Puzzle Contest

This month's contest puzzle is below. First, though, let's refresh your memory on the rules for this contest:

The general plan for this contest will be to present a series of puzzles, all with a bughouse theme. Some of the puzzles will be standard "find the mate" puzzles, like the ones in my bughouse quizzes, but they won't all be like that. To keep the puzzles interesting and challenging, I'll try to present puzzles with a variety of formats and requirements. (I'll probably be the one creating most of these puzzles, but if you have an interesting idea for a puzzle, definitely contact me. I can always use some good ideas.)

Unlike the studies in my bughouse quizzes, I will not be publishing a solution for these puzzles right away. Instead, I will be publishing the names of the first 10 bughouse players who send me a full solution for the puzzle. The first solver will take the honored position at the top of the list, with the nine runner-up solvers listed immediately below that.

To decide the order in which solutions are found, I will generally go by the received date and time on the e-mail. However, for players who send me a more thorough analysis I will throw in a "fudge factor" to allow for the extra time spent. This fudge factor will be granted purely at my own disgression and will be used only when answers are timestamped at approximately the same date and time.

Of course, one of my objectives in creating these puzzles is to make them difficult -- there wouldn't be much point in having a contest puzzle that can be solved in five minutes now, would there?

Puzzle #4
uploaded November 7, 1999

Well, the opening paragraphs to these contest puzzles have been promising that some of these puzzles would be a little offbeat, so I think it's time to fulfill that promise. The theme this month is: imagine bughouse played on a cylinder. The board, instead of flat, is shaped like an oil can, with the h-file adjacent to the a-file. Rook moves can be either straight up and down the cylinder or in circles around the cylinder, while bishops move in helical spirals up and down the cylinder. For example, after 1. b3 e5? White can play 2. Bxd8 -- the bishop moves along the path c1-b2-a3-h4-g5-f6-e7-d8.

If all this cylindrical movement is a little hard to picture, then just print the diagram below, curl the page so that the h-file is alongside the a-file, and, voila, you have a cylindrical chessboard.

How would bughouse on a cylinder be different from bughouse on a flat board? I think the offense would benefit for sure, and the contest puzzle is a good example why. It's White to play and mate. Test your brain's ability to think in three dimensions. Really, this puzzle is not that tough once you get a feel for thinking cylindrically -- I think even 1400 rated players can solve it with a little persistence. So, give it a go...


So far five players have sent me a successful solution to this puzzle. There is still plenty of room for you on the star solvers podium!

Dragonslayr

	Fabrice Liardet		Kueh		Tecumseh
	Blackcomb		Ishamael		7th solver
	8th solver		9th solver		10th solver

If you think you have the answer, e-mail your analysis to me. For your answer to be acceptable, it must cover all the key lines of the solution. There is a forced mate for this particular puzzle, so be sure to carry your analysis out to mate.

If your answer is correct, I will let you know. I will also e-mail a reply if your answer is incorrect or not quite complete, but you make a good attempt to solve it. By the way, I won't be selling your e-mail address to any e-mail merchants, so you don't have to worry about adding to your massive daily allotment of junk e-mail if you send an answer in. Happy solving!


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