Questions tagged [chess]
A puzzle related to chess, a two-player board game with white and black pieces of varying ranks.
489
questions
4
votes
1answer
189 views
Kings' Chess Harem
Pursueing these two related puzzles, Chess Bloodshed and Devouring Nobility I create for you Kings' Chess Harem where you have to find, with the minimum number of moves, a legal game where all pawns ...
10
votes
2answers
1k views
Chess Bloodshed
This puzzle is the idea of Dmitry Kamenetsky in a comment of my puzzle Devouring Nobility.
Find, with the minimum number of moves, a legal game where all pieces are captured except the two kings.
8
votes
2answers
511 views
Devouring Nobility
Provide, with the minimum number of moves, a legal chess game where all pieces are captured except the sixteen pawns and the two kings.
Example of final configuration:
Which is done in 21 moves:
1. ...
2
votes
3answers
435 views
Trapping fairy chess pieces
This puzzle is based on this wonderful puzzle.
A fairy chess piece is placed on an infinitely large chess board with no edges. It can only visit each square once. What is the smallest number of moves ...
-4
votes
1answer
105 views
Check and mate positions
Is there a position where your opponent puts you in check, but in your turn you deliver checkmate by getting out of check?
Don't forget to add your list of moves on how to get into the position.
BONUS:...
3
votes
1answer
188 views
Create the freest arrangement of white chess pieces on board by consequently moving your pieces
You start with this board. You're the White. Freedom Index of initial arrangment of your chess pieces is equal to 20 (each pawn has two moves, each knight has two moves)
Your goal is to have as much ...
5
votes
3answers
195 views
Swapping 6 queens in a 4x4 grid
What is the least number of moves required to swap black and white queens? Queens move using standard chess rules - any number of empty cells vertically, horizontally or diagonally in a straight line. ...
10
votes
1answer
733 views
Swapping 3 rooks in a 3x3 grid
This puzzle was inspired by this one: Swapping rooks in a 4x4 board
What is the least number of moves required to swap black and white rooks? Rooks move using standard chess rules - any number of ...
10
votes
1answer
308 views
No Numbers Sudoku: The Ball of Queens
Those are all of the numbers you need. No, I did not forget any.
Normal sudoku rules apply.
All numbers, except for 1's and 9's, are queens with respect to themselves.
E.g. 2's have the queen's ...
2
votes
0answers
114 views
Center board puzzle
The white pieces in the above position should maneuver themselves into the flipped starting position (i.e. king in e3). All pieces makes regular moves within the 4x4 center squares. By removing a pawn ...
12
votes
1answer
1k views
Chess Puns Don't Get Much Worse Than This
(1) How should the game end with best play on both sides?
(2) Use the clue to complete the bad pun!
10
votes
1answer
460 views
Playing with a chess cipher
Alice and Bob both love encryption, and Alice loves to play chess. Unfortunately, Bob isn't very good at chess, so he doesn't think it's very fair to have to play the game for real. So instead of ...
4
votes
0answers
305 views
A weird chess game
Hello everyone, and welcome back to one really crazy game that was played during the lunch break within a dutch prison. It's an inmate with the white pieces against ...
4
votes
1answer
127 views
A interesting and a bold chess puzzle
Here is a chess puzzle I have made . It needed a lot of thinking .
If you are white , how would you play in this position ? State your best moves !!
Please don't use Stockfish or Alphazero or any ...
8
votes
4answers
1k views
Chess-related puzzle
I'm working on a problem for this cyber security camp, and we're doing a CTF right now. I have one problem left, and I'm almost certain it relates to chess, so I've come here for advice!
Having ...
4
votes
2answers
217 views
Can you find the key move?
I've created this chess problem for today. it's White to move and their pawns move upward. Can you find the key move? Have fun, and no computers are allowed!
Checkmate In 5 Moves
9
votes
1answer
366 views
Mini 8 queens puzzle
On a 5x5 chessboard, place 5 black queens and 3 whites queens so that no queens are attacking those who are of different color. Furthermore, the numbers indicate how many queens are attacking the ...
8
votes
2answers
279 views
An Enigmatic Game
I have a fun-ky puzzle for everyone today.
Here is the position.
FEN-rnbq1rkb/ppp1pp2/5p2/8/8/4K3/PPPPNP1P/RNBQ1R2
It can be reached in one way in exactly 9.5 moves, or 10 White and 9 Black moves. ...
23
votes
1answer
952 views
7
votes
3answers
330 views
Knight Battle: The Face-off
Knight Puzzle
Imagine a chessboard like this:
You are the white knight and can move as a knight does in chess.
Example:
Your goal is to visit every square on the board using legal chess knight moves ...
1
vote
3answers
321 views
Class Chess Tournament
A class of 36 students are expecting to play in the chess tournament held by Math Department. When the schoolmaster arrived he said "Lets start the games but first we must setup all the chess ...
5
votes
1answer
322 views
The Fastest Clean Draw
Playing with regular moves, the position above should result in a draw without repeating
an exact position three times. By Helpmate or in this case a Helpdraw, players cooperate to end this game in a ...
4
votes
1answer
133 views
Kings on a chessboard
Let $n$ be a positive integer. You are given $4n^2$ kings and a $4n\times4n$ chessboard. You have to place the kings on the chessboard such that each row and column contains exactly $n$ kings, and no ...
9
votes
2answers
226 views
A knight chased by four knights
This is a follow up to A knight chased by three knights
Two players are playing a variant of chess on a 11x11 grid. The first player controls a white knight that starts in the centre square. The ...
11
votes
3answers
733 views
A knight chased by three knights
Two players are playing a variant of chess on a 8x8 grid. The first player controls a white knight that starts in the top-left corner. The second player controls three black knights that start in the ...
5
votes
2answers
236 views
Twice Up On Top
Here is a chess problem I've made that has an illegal position. The board is from White’s view and White’s d1 pawn moves normally. Have fun!
White moves and mates in 19 moves
3
votes
2answers
181 views
Black War Heroes or Whites Save the Queens?
After Black Cavalry successfully captured White princesses,
White empire learns their Black opponent is hungry for more and wants White Twin Queens dead!
White will never let such a disaster happen ...
9
votes
2answers
224 views
Black Cavalry Fork Attack
On this chess optimization puzzle, there are only black knights and white queens. Your aim is that no black knight is threatened and to maximize the total number of queens the knights could capture. ...
5
votes
2answers
157 views
Who shall be the winner?
There are two questions to answer here:
Who will win this game of chess?
What were the last 96 individual moves (ply) by both sides? The solution is unique.
Gyula Breyer The Chess Amateur 1922, ...
8
votes
4answers
1k views
What was the last move made in this game?
What was white's last move in the game shown below?
Note: This is a screenshot taken from an actual game and all moves made were legal.
ETA: The last move played by white was the last move of the ...
-12
votes
1answer
152 views
N-1 queen on the chessboard
You are trying to solve the famous N queens problem. You broke one of the queens from your chess pieces collections. Now, you have created the following puzzle:
You are given an N*N chessboard. Is ...
18
votes
4answers
833 views
Knights in a Complete Sudoku Board
In a complete Sudoku board, at most how many chess knights would it be possible to place on its cells with a 1 inside, so that each knight can walk in order (1, 2, 3, ..., 9) through cells numbered up ...
asked Apr 21 '20 at 15:48
Bernardo Recamán Santos
12.2k2 gold badges22 silver badges112 bronze badges
6
votes
1answer
338 views
Whites capture whites and Blacks capture blacks
This is my first Chess Puzzle!
Let suppose you start a Chess game.
Whites' aim will be to place all their alive pieces on white squares in a minimum of moves and black will do the same, but with ...
5
votes
1answer
648 views
100 moves for a rook in a two by two board
A rook is in a corner of a two by two board and wants to get to the opposite corner in 100 moves. In how many ways can the rook perform this?
Note: The rook may go through the opposite corner before ...
7
votes
2answers
526 views
The Russian machine has a flaw
The year is 1969.
You, Robert James Fischer, are invited in a secret Russian basement to 'play a chess game against a strong opponent'. When you finally meet your opponent, a Russian bald guy who is ...
8
votes
3answers
999 views
Uncommon underpromotion motive
Find 2 chess positions in which the only move is a promotion to a knight, or bishop (1 position for each piece).
However the goal of the underpromotion must NOT be one of the following :
Preventing ...
4
votes
1answer
111 views
Maximum number of legal moves after n moves in a chess game [closed]
Given the chess start position :
What is the maximum number of legal moves white can play after $n$ full moves?
We will assume black is helping white in this task.
I want the best answer you could ...
7
votes
1answer
187 views
What is the minimum-value piece combination necessary to checkmate in this game of Crazyhouse?
Imagine you're playing a game of crazyhouse, which operates like standard chess, except that you have a pocket of captured pieces that you can drop on the board in any legal location as your move.
...
12
votes
3answers
229 views
The Chess Moments
The chessboard was well balanced on the mid horizontal by some fulcrum. Black and white pieces were carefully placed on such board for equilibrium. Because the wooden pieces weights vary, their ...
7
votes
3answers
192 views
Placing The Black King
In this position, White’s sole aim is to castle. But in order to do so, they must promote their pawn to a queen to force a Black bishop move. The 10 black kings represent where Black’s king can safely ...
7
votes
2answers
575 views
Knights and Queen puzzle
This is not original. I just want to share this problem. If you have heard of it, please give opportunities for those who haven't to answer.
Horst and Queenie are playing a game on a $200\times200$ ...
1
vote
1answer
72 views
k-threats Chinese Cannons Chess: Part 2
Inspired from the N-Queens problem, I here propose you a puzzle from Xiangqi wich is Chinese Chess equivalent, mostly played in Asia.
The most different piece from Xiangqi is the cannon. You can ...
4
votes
1answer
90 views
k-threats Chinese Cannons Chess: Part 1
Inspired from the N-Queens problem, I here propose you a puzzle from Xiangqi wich is Chinese Chess equivalent, mostly played in Asia.
The most different piece from Xiangqi is the cannon. You can ...
4
votes
3answers
229 views
4-coloured queens attacking every opponent queen once
Can you place 6 queens from four different colours (24 in total), such that each queen attacks exactly one queen of each colour? They may attack as many queens of their own colour as these are ignored....
6
votes
1answer
104 views
Freedom of many choices
There are 40 possible move options for both White and Black players in the starting position. The 4 knights and 16 pawns all have 2 options.
If all the pieces are still on the chessboard, how would ...
7
votes
4answers
335 views
3 Colors of Chess Pieces Attacking Each Other Once Each
Yes, it's another "Chess Pieces Attacking Each Other" puzzle. This time we have 3 colors. Your goal is to place as many of the same type of chess piece (excluding pawns since you can't define the "...
6
votes
1answer
142 views
Most moves by Most number of Pieces
Using one color, White or Black, place as many chess pieces (kings, queens, bishops, knights, rooks, and pawns, or combinations thereof) as you can on a checkerboard so that when the number of pieces ...
2
votes
1answer
109 views
Footmen And Friends #3: Eviction
Welcome to Episode 3, where we have a strange puzzle for today. Pawns aren't legally allowed on the first and eighth ranks, but today we make an exception for the sake of creating another long but fun ...
13
votes
1answer
842 views
The Single Digit - a chess riddle
In front of you lies a safe. Within the safe, you are aware, lie the AI-discovered secrets to solving the game of chess - indeed, every one of its complexities, all of its unknowns, implausibly ...
2
votes
1answer
126 views
Footmen And Friends #2: Leapfrog
Seeing as the pilot episode was a major success, with an outstanding and correct response from one of our viewers, it’s time for Episode 2. Remember, we show puzzles with kings and pawns only! Those ...
