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Subject: Re: draw by insufficient material

Author: Jan K.

Date: 13:19:55 11/17/04

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On November 17, 2004 at 16:02:32, Robert Hyatt wrote:

>On November 17, 2004 at 14:04:06, Uri Blass wrote:
>
>>On November 17, 2004 at 13:35:16, Robert Hyatt wrote:
>>
>>>On November 17, 2004 at 08:39:40, milix wrote:
>>>
>>>>On November 17, 2004 at 08:27:47, Jan K. wrote:
>>>>
>>>>>Under winboard/arena which of the following positions should be claimed(/can be
>>>>>claimed) as drawn by insufficient material-KBKN, KBKNN, KNNKNN? I thought that
>>>>>KBKN can be claimed as a draw, but once this position happened under Fritz GUI,
>>>>>my engine claimed draw and stopped playing but GUI still expected me to move and
>>>>>my engine lost on time. Thx.
>>>>
>>>>[D] knB5/8/1K6/8/8/8/8/8 w - - 0 1
>>>>
>>>>White to move and mate in one - so this position is not a draw. The king is in
>>>>the wrong corner.
>>>
>>>
>>>Fine, but what was black's last move?
>>>
>>>Had to be the knight.  Which could only have come from a6 or c6 otherwise it
>>>would have captured the white king.  Therefore there was a forced draw one move
>>>earlier, where black left the knight on a6/c6 and moved his king instead.
>>>
>>>It's a draw.
>>
>>It is not a draw by insufficient material.
>>A program may evaluate it as 0.00 but not stop moving.
>>
>>Uri
>
>It is a draw by insufficient material so far as I can see.  The definition of
>"insufficient material to force checkmate" seems pretty clear.  Neither side can
>_force_ checkmate here.


Checkmate cannot be forced there, but is this really the right definition of
'draw by insufficient material'?

This is from (maybe outdated) FIDE chess rules I found:

9.6. The game is drawn when a position is reached from which a checkmate cannot
occur by any possible series of legal moves, even with the most unskilled play.
This immediately ends the game.



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