"Queries" in Fischer Random Chess (Chess960)!

Hi friends,

I understand that not many international level tournaments/matches have been held with Chess 960/Fischer Random Chess (FRC) but am curious to know about the following.

1. Is there any standard notation or way to decide the type of position (as in how do they decide position #200 is so and so position?

2. How do they decide on the type of position to be played in each round between two players? (Is there are a Random Number Generator or is it out of some lucky draw or something)

3. Has it ever happened that the standard chess position (position#518) has been selected and played in a FRC game?

Cheers,

I am aware of three methods for assigning numbers to Fischer Random (Chess960) starting positions: Scharnagl's, Fritz's, and Millener's. Scharnagl's is the one usually used. That gives the standard chess starting postion the id of 518, and I have found FRC games on other sites with that starting positions. There are several methods for randomly generating a postion (see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chess960_starting_position#Starting_position_IDs_in_Chess960)

Here is a cut-n-paste from another part of the Wikipedia:- to answer your question #2. It is one-way to do it without a sophisticated random-number generator and a numbered-position-map table.

"There are many procedures for creating this starting position. A common one is that proposed by Hans L. Bodlaender, which uses one six-sided die to create an initial position. Typically this is done just before the game commences:

• Roll the die, and place a white bishop on the black square indicated by the dice, counting from the left. Thus 1 indicates the first black square from the left (a1 in algebraic notation), 2 indicates the second black square from the left (c1), 3 indicates the third (e1), and 4 indicates the fourth (g1). Since there are no fifth or sixth positions, re-roll 5 or 6 until another number shows.
• Roll the die, and place a white bishop on the white square indicated (1 indicates b1, 2 indicates d1, and so on). Re-roll 5 or 6.
• Roll the die, and place a queen on the first empty position indicated (always skipping filled positions). Thus, a 1 places the queen on the first (leftmost) empty position, while a 6 places the queen on the sixth (rightmost) empty position.
• Roll the die, and place a knight on the empty position indicated. Re-roll a 6.
• Roll the die, and place a knight on the empty position indicated. Re-roll a 5 or 6.
• This leaves three empty squares. Place the king on the middle empty square, and the rooks on the remaining two squares.
• Place all white and black pawns on their usual squares, and place Black's pieces to exactly mirror White's (so Black should have on a8 exactly the same type of piece that White has on a1, except that bishops would be on opposite colors).

This procedure generates any of the 960 possible initial positions with an equal chance; on average, this particular procedure uses 6.7 die rolls. Note that one of these initial positions (rolled by 2-3-3-2-3 or 2-3-3-4-2) is the standard chess position, at which point a standard chess game begins."

Thank you ichabod81 and Sas3.That was pretty informative.

By the way, has any general strategies been developed for chess960 as we have in standard chess like "Control the center, connect the rooks, castle early, dont bring out the Queen too early" etc.

Just with my very limited experience in Chess960, I think the following are true compared to standard chess.

a. It is very important to develop pieces than pawns (control the center the pieces than pawns)

b. Activate the Queen early (bcoz oddly, I felt the Queen is not gettin harassed as easily as in standard chess) bcoz it helps in bringing about quick mating attacks

c. Sacrificing a piece for 1-2 pawns surrounding the king is more rewarding than in standard chess.

Ofcourse, these are my own observations, so are there any other general strategies (in addition to standard chess) that are important from chess960 point of view?

Suggestions/comments plz,

I think the queen should be activated early if she's off to the side. You don't need to activate her quickly in normal chess because her central position already supports pieces trying to control the center. You still need to watch for easy attacks on her, the existence of which is going to depend on the position.

I also watch for the knights. In normal chess they block each other off from the center, but this isn't always the case in FRC. This allows them to slip across the border more easily, which can create all sorts of havoc.