the Chancellor-bug, creating such positions was very difficult)....I had to praise G.V for its move 21.Ag1! and not taking the b6-Pawn, because it felt the danger (Unfortunatelly the next 2 moves was Be3 and Bxb6 taking the Pawn and probably that was the critical mistakes)....The question of course is if Ag1 could save the game. The position is already too difficult to hold.....


5)Me-Smirf 1-0
Smirf played as always(it's much more active with Pawns and not only, at the opening from G.V) the kind of moves i hate. Pawn-attacking moves, challenging me for the center and not giving me space, and not afraid to leave hanging pieces. My nightmare......! Some strange moves by me giving 3 Pawns and then a Rook, that Smirf took instead of accepting the 3 Pawns and castling safely. Then a crazy tactical position arised. Giving my last Rook i had a nice attack but the win was not obvious....But the final winning combination was startling........! "27.Cf1! , 28.Cf5!! , 30.Nf6! was some of the good moves......."

In this game also occured the following:
I would put this to my notes for Reinhard about Smirf, but here is anyway:
In the 6th move and after my c3 Smirf had a bad(buggy?) reaction again. The position is this and Smirf's evaluation was the following......:

r1bqckab1r/pp2pp1ppp/2np2pn2/
2p7/4PP4/2P3PP1N/PP1P4PP/RNBQCKAB1R b KQkq - 0 6
-----------------------------------------
End of thinking (mate found)
00:00.0 (06.08+) +M~254 6...Be6 (Af6)
-----------------------------------------



6)Smirf-G.V 1/2-1/2
G.V was out of book in its second only move(smirf doesn't have a book). After some unorthodox moves again by both players, i can really say that Smirf outplayed G.V at the opening in this position and reached a very favorable position. After 18...Kg7 i had the impression that Smirf would convert this winning position into a win. And at move 34 it was clear that Smirf would be able to win although the position was VERY difficult to do it. It needed a strategic plan to do it. To bring the Rooks into action and prevent the Archbishop from breaking through into white's King's position. But Smirf played the awuful Bxf4? instead of gxf4 and allowed G.V a perpetual check.........

In this game also occured the following again:
I would put this to my notes for Reinhard about Smirf, but here is anyway:
In the 33th move and after GV's 32...Ad7 Smirf had a bad(buggy?) reaction again. The position is this and Smirf's evaluation was the following......:

7b1r/p1pa2kppp/2N7/6p3/1P2P5/
3P2PP2/2KB1P3P/3R3R2 w - - 1 33
-----------------------------------------
En
d of thinking (mate found)
00:00.0 (08.03+) +M~254 33.Nxa7 (b5)
-----------------------------------------




Crosstable (1=win , 0=loss , ½=draw).........:

Player  Me  G.V  Smirf  Total
-----------------------------------

Me      --     11     11       4.0

G.V     00     --     1½      1.5

Smirf   00     0½     --       0.5
-----------------------------------

The games............:

[Event "SmirfGUI Computerchess Game"]
[Site "?"]
[Date "????.??.??"]
[Round "?"]
[White "George Tsavdaris"]
[Black "Gothic Vortex"]
[Result "1-0"]
[Annotator "George Tsavdaris"]
[SetUp "1"]
[FEN "rnbqckabnr/pppppppppp/10/10/10/10/PPPPPPPPPP/RNB
QCKABNR w KQkq - 0 1"]

1.f4 Nh6 2.d4 d5 3.g3 Nc6 4.c3 g6 5.h3 Bg7 6.Nj3 Af6 7.Ah2 O-O 8.Bf3 Nf5 9.g4
Nh4 10.e3 Nxi2 11.Cg2 j6 12.Bd2 Nj4 13.Be1 Nxh3 14.Bxj6 ixj6 15.g5 Ag8 16.Ri1+
Nxi1 17.Cxi1+ Kj8 18.Qe1 Ai7 19.Ai4 Ri8 20.Axj6 Aj5+ 21.Ai4 Bh3+ 22.Ke2 Bh8
23.Axj5 Bxj5 24.Ni5 Cg7 25.Cj3 Ri6 26.Cxj5+ Rj6 27.Ch4 Qg8 28.Qh1 Rxj2+ 29.Kd1
Bi7 30.Nxh7+ Ki8 31.Qi1 Cxh7 32.Qxj2 Cxh4 33.Qxh4 Qd8 34.Nd2 Qd7 35.Bg4 Qd6
36.Kc2 Rh8 37.Qj4 Rh5 38.Bxh5 Nb4+ 39.cxb4 Qc6+ 40.Kb3 gxh5 41.Qf8+ Kj7 42.Rj1+
1-0

[Event "SmirfGUI Computerchess Game"]
[Site "?"]
[Date "????.??.??"]
[Round "?"]
[White "Gothic Vortex"]
[Black "Smirf"]
[Result "1-0"]
[Annotator "George Tsavdaris"]
[SetUp "1"]
[FEN "rnbqckabnr/pppppppppp/10/10/10/10/PPPPPPPPPP/RNB
QCKABNR w KQkq - 0 1"]

1.c4 g6 2.Nh3 c5 3.Nc3 h5 4.d3 Nh6 5.g3 Nc6 6.Bd5 d6 7.Ni5 Bxc3 8.bxc3 Af6
9.Bxh6+ ixh6 10.Qc1 Kg7 11.Nh3 Ci8 12.Nj4 Qa5 13.Cc2 Bf5 14.Ca3 Qc7 15.Rb1 Qc8
16.Qb2 Rb8 17.h3 Ae5 18.Ai3 Bxd3 19.f4 Bxb1 20.fxe5 Bf5 21.exd6 exd6 22.O-O Qd7
23.Rf1 Qc8 24.Nxh5+ gxh5 25.Axh5+ Kh7 26.g4 Bg6 27.Rxf7+ Bxf7 28.Qc2+ Kg8
29.Qg6+ Kh8 30.Af6+ Ki7 31.Qh7+ Kj6 32.Ah4+ Ci5 33.Qxh6# 1-0

[Event "SmirfGUI Computerchess Game"]
[Site "?"]
[Date "????.??.??"]
[Round "?"]
[White "Smirf"]
[Black "George Tsavdaris"]
[Result "0-1"]
[Annotator "George Tsavdaris"]
[SetUp "1"]
[FEN "rnbqckabnr/pppppppppp/10/10/10/10/PPPPPPPPPP/RNB
QCKABNR w KQkq - 0 1"]

1.d3 d5 2.h4 g6 3.g3 Nj6 4.c3 c6 5.Nh3 h6 6.Qa4 Ah7 7.Be3 Nd7 8.Bxa7 Nf6 9.Bf3
Nfh5 10.Qa3 Ni4 11.Bxh5 gxh5 12.Nd2 Cg7 13.Cf3 Bg4 14.Cf4 Af5 15.Cg2 Qc7
16.O-O-O b5 17.Bb6 Rxa3 18.Bxc7 Rxa2 19.Kb1 Ce8 20.Kxa2 Ca8+ 21.Kb1 Bxc3
22.bxc3 Ca3+ 23.Kb2 Ca4+ 24.Kb3 Ae6 25.Rc1 Ac5+ 26.Kc2 Ca2+ 27.Kd1 Aa4+ 28.Nb3
Axb3+ 29.Rc2 Ca1# 0-1

[Event "SmirfGUI Computerchess Game"]
[Site "?"]
[Date "????.??.??"]
[Round "?"]
[White "Gothic Vortex"]
[Black "George Tsavdaris"]
[Result "0-1"]
[Annotator "George Tsavdaris"]
[SetUp "1"]
[FEN "rnbqckabnr/pppppppppp/10/10/10/10/PPPPPPPPPP/RNB
QCKABNR w KQkq - 0 1"]

1.f4 f5 2.Nh3 g6 3.Nc3 c6 4.g3 d5 5.Ng5 h6 6.Nh3 b6 7.Bf3 d4 8.Nb5 a6 9.Na3 Bf6
10.Af2 Cg7 11.O-O Nj6 12.d3 Ah7 13.Nc4 i5 14.e4 e6 15.e5 Be7 16.j3 Ri8 17.Nd6
Aj5 18.Nxc8 Qxc8 19.Axd4 i4 20.jxi4 Rxi4 21.Ag1 Ci7 22.Kj1 Kf7 23.Be3 Qi8
24.Bxb6 Rxi2 25.Axi2 Ai3+ 26.Ki1 Aj2+ 27.Kj1 Cj5 28.Nj4 Qxi2+ 29.Kxi2 Cxj4+
30.Kj1 Ah3# 0-1

[Event "SmirfGUI Computerchess Game"]
[Site "?"]
[Date "????.??.??"]
[Round "?"]
[White "George Tsavdaris"]
[Black "Smirf"]
[Result "1-0"]
[Annotator "George Tsavdaris"]
[SetUp "1"]
[FEN "rnbqckabnr/pppppppppp/10/10/10/10/PPPPPPPPPP/RNB
QCKABNR w KQkq - 0 1"]

1.f4 d6 2.Nj3 c5 3.e4 Nh6 4.g3 Nc6 5.h3 g6 6.c3 Be6 7.Ah2 Qa5 8.b3 j5 9.Bf3 f5
10.d3 Bxb3 11.Qe2 fxe4 12.Bxe4 Cc7 13.Bd2 Qa4 14.O-O Bxa2 15.f5 Nxf5 16.Rf1 Ab3
17.Ag4 Axa1 18.Ni5 e6 19.Bxf5 exf5 20.Rxf5+ gxf5 21.Axf5 Kg8 22.Qh5 Ne5 23.Nxh7
Rf8 24.Nxf8 Cg7 25.Ah7+ Cxh7 26.Nxh7 Ri8 27.Cf1 Bf7 28.Cf5 Bg7 29.Ce7+ Kh8
30.Nf6+ Bh6 31.Bxh6 Qd1+ 32.Qxd1 ixh6 33.Qh5 Ki7 34.Qxf7+ Nxf7 35.Cxf7+ Kj6
36.Nh5+ Ki6 37.Cg7+ Ki5 38.j4# 1-0

[Event "SmirfGUI Computerchess Game"]
[Site "?"]
[Date "????.??.??"]
[Round "?"]
[White "Smirf"]
[Black "Gothic Vortex"]
[Result "1/2-1/2"]
[Annotator "George Tsavdaris"]
[SetUp "1"]
[FEN "rnbqckabnr/pppppppppp/10/10/10/10/PPPPPPPPPP/RNB
QCKABNR w KQkq - 0 1"]

1.g3 d5 2.Na3 Nh6 3.c4 dxc4 4.Nxc4 Nc6 5.d3 g6 6.Bxc6 bxc6 7.h4 Ni4 8.Nh3 Bxh3+
9.ixh3 Qd7 10.Rh1 Nh6 11.Af3 Cd8 12.Qa4 Ce6 13.Na5 Cc5 14.Qb4 Ca6 15.Qb7 Qc8
16.Qxc8+ Rxc8 17.Axc6 Rb8 18.Ad7+ Kg7 19.Bf4 f6 20.Cc2 Rd8 21.Ac6 Rd5 22.b4 Af7
23.Axe7 g5 24.hxg5 fxg5 25.Bd2 Ae6 26.O-O-O Nf5 27.Axd5 Axd5 28.e4 Nd4 29.Cxd4
Axa2+ 30.Kc2 Ae6 31.Cc6 Cxc6+ 32.Nxc6 Ad7 33.Nxa7 Kg6 34.f4 gxf4 35.Bxf4 Aa4+
36.Kb1 Ac3+ 37.Kc2 Aa4+ 38.Kb1 Ac3+ 39.Kc1 Ab2+ 40.Kd2 Ac3+ 41.Kc1 Ab2+ 42.Kd2
Ac3+ 43.Kc1 1/2-1/2

No, the best game ever invented is Backgammon and our(Greek) Fevga(Backgammon variant)..........!
But of course this is too subjective and there are about 45-50 amazing games, including in these the Gothic Chess.

tedbarber: There are no 2 move or 3 move mates in Gothic Chess.
Don't bet on this.......
1.Af3 Ah6 2.Ae4 Af4 3.Axh7# mate..........

rabbitoid:
16 extra squares and 2 new pieces, combined give this result........Very simple.

Just notice that the possible arrangements (without taking into consideration illegal positions and checks) for:
Gothic Chess is: (80!) / ((2^6)·10!·10!·40!) = 10^56
Chess is: (64!) / ((2^6)·8!·8!·32!) = 10^42

A HUGE difference..............!
(Notice that i'm a kind of drunk right now (although i don't hit to walls yet) and the calculations might be a little or more wrong......)

So with 1-2 machines one would need around 25 years.....
Very dissapointing......

No i mean the whole size of :
(N+1)-piece = "KNNKN + .... + KBNKA"
against the whole size of:
N-piece = "KNNK + .... + KQAK"

In Chess the following is valid:
A (N+1)-piece tablebase is approximately 60 time larger than the N-piece.
This exists for 3-4-5-6 pieces.
Does this exist for Gothic chess also.....?

(I have the feeling that i have asked this before. Sorry for my bad memory if it's really true)

I want to know if the 6 piece endgames will have any practical importance.......Because if the whole 6-piece is 1 terrabyte then it's obvious that..............

CardinalFlight:

First: it is not a forced mate in 13 after the Queen sacrifice......

Second: i think you meant "white" instead of "black". (It is black that has the advantage.....)
If you don't mean that, then i think you are confused......

Hmm, i think you didn't understand what i mean. You said that after your Queen sacrifice there was a mate in 13. I just said that it isn't! Nothing more nothing less........
And what i am saying, is that after the Queen takes the Archbishop there is no mate in 6 that is needed to have a mate in 13 from the point of the Queen sacrifice. White is lost either way and actually Qxf4 is the best move as then the Rook can take the black Bishop too........

tedbarber:
Hmm, you didn't. You meant the wrong thing........:-)
After the queen sacrifice there wasn't any mate in 13.
For example after 25...Axf4+ if white played 26.Qxf4 there is no mate in less than 20 moves........

Was him really Nigel Short?
Why in the PGN says Nigel Davis?????

I didn't see the game yet, but if someone say "I sacrificed a queen for a mate in 13" it should mean: "I sacrificed a queen and from there a mate in 13 exist" and NOT: "I sacrificed a queen and then i mated in 13 moves".
I doubt you mean the first but we will see..........

Hey Walter hello,
since you approve the messages and this will not become visible(i wrote it instead of a personal message) i'm writing to express my thoughts, i see now you will have to do much work since you are the only moderator left and the most important: you have to approve all the messages.
Ugghh , too tiring!!!
I suggest you to change this for 2 important reasons:
1)It's awful(personal and not only, opinion)!
2)You will have to do a harder job.......

A better system will be: If you see something that you don't approve, then give a notice to the poster and if he repeats it, then you should just punish him for 1 weak or something........

He he, most people would always fight for religions, politics, teams and in every other matter possible. About everything..........! They will always find something.......

I have never tried seriously, to find the reason. I will try to think about it a little. Does anyone knows it.....?

Personally i would never care less if someone insulted me even with the most ugly way, or said awful things about me(even lies).......I don't care!
It's a matter of world's understanding.......

EdTrice:
I will check my e-mail when i go home. I'm looking forward to see where do i have to put the tablebases folder this time......

Where did you see that...........? Do you have the link.......? I just only see statements about his new book.......

I hope this too, but i think the possibility for this, is bellow that of having a straight flush at poker.....
Kasparov will concentrate on his books and on making more money from his name.......(Or not of course. Perhaps he doesn't want more money)

Nobody knows.........
And in fact your question is not well defined so actually nobody can't answer..........

I don't understand what you are saying......
I just said to play Gothic Chess legally. Not ignoring the patent........We don't have to invent new games that are the same with G.C without breaking the patent, we just have to play Gothic Chess......!

Or just play Gothic Chess........

Hmm, again the same situation. It's very dissapointing to see all these meaningless conversations again...........

The important is to KEEP GOTHIC CHESS AND ED TRICE HERE at BRAINKING! Gothic Chess is one of my favourite games here and i'm not the only one, and i will not be simply unhappy if it will be removed from here, but i will lose much of my interest for Brainking............Gothic Chess is popular here and i don't understand the reasons people have suggesting to remove it. You put ideas of Fencer head and make the situation even more difficult.

And why do you care about the patent????? You just have to enjoy G.C but no. You will never satisfy! And what if Ed and G.C leave? What thing you will have for fighting.........? I'm sure you will find something..............

I'm sure Fencer will do the obvious........He is clever and he is not influenced by your voices........

Fariborz2 you succedded in answering all questions correctly. I have communicated with Fencer to add a one year membership on you.......

The only semi-correct question was Q-2 since the line you gave was far from optimal for white (he could mate at the ending position much easier) and ESPECIALLY for black (he could delay mate MUCH longer, there were many more tricks he could do to just delay it...), but your whole idea-combination was correct so.......

Oh, forget it. I just looked at his profile.......the solution was one click away, but i have spent a century looking at Google......

Well, if you really want to win the 1 year, then you have to post both 4 questions at the same post. That means a post with question-1 and another post later with question-2 is pointless, as even if both q-1 and q-2 are correct they are not part of the same post.......

By the way, does anyone remember the Gothic Chess page of Schachmdmt? I don't remember the ending.... I try gothicchess.aus/ast but nothing works

Well since last time nobody succedded, i will increase the prize..... So here is your chance to win a one year membership here, with a lot of effort of course........

The first one who will post here at
Gothic Chess discussion board and only here, the correct answers to the above 4 questions, will win a 1 year Rook membership...........

The 4 questions are here.


***If there are no answers or any correct one until 10/02/2005, there will be no winner.......
***If someone posts more than 1 answer, then the accepted one, will be ONLY his last one. That means even if someone posts a correct answer before everyone, but posts another one later, not correct this time, he would not win as the accepted answer will be the last one. Even if anyone else hasn't answered correctly.......
***In the extremely rare case when there will be 2 or more correct answers at the exactly same time, the winner will be the one whose post will appear first at the Gothic Chess discussion board.
***I will post if there is a winner or not at 10/02/2005.

We should write to Fencer to clarify this.........
If it's true then is one of the most dummy decisions he could make!!!! But even if it's true i think we can change his opinion.....

The first one who will post at
BrainKing.com discussion board and only there, the correct answers to the above 3 questions, will win a 6 Month Rook membership............

The 3 questions are here.


***If there are no answers or any correct one until the same day next week, there will be no winner.......
***In the extremely rare case when there will be 2 or more correct answers at the exactly same time, the winner will be the one whose post will appear first at the BrainKing.com discussion board.

Walter, i wanted to reply but you just said exactly all my thoughts. Nothing to add.......

This is a good idea that the user picks the symbol.
For me the current Janus piece icon is very funny and whenever i look at it my feelings change positive!
So i like the piece......
I also find its smile smirking, like it makes fun of us playing the game......

But look the Janus piece again! Look it's smiling with so much silliness that it should make you laugh!! It's a damn of a piece for me!