Charles Gilman wrote on Thu, Sep 13, 2007 05:35 AM UTC:
Well I looked for the error in white's fourth move, and couldn't see it. Nothing threatens, and therefore nothing promotes, any piece on the ranks 1-2 or the c3 Knight. That leaves the B6 and g3 Bishops threatened once each, and the e4 Pawn threatened twice, so each of those three is promoted. If I have missed anything please say what it is.
I have considered the options that you suggest. Option 1 has the problem of keeping track of which Pawns have and have not promoted. Option 2 puzzles me slightly: the e4 Pawn promotes nothing until it is itself promoted. Option 3 would raise the question of which player decides which piece gets promoted.
One modification that occurs to me is that a piece does not promote a protected piece earlier in the sequence than itself, as capturing such a piece and being captured back would be a net loss of piece. So in the Fast Sequence a Knight would not promote a protected Pawn, and a Queen would promote only unprotected pieces. With that rule the sample game would run without promotions in the first five moves.
Well I looked for the error in white's fourth move, and couldn't see it. Nothing threatens, and therefore nothing promotes, any piece on the ranks 1-2 or the c3 Knight. That leaves the B6 and g3 Bishops threatened once each, and the e4 Pawn threatened twice, so each of those three is promoted. If I have missed anything please say what it is.
I have considered the options that you suggest. Option 1 has the problem of keeping track of which Pawns have and have not promoted. Option 2 puzzles me slightly: the e4 Pawn promotes nothing until it is itself promoted. Option 3 would raise the question of which player decides which piece gets promoted.
One modification that occurs to me is that a piece does not promote a protected piece earlier in the sequence than itself, as capturing such a piece and being captured back would be a net loss of piece. So in the Fast Sequence a Knight would not promote a protected Pawn, and a Queen would promote only unprotected pieces. With that rule the sample game would run without promotions in the first five moves.