BMEWS
 

Today’s Chess Problem 9/16/11

 
 

Forced mate for White.



Posted by Christopher    United States   on 09/16/2011 at 06:14 AM   
 
  1. It’s been a long time since I played chess and I never learned the numbering system, but it looks like White Queen takes Black knight and it’s over.

    Posted by ozarkmatt    United States   09/16/2011  at  07:09 AM  

  2. Yikes! Another winner! Yes, Black loses in all variations after 1. Qxc7+

    You’re a strong player, aren’t you? Numbering system? You mean algebraic notation? Like me, maybe you first learned descriptive notation? That means I’d write 1. P-K4 on my game record instead of 1. e4.

    Damnint! I was hoping this would last until this afternoon.

    Now it’s:

    Wes 01
    Drew 01
    ozarkmatt 01

    BMEWS 3/7

    You get bragging rights and I’ll mention this before tomorrow’s problem.

    Posted by Christopher    United States   09/16/2011  at  07:31 AM  

  3. Chris, a little post on how the nomenclature works would benefit everyone. It’s shorthand notation, and very terse ... I find it a bit irritating because I don’t fully understand it, and I also am not happy “leaving out the final moves as an academic exercise” even when they are blatantly obvious. I’m not much of a player so that seems wrong to me somehow.

    An example is today’s problem. Yes, queen takes knight wins the game, but it isn’t ‘all over’ when that occurs. Black rook at d7 then takes white queen at c7, white rook at d1 takes black rook at d8 for another check, black rook at c7 moves to c8 to block, and then white rook at c1 takes black rook at c8 for the mate. If it goes any other way (queen takes knight, rook takes queen, then white rook at c1 takes black rook at c7) then black can not only escape but win!

    Also - where do you get the digital board and pieces? I don’t own a physical chess set, and it would be easier to be able to set the problem up and then try solutions in front of my eyes instead of in my head.

    Posted by Drew458    United States   09/16/2011  at  08:08 AM  

  4. See, that’s why I stopped playing, you chess guys are SO anal! Seriously, yes I should have fleshed that out more. Next time, I’ll “complete the paragraph.”

    Posted by ozarkmatt    United States   09/16/2011  at  08:39 AM  

  5. I’ve been thinking of doing just that Drew, since I said something to Wes about his chess nomenclature.

    My ‘digital’ chessboard and pieces? I use Exachess. It’s a Mac-only chess database. All of the well-known databases (ChessBase, for example) are written for Windows. I just set up the board and take a selective screenshot using Grab. Grab is a utility that I never used until now, but has been included in every iteration of Mac OSX that I’ve bought. I currently use OSX 10.6 Snow Leopard.

    ozarkmatt, I don’t see where anything said has to do with you. I posted the problem. You solved it. I understood that you solved it. I said so. No need to complete the paragraph with me. I don’t know who is being anal. Drew was just pointing out that I’m maybe giving BMEWS readers more chess awareness than they deserve. Drew included.

    Since my aim is to increase the chess ‘awareness’ of BMEWS readers, Drew is exactly right. I will post an article on chess nomenclature.

    Posted by Christopher    United States   09/16/2011  at  09:24 AM  

  6. Oh I’m not criticizing OzarkMatt, I’m just saying I don’t immediately see the completions, so that makes it harder for me to grok the solutions.

    And I’m not trying to be anal - some of that comes naturally I guess - but coming from an IT background it’s difficult for me to ignore the nearly infinite number of other permutations ... as Christopher said to Wes the other day, IIRC, what passes for a ‘best solution’ in these problems is the most compact solution, ie the least number of moves - also considered the boldest manner of play I think. To me, any solution that completes the job IN A GAME is acceptable; there are no costs involved other than time.

    And I’m still trying to visualize yesterday’s Qf2 solution; I can see it but I can’t see how it’s bulletproof. I need some kind of board so I can put the pieces in front of me. Free would be a good price for that right now, seeing as I’m on thin fiscal ground waiting for some customers to pay their dang bills.

    Posted by Drew458    United States   09/16/2011  at  09:43 AM  

  7. See, that’s just what I was saying. Maybe I should ‘play the game out?’

    Remember, you found the right first move 1… Qd4+.

    After the book move 2. Kh1 you question 2.… Qf2!

    Set this up on a physical chessboard. White’s king is no longer on g1 where it would defend the f1 Rook.

    So, if White takes the Queen Rxf2, then Re1+ leads to mate. All you can do is try to block with Rf2-f1. Then Black just plays Re1xf1 mate. White’s King is a square too far away.

    Posted by Christopher    United States   09/16/2011  at  10:05 AM  

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