Unless I've missed something, that one has 2 solutions
Which one? The Stamma's Mate puzzle or this most recent one?
For the second-to-last puzzle, there were variations depending on how Black moved at the beginning which were shorter, but any variation in White's moves leads to mate in six or seven in my analysis rather than mate in five.
For the last puzzle, I don't know of any other sideline which guarantees mate by giving checks, which is necessary to stave off White's threatened checkmate.
But if you have other solutions, could you post them?
I looked at this again, and while it's possible to do this more than one way, it's ONLY possible the way I was looking at it if white makes a really poor move, so I was working under a bad assumption.
So basically, here's what I have now:
The first move seems like it must be 1. ... Rc5+. This is the only move that seems to effectively stop 2. g8->Q+ Ka6 2. Qxc8, etc, black is fucked.
...anyway, after 1. ... Rc5+, 2. Ka4 is the only legal move. After this I screwed up with Ka6. I didn't notice earlier that b5+ or, even better, bxc5, nukes the whole thing.
After that I went with 1. ... Rc5+, 2. Ka4 b5+??. At this point 3. Ka5 gives white enough time to push the g pawn and mate soon after.
So yeah, I'm stuck again. As you can tell, I'm fairly inept when it comes to sort out ideal moves from the position of trying to escape an oncoming checkmate. In this one I'm having almost more of a difficult time sorting white's moves than black's.
Also, the stamma's mate made perfect sense as soon as I stopped trying to use one knight as a placeholder and make the checkmate with the other... which works, but takes longer.
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Well, I would give you two hints. First, that you think there's no good continuation may be the sign that the actual continuation is one you consider a bad one.
Two is look at the theme of the checkmate problem. It is an Epaulette Mate.
I am sorry guys, work has been really busy this week and I haven't had any time to devote to these puzzles. However, with a long week end coming up .....
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The entire domain of Chessup.net is down, as if someone hasn't re-registered the domain name. Until the time that it comes back, I'm afraid that I'm going to have to use my very own chess program to generate puzzles and host them on my Photobucket account.
So, without further ado, here's a nice puzzle which was posted today at GameKnot. This composition is by Domenico Ponziani and it was posted along with a puzzle by Giulio Polerio. Unfortunately, neither of these luminaries of the Old Italian School were the most precise when it came to their puzzles and both could be solved with faster checkmates than they originally gave.
However, I have fixed it by adding the rook at b2 so that it can be seen in its full glory. So this is a double barreled puzzle: first solve the puzzle in the diagram as given, then go back and find out what the original, more efficient checkmate was without that rook at b2.
White to move and mate in seven. Be aware that there are two equally good starting moves.
The FEN is:
8/1p5p/pkp3r1/5Q2/1P5B/7P/1r4P1/R6K
I hope it's not too ugly for everyone. If it is, let me know, and I'll try to change it.
Last edited by Nullifidian; 04-24-2008 at 07:56 PM.
Solution:
1. Bd8+ Ka7
2. Rxa6+ bxa6
(These first two moves can be reversed.)
3. Qd7+ Kb8
4. Qc7+ Ka8
5. Qc8+ Ka7
6. Bb6+ Kxb6
7. Qb8#
The more efficient checkmate began was a mate in five that with Bf2+, Kc7 Qf7+ Kb8 and so on.
Here's another puzzle I composed. Depending one of two initial moves for White, you'll have to box the king in while pieces are closing in all around him or find a way to box him in while out in the open.
In either case, it's Black to move and mate in four.
The FEN is:
3b2k1/6pp/4pp2/3bN1P1/3P2KP/2r5/7P/8
Last edited by Nullifidian; 04-27-2008 at 07:40 PM.
The entire domain of Chessup.net is down, as if someone hasn't re-registered the domain name. Until the time that it comes back, I'm afraid that I'm going to have to use my very own chess program to generate puzzles and host them on my Photobucket account.
Was that your secret?
I can't say I am a huge fan of the new chess diagrams though. Have you tried the ones at Chess Videos TV - Now Over 400 Free Chess Videos! - I prefer them the best. The puzzle in post 66 is gone (so I've reposted it below). Thankfully the answer is still up, and I thoroughly enjoyed that puzzle Nullifidian!
Best
AO
ps- A member at my forum made a YouTube clip for it, probably the first time ever a YouTube clip has been made to promote a chess forum.
__________________ OzChess - Australia's Chess Forum- Upcoming Chess Tournaments, Game Analysis, Chess Politics, & Australian Chess News http://www.ozchess.com
Thank you! These diagrams are very nice. (And thanks for the kind words about my composition as well.) As you can see, I've edited the latest puzzle to be hosted there. For some reason I hadn't thought of them, although I've hosted some complete games there.
And yes, the puzzle was just generated by WinBoard and then doing a screen cap, which is not something I find entirely satisfactory. Its default settings are distractingly ugly, so the colour scheme was my attempt to find something which looked slightly better.
Last edited by Nullifidian; 04-28-2008 at 01:55 AM.
Solutions:
The closed up mate:
1. ... f5+
2. Kh5 Rh3
3. Ng4 g6+
4. Kh6 Rxh4#
The out in the open mate:
1. ... f5+
2. Kf4 Bc7
3. g6 h6
4. h3/h5 Rf3#
This puzzle has several themes operating at once. In the former solution, it has the use of the single correct "silent move" to make White destroy its own position. Ng4 was the only possible move which didn't involve an immediate mate on the next move, but in doing so White had to cut off the king's retreat.
The latter solution involves two restraining moves which prevent the king's defenders from coming to his aid and prevents the king from moving to a particular square before the final blow is struck.
Here's the new composition, which is another deceptively simple and entirely plausible endgame scenario.
I don't know if my notation is any good, because I haven't played chess in so long. Of course white's first move could be k-a7, but the result would be the same.
__________________
"It's lovely to live on a raft. We had the sky up there, all speckled with stars, and we used to lay on our backs and look up at them, and discuss about whether they was made or only just happened."
- The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, Mark Twain
Yes, that gets you four moves, but I'm afraid it's not correct. Explanations below the fold:
First off, it's not required that one promote to a queen—one can also promote to a rook, bishop, or knight—so if White responded by promoting to a knight, e8N+, then you'd have a mate in five.
It would go like this:
1. ... d1Q
2. e8N+ Kb6
3. Nd6
Now, the obvious move Qxd6?? would be a draw by stalemate.
So you'd have to play:
3. ... Qa1/a4+
4. Kb8 Qa7+
5. Kc6 Qc7#
Secondly, if White did promote to a queen on the first move, it would be shorter to checkmate with:
Well, easy it may have been, but I must point out that I haven't been given a correct answer yet. Given BDS's first move, as I pointed out, the opponent could have stretched it out to mate in five with the best possible play. Now you may have gotten the answer, but without you giving me it I cannot tell.
And I tried to solve yours, and either I'm missing something obvious, or there's something missing from this puzzle, because I cannot see how to force mate in two. I gave up and submitted it to a chess engine, and it can't find a mate in two either.
Cool new puzzle Nullifidian! I'll get right on it. As for the previous puzzle I gave, your computer would easily be able to answer it if, and this is critical, IF it knew how the position arose.
If you want me to give you the answer I can. A hint is below:
Solving the puzzle involves using a special move, which is a completely legal move, although it isn't really too common to see this move in chess.
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I won't bother giving the answer for the last puzzle, because it's already been given. Good job, Arrogant One!
This one is another composition of mine that I have been working hard to make multi-tiered. In this case, it's Black to move, and depending on White's next move, it's Black to move and mate in three, four, or five.
So I call it The Marriages Between Checkmates in Three, Four, or Five
And the solution to the other puzzle, Black to move and mate in three, is:
1. ... Qe1+
2. Rxe1 Rd1+
3. Kxd1 Nc3#
Though simple, it took me forever to work out a way where this knight and bishop mate would be the only possible outcome, and it's such an unlikely outcome that I had to put both an enemy queen and rook on the same rank to discourage Rxf7+, which in this case only results in a draw(!).
Now, the following puzzle is another original composition. Black to move and mate in seven.
Even more original compositions! I have a backlog of other people's games and compositions that I think are interesting, and I think I'm going to force myself to post one next time. There's a nice missed mate by Ivanchuk that I'm especially looking forward to posting.
In my opinion, this is a humorous king hunt.
Black to move and mate in eleven.
The FEN is:
1k6/ppp2pQ1/8/q7/3P2n1/1P1n4/P2N2P1/RNB4K
Edited to add:
Last edited by Nullifidian; 05-12-2008 at 04:32 PM.
Even more original compositions! I have a backlog of other people's games and compositions that I think are interesting, and I think I'm going to force myself to post one next time. There's a nice missed mate by Ivanchuk that I'm especially looking forward to posting.
In my opinion, this is a humorous king hunt.
White to move and mate in eleven.
The FEN is:
k4bnr/1p2n2p/4N1p1/1N2p3/7Q/8/1qP2PPP/6K1
I have solved the humorous king hunt, as Null well knows, for he watched me do it in real time.
It's a corker! It's also "anarchism-themed," so I would suggest that the attacking pieces be the black ones, not the white ones.
I have solved the humorous king hunt, as Null well knows, for he watched me do it in real time.
It's a corker! It's also "anarchism-themed," so I would suggest that the attacking pieces be the black ones, not the white ones.
Good point! It was reversed on GameKnot, because of my general opinion that starting with Black is undervalued by problemists and their puzzles are White-heavy, so I've just used that as my framework for changing the puzzle today.
I changed it as you suggested and your solution is still the same. It's just like Ginger Rogers' career: do everything you did yesterday backwards (I won't insist on the high heels).
Last edited by Nullifidian; 05-12-2008 at 05:31 PM.
But I think I may be missing something because I'm not so sure Kh3 is the optimal move for white.
Or is this where the theme of the puzzle comes in? Depending on the king's move after 1. ... Rf4, the number of moves to mate changes?
If so, I'm having a rough time figuring out which is the 4 and which is the 5 move version out of Kg5 and Kh5.
Some hints below the fold:
Yes, that's exactly the theme. You've correctly solved the mate in three version of the puzzle. As a hint, the mate in four move is ...Kg5 (there are unavoidably two versions depending on where the White king moves on the third time, but Black's moves remain the same) and the mate in five move is ...Kh5, which only has one set of moves, a forced mate by a constant series of checks.
If you really cannot solve it after a while, I posted the solution with the next puzzle after this one.
Re: Chess Puzzles
I put it up at GameKnot, since it allows direct importing of FEN, which I used to make sure it enabled the 
Linear Mode
