Your New Years Eve Puzzle

White to play and mate in 7 moves.
(White goes first and will deliver checkmate on his 7th move.)

Clues:
Be careful what you do with the White King.
If it strays onto a clear rank then the Black Rook will check allowing Kg7.

The final mating position is not the obvious one you can see from the diagram.


Composed by G.Sladek 1957.

Beautiful! The king moves like a scorpion and black has nothing better than submit itself, all because of zugzwang. I'm not going to spoil this for others and print the 'hidden' solution.

The Scorpion King....I like that.

Need to find a game with the Scorpion King -v- the Assassin Pawn.

That puzzle, although not very difficult once you have stumbled on the first move.
Is one of those pleasing puzzles that leaves one with a wee glow once you have solved it.

Alright, now I'm trying to imagine how a scorpion moves instead of thinking about the problem. It might actually be more productive because I can't imagine what the mating position could be... But OK, I'm going to get it. I've given up on too many.

Is the first move Reveal Hidden Content

This one was a lot of fun. I figured it out all by my lonesome.

Reveal Hidden Content

Man, you guys's "clues" had me barking up the wrong tree forever... scorpions and not the obvious mate! Doh. Anyway thanks for the puzzle 🙂

I was looking along this line:
1.Rh5 e5 2. Rxe5 Rg8 3. Nxg8 Kxg8 etc.

which is winning as well, but not so nice (and fast).

Originally posted by tvochess
I was looking along this line:
1.Rh5 e5 2. Rxe5 Rg8 3. Nxg8 Kxg8 etc.

which is winning as well, but not so nice (and fast).

Originally posted by Varenka
>> which is winning as well

... for Black 🙂 And I don't mean in the final position.

Originally posted by tvochess
Rg6 followed by Kg7 is a better alternative for Rg8. Correct?

Yes

I wonder if this means I'm going to win at chess this year.


If only someone told me when I had a mate in 7.

Originally posted by greenpawn34
[pgn]
[FEN "7k/5prp/K3pN1R/8/8/8/8/8 w - - 0 1"]
1. Rh2 {White sets up a mating zugzwang. Black tries to avoid mate for as long as possible} 1... e5 2. Kb5 {The White King stalks the Black Pawn like a....Scorpion.} 2... e4 3. Kc4 e3 4. Kd3 e2 5. Kxe2 {He captures the pawn on the correct square. Black's next move is forced if he wants to avoid being mated next move.} 5... Rg2+ 6. Rxg2 h6 7. Rg8 {And that is checkmate on move 7.}[/pgn]