NP Friday March 18, 2016

[Stature 96]

http://www.egscomics.com/egsnp.php?id=435

Wait until 3D chess.

King me!

[Wildcat 37]

Now that is an awkward way to end a storyline.

Sounds like a very Teddish way to play chess though

[Arcanimus 31]

...you mean Queen Rushing isn't the optimal strategy for chess? I've been playing wrong all these years, then.

[Aura Guardian 57]

Pshaw, a true pawn rusher makes them all KNIGHTS.

[Wildcat 37]

The best way to play chess is the way in which you steal your enemies pieces

[Haylo 57]

There's no joy quite like your opponent's well protected (but trapped) King falling to an unexpected underpromotion (to a knight which can attack right over the defending pieces).

[WR...S 41]

Y'know, there was a time this would've been funny, but now it just feels a bit tragic.

[Howitzer 32]

The thing is, it's actually pretty darn hard to Queen a pawn in chess, at least against a competent opponent. If you manage to get to that position, you're probably winning anyway. 

[Duke of Pretzels 4]

As black, I'm pretty sure that the best move is pawn f4, though black is in a decently poor position in general. Elliot should at this point try to take as many pieces as possible, and play for stalemate.

EDIT: Yes, what brings me back to the forums is chess. I should have known.

[Howitzer 32]

41 minutes ago, Duke of Pretzels said:

As black, I'm pretty sure that the best move is pawn f4, though black is in a decently poor position in general. Elliot should at this point try to take as many pieces as possible, and play for stalemate.

Well, I don't know if it's White or Black to move in the diagram.  If it's White to move, I'm pretty sure Black is doomed no matter what he does. If it's Black to move, the only thing I see is Nd7, with the idea that after Nb6, the promotion square is defended by another piece.

Black's in pretty serious trouble regardless however. Even after doing that, all of Black's pieces save the bad Bishop are stuck trying to prevent the promotion, while the White Bishop and Rook on f1 have free reign to basically do whatever they want.

EDIT: Actually, I'm a moron.  Black can just move one of his pieces right onto the promotion square at a8, and the pawn will be stopped from getting to it. It still ties up a piece, but that's way better then tying up three of them.  Black's still quite doomed. :-D

[Stature 96]

2 hours ago, Duke of Pretzels said:

EDIT: Yes, what brings me back to the forums is chess. I should have known.

Forum chess?  Hard to say on the subject of effectivity, but...

Elo there, friend. Here is a starter pack for you: a gallon of cheese sauce and 6 glass bowls. Hope you enjoy it and welcome (back)!

[partner555 170]

Winning, is SECONDARY!? What heresy is this!?

[Duke of Pretzels 4]

2 hours ago, Stature said:

Forum chess?  

I could see it working, provided people set a time limit between posts and everybody knows algebraic notation. It'd be like the old play by mail games! 

[Pharaoh RutinTutin 1,586]

3 hours ago, Stature said:

Forum chess?  Hard to say on the subject of effectivity, but...

 

1 hour ago, Duke of Pretzels said:

I could see it working, provided people set a time limit between posts and everybody knows algebraic notation. It'd be like the old play by mail games! 

Computerized Play By Mail:
A system that allows a machine that thinks in nanoseconds to take a game that normally lasts a few hours and stretch it out for several months.  This was once perceived to be a viable business model.

There is a problem with using Tedd's hair length as an indicator of the relative date.  Tedd revealed the hair growth watches to Sarah and Nanase (and the readers) when the Maine Ate finished their Junior year in High School.  This of course means that Tedd's hair can be any length or colour at any time and, as long as it is after Sarah started her lab assistant job, no explanation would be necessary to any of Tedd's friends.

[Scotty 1,061]

Elliot can block Tedd's pawn with the rook, otherwise he risks trading Tedd's new queen for his rook, then Tedd can take Elliot's rook with his rook, Elliot could take Tedd's rook with his queen, but then Tedd could take Elliot's queen with his queen and Tedd would have the advantage with a queen and second rook on the board.

Blocking's probably the best course of action, Tedd might still win but there will be more opportunities for him to make a mistake.

[Circe 32]

Way back in the mists of time I played a computer version of chess (Battle Chess) that included little animations when you took an opponent's piece. I remember wishing there was a better animation when the pawn became a queen.  It was basically a "poof" transformation.  Still it was fun to do....I do recall setting up a board with all of the pawns turning into queens.  Tedd would have loved it.

 

[The Old Hack 2,448]

On 3/18/2016 at 6:06 AM, WR...S said:

Y'know, there was a time this would've been funny, but now it just feels a bit tragic.

The Moderator: This post changed to reflect the fact that I made an unfair criticism of WR...S here. I apologise for that to both WR...S and the forum at large.

~tOH.

Edited March 24, 2016 by The Old Hack
Mistaken moderator call.

[Scotty 1,061]

5 hours ago, Circe said:

Way back in the mists of time I played a computer version of chess (Battle Chess) that included little animations when you took an opponent's piece. I remember wishing there was a better animation when the pawn became a queen.  It was basically a "poof" transformation.  Still it was fun to do....I do recall setting up a board with all of the pawns turning into queens.  Tedd would have loved it.

 

I played Battle Chess as well, there were several battle sequences that referenced movies, like Knight vs Knight played with the losing Knight getting each limb chopped off Holy Grail style and King vs Bishop had the Bishop swinging his staff around all fancy until the King gets bored, pulls out a gun and shoots the Bishop Indiana Jones style.

[Dabat 60]

At least now we know this storyline is sometime after Christmas, but before the Friday Night Magic tourny (I think it was Friday anyway). Tedd's hair is a dead giveaway. I am thinking it might tie in even more directly as well. Eliot is pointing out Tedd's liking of gendered transformations in a very direct way, rather than his normal offhand manner. Having been in a somewhat similar situation before, this may be the catalyst that causes Tedd to change his hair. (as well as the semi-Freudian psychology of weak male pieces being turned into strong female pieces, perhaps mirroring how gender-fluid Tedd often does not feel right as male)

 

 

As for the rest, I suck at chess (my strategy is "baffle them with bullshit"), so I am not going to comment on that.

[SeriousJupiter 49]

Ah, chess. I was once quite fond of it, but then I got tired of losing. I'm not sure I even remember all the rules anymore, but at least I remember how all the pieces move.

Anyway, yay, Dan didn't forget his promise and now we know that this storyline takes place after Elliot and Sarah's break-up and before the card games like almost everyone figured out a long time ago!

[Howitzer 32]

Ok, I had Fritz 13 analyse the position overnight. With White to move, it likes the sequence:

1. Bxf6  exf6
2. a7  d4
3. Re1  Bd5
4. Qxd4

and White is up by 12.28 pawns.  When it's Black to move, there are a lot more variations, but it deems the main line as:

1. ...  Nd7
2. a7  Ra8
3. Ra6  Qb7
4. Rb1  Qc7

and White is up by 8.63 pawns. Note that being up by more than a pawn or two is clearly winning, so both of these give an ENORMOUS advantage to White, as we already stated.

[hkmaly 490]

Nothing against the comics itself (I DO think it's funny), but it doesn't really feel as part of the storyline. Obviously, it serves as a way to specify time, but ... there should've at least been Tedd's "sexy stuff is happening" senses tingling ...

16 hours ago, partner555 said:

Winning, is SECONDARY!? What heresy is this!?

You should understand. The clan comes first, everything else is secondary.

13 hours ago, Pharaoh RutinTutin said:

There is a problem with using Tedd's hair length as an indicator of the relative date.  Tedd revealed the hair growth watches to Sarah and Nanase (and the readers) when the Maine Ate finished their Junior year in High School.  This of course means that Tedd's hair can be any length or colour at any time and, as long as it is after Sarah started her lab assistant job, no explanation would be necessary to any of Tedd's friends.

Technically, yes. Practically, everyone was surprised on the championship, suggesting he was NOT changing hair before. It was supposed to be shocking.

3 hours ago, SeriousJupiter said:

I'm not sure I even remember all the rules anymore, but at least I remember how all the pieces move.

Maybe I just forgot myself, but I don't think there are any rules in chess besides initial position and how the pieces move.

1 hour ago, Howitzer said:

Ok, I had Fritz 13 analyse the position overnight. With White to move, it likes the sequence:

1. Bxf6  exf6
2. a7  d4
3. Re1  Bd5
4. Qxd4

and White is up by 12.28 pawns.  When it's Black to move, there are a lot more variations, but it deems the main line as:

1. ...  Nd7
2. a7  Ra8
3. Ra6  Qb7
4. Rb1  Qc7

and White is up by 8.63 pawns. Note that being up by more than a pawn or two is clearly winning, so both of these give an ENORMOUS advantage to White, as we already stated.

... and we have confirmation from someone who knows how to play chess ... the Fritz 13

[Scotty 1,061]

5 hours ago, Dabat said:

At least now we know this storyline is sometime after Christmas, but before the Friday Night Magic tourny (I think it was Friday anyway). Tedd's hair is a dead giveaway. I am thinking it might tie in even more directly as well. Eliot is pointing out Tedd's liking of gendered transformations in a very direct way, rather than his normal offhand manner. Having been in a somewhat similar situation before, this may be the catalyst that causes Tedd to change his hair. (as well as the semi-Freudian psychology of weak male pieces being turned into strong female pieces, perhaps mirroring how gender-fluid Tedd often does not feel right as male)

I could probably safely place this story happening between the breakup and New Years Eve (28th or 29th), Sarah could have come up with the idea of making MV5 as a way to get her mind off of the breakup, which goes with her reaction Ellen's sister comment. It can't be the 30th because Ellen and Elliot were together discussing Susan's birthday and when Grace had called Ellen, she looked as if she was in "just gonna chill around the house" mode and while we don't really know how much time pasted during this NP, it was probably longer than "Playing with Dolls" especially if you account for them playing video games afterwards.

It also couldn't have been New Years even or New Years day cus, well parties and monsters and burnouts and such. January 2nd would be out too because of Ellen and Nanase getting together to discuss what they learned the previous couple days, as well as play with magic. Beyond that we get into Elliot Sarah and Susan working on the video revealing the breakup and then school stuffs.

[Don Edwards 548]

14 hours ago, Pharaoh RutinTutin said:

There is a problem with using Tedd's hair length as an indicator of the relative date.  Tedd revealed the hair growth watches to Sarah and Nanase (and the readers) when the Maine Ate finished their Junior year in High School.  This of course means that Tedd's hair can be any length or colour at any time and, as long as it is after Sarah started her lab assistant job, no explanation would be necessary to any of Tedd's friends.

 

1 hour ago, hkmaly said:

Technically, yes. Practically, everyone was surprised on the championship, suggesting he was NOT changing hair before. It was supposed to be shocking.

Everyone knows hair dye in all sorts of colors is readily available and hair is easily restyled. But when that person shows up with their hair in a style far different from normal and dyed that color, it's still shocking.

[Dabat 60]

On 3/19/2016 at 10:07 PM, Scotty said:

I could probably safely place this story happening between the breakup and New Years Eve (28th or 29th), Sarah could have come up with the idea of making MV5 as a way to get her mind off of the breakup, which goes with her reaction Ellen's sister comment. It can't be the 30th because Ellen and Elliot were together discussing Susan's birthday and when Grace had called Ellen, she looked as if she was in "just gonna chill around the house" mode and while we don't really know how much time pasted during this NP, it was probably longer than "Playing with Dolls" especially if you account for them playing video games afterwards.

It also couldn't have been New Years even or New Years day cus, well parties and monsters and burnouts and such. January 2nd would be out too because of Ellen and Nanase getting together to discuss what they learned the previous couple days, as well as play with magic. Beyond that we get into Elliot Sarah and Susan working on the video revealing the breakup and then school stuffs.

I at first thought this story took place after New Years. but reading what you said, I think you are right that it takes place a day or two before. I don't recall any mention of school or Eliot getting a new gf, or anything that should have happened in the week after.