A true swindle.

Here is a position I came across recently. Find the best moves for white.

White should be doing alright. Black is surprisingly finding it difficult to move (white font for next words) (nearly zugzwang)!!. A true swindle is to come. Take a look by yourselves and discuss in the comments.

Here is another interesting position which is white to play.

Can you be brilliant in your calculation and figure out what white should do?

So White gives up the bishop and "traps" Black's queen but then has no way to take it?...

You can't attack with the queen ;), nor with the black squared bishop, so you can only use the knight, but moving the knight releases the queen.  So now you need to stop the black squared black bishop from walking over to f8 or g7 and freeing black's knight to try and force the white queen away...

I can see from your second position that black tried to advance his pawns to either threaten mate or break out the black queen, but all black can really do, I think, is stop moving every single other piece and walk the bishop over...

So if black does not advance his pawns, and walks the bishop over, you will end up with something different like...

After g4, black has Be8, forcing white's queen to either take back the bishop, or retreat back to f2 which could then be followed by Bh5, sacrificing the bishop for a pawn but freeing black's queen and ending up a pawn up on the whole event.  Taking the bishop and having access to all of the pawns on the opposite side while still harassing black's pieces and king seems better.  

Also, Be8 after your initial Ng2 seems stronger for black and avoids everything.  I could be wrong :).

Well, Qxd7 looks obvious. Or is that too easy?

Qxd7 Qf3 and the black queen escapes, while material is equal.

Granted, e6 is hanging and the e5 pawn might be a problem for black, so Qxd7 might win.

I'm not sure.

Ok, I gave up and checked my engine and I am guessing that even some masters would fail to solve this, and no one here will.

i figured the black idea of qf3-e2; white's counter idea of bc1; but i don't seem to get better than a seemingly drawn ending, bxe5 d4 lines actually seem pretty good for b. i guess i am close though

The maximum I could get from the second position is this:

1. Qh5+ Kg7 2. Qg5:+ Kf8 3. Be1 and the h-pawn will fall too. Those two passed pawns will compensate for the minor piece.

Sac the knight to get coordination between the dark square bishop and queen for the mating net looks like an idea.

1. Nf5? Qg4:+ 2. Kf2 Qf5:+ 3. Qf5: ef5: 4. Bg5: Kg7 and black is two pieces up. He will win.

1. Nf5? Qg4:+ 3. Kh1 Qd1+ 3. Kg2 Qd2:+ 4. Kh3 Qd3:+ 5. Kg4 Qf5:+ 6. Qf5: ef5:+ 7. Kg5: h3 and black will win too.

This was my initial idea, but it fails to gain any advantage.

Agreed.

Well, 1 person was pretty close, but didn't give concrete moves and misevaluated the final position.

heh, that description only fits me :P anyway, easier to go on when you know you're right ;)

- qxd7 qf3! qxe6 qe2 and black grabs the b (bc1 qe1+), also threatening qxe3 which is very strong
- qh5 kg7 kf8 be1 qf3 bxh4 bc7 (or whatever) and hard to see how white makes progress because the pieces are tied... trading queens though (via bg3 qf4+) will free black's pieces when he should hold quite easily, worst case scenario is he sacs a piece for the pawns. pretty interesting though
- bc1! bxe5!? (or bc8 qf8 - black is in a serious shortage of moves!) d4 qh5+ kg7 qxg5+ kh8 seems like a huge mess, though wouldn't surprise me if white is forcingly winning. someone can work on this :D

the trick with bc1 is that you just win an important tempo - a sample line would be bc1 bc8 qf8 bd7 qxb8 qf3 qd8! qe2 qxg5 qe1+ nf1! and white is clearly better, ie qxd4+ be3 and black should be busted with his terrible kingside and dead bishop

If you managed to figure out Bc1 without an engine, you are clearly an FM or higher. I don't believe someone can get so lucky like this. Lol.

i'm not a FM, just expert level :P

so bc1 IS the solution... it comes from the fact that black has no real moves (you even pointed it out yourself) and once the white q gets out black gets to play qf3-e2 when qxe2 is strong. "just" find that idea and shell out the variations

could you post the full solution?

anyway, since i guess i beat it (close enough), i'll take the liberty to post a really hard one:

white to play and draw.

there seems to be no way to hold against black's very strong passers, ie Nf3 h3 and there's no way to prevent a new queen after h2... so is there any way for white to survive? (duh, yes, because i just told you so. but how?)

Easy!

1. Kc6!! g1Q Nxh4 followed by Nhf3 and white cannot make progress without the king.

black cannot make progress rather.

that was quick :D

i specially like that one because the engines are too dumb to find it. anyway yeah, q can't mate alone and black has no way to win white's c-pawn while keeping his b-pawn.

Any comments on my analysis (2nd post)?  I am not saying it is any better, but I would like to know if it was okay or not.  I think black's advancing pawns just leads to black's queen being trapped further without white's queen being needed to hold the line.  I also think black maybe could have avoided this whole mess by playing Be8 in response to the initial Ng2.