The World Chess Championship is kinda not so great

As I write this, the chess Candidates Tournament is still expected to be held as scheduled, starting March 17, 2020, in Yekaterinburg, Russia. The tournament is between eight of the top chess players who aren't currently the World Champion. The winner of the tournament will earn the right to play a match against the current …

Computerized chessboard displays should be better

You can't tell everything just by looking at a game position on a traditional physical chessboard. If you see: You can't necessarily tell: the board orientationwhose turn it is to movewhat castling rights existwhich pawn, if any, can be captured en passant There are also lots of other things you can't tell, such as whether …

Chess and drawing by threefold repetition

Chess is an ancient game with simple rules, so you might think the official written rules would have evolved to be very clear and concise, and to unambiguously cover all corner cases (at least as to which moves are legal, and how the outcome of the game is determined). But I'm not so sure. I'll …

Superstalemate solution

This is a solution to the chess challenge I posed in a previous post. It is not the only solution. From this position: 8/7p/6p1/2K3pk/6pb/6p1/6P1/8 b - - 0 1 Black plays ...h6. Any move by white then stalemates black. Occasionally in a chess discussion group, someone will suggest that stalemate being a draw is a …

Superstalemate: A chess challenge

Challenge: Find a legal chess position in which one player is stalemated, and in which the stalemated player would still not have any legal moves, even if the rules were changed to make it legal to move your king into check, or otherwise leave your king in check. I don't think this is a very …