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Bobby and Garry are playing chess. If Garry is playing with the black figures and agrees to mirror every move Bobby makes, what is the minimum number of moves in which Bobby can mate his opponent?
Bobby can mate Garry in four moves:
1. d4 d5 2. Qd3 Qd6 3. Qh3 Qh6 4. Qxc8
Place only 2 rooks and 1 knight on the board, so that the Black player is mated.
You can place the rooks on c5 and e5, and the knight on f5.
White to play and mate in 4 moves.
Remark: The position on the diagram is one which occurs in actual play.
Notice that the black queen and the black king have switched positions. However, this can happen only if some pawns have been moved. Therefore we can conclude that the bottom row on the diagram is actually the 8th row of the chessboard. All black and all white pieces have reached their respective opposite sides of the board.
Now White’s first move is Kb8-d7. The only moves black can play are with the knights. If Black plays Kb1-a3, Kb1-c3 or Kg1-h3, white mates in 2 more moves – Kd7-c5 and Kc5-d3. If Black moves Kg1-f3, then after Kd7-c5 Black can delay the mate by playing Kf3-e5. However, after the white queen takes it with Qxe5, Kc5-d3 is unavoidable.
If White is to play, can he always mate Black in 2 moves, regardless of the moves played before?
The first thing to notice is that since the last move was made by Black, either the king or the rook was moved and therefore Black cannot castle anymore. Now White plays Qa1 and no matter what is Black’s next move, Qh8 gives check-mate.
You have unlimited number of knights, bishops, rooks and kings. What is the biggest number of pieces (any combination) you can place on a chessboard, so that no piece is attacked by another one?
If we put 32 knights on all black squares, then no two pieces will attack each other. Now let’s see that if we have more than 32 pieces, then there will be two which attack each other. Split the chessboard in 8 rectangular sectors of size 2×4. It is not hard to see that if we have more than 4 pieces in the same 2×4 sector, then 2 of them will attack each other. Therefore we can place at most 4 × 8 = 32 pieces on the chessboard.
The following game is played under very specific rules – no pinned piece checks the opposite king. How can White mate Black in 2 moves?
First, White plays f3 and threatens mate with Qxe2. Indeed, blocking with the black rook on d4 will not help, because it will become pinned, which means that the rook on d6 will become unpinned, which will make the bishop on b6 pinned, and that will unpin the knight on c7, resulting in a mate. Below are listed all variations of the game.
1. … Rd5 2. Qxe2#
2. … Bxa5 2. Kc8#
3. … Bxc7 2. Nxc7#
4. … Bxe8 2. Kxe8#
5. … Qxe7+ 2. Kxe7#
6. … Rd2 2. Bxd2#
7. … Rxd6+ 2. Qxd6#
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