Talk:Arimaa/Frames

Flipping out a framed piece
I'm not sure what the advantage would be of flipping out the framed horse. From the position diagrammed (other than a silver piece occupying d6), flipping the f6 horse would not give the gold elephant freedom to leave e6. Without the frame, the silver elephant could pull the g6 horse to g5, threatening to capture both gold horses. Also, if the gold elephant left, a silver horse or camel could occupy e6, possibly setting the stage for the silver elephant to leave even if it didn't capture the gold horses. Flipping the f6 horse might make sense only if Gold had more advanced pieces in the east, and Silver's strong pieces were attacking in the west, but even then it would give the attacking silver army another horse and maybe the freed elephant, unless it had to stay in the east to stop a goal. Belteshazzar (discuss • contribs) 19:36, 13 April 2018 (UTC)
 * I don't think it's good yet, but it's more plausible once Gold is more advanced. It would probably be necessary for Gold to control f6 with a dog in order to free the elephant. If Gold could prevent Silver from rebalancing, then the silver elephant would have to stay around since the horses would be the strongest local pieces otherwise. Risteall (discuss • contribs) 22:01, 13 April 2018 (UTC)

Pre-frame
In general, keeping d7 clear would make it harder to frame a horse on c6. That seems like a pretty important point when it comes to frames. I had been contemplating a whole section on pre-frame tactics, but those two sentences seemed mostly adequate. Belteshazzar (discuss • contribs) 15:36, 25 July 2018 (UTC)
 * The c7 phalanx is already mentioned, and implies a piece on d7. In this case, Silver left d7 clear because a d7 piece could have been flipped to c6 or d5. With d7 clear, the frame can sometimes be forced via a fence (Ed5 hc5 Hb5). Anyway this seems the wrong place to discuss such specific tactics. Risteall (discuss • contribs) 02:04, 26 July 2018 (UTC)
 * Then should there be a section on pre-frame tactics? Belteshazzar (discuss • contribs) 02:44, 26 July 2018 (UTC)
 * There could be a section on horse baskets. I'm not sure I understand framing tactics for weaker pieces. Risteall (discuss • contribs) 15:20, 30 July 2018 (UTC)