Mate In 1, 2, 3, Or 4 Moves

It’s Black to move such that White mates in either 1, 2, 3, or 4 move/s. Good luck solving!

Nice one - or should I say nice four? I missed the beautiful #3!

Btw, what's the bishop on a1 for?

Many thanks Arisktotle! I had stroke of luck with the soundness, with the fact that the piece structure by the Black king provides for dual-free play with each Black move.

The a1 bishop is the prevent the dual Ba2 in the event Black plays f5/6 first in the #3 line, since Ba1 now stops Bg7#.

Also also, guess what the theme is!

"Pickaninny".

Technically, there is no extra value in "undualing" the ...f5/f6 defenses since their solution duplicates the Ba2 solution which already exists in a valid line. I in fact prefer it when black must find the "best" defense ...Kg8! in this setting. Of course that would be different if there was a new checkmate tied to the ...f5/f6 defenses. But I'm just a mainstream composer

Btw, The extra bishop does not undual the ...f6 defense.

I didn’t mean it unduals the f5/f6 defense-I meant more it unduals White’s response to it. Without Ba1, then after 1... f5/6 by Black first, than. 2. Ba2/Bg7+ are both options for White. I merely wanted the problem to be “perfect,” i.e White has only one possible response to either of Black’s defenses, which is Bg7 in both cases. Just me and my nitpicking I suppose!

And that is the correct theme!

a3, then smothered checkmate

Similarly, here is an Albino.

White To Move-Mate In 1, 2,  3, Or 4

The real challenge here is to do it without a promoted piece! It’s hard since the #2 and #3 musn’t be allowed to be lengthed and there must at least one dual-free mainline for the #2, #3, and #4.

Yep, that's the same thing I meant - and it doesn't change my comment. I saw a very old problem recently which was degraded by adding extra pawns only to achieve 1 mate against all defenses. In modern times, composers don't care much about it. What matters is that the Ba2#-line occurs somewhere dualfree against one black defense and it gets full marks! So it gets full marks from me, with or without ..f6/f5 related duals. You said something similar in your albino-post

Besides that, the extra "Ba1" does not make your problem perfect (in your eyes) as it fails to eliminate the white dual after ...f6. It only works well after ...f5.

There is a simple version without Ba1 and without ...f6/f5 related duals but you may not like it:

Right! I agree that the albino is much harder than the pickaninny and it won't be easy to get rid of the promoted bishop. You made a valiant attempt to get it this far!

Ah! I only see now how f6 still allows the dual. Silly me! I very much like your version as it is a total fix and it saves a piece.

And thanks! The Albino is indeed hard to do. Other then the promoted piece, there has been complaints on Matplus of the #4 line not being an “exact mate.” Hauke Reddmann has been trying to find a standard piece version only, but to no avail so far. Perhaps you can do it!

Wrong direction my friend! The black pawns are going down.

Here is a pickaninny version that lacks the nice checkmate on the a2-g8 diagonal but instead features a valuable retro element. You need no longer state that black is on move but merely "checkmate in 1,2,3, or 4 moves" just as in the albino problem. Though you might complain there is a dual after the optional ...f6xe5 defense.

Superb economization Arisktotle! The retro content is indeed very valuable. Besides, it saves some typing.  I don’t the cutting of the diaganol mate.

Also, your diagram has Black to move.

Congratulations on solving it!

Btw, I don't want to be unduly critical, but white should really play 4 different key moves after blacks opening move. This is neither the case in your version nor in my versions.

In the last version it can be fixed by adding white pawns on e4 and f2 which also makes the solution "perfect" by your definition - but evidently at the cost of economy

It’s okay. My only concern is economy and complete soundness for White.

I promise this is the last version of the pickaninny problem! It has 3 advantages over the last one and one disadvantage - economy - which you consider very important. I am not saying it is better than the others since that all depends on taste and focus.

The advantages:

- it is perfect by your standards, while the last one had one "poor" defensive line with dual mates.

- it provides 4 different white key moves

- it adds tries in 2 of the 4 different problems.

Next post will be on the albino -  I hope.

As announced, here is your pretty efficient albino. Each problem has at least one dualfree line. The #4 is beautiful!

And here is a more professional version of the albino. At least 2 variations in every line (except the #1) and an awesome #4, including knight promotion.

I am glad with this one!