ENDGAMES TO MAKE YOUR HEAD HURT

These compositions all exploit the same opportunity given by a certain article of the Codex for Chess Composition.

They were originally built using endgame analysis results at Ken Thompson's "Play Chess with God" site. They aren't really designed to be solved by mortals alone, but in tandem with a decent endgame database ("tablebase").

There are no plans, as far as I can see, for developing further Thompson's pioneer database. Fair enough: he never promised it would last for ever. I suggest instead the multi-metric access set up by John Tamplin, which has the prospect to be better than its predecessor, as the amount of data in there expands.

The combinatorial complexity of these positions can be palliated by use of computational tools. But even more painful is the mind-wrenching entailed in any sufficiently close examination of the chess problem conventions. I myself can hardly bear it. You have been warned. :-)

	{A} A.G.Buchanan EG 143, Jan 2002		{B} A.G.Buchanan Original, 18-Jan-2004
	(3+3) Draw. (a) Diagram. (b) Rotate board 180º.		(4+2) Draw.
	{C} N.D.Elkies, version A.G.Buchanan Original, 18-Jan-2004		{D} N.D.Elkies Original, 18-Jan-2004
	(5+2) Draw.		(4+3) Who wins?

Solutions

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