Attack on the uncastled king: queen to d8 (h4·4)
c9-13869naming 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.
A fork made possible by the Chess960 piece placement.
Uncastled king: the enemy king is stuck in the centre — punish it before it castles.
Difficulty 1630 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.
A set-up fork needs one preparing move before the fork lands — a check that drives the king onto the forking square, or a capture that lines the targets up. Find the preparation first, then the fork it makes possible.
An uncastled king in the centre is a standing target. Look for ways to open the central files and diagonals against it with checks and threats before it can shelter — every tempo the king spends in the middle is a chance for a combination.
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 g1, queen h4, rook b1, bishop b2 g4, pawn a2 g2 b3 e4.
Black: king g8, queen c2, rook b8, bishop h6 a8, knight c8, pawn b5 d6 a7 c7 f7 g7.
9 white and 12 black pieces are on the board; the puzzle position arises after move 17.
The position in numbers
Black are ahead by 5 points of material (24 against 29; pawn = 1, knight and bishop = 3, rook = 5, queen = 9) — the tactic has to convert or outweigh that.
The white king stands on g1, the black king on g8.
It is White to move on move 17, with 42 legal replies to weigh — only the line that keeps the advantage solves the puzzle.
White keeps 4 pawns, Black 6. Files fully open (no pawns of either colour): h — natural highways for the rooks and queen. Half-open for White: c, d, f.
The White king has 3 empty squares to step to right now — the fewer they are, the closer a mating net.
Solution & explanation
Main line
17. Qd8+ Kh7 18. Bf5+ g6 19. Qh8#
Why it works
- Great move! queen to d8 keeps the pressure (#2).
- Well found: bishop to f5 (#1).
- Precise: queen to h8 is the top choice (#).
- The line ends in a forced mate in 3.
- If instead Kh7, then Bf5+ and you stay on top.
Move by move
- 17. Qd8+ — queen to d8 with check
- Kh7 — king to h7
- 18. Bf5+ — bishop to f5 with check
- g6 — pawn to g6
- 19. Qh8# — queen to h8 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.
Only move
Everything else loses — find the only move that holds.
An only move is a position where everything loses except one single continuation. You cannot play "by hand" here: run through fundamentally different defenses — run away, block, trade, counterattack — and discard the ones that fail. The hallmark of these puzzles is that the obvious moves lose quickly while the solution often looks strange. First understand exactly what the threat is — then the one saving move reveals itself.
Setup fork
The random setup allows a fork that classical chess never sees.
A setup fork is a double attack that exists only because of the unusual starting squares — in classical chess these targets never stand side by side. Look for pairs of undefended pieces on your opponent's back rank and for squares from which a knight or pawn hits both at once. Such forks usually appear within the first moves, before the pieces disperse. In every new position, note right away which starting pieces are defended by no one.
About this position
These pieces come from starting position #417.
SP-417 · RampartGuard — King pushed to the b- or g-file, knights off the edges — 144 positions here.
The king starts on g1, the rooks on b1 and h1, the queen on e1.
The king already stands on its castled square, so castling short moves only the rook, from h1 to f1.
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 g2 is defended by the king alone — the same soft spot f2 is in the classical setup.
The setup belongs to the RampartGuard family; read right to left it becomes position 731.
The engine's main line opens with e4, putting a pawn straight into the centre.
Morozov Balance Index: 37 of 100 — class C — noticeable edge. Engine evaluation of the starting position: +30 centipawns for White (depth 43, 400 000 000 nodes).
Explore position #417Provenance
Mined from the project's engine self-play games.
Pack 012 · SP-417
Similar puzzles
In your browser or in the Android app. Nothing to install · Free, no ads