MARK RUBERY CHESS

Kriegspiel is an unorthodox variant of chess invented by the English player Henry Temple (1862-1928) and was introduced at the end of the 19th century becoming very popular, even amongst famous chess players like Emanuel Lasker. At that time it was played by two players, but required a third person to act as a referee. Three boards were required for a game. The main point about Kriegspiel is that players only get to see their own pieces, not those of their opponents. They also do not know what moves the other side has made, so they have to guess where the opponent’s pieces are. Only the referee knows exactly the real position of both sets of pieces. The players attempt to make their moves, and the referee tells them whether their moves are legal or not. If an attempted move is not legal the player tries another one, until he has made a legal move. The referee also announces when a move is a capture or checking move. The only question a player may ask is ‘Any?’, meaning are any pawn captures possible; if the answer is yes at least one must be tried.

The name of the game comes from the German for ‘war game’ used in the 18th and 19th centuries to train their military officers and was played on an 11 x 11 board.

In the following game between two experienced GMs at the 2022 British Championship White forced his opponent’s resignation with his 12th move.

Emms,J (2474) - Gormally,D (2466) [B22] 108th ch-GBR 2022 Torquay ENG 2022

1.e4 c5 2.c3 d6 3.d4 Nf6 4.Bd3 g6 5.dxc5 dxc5 6.e5 c4 7.Qa4+ Bd7 8.Qxc4 Ng4 9.f4 Nc6 10.Bc2 Qb6 11.Qe2 Nxh2

World Champion Magnus Carlsen fielded the following question in an interview he gave to Lex Fridman:

Q: What would you say motivates you now and in the years leading up to now, the love of winning or the fear of losing?

MC: So for the World Championship, it’s been fear of losing for sure. Other tournaments, love of winning is a great factor and that’s why I also get more joy from from winning most tournaments than I do for winning the World Championship because then it’s mostly been a relief. I also think I enjoy winning more now than I did before because I feel like I’m a little bit more relaxed now and I also know that it’s not going last forever. And in terms of fear, fear of losing, that’s a huge reason why I’m not going to play the World Championship because it really did not give me give me a lot of joy. It really was all about avoiding losing.