Bruce Wright wrote on Tue, May 26, 2020 05:07 PM UTC:
To Kevin Pacey: Your comment that if you used a lone Champion+King it was possible to force mate against a lone King on a "normal" type of Chess board (that is, if the four corner "bolthole" squares were eliminated) sounded wrong to me, so I added that piece to one of the Chess engines I've written and had it compute the endgame database for that piece combination, and sure enough there are only a handful of positions for which a single Champion can force mate, whether on any size of rectangular Chess board or on an Omega Chess board. On the other hand, two Champions can easily force mate either on a rectangular Chess board of any size or on an Omega Chess board. I think you misunderstood Muller's comment - the one I saw says that a WD (or WAD) piece can mate, but doesn't say that this is forced in the typical case.
A word on my qualifications: I am a USCF Expert in standard FIDE Chess as well as the author or co-author of several computer Chess programs including the "Duchess" program that was the runner-up in the World Computer Chess Championships.
To Kevin Pacey: Your comment that if you used a lone Champion+King it was possible to force mate against a lone King on a "normal" type of Chess board (that is, if the four corner "bolthole" squares were eliminated) sounded wrong to me, so I added that piece to one of the Chess engines I've written and had it compute the endgame database for that piece combination, and sure enough there are only a handful of positions for which a single Champion can force mate, whether on any size of rectangular Chess board or on an Omega Chess board. On the other hand, two Champions can easily force mate either on a rectangular Chess board of any size or on an Omega Chess board. I think you misunderstood Muller's comment - the one I saw says that a WD (or WAD) piece can mate, but doesn't say that this is forced in the typical case.
A word on my qualifications: I am a USCF Expert in standard FIDE Chess as well as the author or co-author of several computer Chess programs including the "Duchess" program that was the runner-up in the World Computer Chess Championships.