Talk:Shogi/Archive 3

Archive 1

Archive 2

Archive 3

Stalemate

What is the ruling if a player is stalemated? (Admittedly this is a nonexistent phenomenon in real games, but it can be accomplished if both sides perversely cooperate to achieve that goal.) The GNU shogi manual says that stalemate is a loss for the stalemated player, but is this covered under any official rules? Double sharp (talk) 19:42, 14 March 2016 (UTC)

I've never seen anything specific about stalement in any Japanese books about shogi. This probably because it's not considered a legitimate game outcome. It may be theoretically possible to create/reach such a position, but it's almost certain to never occur during standard play. In chess, stalement results in a draw (.5 point) so there's actually a reason to playing for it, which is why you sometimes see "super rook" type endings. In shogi, there are really no draws so playing on in a hopeless position hoping that your opponent gives you the game (even playing for a win on time) when the result is obvious per normal play is not really done (at least not by Japanese players); most players would've have resigned or been mated long before such a position could occur. Moreover, the stalematee would have to have no pieces in hand and most players would resign long before such a thing happened. Illegal moves and forbidden moves result in an immediate loss so the stalemater has no incentive to screw around as well, and would almost certainly mate the other player before reaching such a position. If by chance such a position did happen, then the stalematee would not be able to make a legal move, so by default they would lose. Whether they simply let their clock run out or resign, the end result would be the same: a loss. All of this relates to official games according to generally accepted rules in Japan. I guess overseas organizations/websites could tweak their rules to allow such a thing, but it would seem improper to a Japanese player. Most Japanese beginners are taught that the way you play is in some way more important than the actual outcome, so you rarely find someone trying to play on in a hopeless position or play the clock for a win. Not saying it never happens, but it's quite rare in OTB play and usually is only something you see online. -- Marchjuly (talk) 18:49, 16 March 2016 (UTC)

Thank you for this information! Hmm, it's rather as I expected: things not covered in the rules will presumably be sorted out at the board if they happen. Fine for practicality, but perhaps not fine for people who obsess over rule minutiae (and I admittedly am one of those). I suppose that for definiteness we can therefore declare it simply a loss for the stalemated player in shogi, should both players decide to mess around despite having no incentive to (except perhaps to see what the ruling would be). Double sharp (talk) 20:29, 16 March 2016 (UTC)

I don't think "messing around" would be something any serious player, Japanese or Western, would even consider doing which is why such a thing is not specifically mentioned in the rules. Perhaps the feeling is that there no need for a rule for something so obviously wrong. Stalement in this case seems to be a case of chess players trying to find similarities between the two games based upon what they know about chess, but the rules of shogi weren't written in a chess context. If things went as far as stalemate, it would probably be seen as no longer being a game of shogi and more like a game of players making things up as they go along. As for a specific ruling, each player is required to make a legal move when it's their turn, if you can only make illegal moves, then you either resign or let your clock run out and lose anyway. There are no passes or take backs, so I think that's how it would possibly be handled by a TD if it ever came up. -- Marchjuly (talk) 22:31, 16 March 2016 (UTC)

OK, so it seems that the rule is basically "move or lose". The game doesn't end until you resign or the time runs out, so if you can't move (whether it's checkmate or stalemate), you just politely resign instead of sitting there until your time runs out. (BTW, while I don't think anyone would consider doing something like this in a real game, I think Western players at least may see it as a valid construction task, i.e. "construct a series of legal moves from the initial position that ends in stalemate". There are already construction tasks in chess asking for such outlandish things as 54 consecutive checks, or moves determining all the previous moves like 6.gxf8=N# or 7.Ka3#, so this would not be too strange.) Double sharp (talk) 11:36, 17 March 2016 (UTC)

Explanation of shogi

Compared to An Introduction to Shogi for Chess Players this article makes it very hard to extract the rules of shogi. The exclusive use of kanji is perhaps the biggest problem. I understand the need to preserve the authentic character of the game, but a side-by-side use of both kanji and chess(-like) symbols and boards would perhaps greatly increase the clarity of this article. MarSch (talk) 09:10, 1 March 2016 (UTC)

I'm not sure how your suggestion would be an improvement. I think the notation used in the article reflects the style used in most English books and websites on shogi that I have seen. The kanji obstacle probably mattered more twenty or so years ago, but now kanji is pretty much incorporated into most English books and website on shogi out there these days and this article reflects that. Moreover, the article is not really intended to be a guide on how to play shogi and is written for anyone who may be interested in shogi (for whatever reason), not just chess players. -- Marchjuly (talk) 12:21, 1 March 2016 (UTC)

(How to play unfortunately is a very ambiguous phrasing, so forgive me if I take that to mean how to play well in error.) That link's essential sentence is: "Describing to the reader how people or things use or do something is encyclopedic; instructing the reader in the imperative mood about how to use or do something is not.". I understand that to mean that the explanation of how the pieces move and what the other rules of the game are is within scope. I think the current article reflects that. I just do not think it does a very good job of explaining the rules in the most accessable way. I do not think only chess players would benefit from my suggestion; I think all people who do not have Chinese or Japanese as their native language would benefit, especially people who do not yet know chess. If you already know chess then the movements are pretty easy to learn, but in this article the starting setup is only in kanji and perhaps in words. If you do not already know chess, then this article will be even more inscrutable I imagine. The pictograms used to represent chess pieces are just so much clearer and harder to confuse with one another. Surely you can see the benefit of a hybrid approach? MarSch (talk) 09:08, 8 March 2016 (UTC)

I don't see any benefit to such an approach at all. It seems you are suggesting that replacing the kanji (pictograms) being used with a different set of pictograms (images of chess pieces) is somehow going to make it easier to understand the article, even for people who know nothing about chess or shogi. Such a person might be just as confused by seeing File:Chess plt45.svg as they would be by seeing File:Shogi fuhyo.png. Moreover, the differences in chess piece pictograms might seem clear to someone such as yourself (perhaps you are a chess player), but that might not necessarily be the case for someone else. Why try and create new symbols for pieces when you can use already use the ones used by most English shogi books and websites and complement the images with text explaining how each piece moves? Most beginner English shogi books do not try and teach a player to read Japanese; they simply show the pieces, explain how they move and give their English and Japanese names much like is done in this article. I could see using the style your proposing if it's usage was widespread in shogi publishing or on shogi websites, but it just seems to be just limited to that particular website: a website which looks to me to be written by a chessplayer specifically for other chessplayers.

If an alternative version of the board setup is needed, then it seems that a more acceptable approach would be use something similar to algebraic notation, where K=king , G=gold, S=silver, N=knight, L=lance, P=pawn, R=rook, and B=bishop. This is a style often used in shogi games annotated in English and would make more sense (at least in my opinion) than what you are proposing. Perhaps there are other editors who feel differently, but I do not see how doing that is an improvement any more than using alternative pictograms would be for chess. -- Marchjuly (talk) 11:21, 8 March 2016 (UTC)

I don't mind the initial-letter solution, but we have to remember that we are describing the game as it is, not as one wishes it should be, even be it for the supposed benefit of people who cannot read kanji. Anyway, it is not as if it's that hard to remember the limited number of characters used in shogi – this isn't chu shogi. (And even then, I don't think letters should be used because that's not how the vast majority of the few players would play it.) I do not think there is any standard set of pictograms for shogi, mostly because figuring pieces make the drop rule so difficult to employ and promotion doubles the number of figurines needed. Double sharp (talk) 05:37, 9 March 2016 (UTC)

I think its relevant to note that article xianqi uses a hybrid approach similar to what I think is MarSch's suggestion. (But I'm not sure it doesn't just make that article more confusing.) IHTS (talk) 07:04, 9 March 2016 (UTC)

I'm not familiar with that game, but it seems at little odd to me and possibly original research unless those images are commonly used in English books or websites about the game. It also seems that the western piece images are used only in the descriptions of the pieces and not in any board diagrams.

Anyway, I think Double sharp brings up a good point about chu shogi and about describing the game as it "is". It seems that the primary reason for wanting to use a "hybrid approach" is to make the article easier to understand for those unfamiliar with kanji. The first paragraph of the Crockford website cited above seems to basically say that kanji pieces are too difficult for the average Western chess player to understand so let's make them look more like chess pieces to help increase shogi's popularity outside of Japan. I think that's fine for somebody's personal website, but not sure how well that transfers to Wikipedia since the article is not intended to be a promotion piece for shogi anymore than it is intended to be an instruction manual on how to play the game.

If, however, the consensus is to do something like this, then I thing there are some practical issues to consider. We would basically need to come up with new images for the silver and lance since those are the two pieces on the Crockford website which do not use traditional chess images; I'm not sure if we can use his or any derivative of them since the content on his website might be protected by copyright and there's no way to justify non-free use for something such as this. So, we would have to agree on and create two new images which of course would be basically our own original research and something that could be challenged as such by someone else at a later date. There are examples of western/international/instructional style shogi sets such as shown here, here or here and sets designed specifically for kids like shown here. Kurnik even has (or used to have) a western-style setup for online play. We have to be a bit careful though because these "alternative versions" were created to make money, and we just can assume that similar imagery can be automatically used on Wikipedia. That's why it seems much simpler to me to use the images already on Commons and which seem to be the style used in almost all books and websites related to shogi, regardless of whether they are in English or another language. -- Marchjuly (talk) 08:40, 9 March 2016 (UTC)

Indeed, a board diagram seems to be missing, which I think is essential, since it provides the link between the piece descriptions and where they start on the board. MarSch (talk) 22:18, 9 March 2016 (UTC)

I like the Shogi for kids! Anyway, I wanted to clarify that I am not set using symbols with a strong connection to western chess, letters from the Roman alphabet would be a huge improvement already. There are also symbols that are mnemonic for the movement of the pieces as you can see here. But perhaps a good to do first would be to expand on what little the article says about using westernized equipment and showing a number of different options for that? MarSch (talk) 22:37, 9 March 2016 (UTC)

I'm not in favor of combining as is done in the xiangqi article, but the idea of including a section devoted to attempts to Westernize pieces seems a good one (and also notable, methinks). A board w/ Westernized pieces is best located (only) in said section, IMO. IHTS (talk) 23:21, 9 March 2016 (UTC)

Expanding the article in such a direction is certainly something worth discussing in my opinion as well, but it might be tricky to find Reliabke sourceto support such a thing. We just can't list a bunch of personal website where such a thing is done because these are WP:UGC and most likely just WP:OR unless they have received coverage in reliable secondary sources. I'll look for something official from the Japan Shogi Association and some Japanese newspapers. The JSA is making attempts to increase the popularity of the game outside of Japan and stuff like that may be able to be incorporated into such a section. -- Marchjuly (talk) 23:51, 9 March 2016 (UTC)

I'd suggest making .pngs that are super redundant. Have the character, the abbreviation (K, G, S, L, etc.), and the schematic movement directions on the border edge of the .png (like some international pieces have).

As for the western chess style piece shapes, there's no standardized convention for silver, lance, and gold modified chess pieces. Using various ad hoc pieces for these doesn't seem so useful. (Personally, although I dont remember these very well, they often weren't very easily distinguishable from normal chess pieces, which kinda defeated the purpose of going this route.)

On 'original research', I'd hardly call this 'research'. The issue is just how to display the information and how accommodating to readers you want to be. Because it originated in Japan, it uses characters. But, one can perfectly explain the game using any arbitrary collection of symbols. I'm not recommending doing this, just making the obvious point. If wikipedia uses some unique convention to explain the game, that's entirely justifiable if that's the best way to convey information. It's better, of course, to use known conventions. This is, I admit, perhaps there could be considered a somewhat pedagogical point of view, but the boundary between pedagogy and encyclopedic explanation for a subject that isn't very familiar with a given audience (with a slightly related subject that is more well known) is not so well defined.

Anyway, that's my thoughts. I dont have a bone to pick here, I can read Japanese just fine. But, the question you need to ask as editors is to what extent do you want force readers to come up to the higher level and to what extent do you want to bring the article down to the level of readers. – ishwar  (speak) 16:01, 7 April 2016 (UTC)

Japanese notation for dropped pieces

The article mentions the asterisk convention for dropped pieces in western notation, but it doesn't mention what the Japanese notation equivalent is. (One puts 打 at the end of the notation string for dropped pieces.)

(Also, Japanese notation on websites often includes black and white triangles to indicate whose owns the piece in question. This is not mentioned in the notation section, either.) – ishwar  (speak) 1 January 2016

so, i added stuff about this. but via example and not with prose. (hopefully no typos!) there's some other things though: (a) when pieces don't promote even though they are allowed to, and (b) when the same piece types (like silver, gold, etc.) can move to the same point the notation is ambiguous so ambiguity resolution is needed (western indicates start position, japanese uses 'left' or 'right'). peace – ishwar  (speak) 15:43, 7 April 2016 (UTC)

well, i've done this myself. (maybe went overboard?) Now one should be able to read Japanese notation and understand it. So, nevermind – ishwar  (speak) 21:32, 10 May 2016 (UTC)

shogi notation on wikipedia

How do you feel about the western shogi notation used on wikipedia?

The site first used the (second) Hodges–Townhill notation which uses letters for the rank as in:

Bx2b

And, i've followed that since, which also gives respect to all of Hodges's work. However, i've always been annoyed by it. And, i've wondered if the first wikipedia shogi editors simply didn't know about other options. The letters originally gave a nod to chess players, but there's no reason the non-Japanese shogi community needs to continue to give chess players that nod, in my opinion. Using numbers for both the file and rank – as in

Bx22

– seems preferable as it more closely follows the Japanese notation. And, that's what Hosking's excellent book uses as well as the new Kitao–Kawasaki notation used by the Nekomado publishing house (which is otherwise not preferred for non-Japanese readers since it can't be written by the nonliterate on paper).

Anyway, i'm in favor of using the Hosking western notation with only numbers on wikipedia. Since there's no shogi editor central discussion place, i'm asking here about it.

Below are some notes about usage:

• everybody associated with Hodges used the letters including his Shogi magazine, the various publications with Fairbairn as translator (including his books and the two bilingual books by Aono)
• Hosking uses numbers
• Japanese literature (in Japanese language) uses numbers always (unless it's ancient)
• some (usually java?) kifu readers embedded on websites use letters for western notation mode
• some shogi software made by westerners use letters (e.g. MacShôgi)
• some software made by Japanese folks uses letters (e.g. Shogidokoro in English mode)
• some software made by Japanese folks uses numbers (e.g. Shogi Droid app's 'universal' notation option)
• Kitao–Kawasaki uses numbers
• 81Dojo uses numbers for a strange sort of translated western notation (much like the Kitao–Kawasaki notation)
• 81Dojo uses letters for it's so-called 'chess' notation

Pros for letters:

• widely used by non-Japanese
• clear distinction between file and rank
• somewhat like the familiar chess notation – backwardized? (but who cares & doesnt it just make it more confusing to a chess player anyway?)
• nod to Hodges

Pros for numbers:

• well-known (but probably less so than letters?)
• matches Japanese conventions (which makes it easier to process mentally when converting between Japanese & western)
• nod to Hosking
• less confusing to chess players (?)

For me, the most compelling argument in favor of using letters is that we give a nod to Hodges. But, i'm kind of tired of doing this conversion in my head and, ultimately, i think it's an inferior option.

What says you folks?

– ishwar  (speak) 01:11, 7 August 2017 (UTC)

Speaking as a chess player, I find the Hodges-style notation to be incredibly confusing, because our association of letters with files and numbers with ranks is alas far too deeply ingrained for our own good! I would prefer to follow the Japanese notation, as it makes the differences abundantly clear (and it would stop confusing the heck out of us ^_^). Double sharp (talk) 10:33, 7 August 2017 (UTC)

I see. So, similar to me. I find chess notation annoying because it's like shogi notation but everything is backwards and in the wrong place. I dont know what Hodges was thinking. Well, it's 2 votes so far. – ishwar  (speak) 04:56, 9 August 2017 (UTC)

Well, everything is converted now to the number-number coordinate system. Any objecting majority can feel free to change back if they want, but as I add more & more info it will become a bigger task.

I retained Hodges's hyphen for noncapturing-nondropping moves even though it's not used by Hosking. Although different, the mixed Nekomado notation also uses hyphens. – ishwar  (speak) 19:16, 1 September 2017 (UTC)

My advice (I know both chess and shogi) : as I said elsewhere, I prefer letters, it's clearer... And it's widely used in books and websites about shogi (by Japanese people).