ChessVariant: I sure wouldn't mind a fellowship devoted to play-testing variants (whether just invented or already "established"--in the sense that rules are fairly well agreed-upon--even if there's no current implementation of the game here.)  For such a fellowship, members ought to be disciplined--that is to say, I'd hope for members who will follow through...when they say they're willing to play a variant (by email, I suppose), they'll be likely to finish what they begin, will move at better then a snail's pace, and have the organizational skills to keep track of positions of games in progress.

Unlike you, my preferences in variants tends toward smaller departures from traditional western chess.  I tend to prefer the standard set of pieces, moving in the traditional manner.

But I enjoy different starting positions (fischerrandom), different means of determining the moves to be made (compromise, dice), different goals of the game (castle chess), departures from the traditional white-black-white-black order of moves (progressive), or less-than-perfect information about the board position (dark).

wetware:and that's "purely purfect" ... we need to be different ... frankly, my games are not chess variants at all , they departed too far form the main goal of the king of the games ... I am rather exploring new games using chess pieces, let's put it this way ...now  look at the Racing Kings ...it's perfect example of my ideas of chess variants ... I hope one day I will build something like this ...
Cheers,
Andy.