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[FEN "8/8/8/8/8/pNnbPPpN/RBppPbrP/pkKPrqQR b - - 0 1"]

I was introduced to a challenge a few weeks ago with the above position. The challenge is to move the Black Knight such that it must always be three squares in the third row from the right, the point is to capture all pieces with the Black Knight. The order of the other pieces doesn't matter.

While an answer is awesome, what I'm mainly interested in is, is this really a thing?

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    Is this supposed to be a knight's tour? For a 3x8 board an open tour exists, but not a closed tour where the knight returns on its original square.
    – Glorfindel
    Jul 20, 2017 at 7:21
  • This is quite a curiosity, would you mind posting it as an answer Glorfindel? Jul 25, 2017 at 1:04
  • What are you asking? It is definitely a thing. :) Jul 31, 2017 at 12:33
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    There is no way you can access the h1 rook in the corner, so can't be done. Or do you mean capture all pieces, including black's own?
    – jf328
    Aug 4, 2017 at 12:08
  • "The challenge is to move the Black Knight such that it must always be three squares in the third row from the right," That makes no sense. Dec 14, 2020 at 5:07

1 Answer 1

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As @Glorfindel pointed out, this is a knight's tour.

One sequence is Nc3-a2-c1-b3-a1-c2-a3-b1-d2-f3-h2-f1-e3-g2-e1-d3-b2-d1-f2-h3-g1-e2-g3-h1.

[FEN "8/8/8/8/8/pNnbPPpN/RBppPbrP/pkKPrqQR b - - 0 1"]

1... Nxa2 2. null Nxc1 3. null Nxb3 4. null Nxa1 5. null Nxc2 6. null Nxa3 7. null Nxb1 8. null Nxd2 9. null Nxf3 10. null Nxh2 11. null Nxf1 12. null Nxe3 13. null Nxg2 14. null Nxe1 15. null Nxd3 16. null Nxb2 17. null Nxd1 18. null Nxf2 19. null Nxh3 20. null Nxg1 21. null Nxe2 22. null Nxg3 23. null Nxh1

How did I create the sequence? I used Warnsdorff’s Rule:

Always move to an adjacent, unvisited square with minimal degree.

Where the degree is:

the number of unvisited squares that are adjacent to a given square

In the case of ties, I calculated ahead and made sure that the knight didn't get stuck.

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