Unbelievable to me

Uh oh... I think I smell something cooking, and it's not food!

I did not intend for the problem in post #57 to require the sort of artificially specific information you're describing. So if the uniqueness of the solution you found does require an especially bizarre condition that I didn't explicitly mention, then you've totally busted my puzzle. When I have the time, maybe I'll try to find the glitch you're referring to.

Ah, but the level of interest expressed by others is the only thing that ultimately matters, once you really get down to brass tacks. If you stop and think about it, where does the value of anything come from, besides the degree to which other people appreciate it? That's the harsh reality in even the most "objective" fields (such as mathematics or physics) - independently constructed proofs don't count for anything unless there are people out there who accept, and agree with, the underlying methodology.

Wow!  This is a great puzzle thread. I've bookmarked it!

Did I miss the explanation to Arisktotle's Sherlock Holmes puzzle as to how the K can have gotten to c3? in the four pages of comments I don't see it.

I came to the very basic conclusion as Hajafar when I looked at the problem. I even looked at the possibility of a Black piece that White captured its last move or vice-versa.

I came to the conclusion the White K had to be on b3 and could have moved to a3 or c3 - with or without capturing a Black piece.  The given solution, WK on c3, also means he was on b3 where he would have been in double check and I can't conceive how that was possible. Even if a Black piece moved to c3 and the WK captured it, that Black piece couldn't have interfered with check from both the BR and BB.

By the way, the puzzle was made by Raymond Smullyan who made many popular puzzles and recently died at high age.

Sameez1 figured out the solution and I assumed optimistically that everyone did. White's last move was Kb3xPc3 and blacks move before Pb4xc3 e.p. Capiche?

I posted a simple endgame study ending with those moves a few weeks  ago to illustrate the moves are not even strange. I think I titled it "For sameez1".

Okay, so I've looked for awhile, but haven't found the cook you alluded to. It takes a LOT longer for me to spot these things in my own puzzles, because I tend to gravitate toward positions I'm not very good at analyzing quickly.

Could you please just post the [presumably alternate] solution you found? You never know - I might be able to fix this one, too!

Before I move on to a problem of mine from 2014, there's another from 2013 that I'd like to share... not because it's good, but because it fits nicely with the "theme" of this thread:

White's king is missing from the diagram below. Where should it be located?

I think you misuderstood me, I found no cook. In fact, I didn't find the time yet to look at the problem!

I tried to explain that your original stipulation could be easily converted into a standard format based on the fairy chess form "ohneschah" but that such would not be the case for all types of uncommon stipulations. And I gave an example. Your latest problem is another example (#68). It is not wrong but placing missing pieces is more of a Smullyan type stipulation you won't often find in problemist publications. Such a problem could still be appreciated though when problemists find your stipulation well motivated by the content. And of course anselans note on "independent spirits" is always in force!

anselan is right! I wasn't thinking of the category of adding pieces to make positions legal - in which your problem fits because the king is missing - but of the unqualified additions of pieces which is of a much lighter type. anselan/brobeckers category is an echo of the popular "illegal cluster type" where taking away a unit makes positions legal.

There are several problems in Smullyans books where units are added but they come under the heading of "mystery pieces" where the square is already specified. It's a bit of language interpretation but that's what I had in mind. The point is that these additions are in a less challenging category of composing and solving than e.g. the "legal/illegal" types.

The whole retro-field is fluid and different types are popular at different times. The core principle is though that one should feel that a composition was made to demonstrate the stipulation type and not that the stip was a haphazard topping to make the pudding look more tasteful. This is certainly true for the problems in the brobecker article!

anselan has more of a 360-vision on the retro field than I have, so you can trust him on describing its current state.

Comments on #68 moved to the next post.

@#68: Good differentiation of Ka3 and Kc3! One could believe the composition was made to explore that choice which validates the missing king stipulation.

I would have preferred a different unwind of the position whereby the g4-knight moves to f8 (from another square), Ng8 is retracted and the king gets tempo moves on g8 and h8. After that, the white pieces may be withdrawn from the backrank. This unwind can be combined with same pawn and king decisions as your current solution. Whatever, your composition is still two levels up from Smullyan!

I believe however that, with the suggested unwind, more can be done when the king is on the board though it requires research. That would of course lose the nice Ka3/c3 pair! But since you stopped composing ...

@#57: Haven't been able to solve it sofar. 14.5 moves is as close as I can get. Whatever comments can be made on it, it is definitely a challenge. I'll look at it again later.

Later: found it! Missed the second move. Perfect proof game, ready for the pro market place! The checkless condition is well used on several occasions which justifies its inclusion.

I like the king replacement problem! Another direction to modify it might be to place wQ somewhere random and put wNg4 on d8 instead. That means that last 7 single moves are determined. Unmoving the knight to f8 now becomes a try which is one move too slow. Can't jettison wQ entirely because it would allow Black a second promotion.

@cobra91 composed your own retro puzzles,(how cool is that)now you have the means to comfortably tweak any little glitches so your going to scrap them?What a BS waste that would be.

Yep, there are lots of free variables: the white pawn formation, the free units on the board, alternative destinations of the black pawns. Even adding Bf1 has its perks. It is a sound and flexible framework.

The Cobra is a bit cagey on joint efforts. He tends to feel he is trumped by a superior hand while the truth is that everyone takes his own music to the party. All top composers include suggestions by others at times.

In communication at the moment with a leading composer Z, whose problem was cooked by Y, then repaired, but X cooked it and then came up with a fix himself. So the latest version is by Z&X, dedicated to Y.

One of my early efforts had 2 totally unnecessary pawns: I was embarrassed but grateful to the guy who pointed this out.

Personally, I found the conventions the biggest barrier to entry to the hobby, with no guidance as to what the right interpretation was. After some work, and problems built on one interpretation, I felt discouraged when an established composer came along with a different interpretation, which he claimed was the right one, but with no real evidence provided for his view. On the other hand if I'd had his interpretation at the start, I would have happily gone along with it. (This is why I feel it's so important, if you have a cleaned up version of the conventions, Ari, to publish it ASAP so that this is the first thing that new composers come across, rather than the disappointing mess newbies stumble through currently, if they can be bothered.)
I agree Cobra's basic matrix is very rich and lots of things may be possible for him. I can't help pointing out one can freely slide wPe2 to e3, since the wKB couldn't enable another promotion. Still can't find a good square for wQ.

Your points are taken. I'll see what I can do my physical condition permitting. Currently it is only the 'relaxed' stuff, but there are better periods as well.

Yes, there are many options available due to the "loose" nature of the position. When composing such problems, the one weakness I never outgrew was "tunnel vision" - I've only ever cared about finding what "works", and never really liked the idea of trying to elevate the quality standards all the way up to perfection. Usually, that means limiting oneself to a single composition for an indefinite amount of time, making changes ad infinitum (some of which inevitably lead to glitches, and must eventually be reversed if/when said glitches are finally noticed). Some composers (the pros, I'm guessing) have the patience for that, while others (presumably the amateurs) do not.

Coincidentally, the many weeks I put into this puzzle after having arrived at the current version in just 4 days marked the "last stand" for my interest in the concept of perfect compositions. I still remember how tedious it was to disect the consequences of each and every conceivable change that could be made, all in a rather silly attempt to remove the restriction against checks from the problem (I was satisfied with what I had after 4 days... and still am).

Ultimately, I came to understand a basic truth of composing: one cannot "create" that which is not already there to be discovered. So after wasting over a month on the project and accomplishing absolutely nothing (apart from busting several modified versions of the same puzzle), I decided to just chalk the whole thing up to "experience". Ever since then, not once have I been willing to spend more than a week's worth of free time on any one composition of mine. It's not worth it... at least not for me.

As I said above, there's plenty of "looseness" in the position which is simply an intrinsic property of the idea being implemented (just as my checkless SPG from post #57 had alternate solutions that were intrinsic to its main idea, making it impossible to correct without explicitly forbidding all checks). I could be wrong, but it seems to me that most of the obvious changes one could make are a matter of personal taste. I also have a feeling that obtaining an improvement which goes beyond mere subjectivity may very well be a task for professionals, not amateurs.

However, all compositions that I post are of course "public domain" - meaning you can do with them what you like.