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MatPlus.Net Forum Competitions Sven-Hendrik Loßin 35 JT (Selfmate)
 
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(1) Posted by Sven Hendrik Lossin [Monday, Jan 20, 2014 23:20]

Sven-Hendrik Loßin 35 JT (Selfmate)


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Schach-Drachen Isernhagen present the Sven-Hendrik Loßin 35 JT. Selfmates of any length are asked for which show a theme which is typical for studies but rather untypical for selfmates or which for some other reason are studylike. You can refer to a specific study in your entry. Be keen and imaginative in your explanation why your selfmate is studylike.

Prize fund is 200,- Euro and will be distributed by judge Sven-Hendrik Loßin (minimum 20 entries that fulfill the theme needed otherwise the prize fund is possibly reduced). First prize is min. 50,-€. Entries by May 26th per mail to the tourney director Marius Eilert: marius.eilert(at)gmx.de.

PLEASE REPRINT!

Die Schach-Drachen Isernhagen präsentieren: 35 JT Sven-Hendrik Loßin.
Zum bevorstehenden 35. Geburtstag von Sven-Hendrik Loßin veranstalten die Schach-Drachen Isernhagen folgendes Thematurnier: Gefordert sind Selbstmatts jeder Zuglänge, die ein Thema zeigen, das typisch für die Studie, aber untypisch für das Selbstmatt ist oder die aus anderen Gründen studienähnlich erscheinen. Man kann dabei gerne auf eine Studie als Vergleichsstück verweisen. Seien Sie ruhig mutig und fantasievoll bei der Begründung des studienhaften Inhalts.

Der Preisfonds beträgt 200,- Euro und wird vom Preisrichter Sven-Hendrik Loßin aufgeteilt. Der erste Preis, so er denn vergeben wird, erhält dabei mindestens 50,- Euro. Der Preisfonds wird reduziert, wenn weniger als 20 turnierfähige Stücke eingehen.
Einsendungen bitte per Mail bis 26.5.2014 an den Turnierdirektor Marius Eilert: marius.eilert(at)gmx.de
Die Einsendungen werden in anonymisierter Form an den Preisrichter weitergeleitet.

PLEASE REPRINT!

Translations into other languages are highly appreciated.

I have shown some examples in the recent harmonie issue:
http://www.problemschach.de/harmonie/h117.pdf
 
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(2) Posted by Steven Dowd [Tuesday, Jan 21, 2014 19:59]

Thank you for sponsoring such a potentially interesting tourney.

I've read and re-read the article over several days. There are two issues that still plague me.

1. Is your first example meant to imply that "Domination" is not a theme often seen in the selfmate, but is seen often in studies? One can enter the keyword domination in the PDB along with stip='s#' and quite a few examples come up. Plus isn't something like "Stufenweise Abdraengung" a form of domination, and thus an ancient selfmate theme?

Your example problem is quite good as you note yourself, but I see what is happening in that problem as more of a "Grab" theme than anything else (and grab again to me is another form of domination often shown in many problem types), with multiple grabs of black material until only the weakest pieces survives to mate. That sounds ill of me, as if I am criticizing your problem, but you will of course realize that this is a compliment, as Yves Tallec once noted to me, an "advanced Grab" where what look like mateworthy pieces are removed can be quite a thing of beauty as it actually is a problem paradox.

2. I got thoroughly confused though on your second example, where if I am correct you present a theme that you think should be a study theme but has never been realized as such but you have achieved it in the selfmate. That pretty much rebounded with my understanding of the tourney, which was to show common study themes that have not been commonly shown in the selfmate.

Those have been my thoughts, and they may be misguided or misunderstandings on my part and perhaps you can clear up my muddled thinking.
 
 
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(3) Posted by Sven Hendrik Lossin [Tuesday, Jan 21, 2014 21:20]; edited by Sven Hendrik Lossin [14-01-21]

Dear Steve,

I see your trouble and I just have some ideas but maybe not all the answers that you'd like to have.
First of all I think that we agree that this kind of tourney is quite experimental not only because most of the selfmate componists are not so deeply interested in study themes and vice versa but also because close to nobody can really tell how to compose those selfmates - neither do I. The first example I gave was found by me when I was looking for something completely different, the second one appeared when I created a matrix and found out that you have an interchange function with the knights that bases on the idea that the wrong knight can not lose a tempo which I think is quite typical for studies.

ad 1. While domination is very common in studies you will find only a few of them in the selfmate genre. And I guess that most of them are more or less stalemate problems. Moreover the first example has the typical study form with introductory play which is rather unusual for selfmates.
ad 2. Maybe I am wrong here but when I saw what is possible in this matrix I had exactly this typical study construction with the wrong knight in mind. I will do some more research on that issue. There are a lot of studies with this wrong knight theme but usually they are about exact pawn play, for example:
(= 4+4 )

1.Ne7 c3 2.Nd5+ Kc8 3.Nxc3 e3 4.a3! (4.a4? and White has the wrong knight in the end.) 4.-c4 5.a4 Kc7 6.Nd5+ Kc8 7.Nxe3 c3 8.a5 Kc7 9.Nd5+ Kc8 10.Nxc3 Kc7 11.a6 and White has the good knight.
 
   
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(4) Posted by Steven Dowd [Tuesday, Jan 21, 2014 21:51]; edited by Steven Dowd [14-01-21]

Aha! Some of it makes more sense now, thanks for the answers.

The other question I had was this "lack of introductory play." I am fairly certain I understand what you mean there, but maybe you could provide 1 or 2 examples of introductory play in a study and how it is lacking in a s#?

Good luck with the tourney! I hope to make something, but usually I don't do as well under thematic constraints.
 
   
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(5) Posted by Sven Hendrik Lossin [Wednesday, Jan 22, 2014 21:00]

Dear Steve,

"introductory play" is by far easier to achieve in a study than in a selfmate because you only need a won or drawn position in a study while in a selfmate you need a mate of the white king in time.

You can find an interesting article about introductory play:
http://dieschwalbe.de/schwalbe256.htm#studien

In the beginning there is the sentence:
"Die Dramaturgie sollte so gewählt sein, dass sich die Spannung langsam steigert und aufbaut, um sich dann in der Krise, einer scheinbaren Ausweglosigkeit, zu entladen."
"The dramaturgy should provide a tension that is slowly rising and should be relieved in a crisis of a seeming hopelessness." (Very hard to translate that one...)

How differently selfmates and studies are treated in practical composing you can see here:
(= 4+3 )

Yochanan Afek, EG 2010/11 1st Prize

1.a4 Kb4 2.b7 Re8 3.a5 Kxa5 (end of introduction) 4.Nf6 Rb8 5.Ne4 d5 6.Nc3 d4 7.Ne2 d3 8.Nc1 d2 9.Nb3+ K~ 10.Nxd2=

With typical selfmate reasoning you would probably omit the first three moves as they do not contribute to the content but are "zurechtstellend" and moreover cost white material. I sometimes wonder what it is that makes the whole judging almost completely different in these two genres of chess composition.
 
   
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(6) Posted by Steven Dowd [Thursday, Jan 23, 2014 01:32]

The article is very good and gives a good view of how introductory play is an integral part of studies. However, I found your example quite unconvincing. The introductory play there is to divert the king and rook to give White the time he needs to draw. That White loses material also seems a plus, hardly "zurechtstellend," and part of the paradox - a player might assume you need to keep the pawns to draw.

I'll certainly think about it, though, as I established some time back that I really don't understand studies very well and gave up trying to compose them. So this may certainly be a lack of understanding on my part; I'll ask Siegfried, he is always helpful here. Thanks again!
 
   
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(7) Posted by Juraj Lörinc [Saturday, Jan 25, 2014 12:17]

What do you think about this selfmate in relation to the tourney?

Julius Gazon
19 Slovensky magazin 15.6.1941
(= 5+3 )
s#7 (5+3)

The idea of duel of RB-B was shown repeatedly as far as I know, but I show it for a different reason. WinChloe gives 5 full-length sub-variations, while the book Kompozicny sach na Slovensku lists a few variations of varying length.

And what is the most interesting, the stipulation given in the book is "Selfmate study". I remember how strangely it sounded to me when I was a beginner and the book was among the first theoretical materials I had a chance to analyze in detail.
 
   
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(8) Posted by Jacques Rotenberg [Saturday, Jan 25, 2014 17:46]; edited by Jacques Rotenberg [14-01-25]

Juraj, have a look at this (long story)
http://www.matplus.net/start.php?px=1390667868&app=forum&act=posts&tid=57&fid=xshows&page=0

Theme : taboo
 
   
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(9) Posted by Steven Dowd [Saturday, Jan 25, 2014 21:10]

That is the PDB theme stufenweise Abdrängung (specifically a Broecker schema, I believe), which I mentioned earlier, and I thought was one of many selfmate themes that showed domination, and was as old as the hills. In fact, "domination" in various forms such as Grab or tempo loss maneuvers seems to define most selfmates.

I know there is a big push amongst "the real composers" to show this thing called "selfmate specificity" but I do not believe it exists. A selfmate is simply an inverse of a directmate (the French have the right word for it!) and chess itself, so why shouldn't all the same themes and ideas be shown in selfmates as in more orthodox problems?

As to foreplay, I again am no study expert, but a lot of the studies I see have rather contrived foreplay that I can't see as having any logical use in the problem. Siegfried published here or on another site a number of studies that lacked foreplay but seemed to, in my view, be better because of it; I keep hoping he will chime in here soon too.

I am interested to see what comes out of the tourney, as I cannot for the life of me think of a study theme that has not been commonly used in selfmates. And I am hoping that is simply my own lack of viewpoint/dogmatism as I like to see innovative ideas succeed.
 
   
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(10) Posted by Sven Hendrik Lossin [Sunday, Jan 26, 2014 20:45]

I have read the term "selfmate study" once or twice before not knowing where to put it. I supposed that a selfmate study means that white must find some moves after which it is clear that black can not avoid a white selfmate. But for that you would need something like selfmate endgame theory to know which constellations allow a selfmate and which do not so that I am surprised that somebody called a s#n a "selfmate study".
@Juraj: I think this selfmate you have shown us would be "turnierfähig" (what is the English word for that?). Nevertheless an entry that shows something alike should add something to the already existing selfmates because this issue has been investigated several times. Last time I have seen it is P1245379.
 
 
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(11) Posted by Sven Hendrik Lossin [Sunday, Jan 26, 2014 21:12]

"I know there is a big push amongst "the real composers" to show this thing called "selfmate specificity" but I do not believe it exists. A selfmate is simply an inverse of a directmate (the French have the right word for it!) and chess itself, so why shouldn't all the same themes and ideas be shown in selfmates as in more orthodox problems?"

The answer is quite easy: white power is always "good" (only one exception - stalemate) in orthodox play. With selfmates white power can be good or bad. Or it even changes from time to time which often leads to very enjoyable works. The whole motive inversion thing cannot be shown in orthodox pieces. By the way: one of the first question that a good solver asks when he solves a selfmate with white batteries is if they are good or bad.

Example:
(= 11+10 )

Sven-Hendrik Loßin F10 Schachmatnaja Komposizija 111 07-09/2013
1.Ra4! (2.Qc4+ Kxc4 3.Ba2+ Kd3 4.Rd2+) 1.-Bxb4 2.Rb2+ Kxc3 3.Rb3+ axb3 4.Qxb3+

The white battery is "bad" in the starting position because it makes 1.Rd2+ impossible. Hence the thread destructs this battery. After 1.-Bxb4 the battery is no longer "bad" but fires now to build a black battery with the king as the battery front piece. This is selfmate specific in my view and can not be shown in orthodx play.

Look at the selfmates by Volker Gülke - these are gems as they usually work like: Black defends by making move x possible - White uses the fact that Black can play x. I prefer these selfmates to those that only "abuse" (a little too harsh a word for that but I don' know of a better one) the selfmate stipulation for things that cannot be shown otherwise and - as a judge - would always deduct at least half a point if a selfmate has no selfmate specific content. Of course this does not mean that selfmates with selfmate specific content are per se better than others but it adds to the quality of a selfmate.
 
   
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(12) Posted by Steven Dowd [Tuesday, Jan 28, 2014 00:05]

Don't buy it in the least. The only thing selfmate-specific about the problem is that you found the correct moves to make Black mate you instead of you mating him. You found a threat that forced him to render your own mate threat harmless and forced him to form a more deadly battery. It's cleverly done, and attractive, but the reason for it is simple. You want to make him mate you.

You don't form Black mating batteries in directmates for the simple fact that you don't want Black to mate you. What is selfmate-specific? That Black is forced to mate White. Everything else is hubris.
 
   
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(13) Posted by Steven Dowd [Tuesday, Jan 28, 2014 03:14]

I thought I should add that I used a strong word, "hubris," but that isn't directed at SHL nor is any disrespect intended. I just don't buy the assumption that a selfmate is any different from normal chess or chess problems except in that the goal is to mate the own king.

In my time in academia, it always seemed like we were trying to complicate things instead of getting at the root of the matter. And Keres' assertion that what made problem chess unpopular was its obsession with periphera and marginalia seems very true.

Anyway, I have strong opinions and always will, but hope no one finds me disrepectful, especially to someone like SHL, who has taken the time to answer my probing questions.
 
   
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(14) Posted by Sven Hendrik Lossin [Tuesday, Jan 28, 2014 18:58]

Well, Steve, I will give it a last try. Not to be stubborn but to let as many people as possible feel the kind of aesthetic that is in these works.

First of all: it is completely clear that in a selfmate you want black to mate white. That is the cause. What is the effect? Black power is sometimes good sometimes bad when it is always bad in orthodox problems and White power is also sometimes good sometimes bad when it is always good in orthodox play.
You can use this thing by showing something that you can never show in an orthodox problem: The move that defends is also the move that is responsible for the black impairment ("Schädigung").

(= 10+13 )

Hartmut Laue, Volker Gülke 1278 idee & form 10/2000 2. Preis
1.d8R! ~ 2.Nxc6+ Kxc6 3.Rc5+
1.-Bc2 (now 2.Nxc6+? Bf5!) 2.Ng4+! Bf5 3.Bxc4+
1.-Bd1 (now 2.Nxc6+? Bxh5!) 2.Nd3+! Bxh5 3.Qxc4+
In both variations the defending move is the impairing move as well (black defends by making a move possible, white uses exclusively the fact that this move is possible now).
It is not possible to show this in orthodox play so it is just right to call it selfmate-specific.

If I cannot convince you then I am full of regret but at least can hope of somebody else seeing this thread and feel the beauty in this inversion of motives.
 
   
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(15) Posted by Steven Dowd [Tuesday, Jan 28, 2014 19:24]

Thanks again, specific examples are always appreciated.

I want to think about this for a few days before replying as this is the sort of thing one should ponder for awhile instead of making a hasty assertion. I usually spend my Saturday mornings going to a restaurant for breakfast and reading Petkov's book, but I may print out your example and ponder it instead.

I will take exception to the comment that you hope someone can appreciate the selfmate specificity and "feel the beauty in this inversion of motives." I can feel the beauty in what is done here without assigning it to a class called "selfmate specificity." The implication is that if I cannot assign it to this class, I cannot appreciate its beauty.

I am something of a populist when it comes to chess aesthetics; I think any decent chessplayer can appreciate the beauty of any type of chess problem as it is still chess; it is still a bishop, a queen, a king. I think some of my resistance to the thing called selfmate specificity comes from the fact that I find jargon to be a barrier to the appreciation of any human activity, including the arts.

I have given some thought to the ideas of "introductory play" and "domination" and may have something to share on these topics as well. It took me some time, but I think I finally figured out what you were trying to get across in the article and in this thread. Excuse me, I am not always a quick thinker.
 
 
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(16) Posted by Kevin Begley [Tuesday, Jan 28, 2014 20:45]; edited by Kevin Begley [14-01-28]

Forgive me for interjecting my inexpert opinion, but I do not believe that selfmate expertise is required to spot the underlying weak premise (which plagues this debate).

On the basis of intuition, it's easy to assume that the selfmate-style "genre" is unique in producing moves which exhibit some benefit-duality (read: moves with simultaneously positive and negative aspects); but, careful scrutiny suggests that this is an illusion, not a unique feature of the selfmate aim/stipulation/genre.

Alternative categorization schemes (e.g., directmate, studies, helpmates, etc) do offer moves with the same benefit-duality -- not only as a theoretically attainable possibility, but also as richly exploited thematic realizations.
I hope a gentle reminder is sufficient to achieve consensus on this point, but if not, countless examples can be provided upon request.

Note: I make absolutely no claim as to whether (or not) the example problems exhibit any selfmate-specificity.
I only claim that the (derived) wording of the key premise (asserting that benefit-duality constitutes an inherently specific feature of the selfmate genre) can be easily unsubstantiated, and therefore, the argument can not possibly survive scrutiny.

If the proponent (SHL) truly believes some specificity exists in these problems, I hope he takes the time to locate, and succinctly express the key concept, such that the readers might explicitly understand what constitutes a truly unique feature of selfmate problems).
Arguments based upon subjective intuition are all too common, but never persuasive.
And, if I have mischaracterized your premise (in any way), I would appreciate if you would please help alleviate this miscommunication.

My gut tells me that there may be something to this intuition about selfmates -- there does seem to be something unique about them -- and, I'd like to better understand this suspicion (if it is, indeed, correct).

Many thanks to SD for sharing this transcendent quote from the razor sharp Grandmaster, Paul Keres -- reading this was all I ever needed to realize that the passage of considerable time is utterly insignificant.
 
 
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(17) Posted by seetharaman kalyan [Tuesday, Jan 28, 2014 21:09]; edited by seetharaman kalyan [14-01-28]

The Hartmut Laue problem quoted is indeed is beautiful. Perhaps such effects are not possible in orthodox direct mates. Is it impossible in fairy chess also?

I think Juraj Lorinc's for his latest jubilee tourney prescribed such a theme only. "Black defends by closing a white line, and white uses it to his advantage".
 
   
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(18) Posted by Sven Hendrik Lossin [Tuesday, Jan 28, 2014 23:59]

"Black defends by closing a white line, and white uses it to his advantage"

Something like that is called motive-inversion in a broader sense. I would say that you can also show it in orthodox play although not in such a sophisticated way than in selfmate.

Example for a similar theme - Black defends by opening a black line and white uses it to his advantage:
(= 15+10 )

Henk le Grand, Probleemblad 2012

1.Qh3! ~2.d3+
1.-dxc5 2.Nxe6+ Kd5 3.Nc7#
1.-e5 2.Nh5+ Kd5 3.Nxf6#

The example by Laue/Gülke shows motive-inversion in a narrow sense when it is the exact move that is used by White (without any other added impairment). This cannot be shown in orthodox play but maybe Kevin can show me ;)
 
   
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(19) Posted by seetharaman kalyan [Wednesday, Jan 29, 2014 07:26]

You are right. In the above example, the black defences have the advantage of line opening for black while there is the added impairment of masked line opening of white pieces, which is used by white. Probably similar explanation is possible for the theme of Juraj's JT.
 
   
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(20) Posted by Arno Tungler [Wednesday, Jan 29, 2014 15:41]; edited by Arno Tungler [14-01-29]

As Sven-Hendrik is probably aware, there is one exclusion for orthodox more-movers - Black can stalemate himself as defense of a White threat and White can exactly use that manoeuver for himself. See as an example the beneath.

Siegfried Brüchner
Freie Presse 1981
(= 8+9 )

#4

1.Re8? Ba4! 2.Re1 b5! 3.Rh1?? stalemate! Therefore better:
1.Rf8! Ba4 2.Rf1 b5 3.Rf5! (making use of the Black Kling) gxf5 4.Be8#

However, that is the only possible situation and the selfmate gives the nice opportunity to have a lot more opportunities for this fine effect. Personally, this is really the main reason why self-stipulations continue to be one of the most attractive realm of problem chess for me.
 
   
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MatPlus.Net Forum Competitions Sven-Hendrik Loßin 35 JT (Selfmate)