Author: Marc Bourzutschky
Date: 11:28:48 05/16/04
In a book review at www.chesscafe.com there is a discussion of an older version of Fischer Random Chess, called pre-chess. The main difference between FRC and pre-chess is that in pre-chess black and white can have different piece arrangements on the first row. The only constraints are that each side has to have opposite colored bishops, and that castling is only allowed like in classical chess (i.e., white can only castle if the king is on e1, and there is a rook on a1 or h1, etc). However, it is not required that the starting position must allow castling. How many game theoretically different positions are there in pre-chess? I know of 4 different suggestions, 2 by famous and 2 by less famous chess enthusiasts: Max Euwe: 4,147,200 Noam Elkies: 8,294,400 Paul Epstein: 5,317,600 Marc Bourzutschky: 5,149,368 Which one is correct, or all they all wrong? -Marc
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