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Subject: pre-chess

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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