Winning blow: knight to e6 (f4·10)
c9-14260naming 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.
Winning tactic: there is a move that gains a decisive advantage — find it.
Difficulty 1200 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.
This position hides a concrete tactic that wins material or mates. Start with the most forcing candidate moves — checks, captures and threats — and calculate each to a clear end before choosing; the winning line is usually the one the opponent cannot meet.
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, rook a1 h1, knight c2 f4, pawn a2 g2 f3 e4 h6.
Black: king f7, queen e6, rook a8, bishop f8, knight b6, pawn b3 b5 c6 g6 a7 h7.
10 white and 11 black pieces are on the board; the puzzle position arises after move 26.
The position in numbers
Black are ahead by 5 points of material (21 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 g1, the black king on f7.
It is White to move on move 26, with 32 legal replies to weigh — only the line that keeps the advantage solves the puzzle.
White keeps 5 pawns, Black 6. Files fully open (no pawns of either colour): d — natural highways for the rooks and queen. Half-open for White: b, c.
The White king has 5 empty squares to step to right now — the fewer they are, the closer a mating net.
Solution & explanation
Main line
26. Nxe6 bxc2 27. Nxf8 Rxf8 28. Rc1 Nc4 29. Rxc2
Why it works
- Best move. knight to e6 is exactly what the engine plays (+1.9).
- A brilliant blow: knight to f8, and you stand better (+2.1).
- Strong! rook to c1 is the sharp choice (+1.9).
- Great move! rook to c2 keeps the pressure (+2.7).
- You win a piece — the queen.
- If instead bxc2, then Nxf8 and you win the queen.
Move by move
- 26. Nxe6 — knight to e6 (capture)
- bxc2 — pawn to c2 (capture)
- 27. Nxf8 — knight to f8 (capture)
- Rxf8 — rook to f8 (capture)
- 28. Rc1 — rook to c1
- Nc4 — knight to c4
- 29. Rxc2 — rook to c2 (capture)
Types in this puzzle
Overload
One defender guards two things — it cannot do both jobs.
Overloading exploits a defender with two jobs at once — guarding a piece and covering a mating square, for instance. It cannot do both: your first strike forces it to handle one duty and abandon the other. Find the overworked piece by asking what happens to each of its charges if it gets distracted. Then hit one target and collect the other — an overloaded defender only pretends to defend.
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.
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 #438.
SP-438 · RampartGuard — King on the wing (b/g) with both knights on inner files.
The king starts on g1, the rooks on a1 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.
The bishops stand on c1 and f1; their long diagonals reach h6 and a6 once the d- and e-pawns step aside.
One second-rank pawn starts with no defender at all: c2.
The setup belongs to the RampartGuard family; read right to left it becomes position 710.
The engine's main line opens with d4, putting a pawn straight into the centre.
Morozov Balance Index: 26 of 100 — class C — noticeable edge. Engine evaluation of the starting position: +34 centipawns for White (depth 47, 400 000 000 nodes).
Explore position #438Provenance
Mined from the project's engine self-play games.
Pack 008 · SP-438
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