This match has sort of been all about me, so far.
I'm the handsome face in the gifs, the common foe, and the one who will be taking home all of that sweet, sweet steem when your King falls.
So to balance things out a little, over the next few rounds I'll be turning the spotlight onto my opponents. Ladies first,
@immarojas has just landed on the leaderboard.
Imma is a nurse from the UK. A big believer in the future of steemit, she's been with us since the 10th of August, and has powered up over 1200 steem in the last week. Currently ranked 1116 for total account value, she's only $300 away from breaking into the top 1000.
She loves her family, and exploring London.
I haven't written her name on a slip of paper yet, but she's a canny observer of the game, and I expect she'll be quite the thorn in my side until all the pieces go back in the box.
d6->c5 is also interesting, on balance I think I like it more than f4->f3 because it keeps tempo a bit. At first I was a little fearful of advancing king this far into enemy territory, but I don't see that he can take advantage of it (check with knight looks toothless as it has no followup move and just sacrifices his bishop), and his pawns are a bit slow to be much of a threat.
I see you've withheld your upvote. Perhaps you've decided that since I'm going to win, there's not much point in boosting the pot?
nope, just so focused on the game I forgot I guess ;-)
I haven't played chess in a long, long time, and I'm not even entirely sure what's going on with this post. Judging from the comments though, it would seem @mattclarke is playing a game against the entirety of the steemit community?
If so, that's a great idea and a good thought exercise. I'd like to suggest a move. I'm not certain on where A1 or C5 etc is, but I have decoded @blocktrades suggestions and think I may have it figured out.
If we were to move the knight at f6 to d7, threatening his rook at a8, then the only move I can see for him to prevent that from happening is to move his knight at c3 to e2, placing us in check. At this point, our best option would be to move our king to e3. Now not only would his initial rook still be in jeopardy, but also the bishop in front of our king. The option would be available to him to take our knight at d4 with his knight at e2, but then he would have three power pieces in danger. I am going to stop now because this explanation of what would likely happen next could go on forever.
As I said, I haven't played in a long time, so if I am overlooking something obvious or just talking complete gibberish, ignore this comment and move on with your day. Lol
I think the part of the notation that is confusing you is that since we're playing black, the 1st rank (e.g. a1) is white's rook on right side of board. So d6->c5 is moving our king to threaten his bishop. He can either retreat bishop or try to protect it with pawn or check us with knight as you mention. Checking us with knight doesn't help him, since we just take his bishop as we move out of check and he has no good followup. If he tries to protect with pawn, we just capture pawn with knight and put in him double check to take his rook with knight fork. Same thing happens if he moves bishop elsewhere.
By the way, if you like this move, please upvote my first reply, that means you would like this to be our next move (move with most votes is the one used for black). But act fast, only got like an hour before the vote counting is done.
Sorry, I only just noticed this. I upvoted but, based on what you said it is probably too late.
I must say, this is an inventive use of Steemit and it gets the whole community involved. Great thinking!
I just posted the most recent move. The board's wide open, and there's some steem up for grabs (assuming you guys win)
https://steemit.com/chessmatch/@mattclarke/that-was-a-close-one-i-refreshed-at-exactly-midday-and-armen-was-still-in-front-with-3
https://steemit.com/chessmatch/@mattclarke/that-was-a-close-one-i-refreshed-at-exactly-midday-and-armen-was-still-in-front-with-3
i will follow you ^_^
damn how could i oversee this.
amazing idea :)
It's actually really fun. Also horrible, but mostly fun :)
B7B5, we can take the rook out with our bishop after he is forced to retreat his bishop. Next move C8B7.
I think you are right. There is still the pawn in the way at E4, which we would need to move out of the way first, and which I initially thought would allow his rook to escape, but moving that pawn would put him in check and I can't see a possible move he can make after we move the bishop that wouldn't sacrifice a piece in trying to save the rook.
This is a good potential attack, but I think he can recover some of this loss by moving king to d3 and taking our knight as we setup to take his rook, and he can regain tempo moving his knight, threatening our capturing bishop and pawn at f4. Here is the sequence I was looking at with d6->c5: white bishop to f1, knight->b3 (double check from knight and queen and knight fork of king and rook at a1).
If he moves his king to d3 we still have your option. I think Matt is trying to divide and conquer by giving us too many ways to beat him...lol.
I don't think we will still have my option, because we have to move our king out of the way of queen, and it's no longer a forcing move if we can't threaten the bishop when we do it. This gives him time to do things like move the rook.
I think if he tries what I think you are saying (moving knight from G1 to H3), we can get him in checkmate. I don't see how he can take our knight before we take his rook. I think his best response is bringing his other rook into action.
https://steemit.com/chessmatch/@mattclarke/that-was-a-close-one-i-refreshed-at-exactly-midday-and-armen-was-still-in-front-with-3
f4->f3
E4-E3 Check!
Upvote yourself, brendio. You won't go blind, I promise.
I like this one after we align the black bishop with white rook.
Haha nice
https://steemit.com/chessmatch/@mattclarke/that-was-a-close-one-i-refreshed-at-exactly-midday-and-armen-was-still-in-front-with-3
Amazing post!