Hi sandaquish, Where did you originally find this puzzle? It's interesting that Tom Braunlich would have missed Zk's solution given that guys like Rollie Tesh et al. were likely testing and proofing puzzles published in that era.
Retired from TB Pente, but still playing live games & exploring variants like D, poof and boat
I found it interesting too that Zoey's solution was there. In addition 1. R9 S10 2. R9 P9 3. K5 J4 4. N9 ? 5. P9 or O9 wins rather easy. I don't know if the rules on Scott Justices Site http://spjustice.tripod.com/puzzlebasics.html applied strict to all puzzles back in the day but according to rule 4 there can be only one solution.
Maybe this puzzle was meant to be solved by captures and that is why there are other solutions by pente.
The problem is from page 56 of Braunlich's Pente Strategy: Book II. He writes, "I composed this problem for the sole purpose of surprising you! See chapter 6 for more problems like this." Chapter 6 consists of problems from the Pente Newsletter.
Braunlich's solution is a win by captures: 1. M8 O8* 2. M8 M9* 3. N12 N11 4. R9 P9 5. N9* (a quintuple capture).
Maybe the diagram was misprinted, or, maybe, Braunlich just didn't let anyone proof-read the problem because he wanted it to be a surprise.
Okay, I thought it looked vaguely familiar, but couldn't recall where I might have seen it. I believe there were some glitches in the Pente Strategy books which were corrected during later printings.
Retired from TB Pente, but still playing live games & exploring variants like D, poof and boat
