Azhdarchid

One of my favorite game design things

Is the concept of an adjournment in chess; essentially using time travel to fix a little imbalance in the game.

You see, in classical chess, players have a lot of time on the clock to make their moves, and more time is added when the game reaches a certain number of moves. This would sometimes lead to games running over a reasonable amount of time to play in a single day, so a procedure was developed to adjourn the game and restart the following day; much like how a tennis match might go for multiple days if nobody manages to win.

However, adjournments have an inherent imbalance. They give both players a lot of extra thinking time off the clock; historically when a game was adjourned, the players would go back and analyze the game away from the board, often with their teams and coaches. But one player has the next move. This means that they can commit to their next move and then analyze the position ahead of that move, while their opponent, instead, has to think one move behind and analyze all their possible moves.

So, the FIDE rules governing an adjournment are simple: The player who has the last move before the adjournment writes their move down and puts it in a sealed envelope. When the game is resumed the following day, the arbiter in charge of the match opens the envelope, plays the sealed move, and starts the clock for the other player. This means that both players are slightly offset in time; one player is one move ahead. But both players have to analyze a board state where they are not next to move, and they don't know their opponent's next move. This more or less equalizes the advantage of having the next move.

Of course, nobody adjourns chess games any more; you can probably guess the reason. It's just one more thing the machines took from us. Anyway, I count that I have about thirty rounds left, and they're just about done cutting through that door. I don't know about you, rookie, but I don't plan on letting those metal bastards take me alive. You didn't drop your rifle when you were running, did you? No? Good. Here they come.

#chess #cohost #game design #put your helmet on