GIPF
AT MSO4
Saturday, August 26: GIPF WORLD CHAMPIONSHIP
Sunday, August 27: GIPF + TAMSK-POTENTIALS CHAMPIONSHIP
GIPF
rules: click
All
there is to know about the GIPF World Championship: click
All there is to know about the GIPF + TAMSK-potentials championship: click
To
register: click on the MSO banner above and look for the registration form.
Or contact us: click
GIPF PROBLEM SOLVING
CHAMPIONSHIP
The
first GIPF Problem Solving Championship is history! It took place on August 28,
1999, during de 3rd Mindsports Olympiad in London. If you have read
the news on this site (September 6) you already know that it turned out to be an
extremely difficult contest. The participants - amongst which a number of the
most experienced Gipfers - suffered for 2 long hours and quite a few of them
didn’t feel well immediately the
having handed over their answers - and even worse after having heard their
score… Meanwhile everybody seems
to be recovered from the mental dammage and, it may be said, it is now
acknowledged that their are real beauties amongst the problems.
At
the bottom of this page you’ll find the index of the 12 problems which the
participants had to face. But first some of the important paragraphs out of the
list with the championship regulations:
Each of the (12) problems has
the same starting point: White may
win the game in at most 6 moves. There will be no further specification
of any of the problems.
White is to play. The task,
for each problems, is to find what White should play with his next move in
order to force the win. Only one
move must be noted down (i.e. the first move of the sequence against which
Black has no defense).
The move that should be found,
must concern White’s shortest possible win. A move which introduces a win with a certain
number of moves is incorrect if there is another way to win with less moves.
If there are 2 or more
solutions with the same number of moves, then any solution is sufficient.
A win is either capturing Black’s last GIPF-piece, or making Black run out of pieces. For further details, we refer to the GIPF rulebook and to the appendix with FAQ’s: click
The participants have a
maximum of 2 hours to solve the 12 problems.
Each participant will get a
game of GIPF at his/her disposal.
You will find all the
specifications about how a move should be noted down on the next pages: click
The winner:
Each correct answer scores 1 point. The player with the highest score, wins the championship.
If two or more players have the same score, then the player with the fewest incorrect answers gets the advantage.
If 2 or more players have the same score and the same number of incorrect answers, then time will make the difference. The participant who used the least time looking for the solutions, gets the advantage.
If there would still be a tie after these 3 criteria are applied, then the respective participants end exactly equal, except for the top 3 places. A tie in the top 3 will be decided with a play off: the participants will get to solve a 13th problem; the first to find the solution, wins the play off.
So, which move should White make to force a win in maximally 6 (white) moves?
| Problem 1 | Problem 2 | Problem 3 | Problem 4 |
| Problem 5 | Problem 6 | Problem 7 | Problem 8 |
| Problem 9 | Problem 10 | Problem 11 | Problem 12 |
Note 1
Each problem is provided with 3 TIPS. The
participants of the championship in London had to look for the solutions without
these tips.
Note 2
Don’t feel frustrated if you don’t find as many
of the solutions as you would like. As said before: even the most experienced
Gipfers had real difficulties. Look at them as examples that reveal part of how
GIPF can be played on a higher level.
Note 3
All the problems are checked and double checked in
advance by several players, but, since GIPF is a rather new game, it must be
said that the level of play - in general - has not reached the point where it is
possible to give an absolute guarantee that no “bugs” will be found in the
given problems. Any way, when the championship was over, all the problems (and
their respective solutions) have been discussed thoroughly, and until now no
backdoor has been detected. (Sigh of relief! Praise the Lord!)
GIPF - Problems © 1999, Kris Burm. All rights reserved.
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