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Subject: Re: Positional Draw

Author: Dann Corbit

Date: 19:32:42 01/05/00

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On January 05, 2000 at 21:33:17, Michael Claude Bennett wrote:

>Is a positional draw a situation which can be clearly and unambiguously shown to
>be a stalemate?  e.g. Pandolfini's Endgame Course gives the following position
>as a positional draw: White: King d1, Bishop g3 Black: King e3, Rook e2.

Here are the EPD records for the two possibilites:
8/8/8/8/8/4k1B1/4r3/3K4 w - - acd 4; acn 485; acs 22; ce -305; pv Bb8 Kd3 Bc7
Ra2;
8/8/8/8/8/4k1B1/4r3/3K4 b - - acd 45; acn 544; acs 1; ce 32722; pv Kd3;

I'm anything but an expert, but I will hazard a guess as to what is meant.

It must mean that white is on move, because if it is black's turn it is a sure
checkmate.

Black has mating material, so if white can force a 3-fold repetition because of
the current arrangement of pieces, or avoid capture 50 moves, it's a draw.  If
the pieces were situated in a bad way, there would be no way to force the draw.

Here is a draw (provided white does not do the absurd Ke1):
8/8/8/8/3n4/4k1B1/4b3/N2K4 w - -
Is it a positional draw?  I would not call it that.

Here is a draw that is a material draw:
8/8/8/8/8/4k3/8/N3K3 w - -
There is no way to win.

Other draws would be by repetition and by agreement.  Probably some others that
I am not even aware of.  I suspect that a real chess expert will hop in now, and
provide the correct answer.
;-)



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