Questions tagged [problems]
Chess problems consist of a board position and a task. Most ask for a line of play that mates black in a set amount of moves, or a combination that results in a winning position. Many other types exist, including, but not limited to, construction tasks for various positions and proof games that have numerous goals, selfmates, helpmates, and retrograde analysis. Tournaments and championships exist for composing of original problems and for speed-solving.
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Searching games by chess positions
I have a somewhat weird question that is only indirectly related to chess. I am trying to solve a chess-related puzzle in which I have to find games played by Soviet chess players based on positions. ...
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A puzzle where you must find the mate in 3 solution but avoid mate in 2 and mate in 1 solutions?
I want to see if a puzzle could exist where you must avoid finding mate in 1 or 2 but just find the mate in 3 solution.
This is not subjective it is a hard math problem to make a move that forces mate ...
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Good chess puzzle that involves queen running around the board?
Basically title. Ideally not too difficult or too many steps, but if you have any good puzzles where the queen traverses across the board.
Thanks in advance!
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Checkmate in ω² moves with finitely many pieces
The post Checkmate in ω
moves? has inspired a lot of discussion and mathematical research into positions on an infinite chessboard where white can mate in a transfinite amount of moves. The current ...
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Mate-in-N problems where N scales indefinitely with board size
Motivation - Long range mating patterns
This question is inspired by my recent interest in infinite chess and the post on MathOverflow Checkmate in ω moves?. Since my chess endgame skills are quite ...
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Grimshaw in practical (OTB) game
Does anybody know of an example of the Grimshaw-Theme being used in a practical game?
For the Nowotny there are several examples (e.g. Navara-Dergatschova, Ordix, 2007) and for the Plachutta there is ...
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Are there any hard mate-in-2 problems?
I'm interested to know if there are any particularly challenging mate-in-2 problems. Since the second move will be essentially forced, the problem essentially comes down to 1 move. Typically, the ...
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Longest sequence of moves where White's number of available moves does not change
There are challenges for the longest sequence of moves in which white's available moves increase or decrease. This challenge is for the longest sequence of moves (from the opening position) in which ...
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What is the longest sequence of increasing White moves with only White pieces?
Inspired by a comment by @Evargalo on this question, I ponder how long a sequence can last where each turn, White has more available moves than the previous turn, in a situation with only White pieces ...
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Is there a Chess 960 position in which White's moves can be decreased to zero without check?
Inspired by this question, koedem proved that, from the starting position, White's legal move amount can be decreased sequentially from 20 to 0 in 20 moves. However, doing so required some checks. I ...
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Longest sequence of moves where white's number of available moves decreases
An easier version of this
White has 20 available moves at the start of the game (from the standard position). After 1.h3 h5, white has 19 available moves. (The h pawn has lost the ability to move two ...
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Longest sequence of moves where number of available moves increases
White has 20 available moves at the start of the game. After 1.a4 e5, white has 21 available moves. (The rook has gained 2 moves, while the pawn has lost 1).
What is the longest sequence of moves ...
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Roundtrips with no shortcuts
In the picture, you see the longest roundtrip of a rook such that there are no "shortcuts" - imagine the target squares are given, then at each square you have exactly two other given ...
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Forced Mate (differently)
I was wondering if there was a move so bad in chess that if you played it the only move your opponent could do was checkmate you back, through blocking your piece or through moving the king. It would ...
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Longest sequence of unique legal moves for one player, always in check and ending in checkmate
I recently played a bullet game, in which I thought I was in checkmate, but then realized I had one legal move, this then repeated again and again 6 times until ultimately I was in checkmate. I share ...
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What is the maximum total number of piece points possible on the board?
Maximum number of non-pawn pieces on the board notes how to get the maximum number of non-pawn pieces on the board.
But what about the maximum number of points possible? It seems like this starts ...
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Legal positions with one color to move only?
Most positions in chess can be reached with both black or white to move.
Some positions are only legal with one color to move. One such position is the starting position, which famously can't be ...
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A little Silvester puzzle
A regular game has been played where White still has all 16 pieces. White promoted only a single pawn, and not to queen. In the final position all 16 pieces of White have (at least) one mating move. ...
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Basic "mate in one move" puzzle - what am I missing?
I am extremely new to chess and have been working through some "mate in one" problems on chesspuzzles.com for practice. This one has me very confused though:
The stated answer is:
But why? ...
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Piece Peace Puzzle
Place the whole army of White and the black king on the board, such that no piece is attacked or defended. (Obviously you must use double pawns.) That's fairly easy, so tie breaker will be how many ...
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Position where neither player can force an *exact* outcome
There are three possible outcomes of a game of chess: white wins, black wins, or the players draw.
Typically, we consider a win better than a draw, so when we say "white can force a draw" ...
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Do any unique proof games feature an en-passant capture?
Most positions that could be reached, in a specified number of moves, after an en passant capture could be reached just as well without one, suggesting that such positions could not occur in unique ...
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Open problems in chess involving maximum material imbalances
I am posting the present question since here Very unbalanced Chess Positions I have introduced three open problems (i.e., the third one, the fourth one, and the sixth one from the above), regarding ...
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Longest sequence of unique series moves
Clearly a spawnoff of the preceding question, but far easier to analyze, and maybe helping a bit to solve that one too.
Take the starting position, remove all black pieces to simplify and now make ...
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A fun game (for problem composers, mostly...)
A game leading to a given position is called a proof game. Of course any proof game can be prepended with 1.Nf3 Nf6 2.Ng1 Ng8, so we defined a shortest proof game as, duh, the shortest possible proof ...
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Minimal forced checkmate
A forced checkmate is a situation in which the player whose turn it is has only legal moves which put the other player in checkmate.
I’m searching for the minimal forced checkmate (the smallest amount ...
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Where does the term “cook” originate?
What is the origin of the term “cooked” for a chess problem with an additional, unintended solution?
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Fastest stalemate in Duck Chess
Seeing the meteoric rise in popularity of Duck Chess (full rules), I'd like to ask how to stalemate the fastest (from the starting position) in this variant, because the stalemated player wins here.
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How many more squares can you attack?
(Inspired by this cool problem)
Let’s say it’s White to move. Let A = the number of squares currently attacked by White, and B = the number of squares attacked by White after White’s next move.
What ...
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Why do chess puzzles need a unique solution?
Why do chess puzzles need a unique solution?
This is different from real games, where such situations do occur, but more frequently, there are multiple avenues to success. Contrary to what one might ...
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Maximum futile material (in illegal position) neither winning nor forcing stalemate
We assume standard (P1BN3R5Q8) value (personally I prefer 1,3,3,4.5,9 but so there).
To get a drawn position with maximum material difference, not caring about that it's illegal, we just have to ...
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Position where neither player can force a win and neither player can force a draw
One sometimes sees the claim that in every chess position, either White has a forced win, or Black has a forced win, or both players can force a draw.
While this claim is "morally" correct, ...
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Pinned piece chain
How long a "Pinned piece chain" can you make?
Here a "Pinned piece chain" is a chain of pieces where each is pinned by the last.
Here for example is a chain of length 3.
The ...
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How can I mate the black king in 4 moves or less (helpmate)
In this helpmate puzzle, it is White to move.
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Is there a position with the stupidest possible move?
I define a stupid move as a move that
puts the opponent in zugzwang so that all their moves result in mate in one (weaker version: a loss);
is chosen instead of a move that gives mate in one (weaker ...
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What is the maximum number of moves in a position of Crazyhouse?
We know that the maximum number of moves for a given colour in a legal position of standard chess (or at least record so far) is 218.
What is the record we can come up with for Crazyhouse?
Note that ...
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Least amount of "points" to mate a berserk king
"Berserk king" is my own invention ;).
It means that you play according to the normal chess rules, until a king is mated. At that point the mated king is allowed to do TWO moves, in a last ...
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A helpmate in 15 moves
I recently came across this ChessBase India article on "engine defying problems." Here's a problem from the helpmate section. We need to reach the helpmate in 15 moves. I thought for a long ...
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Why are capturing key moves "frowned upon"?
Wikipedia's article on Babson tasks says:
However, Yarosh's problem has a small flaw: the key is a capture, something which is generally frowned upon in problems.
(The "key" of a chess ...
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Shortest game to "elegant" mate
Define an "elegant" checkmate as one in which
the king is not on the edge of the board
the king and each of the 8 squares surrounding it are each attacked by exactly one, different opponent ...
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Is it possible for black to win this?
[FEN "5bbk/5p1p/3b1P1P/6PK/8/8/8/8 w - - 0 1"]
How does Black get out and is it possible for Black to win? And if so, what is the least amount of moves it takes Black to win?
It is Black to ...
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Puzzle: Forced game end in at most two halfmoves
Compose a position where
It's White to move
White can deliver checkmate or stalemate in 1 move
Or if they make a different move, then Black can deliver checkmate or stalemate in one 1 move
I needed ...
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Stuck on a mate in 3
I've been stuck on this for the longest time. At this point I would just like confirmation it is possible.
[Title "White mates in 3"]
[FEN "8/8/8/2N5/8/2k1N3/Q3r2q/K7 w - - 0 1"]
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Fastest algorithm to give mate with K+R vs K on infinite large board as function of starting position
Consider a board with only two edges that are perpendicular.
Something like:
.------------------------------------------------------
| ^
| ...
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Which piece was captured last - knowing that this position was reached in the minimum number of moves possible?
This is a puzzle that I made a while ago, but never really published anywhere before (although I posted it on an obscure Dutch telegram channel).
The question is simple: what was the piece that was ...
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Explanation of Hard Puzzle #34
Wikipedia defines a chess tactic as:
In chess, a tactic refers to a sequence of moves that limits the opponent's options and may result in tangible gain.
I'm having a hard time understanding a ...
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How do you solve vague mate in two problems?
I am a big fan of solving mate in N problems and believe they help tremendously with i.e. visualization. The only issue I seem to face in certain problems are when they are very vague. For example ...
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Bishops standing on their toes
Another silly idea:
[FEN "1B1B1BkB/B1B1B1B1/1B1B1B1B/B1B1B1B1/1B1B1B1B/B1B1B1B1/KB1B1B1B/BNB1B1B1 w - - 0 0"]
How many bishops must be removed such that the position is won? How long does ...
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Chess against Chuck Norris (starting position with lots of queens)
Just plain silly.
Replace all pieces of Black (except the king — you are not Chuck Norris, you must have one) with queens. The starting position is then a Mate in 3 (#3).
Challenge: Replace only a few ...
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The king fell off the board
Give a position (White to move) with the bK missing. If it is inserted on any legal square, it is mated in one move by the wQ, with a different mate for each square.
(Point of side conditions: If you ...
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