⚔️ BY Setup 🛡️ Why we should all play in this new Setup?

I am pleased to announce that the option to choose "BY Setup" is now available in the Lobby. Below I will give the many reasons why we should play and learn in greater detail all the benefits offered by this new version of Four Player Chess.

We have lived in great hierarchy and experience of Omatamix, when the first championship was held, for me it was very exciting to know this variant; I became the Current Champion of this Omatamix Modality and I am proud of that achievement, since I competed with very strong rivals, but my perseverance was higher.

Omatamix allows for optimal game balance but lacks a lot of variety and there are a lot of forced moves early in the game, but by giving me space to get to know this BY Setup alternative and understand it in depth, it made me discover new things, extremely important, that give more dynamism to the game.

I have requested in the administration, the activation of BY as an official standard. It is a reality that Omatamix was never the solution to the problems, this current setup does not solve the real problems that are discussed today. Omatamix in the social voting is in last place.

With old standard we already lived the experience in the past and currently it is ongoing in the 4PC league, for those who are most fond of this setup and the same competition, in which I include myself because I like to compete, I do not do it for the setup OG (old standard).

Everyone knows that I have always considered it to be unbalanced, and the number of abortions with green pieces is significant, which led the previous administration to make the decision to change it to the new standard Omatamix.

This year with Omatamix we have already had a few months of experience and the truth is that they are more than enough and it does not need to be the official setup.

Experience:

With OG (old standard) I reached 2750 ELO (in the year 2021), managing to beat the best many times, With Omatamix I am in the TOP 20 with 2715 ELO (in the year 2022) and many of the best are still present in the Leaderboard. I mean no matter the setup, your level should be very similar. The difference today is that many players from the great base that existed have not returned yet. 

Everyone here is aware that I have been one of the administrators who has been most active in this type of discussion both in public forums, as well as in internal administration.

These issues are of great importance to me and that is why I have a record and follow-up of all the threads that we have discussed all these months together, I, like you, want a definitive solution soon.

The social votes that we have carried out among all of us here, also give support to my proposals, which are in short: 

- Users want to play BY as the official Setup with 50% and another 50% prefer OG (old standard).
- They want a different rating system, users do not want a rating system SOLO.

Therefore BY Setup deserves a chance to be known by all, I take the time to explore it, playing various games and notice the difference that exists, why can't others do the same?

I gave a lot of reasons why we should play BY, but I'm going to put them back here:




I am the number 1 defender of the BY Setup and if you review this same forum I am the one who has given the most arguments regarding this, please review previous comments so as not to have to repeat the same thing now.

However I want to add something more to my argument, since all visions are possible in this.

Mentions:

- Gives the feeling of being able to make multiple openings.
- Compared to the other setups, it doesn't feel forced, to make openings in terms of defense, I feel like you can open yourself up to more than one option.
- As for the initial aesthetics, it gives you an identical view to classic chess; And this is an important achievement, which I highlight in magnitude.
- Playing it immediately gives you that feeling of excitement.
- BY Setup according to the analyzes of the engines or programs, it is also much more balanced, almost at the same level as BYG.

Classic Chess: Initial position of the king and queen on the board.

When I made a reference to aesthetics, I wasn't referring to whether it looks prettier or uglier or I miss the board, or whatever you want to call it. The reference goes directly to the concordance and similarity that it has with 2PC chess.

There is also something very important to note, in 2PC chess there is historically a very extensive book of Openings and they have earned a name for life.

We have for example:

Italian Opening
Sicilian Defense
French Defense
Ruy Lopez
Slav Defense
Caro-Kann Defense

and many more, but one of the best openings that I highlight in Omatamix, is the Ponziani Opening, which is a success today and makes you really strong and solid.

So we don't need to reinvent the wheel again, when the wheel was already invented many years ago, I mean, we don't need to invent new opening names, logically the gambits don't participate here because of the distance that exists on the chessboard.

So, we can keep that same language in BY Setup for all the colors, compared to the other Setup options that, due to their initial configuration of the king, could not use that same language that we are already used to using in 2P chess.

In Spanish we are also used to saying "Flanco de Rey | Flanco de Dama".

So how can we re-enchant ourselves with this game, as we did before the merger?

We have reviewed and experienced several initial positions, we have had reports from CGA specialists, where they demonstrate according to their analysis that BY Setup is one of the best options for 4pc.

Tournaments and League

There have been 2 BY tournaments, which have left a pleasant feeling and a very good experience, the gameplay is excellent and exciting, the quality is much higher, it surpasses the old standard and the current standard by far.

Eyes are on 4pc right now by the chess.com administration, so it's the best time to make the changes we need. 
I want to enjoy the game, that is fair and balanced for all colors, reduce the abandonment of games in the first move, that there are wide varieties of opening and not the forced game that exists today at the beginning of the opening, too monotonous For all colors, you have very limited options at game startup.

Ok but, if we want to keep the 3 options available, we need to improve 2 important things:

- The name of each setup
- Other players have proposed something quite interesting and logical.

What he said JkCheeseChess:
> we should include a separate section for OS and BY so that people can actually see those as options instead of having to go into Standard.

So, here again we see the need to be able to reproduce a version different from the official standard, it is now impossible to complete a queue in another secondary format.

The Format "Old Setup", It is definitely not a good name for a setup, which is still very active by only elite players, which is mainly in the league. All users only play the main format available, as they just want to fill up the game queue as quickly as possible.

- Another viable solution or route would be to separate the leaderboard, and for all of them to work independently, since strictly speaking it is the same game, but with a totally different theory. That is why I still think that we should only have a single format and not 3 options, since all these versions, the only thing it does is confuse things more in my opinion.

So what is better for you, continue with 3 different formats of the same game, or have only 1? And what should be the main format?

Saying omatamix , old standard, BY, BYG, is too confusing for users, compared to an appropriate name for each game or version. Finally, the main name of the game is Four Player Chess, which in my opinion should exist in a single format.

More than 1 year ago, some additional appreciations:

- No one would have imagined that they would prefer to vote for the current official standard (Omatamix).
- Also to say that many of those who voted for old standard consider that BY is better, but they voted for old standard thinking that BY would have few votes.
- It is also true that some elite experienced players have already gotten used to the official standard and prefer it.
- The first Omatamix World Champion is an elite experienced player.

I take advantage of mentioning that when all the great changes in Variants occurred and that great universal flood that we all experienced occurred, they only came to discuss in the forums, a number of no more than 50 people, remember?, I remember it quite well, which seemed very strange to me, that in the face of such a big change very few users participated in this discussion. We also received important letters from the best players in the world, which I think we should consider.

Do we really want to continue with this setup format, where we know very well that it is not the best and wait for the rest of the year or until the next FFA world championship?

I hope they are efficient sometime!

So my criticism is that hasty decisions have always been made, very brutal changes, and they have not given it enough time nor have they taken into consideration the opinion of the main experts in 4pc and what it deserves. There is always that feeling of making decisions without notifying anyone and totally biased, that is the reality.

There is another factor to take into account when users vote on the platform:

Always keep in mind that most of the players have no idea about anything, they have never heard of oma or BY, they don't read forums, they don't watch the best games, they have never heard of the league, etc. they don't know what the old standard is, maybe this sounds radical, but it's the truth.

This makes me think and disagree with some of you when you say:

- That we are going to lose the player base again.
- That we are not ready for another Setup change.
- That 4pc will not be what it was before, etc.

Honestly today I think that none of this is going to happen, and time has shown me, since today the vast majority of elite players have returned, but they play less naturally or less than before, but they have returned only because there is an important event or only to play sporadically just because there is an need to play a chess with 4 armies and I can also add that many new players with good skills have arrived.

The problem is that we are not playing in the best 4pc format, this is not the best version for the game and there are many who agree with this, But honestly there are also many who are not interested in participating in forums, networks like Discord and giving their opinion on the matter, they only settle for what is available in the system and that's it.

I will send all the information I have available on this matter, to reinforce the analysis we already did some time ago. I just hope that they consider it, and don't leave it in the book of memories, I really hope that action is taken once and for all.

We cannot go back to the old standard where we already know it is not the best for FFA in all categories from novice to elite. Nor can we continue with the current Setup where all those forced plays and low variety of openings are clearly appreciated, among other difficulties that we have mentioned before.

BY Setup, It's a great compromise between Old Std and current Standard,
I am totally convinced of that!

The passion for him Four Player Chess:

Since my passion for 4pc increased, I have always dreamed that one day Four Player Chess will have the same level of importance as 2pc in the future, and grandmasters will come to participate with the same level of importance, and It will no longer be a simple variant.

Many times we have seen that great 2pc chess players have lost games with much inferior players, and this happens mainly because other additional skills are required to be an excellent 4pc player, something that an Elite 2pc player is completely unaware of.

Four Player Chess in the future will be recognized worldwide as an elite sport, by all chess players.That is the main objective, and we are building it together.

To conclude, I would like to inform you that I am going to send this same communication to the entire administration, since I know that it is in the interest of many people and also why not say it, it is in my complete interest as well, since I want and need the total reactivation of the 4pc in all aspects. We are aware of the questions and doubts of all users, therefore it would be interesting to see the BY setup in action again.

Today it is a reality and available for you to fully experience this new format, however, I hope to see BY as the main Configuration in four-player chess.

See you in the next battle!