Mate in 2: rook to d7 (d1·3)
c9-13622naming 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 1220 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 e2, rook d1, bishop b1 h6, knight f3 f6, pawn a2 h2 b3 e3 g3 c4 f5.
Black: king f7, rook c8, bishop b8, knight b4, pawn c5 b6 a7.
13 white and 7 black pieces are on the board; the puzzle position arises after move 27.
The position in numbers
White are ahead by 10 points of material (24 against 14; pawn = 1, knight and bishop = 3, rook = 5, queen = 9) — the tactic has to convert or outweigh that.
The white king stands on e2, the black king on f7.
It is White to move on move 27, with 44 legal replies to weigh — only the line that keeps the advantage solves the puzzle.
White keeps 7 pawns, Black 3. Files fully open (no pawns of either colour): d — natural highways for the rooks and queen.
White hold the bishop pair, an edge in open lines. The White king has 4 empty squares to step to right now — the fewer they are, the closer a mating net.
Solution & explanation
Main line
27. Rd7+ Kxf6 28. Bg5#
Why it works
- Best move. rook to d7 is exactly what the engine plays (#1).
- Spot on — bishop to g5 (#).
- The line ends in a forced mate in 2.
- If instead Kxf6, then Bg5# and it is mate.
Move by move
- 27. Rd7+ — rook to d7 with check
- Kxf6 — king to f6 (capture)
- 28. Bg5# — bishop to g5 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.
Sacrifice attack
Give up material to unleash a decisive attack.
A sacrificial attack gives up material on purpose to rip the king's shelter open and launch a decisive assault. The sac is sound when you get concrete assets in return: open lines to the king, tempi, pieces ready to pour in. The signs: a poorly sheltered king, your forces aimed at its home, defenders stranded far away. The iron rule is to calculate, not hope — once the material is gone, there is no way back.
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 #720.
SP-720 · ThroneGuard — King on a central file (d/e) with both knights on inner files — the classic-type setup.
The king starts on d1, the rooks on c1 and h1, the queen on f1.
Castling long simply swaps the two pieces: the king on d1 and the rook on c1 trade places.
A bishop starts in the corner on a1: it has a single diagonal, which the b-pawn unlocks, running out to h8.
The pawn on d2 is defended by the king alone — the same soft spot f2 is in the classical setup.
The setup belongs to the ThroneGuard family; read right to left it becomes position 431.
The engine's main line opens with c4.
Morozov Balance Index: 55 of 100 — class B — balanced. Engine evaluation of the starting position: +25 centipawns for White (depth 48, 400 000 000 nodes).
Explore position #720Provenance
Mined from the project's engine self-play games.
Pack 008 · SP-720
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