This is one of the longest «technical» endings there is: rook and knight against two knights. The tablebases give the position as won for the stronger side, but converting it takes around 242 moves - far beyond the fifty-move rule.
Here White has the king on f7, the rook on g7 and the knight on g8 against the king on b1 and knights on c2 and c6. White to move; formally it is a win, but such a long one that in practice the game would be drawn under the fifty-move rule (the databases call it a «cursed win»).
Positions like this are pure tablebase theory: they cannot be won over the board. They show how bizarre endgames become at the edge of what is possible.
Drag a piece onto the board, or click a piece and then click the squares. The cross beside the pieces sweeps every piece of that colour off the board, and a single piece can be dragged off the edge.
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It is the mating side to move. Find mate in one.
Openings, endgame positions and breakthrough studies - the set-up appears on the board.
Databases in which every position with a small number of pieces has been calculated. They give the exact result and the number of moves to the win.
In practice no: the win takes hundreds of exact moves, and under the fifty-move rule the game would be declared drawn.
They show the limits of what is possible and help you understand which material ratios are winning in principle.
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