Winboard 4.8.0b and atomic chess variant

[hgm]

No, there is no such option. The most liberal rule was adopted, to make sure WinBoard would never consider a move sent by the ICS an illegal move.

I think the FICS rules are inconsistent: you are allowed to expose your King to explosion but not to capture. This is a consequence of a poor implementation, (where they were to lazy to adapt the check test to the Atomic mode of capture), elevating the bug to rule. It does not deserve following. ICC rules are consistent, as they treat all forms of King removal in the same way.

Basically FICS-Atomic and ICC-Atomic are different variants (and there could be a third where both exposing your King to capture and to explosion is illegal). WinBoard only supports the ICC version, which does not interfere with using it as a client on FICS, as adjudication there is the ICS's prerogative. If anyone wants to play FICS-Atomic locally with XBoard, it should be remembered that it is basically an unsopported variant, which has to delegate some rule checking to the engine. In this case I think that can be simply arranged by switching claim verification off. WinBoard will then honor the engine's mate claims.

[Ferdy]

Castling right was not cleared in fen even if the rook was already exploded.

Code: Select all

[Event "?"]
[Site "?"]
[Date "?"]
[Round "-"]
[White "?"]
[Black "?"]
[Result "*"]
[Variant "atomic"]

1. Nf3 f6 2. e3 e6 3. Nd4 c6 4. Nb5 cxb5 5. Qh5 g6 6. Qb5 Nc6 7. Qb6 axb6
8. Bb5 Kf7 9. Bxd7 Rxa2
*

After Rxa2 the white rook in a1 was exploded. By going to edit/copy position to clipboard I get this.

Code: Select all

5bnr/1p3k1p/4ppp1/8/8/4P3/1PPP1PPP/2B1K2R w KQ - 0 10

There is still Q in the fen.

[d]5bnr/1p3k1p/4ppp1/8/8/4P3/1PPP1PPP/2B1K2R w KQ - 0 10

[belzedar94]

Hello @Ferdy

I see your Mabagsik v1.4 atomic engine wasn't finally released. Do you have any plans to release it? I would like to include it in my test across all the available Atomic chess engines.

Thanks!!