Mate in 2: rook to a1 (h1·2)
c9-10482naming tag (square·N)Opens in the app if installed, otherwise downloads the APK.
The tactical motive
Chess960 twist: use the unusual starting setup of the pieces.
Mate in 2: the first move creates an unstoppable threat, the second delivers mate.
Difficulty 1090 ShuffleRating — club-player level.
White to move — find the best continuation
How to recognize this tactic
In Chess960 the pieces start on unfamiliar squares, so tactics appear earlier and from unusual angles. Do not trust classical patterns — read the actual lines of the bishops, the rooks and the queen from where they really stand in this position.
Mate in two usually opens with a forcing move — a check, a capture or an unstoppable threat — that strips the king of squares or defenders, so the follow-up mate becomes unavoidable. Look for the first move that leaves the opponent only losing replies.
General method: before you move, list the forcing candidates — every check, every capture, every direct threat — and calculate those first. The solution to a tactic is almost always among them.
Position on the board
White: king g2, queen c6, rook h1 a2, knight f2, pawn h2 e3 f3 g3 b4.
Black: king b8, queen a1, rook d8 f8, knight e4, pawn f5 b6 g6 h7.
10 white and 9 black pieces are on the board; the puzzle position arises after move 27.
The position in numbers
White are ahead by 1 points of material (27 against 26; pawn = 1, knight and bishop = 3, rook = 5, queen = 9) — the tactic has to convert or outweigh that.
The white king stands on g2, the black king on b8.
It is White to move on move 27, with 50 legal replies to weigh — only the line that keeps the advantage solves the puzzle.
White keeps 5 pawns, Black 4. Files fully open (no pawns of either colour): a, c, d — natural highways for the rooks and queen.
The White king has 1 empty squares to step to right now — the fewer they are, the closer a mating net.
Solution & explanation
Main line
27. Rhxa1 Rd2 28. Ra8#
Why it works
- Best move. rook to a1 is exactly what the engine plays (#1).
- Spot on — rook to a8 (#).
- The line ends in a forced mate in 2.
- If instead Rd2, then Ra8# and it is mate.
Move by move
- 27. Rhxa1 — rook to a1 (capture)
- Rd2 — rook to d2
- 28. Ra8# — rook to a8 and it is checkmate
Types in this puzzle
Mate in 2
A forced checkmate in two moves.
Mate in two: your move, any reply, then the mating blow. Start with the most forcing first moves — checks and sacrifices that shrink the opponent's options to almost nothing. Against every single reply you must have a mate ready, so check them all without exception. The common failure is analyzing the pretty defense and forgetting the boring one.
Counter-strike
Don't defend — answer the threat with a bigger one.
The counter-strike: instead of defending against the threat, you answer with a bigger threat of your own. While your opponent grabs a pawn, you deliver mate — the arithmetic favors you. Look for a counter when direct defenses fail: do you have a check, an attack on the queen, a mating threat? The beginner's error is meeting every threat with a reflexive defense without checking the counterattacking resources first.
About this position
These pieces come from starting position #595.
SP-595 · ThroneGuard — A central king (d or e) and two knights tucked onto inner files: the family that holds the standard array, SP-518.
The king starts on e1, the rooks on b1 and f1, the queen on c1.
The kingside rook already stands on f1, so castling short moves only the king, from e1 to g1.
A bishop starts in the corner on a1: it has a single diagonal, which the b-pawn unlocks, running out to h8.
The second rank carries 2 pawns with no defender at all: a2, h2.
The setup belongs to the ThroneGuard family; read right to left it becomes position 259.
The engine's main line opens with b4.
Morozov Balance Index: 91 of 100 — class A — most balanced. Engine evaluation of the starting position: +13 centipawns for White (depth 46, 400 000 000 nodes).
Explore position #595Provenance
Mined from the project's engine self-play games.
Pack 007 · SP-595
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