<Thad -

My apologies. I have responded to so much and missed yours. Keep in mind that at night, it's been me against 3 of you. In the daytime, Dmitri King and Harley chime in about our side.

Your prior statement:
>> Ok, well it’s MY premise that one game is a variant of another if it’s rules can be explained more easily by describing the differences between it and the main game, than explaining explaining the rules of that game would be. For example, I can say that fun-pente (as I have called it in previous posts) is ‘official’ pente without the move restriction. I can say that much more easily than I can lay out all the rules for fun-pente. As far as I’m concerned, it’s a variant. Keyro13 is Keyro Pente played on a 13x13 board. That’s much easier to say than to state all the rules for Keyro13 directly. It’s a variant. <

I'm almost certain that you KNOW that your statement is untrue so it isn't worth a real rebuttle but I'll do a small one just in case. If you had chess where a pawn could ONLY move one space forward instead of 1 or 2 on the first move and it ONLY captured one space forward instead of diagonally could be MUCH more easily explained than the real rules for chess. But you certainly wouldn't call that just 'chess' and the correct version of chess 'multi-move-pawn chess'. Anyway, I assume that you were just being funny there.

Your prior statement:
>> Now, with my premise, there is no issue of games being valid or not. I mean, one could play just about anything they want. Pente-on-a-5x5 board? Go ahead. I’m not gonna play, but if you want to, be my guest! Pente-where-more-than-five-in-a-row-doesn’t-win, pente-with-unlimited-captures, pente-where-you-can’t-win-diagonally? All good! Have a blast. How about this one, checkers with shot glasses, when you make a jump, drink your opponent’s shot, when you make a king, add an olive (yes, I stole that from M*A*S*H). I LIKE that variant!! My point here is that I can make up any game I want and no one can tell me it is or isn’t a valid game. <

Thad, there seems to be two issues here:
1. What constitutes a game that ANYONE can play. That's ALMOST anything as long as it is winnable.
2. That which is a VIABLE game so that programming hours should be spent by a site owner to create that game.

I'm saying this because you are making two different arguments here. No one is stopping ANYONE from playing ANY kind of game that they want to.

What I am trying to do is DEFINE what constitutes a valid variant such that programming time should be spent to create that variant. It is VERY obvious that NO site owner would create SOME of the variants that you have described above. A FEW of them are probably VERY good and viable! It is ALSO very obvious that we would be WAY of out line if we were to pass a law forbidding you to play those variants at all at any time.

Does that make sense? There is a BIG difference between a reasonable variant on a site and a reasonable variant that someone might play with their friends (like your MASH checkers variant that I found hilarious!).

Your prior statement:
>> Furthermore, my premise doesn’t take into account anything about the original game. AND IT SHOULDN’T! Whether or not a variant has some kind of impact on the game it was derived from doesn’t validate or invalidate the variant! <

I respectfully disagree. If a variant confuses beginning players such that they think that the variant is the actual rules for the mainstream game, then in my opinion, it is an invalid variant. It is the new and beginning players such as Harley that we are the most concerned about.

Your prior statement:
>> Why can't a variant 'negatively impact the ability of one side or the other to win’? <

Once again, you're confusing what is viable amongst players physically playing one another in person and what is viable for a site to spend programming time on.

To be on a site, although IT CAN negatively impact one side's changes to win, it must be within reason or few players will play it. See my opinion for the 5 different conditions that must be met to constitute an invalid variant. But my biggest issue is for variants with different rules that can EASILY be confused for the game with the correct rules like IYT did with Pente and Keryo Pente.

Your prior statement continuing from above:
>> And if it can’t how can you allow both Pente and Keyro Pente. Surely in one variation, player 1 has a bigger advantage than in the other and therefore must go. <

Pente and Keryo Pente are actually 2 completely separate games. While the strategy has some similarities, the difference in positions and attacking is quite significant. One is not a variant of the other.

This is just like GoMoku and Renju. That have the similarities of the 15x15 board and needing to get 5 in a row to win. But their similarities end there.

Your prior statement continued from above:
>> Or are you saying that we can create variations of pente so long as player 1’s advantage is no greater than it is with the current 'official' rules? Well, who said the current amount of advantage is the correct amount not to be exceeded anyway? <

I am not saying that at all. I am stating that a variant should not be created that is SO similar to the original game such that beginners confuse it for the correct way to play the game AND that variant substantially and negatively affects the ability of one side to win.

So in effect you could create a pente variant where you only have to get 3 in a row to win and call it 3-pente if you want. Although I would find it annoying, I wouldn't object much. The reason is that there is NO WAY that a beginner will confuse it with the actual game of Pente. Of course, there is no way a site owner would create such a game because the 1st player would always win in a few moves, so virtually no one would play it and it would be a waste of his programming time.

Your statement tonight:
>> Your definition of an invalid variant is garbage, junk, meaningless, without merit.
I will say that again so that it clear:
Your definition of an invalid variant is worthless.
A variant of a game is either that or it’s not. If it’s a spin-off of another game, it’s a variant, if it’s not a spin-off of another game, then it’s not a variant of that game. <

I'll ignore your comments about my definition of invalid variants. Here's why. For the 3rd time in 2 posts, you are confusing what is viable for 2 players to physically play in person and what a site owner will take programming time to put on their site. My definition of an invalid variant ONLY applies to that which a reasonable site owner would spend programming time on.
Your statement tonight:
>> A GAME (whether it’s a variant of another or not) may be valid or invalid depending of whether or not it’s winnable. Go-Moku played on a 4x4 grid would be invalid. There’s not enough room on the board to place five stones in a line and therefore, no way to win. Thus the game is invalid. <

That's a pretty narrow definition of a valid variant by most standards. If you said that, then I could say let's play Pente and here's the rules: 1. The first to get 2 in a row wins. -or- 2. The first to get 1 in a row wins.

I think that you should take some time and revise that statement so that it makes a little more sense. Also, once again you're confusing what a site owner would program and what players would play in person.

Your statement tonight:
>> But a variant can't be declared invalid just because of how it stacks up to another game. <

I completely agree with that statement. But I will state my opinion about something else once again. That is that a variant IS INVALID if it is so substantially similar to the original game, meets all of the criteria that was outlined, it confuses beginning players into thinking that it is the correct version of the game, AND one side's chances of winning are strongly negatively impacted. It is the one-sidedness of a game that will NOT allow it to grow in the long run.

Your statement tonight:
>> Fun-pente is a game and it’s a variant of pente. It’s valid, because it’s winable. The fact that one side enjoys an advantage is irrelevant.

I think I made the point that having a simple definition of a game being winnable is FAR to narrow of a definition of a valid variant, but ESPECIALLY for a valid variant that programming time would be spent on.

The fact that one side enjoys an advantage is VERY relavent. It if wasn't relavent, then we could 2-in-a-row Pente.


I think that addresses everything and I think I repeated myself in several instances here, but there seemed to be no other way to get the individual points across.


Gary