Helpmate Help

White to play and Force Black to mate White in 5 moves.



I'm on 1.Be6 and have it solved for 1..fxe6 and 1...f6 but cannot solve 1...f5.

@greenpawn34

I might have it... definitely double check me, though. I think black's moves after f5 are all only moves.

These are called "Selfmates".

"Helpmate" usually means that white and black collaborate to checkmate black.

Hi spidey widey,

Yes that must be it. I was to fixated keeping the White King on f1.
The stipulation said mate had to happen on or before Black's fifth move,
a bit misleading unless there is a quicker forced mate. We have five moves.

It is from the lastest CHESS (there is prize but it would have been won by now).

Hi BigDoggProblem,

Yes, I always get them mixed up. Though the thread title works.

It was composed by Andrei Selivanov in 2000. Good!

Maybe you can rescue the thread by giving us a Helpmate....please do...and not too hard.

@greenpawn34 said
Hi spidey widey,

Yes that must be it. I was to fixated keeping the White King on f1.
The stipulation said mate had to happen on or before Black's fifth move,
a bit misleading unless there is a quicker forced mate. We have five moves.

It is from the lastest CHESS (there is prize but it would have been won by now).

Hi BigDoggProblem,

Yes, I always get them mix ...[text shortened]... . Good!

Maybe you can rescue the thread by giving us a Helpmate....please do...and not too hard.

@bigdoggproblem said
OK...

G. Backsi
[fen]8/8/7K/8/1R6/k7/1R1p4/2b2N2[/fen]
Helpmate in 2, 2 solutions

Black moves first. White's 2nd move should be mate.

Reveal Hidden Content

Reveal Hidden Content

So maybe that last one was a bit too easy. Here's another that's a little bit harder:


Helpmate in 6

Never had a chance to get the last one, got this copied for me to do at work!

I think I have it.

@greenpawn34

That's it.

The main challenge is to get a white pawn promoted without stalemate!

Hi BigDoggProblem

Which of course happened on an earlier attempt.

That last one was also by G. Backsi.

Here's another one:

I think I have this one as well. it's a sister to the Selfmate I had in
the blog where a Black Knight shields the Black King from White Rooks.
This time the Black Knight shields the White King from Rooks. This one is excellent.

@greenpawn34 said
I think I have this one as well. it's a sister to the Selfmate I had in
the blog where a Black Knight shields the Black King from White Rooks.
This time the Black Knight shields the White King from Rooks. This one is excellent.

[pgn]
[Event "?"]
[Site "?"]
[Date "????.??.??"]
[Round "?"]
[White "?"]
[Black "?"]
[Result "*"]
[SetUp "1"]
[FEN "8/1B6/2r2n2/K ...[text shortened]... sk of repeating myself, Black has no choice but to play...} 13... Nxe2 {Checkmate. Brilliant.}[/pgn]

Hi BigDoggProblem

I never noticed the Black Knight ends up on it's original square.
This makes it all the more amazing.

I got the idea for that one fairly quickly.
It was the placing of the f6 Knight and why was it there.
(it is how I have stumbled upon a few solutions....what is that piece there for.)


I saw if the f6 Knight went to g4 then the King is in a mating net
waiting for Bxc6. Then it's just a matter of getting the White King to e1