Fischer's rule, which merely retains the traditional destination squares for the castling king and rook, is better at promoting asymmetrical positions between White and Black, in the form of opposite wing castling.

In FRC when the kings start in column-c, few players would castle their king to column-e. Instead we would see relatively dull sameness of both White and Black castling to column-a, highly symmetrical and drawish.

If FIDE or ChessTigers.de announced that RNBBKNQR was the only chess960 start setup to use for at least the next decade, we could watch the growth from infancy of a whole new set of openings. (RNBBKNQR is legally reachable after 1. e3 e6)

Opening "theory" took hundreds of years to accrue for the traditional setup. But with today's legions of sophisticated grandmasters, all equipped with chess engines that crush the World Chess Champion, we could observe the growth of virgin opening theory in relative real time. It would be facinating.

Until we have substantial opening theory accrued for a second start setup, we cannot reliably judge our assumptions that are currently based on only the one traditional body of opening theory. For instance, Reuben Fine said it is unwise to move develop your queen too early. But I am confident that such advice is bad in some chess960 start setups. Fine's principles remain untested until a second chess960 setup is study for years.

Even grandmasters cannot play strong opening moves when presented with a random setup they never studied. Truly random FRC is still fun to play, but so could be a second stable setup before deep move trees are available to memorize.

For spectators, a stable second setup replayed and honed by grandmasters over the coming years would be far more interesting than continued random setups.

What we have not yet learned about chess is: What are the factors that make White's advantage relatively larger or smaller. And what does the ultimate answer teach about chess? Likely something we do not yet understand as well as we could.

So it is like a total eclipse or recognising a person whose you haven't seen many years: at first move you don't see anything and then little by little you are on more familiar ground (unless you are checkmated around move 10). Well it will be difficult to implement chess 960 to wider public. Chess are difficult game and amateurs, I suspect, prefer at least know where the pieces should start, people don't like something new in any apects of life when they have something other which works better or worse. But it is worth trying.

http://www.chessbaron.co.uk/chess-C...

I wrote a position generator for iPhone:
http://itunes.apple.com/us/app/ches...

* Generates random starting positions (SP)
* Shows SP for given number
* Shows number for given SP
* Intuitive SP editor
* Handy thumb wheel for SP browsing

The traditional start setup has been so over-played and over-studied that grandmasters can now only rarely find a stronger novel move in the early or mid-Opening phase. Novelties now usually occur in the middle game.

But if there were still lots of strong novel moves available to find during at-home preparation, those novelties could be sprung over the board to perhaps create advantages large enough to nurture to a decisive outcome.

But the over-played traditional setup has no more early to mid-Opening phase novel moves or systems left to offer.

Where oh where might we find new start setups that still offer numerous strong opening novel moves and even novel systems??

The chess world should choose one sensible start setup from the other 959 of chess960-FRC, and then STICK WITH IT FOR A COUPLE DECADES.

[But which second setup?
(a) No bishops can start on any corner square.
(b) White's two knight must start on squares of the same shade. ]

I bet the draw rate would be lower for several years under a consistently reused second setup (compared to the suffocatingly enormous draw rate among elite grandmasters with ongoing exclusive use of the over-played traditional setup).

If we mistakenly try to keep the "Random" in FRC, then even grandmasters will be overwhelmed by the mountain of a thousand start setups. No opening systems will develop. Given a new setup, a well-prepared and smart opening system is far more likely to occur on the board. Smart opening play will be more interesting than weak play design mostly on a desire to avoid blunders or on a search for cheap tactics.

Discard the "Random" from Fischer Random Chess!

<Oct-17-11 VladimirOo: Anybody knows where to find games of Random Chess ? Some database, or just games alone ?>

Here in <CG>? sure!, just click

But which second setup?>

Ditto.

<GeneM: The chess world should choose one sensible start setup from the other 959 of chess960-FRC, and then STICK WITH IT FOR A COUPLE DECADES.>