Mate in 3: pawn to g6 (h5·4)
c9-13762naming 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 3: a forced sequence that ends in checkmate.
Difficulty 1760 ShuffleRating — for advanced tacticians.
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.
In a mate in three every move must be forcing; the defender should never get a free tempo. Find the check or threat that herds the king, calculate the single defence to each, and confirm the net closes on the third move.
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 f1, queen h6, rook d1 h1, bishop b1 a5, knight c1, pawn b2 e2 f2 a4 d4 g4 c5 h5.
Black: king g8, queen b8, rook e8 f8, bishop d7, knight e7, pawn d5 b6 c6 e6 g6 a7 f7.
15 white and 13 black pieces are on the board; the puzzle position arises after move 18.
The position in numbers
White are ahead by 4 points of material (36 against 32; pawn = 1, knight and bishop = 3, rook = 5, queen = 9) — the tactic has to convert or outweigh that.
The white king stands on f1, the black king on g8.
It is White to move on move 18, with 43 legal replies to weigh — only the line that keeps the advantage solves the puzzle.
White keeps 8 pawns, Black 7. No file is fully open, so the heavy pieces have to be pried in.
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
18. hxg6 Qh2 19. Rxh2 Nf5 20. Qh7#
Why it works
- Great move! pawn to g6 keeps the pressure (#2).
- Spot on — rook to h2 (#1).
- Precise: queen to h7 is the top choice (#).
- The line ends in a forced mate in 3.
- If instead Qh2, then Rxh2 and you win the queen.
Move by move
- 18. hxg6 — pawn to g6 (capture)
- Qh2 — queen to h2
- 19. Rxh2 — rook to h2 (capture)
- Nf5 — knight to f5
- 20. Qh7# — queen to h7 and it is checkmate
Types in this puzzle
Supported queen mate
The queen delivers mate face to face, protected by a friend.
The supported queen mate is the most common pattern of all: the queen lands next to the king and mates because a friendly piece or pawn protects her. The king is helpless — capturing is impossible, and the queen covers every neighboring square herself. Hunt for a protected square beside the enemy king: a knight, bishop or pawn eyeing it turns her invasion into mate. Verify one thing — that the square really is defended, or the king eats her.
Mate in 3
A forced checkmate in three moves.
Mate in three is a forced staircase: each of your moves narrows the opponent's choices, and the third one ends the game. Look for the start among checks and sacrifices — quiet first moves are rare in mating problems, but deliciously sneaky. Keep the tree in your head: every defense gets its own branch. Do not stop calculating after move two — see the final mating picture with your own eyes.
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 #200.
SP-200 · BastionGuard — A c- or f-file king and two knights on inner files (b–g).
The king starts on f1, the rooks on d1 and h1, the queen on a1.
The queenside rook already stands on d1, so castling long moves only the king, from f1 to c1.
The bishops stand on b1 and e1; their long diagonals reach h7 and a5 once the c- and d-pawns step aside.
The pawn on g2 is defended by the king alone — the same soft spot f2 is in the classical setup.
The setup belongs to the BastionGuard family; read right to left it becomes position 669.
The engine's main line opens with c4.
Morozov Balance Index: 13 of 100 — class D — largest edge. Engine evaluation of the starting position: +41 centipawns for White (depth 45, 400 000 000 nodes).
Explore position #200Provenance
Mined from the project's engine self-play games.
Pack 013 · SP-200
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