horses-by-the-pond chess puzzle

Congratulations!

HORSES BY THE POND

by Serhiy Grabarchuk
MVS:  0/9
Goal >

Swap the white and the black figures.

wap the black and white knights in the fewest moves

Goal

Swap the white and the black figures.

Moves:  / 9

Swap the white and the black figures.

Sumbit solution

HORSES BY THE POND

by Serhiy Grabarchuk
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You Win!

Horses by the Pond* - the inner cutout playing a role of a pond and a single-tiled pathway running around it in a closed loop - both combined together make an intriguing plot for a chess optimization problem. On another hand, the board can be considered a modification of the one from the Four Knights Guarini's Problem, just stretched twice horizontally. Since this is a single-tiled board, we once again deal with the clockwise or counterclockwise movements of all the knights in some kind of alternating mode between the black and the white figures.

Playing the game of the optimization here, a more advanced challenge to pursue would be to spot as many potential multi-leap knight moves as possible to minimize the overall number of moves.

Help the knights of the two squads find their respective ways toward opposite ends of the pond while peacefully passing by each other on the narrow pathway.


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*This chess problem first appeared in 'The Big, Big, Big Book of Brainteasers' by the Grabarchuk Family in 2011, published by Puzzle Wright Press, part of Sterling Publishing